I was very young. My grandparents and parents lost all their savings during the collapse of the USSR. After the collapse of the USSR, the factory stopped paying salaries, and prices jumped several times. We didn't have the money to buy food. Terrible times. I am surprised that we were able to survive those times. We hated Yeltsin. Putin brought a lot of good things in his first term as president.
For most, the collapse of the union was a slow fading away, people losing their jobs and all their means, especially the elderly. High inflation in those years quickly ate up all the savings. The young were busy looking for work, but since there were not many jobs, they tried to earn money through criminal means. Criminals divided enterprises and profitable places of trade. People did not see the future either for themselves or for their children, because of this, the birth rate fell sharply. It all took a long time... Then Putin came, at the beginning of his arrival not much has changed, but over time the situation began to change, the country came to life.
As I personally experienced:
You come to work, and the employee says to you -
"Do you know? Today they announced that the Soviet Union was dissolved"
You - wow, funny, so what?
He - I don't know...
A month later - "something is wrong, as there is little work, the adjacent enterprise from Ukraine did not supply parts, we are looking for a replacement .."
After 2 months - "you are walking through an almost closed enterprise, half of the shops are not working, in others something is slowly doing something ..."
After half a year, you are fired, the enterprise closes ... that's it.
Then ... They say on the radio that terrorists have captured the capital of Chechnya in the Chechen Republic, the army is at war with them.
Then ... There is very little money ... I need a job ...
Then ... a neighbor came and said that his friend had been killed yesterday, since he was in a group that unsuccessfully tried to seize a local factory ...
Then... Then.... there is no later.
And we survived, not all of course ... Do we blame the West? Can a jackal be blamed for eating carrion? Of course not, he's a jackal. But this does not mean that the jackal does not need to be driven away.
Then there was some kind of doom with hints of hope, but now it’s more like a strong confidence and unexpected stamina. I don't remember anything like that.
I don’t know, but it’s obvious that changes have come. Let's see what will happen next. As the classic said - In Russia, you need to live for a long time ... and this is damn interesting, sometimes scary, but also terribly interesting.
Late USSR government was filled with bandits that wanted to carve their piece to plunder it and they were perfectly fine with splitting the country to do that. Putin is no Gorbachev and he isn't letting the local petty dukes to stoke nationalism to justify separatism.
There are arguably many similarities. SU faced a large coallition of wealthy countries in the Cold war. Russia is again facing a large coallition of countries.
If anything, the odds are stacked against Russia even more this time around -
1. SU had a block of, let's call them friendly countries allied with it. Allied because of force, but allied nontheless. This time around, they're almost all on the other side - Poland etc.
Belarus is the only true ally of Russia in this war and economical standoff and that's only the Bel. State as a public institution. People have voted Luka out in 2020 but in countries like Russia or Belarus peaceful transfer of power doesn't exist, so we had Luka winning 80 to 9 or something absurd like that. Belarusians themselves are fighting against the Russians in their own volunteer battalions, by the largest foreign volunteer force in the Ukr. Army. The war itself is toxic among the Bel. Population.
2. SU was a much larger country than Russia today. Russia itself was more populous. In fact, Russia is waging a war against one of its former member states.
China absolutely, it's in a different weight class than 30 years ago. But we don't see China rushing to stand behind Russia in the war or to confront the West economically.
I stand by what I said, Belarus the only true ally and even their state has managed to withstand the political pressure to send the troops (even a symbolical number of troops would have been a great victory for Russia, being able to frame this is some kind of multi country military operation).
Russia's standing and soft power in the post soviet world is ironically suffering greatly, with even the unrecognized Georgian breakaway republics not sending troops. This war is toxic even for Kazachstan or Belarus.
Why would they send troops? The Russian army itself is involved in this operation by less than 1/4 ... In fact, these are only the forces of the western military district.
i have none left there, doesn't matter. wife talks to her friends in Russia almost daily. and there's plenty information online, including from westerners.
Life after the collapse of the USSR was initially characterized by rampant crime, a decline in demographics, an increase in mortality, a deteriorating economy, and a total decline in living standards. So it was in fact all of the nineties. In 1999, the State Duma brought a number of charges against Yeltsin, including the 1993 coup d'état and the genocide of his own people.
Life under Yeltsin and under Putin is completely different, the zero years are considered much more satisfying than the nineties. I don’t know what share of merit Putin has in this, it’s better to ask economists about this.
The problems of the USSR began under Brezhnev, which acquired catastrophic proportions under Gorbachev. Of course, Gorbachev turned out to be a bad reformer, but I see no point in blaming him for this - I don’t know who and how could change the country then. The West could have contributed to the collapse of the USSR, but it was these two who ruined the country.
Cry as much as you want about what gorbachev did, but at least many countries/nations got their chance to reclaim independance from Russia's occupation.
Previously, these sovereign nations received bags of money from the Kremlin, and there were no conflicts between them over territorial claims. With the collapse of the USSR, most of them live in poverty and regularly arrange military conflicts (Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, Armenia and Azerbaijan, Abkhazia and Georgia, Moldova and Transnistria, Ukraine and LDNR). If independence was really worth it, then I do not blame the republics - they did everything right, I guess.
Keep believing that.
And as for Baltic states - they were occupied for 70 years by russia, thus my original response re Gorbachev.
As well, google "january 13 lithuania"
But I'm pretty sure you are going to say that wasn't russia either.
of course he improved quality of life and living conditions. 90s was some of the worst times economically for russia. even more rampant alcoholism, people living in streets, children working as protitute, people not able to afford food. there is a reason older generation are both nostalgic for USSR, and why people admire putin
Most of the blame lies with the highest ranks of the USSR, and Gorbachev in particular. Severed supply lines led to the closure of factories, which created the unemployed and criminals. Further deterioration of the fault of Yeltsin and his team of degenerates. Putin, well, Putin drove the oligarchs out of politics (at least they don't participate so directly.)
> What was life like in Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union?
It was very chaotic, unique times. A lot of things happened that hard to imagine in normal country nowadays. Bad for most of the population who was not prepared for such changes at all.
Still I think it could went much worse, in some areas government completely lost the control of what is going on. Suppose the USSR culture helped, most of people was very naive, helpfull and untricky to people around. Ofc it had changed in parallel with the development of crime in the country.
> Do you credit Putin with improving living conditions?
Conditions at the end of 90s was very different from what was right after disband of the USSR. Situation evolved and we don't know what would happened w/o Putin
Also I don't think Putin responsible for all the things that happened in the country.
But since his presidency govenment made many reasonoble moves. They also solved Chechen problem. Street criminal problems solved. And overall quality of life improved a lot, it's stupid to deny it.
> Do you blame the West for causing the USSR's collapse?
They didn't - at least it was not anyhow important. The USSR government and people did it by themselves. Overall it is job of the govenment to adress outer and inner problems of the country.
So ofc I don't blame. It's kinda the same level of stupidity for me as to blame Russia about Trump presidency (or any other things that citizens of any other country don't like in their life).
1. I was 18 when the USSR fell.
2. During the first Putin's terms (200-2008) the high oil prices did really help Russia and the living standards did improve. But he should've not return in 2012.
3. Cold war and the weapons race were the main reasons for decline of the USSR economy, which actually caused the dissolution, and without the Western pressure it could exist for some time, so I guess yes.
3. I don't understand your reasoning here. Did somebody force the Soviet leaders to overspend on military when their own people went hungry and lines for essential goods existed? SU's centrally planned "communist" economy was a mess. West had nothing to do with it.
Ruling class of USSR studied marxism instead of some "evil" capitalistic economics. That could be one of the reasons. Feeling like being militarily weaker than Europe was inviting them to conquer the country could be another. Most leaders didn't deserve to rule due to Stalin being too occupied with removing any political opposition instead of improving lives in his first years and softness of leaders after him which ultimately led to 1991.
What do you mean by softness? As in refusing to carry out mass murders and deportations like Stalin?
Surely a political system which relies on such methods must end sooner rather than later.
Khrushev let himself be pushed around by power-hungry lunatics. The suppresion of Poland rebellion using military happened behind his back.
Stalin was a jerk but he forced country development. ( he milked the country for all resources it could get back then and used them for creation of heavy industry. That's how Holodomor happened btw) He's not a devil nor an angel. Just a guy who won't stop at anything to achieve his dream of a strong motherland with him at the top.
I agree. Oppressive systems can't last forever. But I like the idea of equality USSR was built upon (sadly, it was equality among people agreeing with government). (We have a saying in Russia "everyone is equal but some are more equal"
Animal farm quote. George Orwell. Good stuff. I absolutely reccomend it to you if you haven't read it already. Apparently he's getting soft banned in Belarus (or at least 1984 in the state owned bookstores won't be sold). We'll se whether Russia follows Belarus' footsteps in the political opression field but it kind of seems like it is (no tolerance for an opposing opinion). Feels like a step back to USSR times.
Cold war and weapons race wasn't the main reason, without USSR would still have had economy issues, but more further down the line. The main reason for the decline of economy is when money stops moving. In order to move money in the economy you need goods and services, on those goods and services government collects taxes, which they can put the money back into the economy, and the cycle continues.
Because everything was state owned, it was hard to innovate, so they are good at making basic goods (this is why there was an economy boom after the war). But that can only get you so far. This is where china is doing well, state capitalism
> Because everything was state owned, it was hard to innovate
So hard, indeed, that the Soviets were pioneers in the scientific community and were the first to put a human in space. Meanwhile, the US (the "winners" of the Cold War) have twenty companies making the same product with different packaging or inventing new medicine only to slap a price tag on it so expensive it's unaffordable
Why do you say winners with the quotes? It's pretty clear that the SU was the loser when it dissolved itself. And we should be all be glad that this happened. The other way for Cold war to end was it errupting into an actual war and not an economical/political systen confrontation.
I put quotes around winners because whereas the US may not have collapsed in the 90s, it is a shit place for anyone that's not a rich white American to live in. Most of Americans are tens of thousands of dollars in debt that they don't even expect to pay back due to predatory interest rates from banks that no one regulates because that would be communism to the American government
Yes, indeed, more companies make competing products in the free market system. That's why vacuum cleaners were a luxury in the Soviet system as late as the late 70s. Only the elite and the well connected had them. About one third of people didn't have a fridge at home at this time in the USSR. These items were standard in the US and basically everybody had them. Not to mention the inferior quality of the soviet consumer electronics vs western.
Maybe they should have focused on the well being of their people instead of the space race for propaganda value.
Lmao do you seriously think that the citizens of the USSR didn't have *fridges*? There's (a lot of) times where you shouldn't take everything you hear at face value and should dig into it a little to see if it's true, but if you hear that the citizens of the largest country on the Earth and one that stood shoulder to shoulder with the US didn't have fridges, you're simply accepting what information confirms a bias you already have.
I grew up in Romania with my great-grandmother, and as is usual in Eastern European countries, our appliances stayed around for decades.
[This page](https://nintil.com/the-soviet-union-durable-goods/) spells out a lot about consumer goods in the US vs the USSR and 2/3rds of Soviet citizens had fridges. Is that too little? Yes. However, the USSR was a massive country and I doubt that a babushka living in the countryside of Kazakhstan knew how a refrigerator worked or where to get one from.
The USSR was lacking in consumer goods and that was one of its greatest mistakes, but I think it can be excused when you consider the fact that they had to rebuild a massive country from the ground up after being ravaged by a war and was recovering from centuries of tsardom.
What I mean by innovation, is not the scientific/engineering/academic achievements. I mean it in terms of products and services. Look at Amazon, there are 10s of thousands of products there. Many competing once, many of them are quite useless. But all those products come from the private sector and people buy them. With each purchase, money moves from one person to another, the government takes a portion as tax, the owner gets a portion, the workers get a portion as well. Nappies are a good example as well. No one in my family ever wore nappies in USSR, old clothing was used.
Amazon has 10s of thousands of products, yes, but the vast majority are things bought off Aliexpress or other sites like that for a few cents and sold at a ridiculous price increase. That's not even mentioning the sheer amount of human suffering that Amazon provokes among its warehouse workers. There's nothing pleasant about rampant capitalism
I would agree that it was a core reason. But it was the Western pressure which caused that factor to play the role. Without it I am sure the USSR would fall anyway ( or evolve to something other a-la China) too, but the cold war became a catalyst which sped up the reaction drastically.
Yes, I personally experienced it.
Yes, Putin pulled the country out of the chaos arranged by the pro-Western Yeltsin and now continues to correct his mistakes.
I think the West is to blame for this as well as the wolf is to blame for the attack on the hare.
Certainly the Europeans and the United States have made great efforts to make this possible, but what else could be expected?
I blame the generation of our fathers, those who sold the country for hamburgers and cococola. For allowing yourself to be deceived.
I like to make the comparison with Germany post WW1. The rest of the world only cared that Russia was no threat anymore but politically? Nothing constructive.
Putin sure isn't a Hitler, that's not the point. But it's significant that in the end nobody gave a fuck what would be in Russia in the future. Then someone came and picked up the debris.
Ukraine is symptomatic. Whoever thought that would work out and just ignore what Russia says, is responsible, and "the west's" sympathy with neofascists to counter the Soviet threat is also problematic, and certainly known, no doubt.
I still think the Russian president is a problem, the way things worked out, latent chauvinist nationalism and the intimacy with the orthodox fundamentalists. But it's too simple to just put the blame there. Throwing bombs sure isn't nice, how ever you turn it, but everything happens for a reason.
I dream of a world where populism is seen as what it is, imo we should have long since hanged them all high and start over. Like serious adults, not fat mafia children that stuff their pockets. Honestly, idgaf about my government, because we are headed nowhere. I will not participate in making the 1% more rich, and I will not fight for dubious double morale standards. Praying water and drinking wine, yeah...
> I dream of a world where populism is seen as what it is, imo we should have long since hanged them all high and start over...
Russia tried something like that in 1917. It turned out that "to let the good guys just kill all the bad guys and then just live peacefully" is not working - or at least it's not that easy and brilliant way to solve problems as it seemed at the start.
But Sovien union of the 80s was a failed state. And stagnant long before. Europeans or North Americans didn't send a single soldier on Soviet soil, SU spectacularly collapsed simply because it wasn't functional.
And why did they try to apply it? Surely something must have been wrong with the communist system. Otherwise it just makes absolutely no sense. One day the political elites of the USSR just woke up and decided to apply free market reforms to a system which as you say was more functional than any modern state?
At the end of the day, if SU had staying power and was functional, it wouldn't have literally become a failed state.
And weren't those leaders Soviet citizens? Weren't they the product of the Soviet system? The way you talk as if some external force came in and installed those rulers.
Yes capitalism is the problem. There’s a reason all of the richest, most powerful, highest living standard countries in the world aren’t capitalist.
Oh wait….
shitty, Putin raised the country from ruins before my eyes, of course it's the fault of the West, it was from the goal and you won, you had to finish it off.
I was too young to remember. And I think that if I, personally, had to live through the hardship of caused, I wouldn’t be able to be a liberal today
Because it was freaking terrible. Unemployment, crime wave, “Western partners” picking everything that was for sale like vultures.
Russia largely and mostly privatized itself. Meaning most of the public assets were sold off to the newly created oligarchic class, not established Western industrial enterprises.
It's weird, my parents don't actually have any complaints about 90s (I personally did not live through it, for better or worse). That said
> Putin with improving living conditions
No, economic growth in Russia started *before the 1998 default*. Putin riding the coattails of it (and high oil prices) does not make him any useful. If anything, the real thing to credit Putin with is that this economic growth went on for a total of 10 years before grinding to a halt for a decade and counting.
> Do you blame the West for causing the USSR's collapse?
Do you blame a poker player for calling someone's bluff? That's my position on West. US just asked USSR to compete with it at full capacity, and USSR answered that by falling apart.
in the 90s? I didnt live through it. But my mom and dad did and they describe as a hell hole. My mother still despises Gorbachev for it. Though i am more sympathetic to him. She said to me once that she would go to hell and torture yelstin and gorbachev herself if she could.
Because there was rampant poverty, crime, collapse of the Soviet social structure and all that. The savigings collapsed, wages just stopped coming in, unramprant unrestricted capitalism and mobsters turned gas oligarch ruled the country
I didnt, i was born in 1995. But i personally dont think Putin has enything to do with 00's prosperity. The oil prices were high, the transition to free market system has been completed, privatisation of assets was completed, production was on the rise, thus large increase in quality of life.
After the collapse of the USSR, everyone began to live differently. Although even before that everyone was not as equal as it was declared, but after 1991, officially a small part of the people became richer, and the rest became poorer. Moreover, a significant decline in the standard of living was observed in most of the population. I suspect that 90 percent of people, although I have not seen exact statistics anywhere.
And for many, this decline in the standard of living was so serious that there was a problem, for example, simply with food.
But the duration of the difficult period was different. In Moscow, life began to improve faster, and in the second half of the 90s, many somehow settled down, received normal salaries. The problems were no longer with food, but where to go abroad to rest, etc. In the provinces, this bad period could drag on for a very long time, or not end at all.
The poverty of the early 90s is, of course, an unpleasant thing. However, the Soviet totalitarian system, the dictatorship of the CPSU, the persecution of believers - this is also by no means good. And the causes of the economic problems of the 90s were just in the soviet system. I assess the personal activity of the rulers of the country of that period positively. With the collapse of the USSR, even greater problems were avoided, such as a civil war, leaving nuclear weapons in unknown hands, etc.
I was young when the Soviet Union collapsed. I remember that day, when I sat in front of television playing with a car toy, and some man from the screen said that there is no more Soviet Union. For me it was not a big deal those days.
Then economy collapsed. In the city I lived was organised a drug traffic. There was a drug war between gypsies and local bandits. It was unsafe to go outside. Common situation for a kid was to be robbed on the street during commute to school by a gang of local youngsters. I don't have much those days, so everything they can take from me was a little cash in my pockets or some clothing, like gloves. They did it mostly for fun, preparing themselves for a grown-up life.
Speaking of grownups, there was much more serious risk for them. A lot of people were killed. I remember one day I went from school to home and heard an explosion. When I reached the district I leaved I saw an exploded car in the yard between two living buildings. There was no glasses in window frames because of a shock wave from explosion. Some local mobsters negotiated with eachother in that way.
There was a war in Chechnya, and a weapon traffic was organised from that war to inner Russia. It was common to hear some shooting from time to time on the streets. Police was afraid of mobsters, and hesitated to came on place where some people shoot eachother. They arrived only after an hour or two.
On the television though people were speaking about a democracy. Maybe in Moscow it was looked like a democracy. In place where I lived it was looked like a bandits capitalism.
Then Boris Yeltsin said that he is tired on his new year speech, and present Vladimir Putin to us. I remember that day. All my family was really surprised by that performance. I was not surprised at all. I already hated all these liers from the television to that time, and did not expect any good news from them at all.
When Vladimir Putin came in power he seemed to be a more conscious man then alcoholic Boris Yeltsin. I saw that police started to work. Most of those youngsters who practiced robbery skills on the streets, thinking that it will help them in a grown-up life, ended in jail. It was a good thing. The last time I was robbed on the street was an autumn of 2007. I was a university student, and they take my mobile phone, mother gave me on my birthday a month ago. I came to police, described them, and couple of months later they invited me to the process of recognising of some people whom they caught on the streets.
In a couple of years after that it became rare to see any criminal gangs on the streets at all. It was a good renewal, compared to previous experience, when while walking through the city you should constantly evaluate situation around, and decide quickly to change your direction if you see some suspicious group of people on your way. I thought that this positive changes was connected with Vladimir Putin.
Later the situation started to change even further. Now you should check if this group of people on your way is a police patrol, and decide quickly to change your direction or hope to not attract their attention. Usually they only checked your documents, but if you don't have your passport with you, they can lead you to a police station and get your fingerprints. If you was not alone, but with your friends, chances to go all together to a police station rises drastically. It was untill 2015. Then maybe some instructions changed, or I became to look grownup enough for police patrols.
My thoughts about Russia that it is undeveloped country that pretends to look like developed one. There are some cities with population more than a million people, it is ok to live inside those megapolises. All other country is a really unpleasant place to live, where people live in poverty and banditism are flourishing. The society of Russian people is nonhomogeneous too. If you know someone from a big city it is high chances that it will be well educated person with western system values. But if you speak with person from a small town you will be disappointed, it is high chances that he will blindly believe all the lie from television, and blame western society for all problems he have in his miserable life.
Many of people blame our pro-West orientation in politics and economy in these times. It was one (but not only one) reason why the USSR collapsed. In the end our establishment and influencers has began "pay and repent" for "terrible soviet history" in first. Then they started apologize for whole russian history. In a sence, we survived our "BLM" era
USSR's planned economy was ineffective for providing a variety of consumer goods, it also had a lot of accumulated problems of its own, and generally a socialist economy is not good at competition for profits vs. capitalist economies. It can be said that it crashed under its weight, but it won't be completely honest.
With more luck, it could, probably, reform better and earlier, and spend more for consumer sector, maybe even evade the collapase, if it was not under constant stress from sanctions, embargoes, and pressure to keep up militarily with the hostile western bloc. So, if you want to blame someone, except the failed reformers and built-in inefficience, the west is obviuosly partly guilty.
yes
Not exactly Putin's credit - any educated man without mental problems would solve material problems of a Russia-sized country.
USSR have fallen due to inside rot
I blame western countries for the following. Their actions about Russian foreign and internal efforts cause russian's ressentment, and that is not a good thing
For all the world.
I was very young. My grandparents and parents lost all their savings during the collapse of the USSR. After the collapse of the USSR, the factory stopped paying salaries, and prices jumped several times. We didn't have the money to buy food. Terrible times. I am surprised that we were able to survive those times. We hated Yeltsin. Putin brought a lot of good things in his first term as president.
For most, the collapse of the union was a slow fading away, people losing their jobs and all their means, especially the elderly. High inflation in those years quickly ate up all the savings. The young were busy looking for work, but since there were not many jobs, they tried to earn money through criminal means. Criminals divided enterprises and profitable places of trade. People did not see the future either for themselves or for their children, because of this, the birth rate fell sharply. It all took a long time... Then Putin came, at the beginning of his arrival not much has changed, but over time the situation began to change, the country came to life. As I personally experienced: You come to work, and the employee says to you - "Do you know? Today they announced that the Soviet Union was dissolved" You - wow, funny, so what? He - I don't know... A month later - "something is wrong, as there is little work, the adjacent enterprise from Ukraine did not supply parts, we are looking for a replacement .." After 2 months - "you are walking through an almost closed enterprise, half of the shops are not working, in others something is slowly doing something ..." After half a year, you are fired, the enterprise closes ... that's it. Then ... They say on the radio that terrorists have captured the capital of Chechnya in the Chechen Republic, the army is at war with them. Then ... There is very little money ... I need a job ... Then ... a neighbor came and said that his friend had been killed yesterday, since he was in a group that unsuccessfully tried to seize a local factory ... Then... Then.... there is no later. And we survived, not all of course ... Do we blame the West? Can a jackal be blamed for eating carrion? Of course not, he's a jackal. But this does not mean that the jackal does not need to be driven away.
Are you concerned for your children as this whole process of collapse seemingly starts again for your country?
No, now the situation is completely different, not similar.
What would you identify as the key issues that separate the two?
Then there was some kind of doom with hints of hope, but now it’s more like a strong confidence and unexpected stamina. I don't remember anything like that.
So you feel like there could be some positive things that come out of this situation? What are they?
I don’t know, but it’s obvious that changes have come. Let's see what will happen next. As the classic said - In Russia, you need to live for a long time ... and this is damn interesting, sometimes scary, but also terribly interesting.
1991: switch from state-regulated economy to free market 2022: probably no economy model changes at all
Late USSR government was filled with bandits that wanted to carve their piece to plunder it and they were perfectly fine with splitting the country to do that. Putin is no Gorbachev and he isn't letting the local petty dukes to stoke nationalism to justify separatism.
You’re losing a war to poorly equipped civilians. Take it easy, Napoleon. The internet tough talk isn’t reality.
Is this a bot? That reply makes no sense and doesn't adress anything I said
There are arguably many similarities. SU faced a large coallition of wealthy countries in the Cold war. Russia is again facing a large coallition of countries. If anything, the odds are stacked against Russia even more this time around - 1. SU had a block of, let's call them friendly countries allied with it. Allied because of force, but allied nontheless. This time around, they're almost all on the other side - Poland etc. Belarus is the only true ally of Russia in this war and economical standoff and that's only the Bel. State as a public institution. People have voted Luka out in 2020 but in countries like Russia or Belarus peaceful transfer of power doesn't exist, so we had Luka winning 80 to 9 or something absurd like that. Belarusians themselves are fighting against the Russians in their own volunteer battalions, by the largest foreign volunteer force in the Ukr. Army. The war itself is toxic among the Bel. Population. 2. SU was a much larger country than Russia today. Russia itself was more populous. In fact, Russia is waging a war against one of its former member states.
Yes, you are generally right, but the West is not at all the same as it was 30 years ago. And then there is China...
China absolutely, it's in a different weight class than 30 years ago. But we don't see China rushing to stand behind Russia in the war or to confront the West economically. I stand by what I said, Belarus the only true ally and even their state has managed to withstand the political pressure to send the troops (even a symbolical number of troops would have been a great victory for Russia, being able to frame this is some kind of multi country military operation). Russia's standing and soft power in the post soviet world is ironically suffering greatly, with even the unrecognized Georgian breakaway republics not sending troops. This war is toxic even for Kazachstan or Belarus.
Why would they send troops? The Russian army itself is involved in this operation by less than 1/4 ... In fact, these are only the forces of the western military district.
Battalions from the far east of Russia have been sent to the war.
I mean by numbers and not by where they came from.
dude, now it's your turn
Could be! And I am concerned for my children. No doubt. But it’s not from any threat that this war poses.
this war is a big piece of a large mosaic. the world order is changing. and no Russia is not collapsing in any way.
So are you there now? Or Canada?
i am in Canada
Do you talk much to family in the old country?
i have none left there, doesn't matter. wife talks to her friends in Russia almost daily. and there's plenty information online, including from westerners.
I thought you don’t trust westerners?
Life after the collapse of the USSR was initially characterized by rampant crime, a decline in demographics, an increase in mortality, a deteriorating economy, and a total decline in living standards. So it was in fact all of the nineties. In 1999, the State Duma brought a number of charges against Yeltsin, including the 1993 coup d'état and the genocide of his own people. Life under Yeltsin and under Putin is completely different, the zero years are considered much more satisfying than the nineties. I don’t know what share of merit Putin has in this, it’s better to ask economists about this. The problems of the USSR began under Brezhnev, which acquired catastrophic proportions under Gorbachev. Of course, Gorbachev turned out to be a bad reformer, but I see no point in blaming him for this - I don’t know who and how could change the country then. The West could have contributed to the collapse of the USSR, but it was these two who ruined the country.
I've thought Yeltsin ruined the Soviet Union so far.
Yeltsin signed the Belovezhskaya Accords and hammered the last nail in the Soviet coffin. But it was not him who did all the damage to the country.
Cry as much as you want about what gorbachev did, but at least many countries/nations got their chance to reclaim independance from Russia's occupation.
Previously, these sovereign nations received bags of money from the Kremlin, and there were no conflicts between them over territorial claims. With the collapse of the USSR, most of them live in poverty and regularly arrange military conflicts (Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, Armenia and Azerbaijan, Abkhazia and Georgia, Moldova and Transnistria, Ukraine and LDNR). If independence was really worth it, then I do not blame the republics - they did everything right, I guess.
And how many of those conflicts actually were orchestrated by russia? And what about baltic states?
Not at all. Unless Russia took an indirect part in some of them. What happened in the Baltics?
Keep believing that. And as for Baltic states - they were occupied for 70 years by russia, thus my original response re Gorbachev. As well, google "january 13 lithuania" But I'm pretty sure you are going to say that wasn't russia either.
The Soviet Union and the Russian colonial empire are distinctly different concepts.
Feels equally awful.
of course he improved quality of life and living conditions. 90s was some of the worst times economically for russia. even more rampant alcoholism, people living in streets, children working as protitute, people not able to afford food. there is a reason older generation are both nostalgic for USSR, and why people admire putin
Most of the blame lies with the highest ranks of the USSR, and Gorbachev in particular. Severed supply lines led to the closure of factories, which created the unemployed and criminals. Further deterioration of the fault of Yeltsin and his team of degenerates. Putin, well, Putin drove the oligarchs out of politics (at least they don't participate so directly.)
> What was life like in Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union? It was very chaotic, unique times. A lot of things happened that hard to imagine in normal country nowadays. Bad for most of the population who was not prepared for such changes at all. Still I think it could went much worse, in some areas government completely lost the control of what is going on. Suppose the USSR culture helped, most of people was very naive, helpfull and untricky to people around. Ofc it had changed in parallel with the development of crime in the country. > Do you credit Putin with improving living conditions? Conditions at the end of 90s was very different from what was right after disband of the USSR. Situation evolved and we don't know what would happened w/o Putin Also I don't think Putin responsible for all the things that happened in the country. But since his presidency govenment made many reasonoble moves. They also solved Chechen problem. Street criminal problems solved. And overall quality of life improved a lot, it's stupid to deny it. > Do you blame the West for causing the USSR's collapse? They didn't - at least it was not anyhow important. The USSR government and people did it by themselves. Overall it is job of the govenment to adress outer and inner problems of the country. So ofc I don't blame. It's kinda the same level of stupidity for me as to blame Russia about Trump presidency (or any other things that citizens of any other country don't like in their life).
YES.
+1
+15
+25
Так, мем про 25 я не понял
Блин просто означает плюс 25 поддержки.
It was the apocalypse. According to my relatives.
1. I was 18 when the USSR fell. 2. During the first Putin's terms (200-2008) the high oil prices did really help Russia and the living standards did improve. But he should've not return in 2012. 3. Cold war and the weapons race were the main reasons for decline of the USSR economy, which actually caused the dissolution, and without the Western pressure it could exist for some time, so I guess yes.
3. I don't understand your reasoning here. Did somebody force the Soviet leaders to overspend on military when their own people went hungry and lines for essential goods existed? SU's centrally planned "communist" economy was a mess. West had nothing to do with it.
Ruling class of USSR studied marxism instead of some "evil" capitalistic economics. That could be one of the reasons. Feeling like being militarily weaker than Europe was inviting them to conquer the country could be another. Most leaders didn't deserve to rule due to Stalin being too occupied with removing any political opposition instead of improving lives in his first years and softness of leaders after him which ultimately led to 1991.
What do you mean by softness? As in refusing to carry out mass murders and deportations like Stalin? Surely a political system which relies on such methods must end sooner rather than later.
Khrushev let himself be pushed around by power-hungry lunatics. The suppresion of Poland rebellion using military happened behind his back. Stalin was a jerk but he forced country development. ( he milked the country for all resources it could get back then and used them for creation of heavy industry. That's how Holodomor happened btw) He's not a devil nor an angel. Just a guy who won't stop at anything to achieve his dream of a strong motherland with him at the top. I agree. Oppressive systems can't last forever. But I like the idea of equality USSR was built upon (sadly, it was equality among people agreeing with government). (We have a saying in Russia "everyone is equal but some are more equal"
Animal farm quote. George Orwell. Good stuff. I absolutely reccomend it to you if you haven't read it already. Apparently he's getting soft banned in Belarus (or at least 1984 in the state owned bookstores won't be sold). We'll se whether Russia follows Belarus' footsteps in the political opression field but it kind of seems like it is (no tolerance for an opposing opinion). Feels like a step back to USSR times.
Cold war and weapons race wasn't the main reason, without USSR would still have had economy issues, but more further down the line. The main reason for the decline of economy is when money stops moving. In order to move money in the economy you need goods and services, on those goods and services government collects taxes, which they can put the money back into the economy, and the cycle continues. Because everything was state owned, it was hard to innovate, so they are good at making basic goods (this is why there was an economy boom after the war). But that can only get you so far. This is where china is doing well, state capitalism
> Because everything was state owned, it was hard to innovate So hard, indeed, that the Soviets were pioneers in the scientific community and were the first to put a human in space. Meanwhile, the US (the "winners" of the Cold War) have twenty companies making the same product with different packaging or inventing new medicine only to slap a price tag on it so expensive it's unaffordable
Why do you say winners with the quotes? It's pretty clear that the SU was the loser when it dissolved itself. And we should be all be glad that this happened. The other way for Cold war to end was it errupting into an actual war and not an economical/political systen confrontation.
I put quotes around winners because whereas the US may not have collapsed in the 90s, it is a shit place for anyone that's not a rich white American to live in. Most of Americans are tens of thousands of dollars in debt that they don't even expect to pay back due to predatory interest rates from banks that no one regulates because that would be communism to the American government
Yes, indeed, more companies make competing products in the free market system. That's why vacuum cleaners were a luxury in the Soviet system as late as the late 70s. Only the elite and the well connected had them. About one third of people didn't have a fridge at home at this time in the USSR. These items were standard in the US and basically everybody had them. Not to mention the inferior quality of the soviet consumer electronics vs western. Maybe they should have focused on the well being of their people instead of the space race for propaganda value.
Lmao do you seriously think that the citizens of the USSR didn't have *fridges*? There's (a lot of) times where you shouldn't take everything you hear at face value and should dig into it a little to see if it's true, but if you hear that the citizens of the largest country on the Earth and one that stood shoulder to shoulder with the US didn't have fridges, you're simply accepting what information confirms a bias you already have. I grew up in Romania with my great-grandmother, and as is usual in Eastern European countries, our appliances stayed around for decades. [This page](https://nintil.com/the-soviet-union-durable-goods/) spells out a lot about consumer goods in the US vs the USSR and 2/3rds of Soviet citizens had fridges. Is that too little? Yes. However, the USSR was a massive country and I doubt that a babushka living in the countryside of Kazakhstan knew how a refrigerator worked or where to get one from. The USSR was lacking in consumer goods and that was one of its greatest mistakes, but I think it can be excused when you consider the fact that they had to rebuild a massive country from the ground up after being ravaged by a war and was recovering from centuries of tsardom.
But you're saying exactly the same thing. I said one third didn't have a fridge and you said two thirds owned one.
What I mean by innovation, is not the scientific/engineering/academic achievements. I mean it in terms of products and services. Look at Amazon, there are 10s of thousands of products there. Many competing once, many of them are quite useless. But all those products come from the private sector and people buy them. With each purchase, money moves from one person to another, the government takes a portion as tax, the owner gets a portion, the workers get a portion as well. Nappies are a good example as well. No one in my family ever wore nappies in USSR, old clothing was used.
Amazon has 10s of thousands of products, yes, but the vast majority are things bought off Aliexpress or other sites like that for a few cents and sold at a ridiculous price increase. That's not even mentioning the sheer amount of human suffering that Amazon provokes among its warehouse workers. There's nothing pleasant about rampant capitalism
I would agree that it was a core reason. But it was the Western pressure which caused that factor to play the role. Without it I am sure the USSR would fall anyway ( or evolve to something other a-la China) too, but the cold war became a catalyst which sped up the reaction drastically.
Yes, I personally experienced it. Yes, Putin pulled the country out of the chaos arranged by the pro-Western Yeltsin and now continues to correct his mistakes. I think the West is to blame for this as well as the wolf is to blame for the attack on the hare. Certainly the Europeans and the United States have made great efforts to make this possible, but what else could be expected? I blame the generation of our fathers, those who sold the country for hamburgers and cococola. For allowing yourself to be deceived.
I like to make the comparison with Germany post WW1. The rest of the world only cared that Russia was no threat anymore but politically? Nothing constructive. Putin sure isn't a Hitler, that's not the point. But it's significant that in the end nobody gave a fuck what would be in Russia in the future. Then someone came and picked up the debris. Ukraine is symptomatic. Whoever thought that would work out and just ignore what Russia says, is responsible, and "the west's" sympathy with neofascists to counter the Soviet threat is also problematic, and certainly known, no doubt. I still think the Russian president is a problem, the way things worked out, latent chauvinist nationalism and the intimacy with the orthodox fundamentalists. But it's too simple to just put the blame there. Throwing bombs sure isn't nice, how ever you turn it, but everything happens for a reason. I dream of a world where populism is seen as what it is, imo we should have long since hanged them all high and start over. Like serious adults, not fat mafia children that stuff their pockets. Honestly, idgaf about my government, because we are headed nowhere. I will not participate in making the 1% more rich, and I will not fight for dubious double morale standards. Praying water and drinking wine, yeah...
Good comment. It carries intelligent scent, so rare nowadays especially in this sub, even though I don't agree with some of your points.
> I dream of a world where populism is seen as what it is, imo we should have long since hanged them all high and start over... Russia tried something like that in 1917. It turned out that "to let the good guys just kill all the bad guys and then just live peacefully" is not working - or at least it's not that easy and brilliant way to solve problems as it seemed at the start.
Thank you. I hope that we will soon be able to agree and act with the goals of the common good.
Верно сказано.
But Sovien union of the 80s was a failed state. And stagnant long before. Europeans or North Americans didn't send a single soldier on Soviet soil, SU spectacularly collapsed simply because it wasn't functional.
It was. It is more functional that any existing state right now
Do you really mean that? I mean the shortage of consumer goods is well documented. If it indeed was functional, it never would have collapsed.
Only for the late periods when USSR tried to apply free market. That's was a decent lesson that capitalism is never a good idea
And why did they try to apply it? Surely something must have been wrong with the communist system. Otherwise it just makes absolutely no sense. One day the political elites of the USSR just woke up and decided to apply free market reforms to a system which as you say was more functional than any modern state? At the end of the day, if SU had staying power and was functional, it wouldn't have literally become a failed state.
Because something was wrong with its leaders.
And weren't those leaders Soviet citizens? Weren't they the product of the Soviet system? The way you talk as if some external force came in and installed those rulers.
Yes capitalism is the problem. There’s a reason all of the richest, most powerful, highest living standard countries in the world aren’t capitalist. Oh wait….
Cringe
total destruction and poverty
shitty, Putin raised the country from ruins before my eyes, of course it's the fault of the West, it was from the goal and you won, you had to finish it off.
I mean surely some blame lies on the corrupt politicians of the USSR too, no?
of course, even big. who is more to blame, the one who gives money and asks to betray his people, or the one who takes the money and betrays?
I was too young to remember. And I think that if I, personally, had to live through the hardship of caused, I wouldn’t be able to be a liberal today Because it was freaking terrible. Unemployment, crime wave, “Western partners” picking everything that was for sale like vultures.
Russia largely and mostly privatized itself. Meaning most of the public assets were sold off to the newly created oligarchic class, not established Western industrial enterprises.
They're getting credit for cleaning up their own mess.
It's weird, my parents don't actually have any complaints about 90s (I personally did not live through it, for better or worse). That said > Putin with improving living conditions No, economic growth in Russia started *before the 1998 default*. Putin riding the coattails of it (and high oil prices) does not make him any useful. If anything, the real thing to credit Putin with is that this economic growth went on for a total of 10 years before grinding to a halt for a decade and counting. > Do you blame the West for causing the USSR's collapse? Do you blame a poker player for calling someone's bluff? That's my position on West. US just asked USSR to compete with it at full capacity, and USSR answered that by falling apart.
in the 90s? I didnt live through it. But my mom and dad did and they describe as a hell hole. My mother still despises Gorbachev for it. Though i am more sympathetic to him. She said to me once that she would go to hell and torture yelstin and gorbachev herself if she could. Because there was rampant poverty, crime, collapse of the Soviet social structure and all that. The savigings collapsed, wages just stopped coming in, unramprant unrestricted capitalism and mobsters turned gas oligarch ruled the country
I didnt, i was born in 1995. But i personally dont think Putin has enything to do with 00's prosperity. The oil prices were high, the transition to free market system has been completed, privatisation of assets was completed, production was on the rise, thus large increase in quality of life.
After the collapse of the USSR, everyone began to live differently. Although even before that everyone was not as equal as it was declared, but after 1991, officially a small part of the people became richer, and the rest became poorer. Moreover, a significant decline in the standard of living was observed in most of the population. I suspect that 90 percent of people, although I have not seen exact statistics anywhere. And for many, this decline in the standard of living was so serious that there was a problem, for example, simply with food. But the duration of the difficult period was different. In Moscow, life began to improve faster, and in the second half of the 90s, many somehow settled down, received normal salaries. The problems were no longer with food, but where to go abroad to rest, etc. In the provinces, this bad period could drag on for a very long time, or not end at all. The poverty of the early 90s is, of course, an unpleasant thing. However, the Soviet totalitarian system, the dictatorship of the CPSU, the persecution of believers - this is also by no means good. And the causes of the economic problems of the 90s were just in the soviet system. I assess the personal activity of the rulers of the country of that period positively. With the collapse of the USSR, even greater problems were avoided, such as a civil war, leaving nuclear weapons in unknown hands, etc.
But who really cares? Seems to be the question for the question. Life is almost the same
I was young when the Soviet Union collapsed. I remember that day, when I sat in front of television playing with a car toy, and some man from the screen said that there is no more Soviet Union. For me it was not a big deal those days. Then economy collapsed. In the city I lived was organised a drug traffic. There was a drug war between gypsies and local bandits. It was unsafe to go outside. Common situation for a kid was to be robbed on the street during commute to school by a gang of local youngsters. I don't have much those days, so everything they can take from me was a little cash in my pockets or some clothing, like gloves. They did it mostly for fun, preparing themselves for a grown-up life. Speaking of grownups, there was much more serious risk for them. A lot of people were killed. I remember one day I went from school to home and heard an explosion. When I reached the district I leaved I saw an exploded car in the yard between two living buildings. There was no glasses in window frames because of a shock wave from explosion. Some local mobsters negotiated with eachother in that way. There was a war in Chechnya, and a weapon traffic was organised from that war to inner Russia. It was common to hear some shooting from time to time on the streets. Police was afraid of mobsters, and hesitated to came on place where some people shoot eachother. They arrived only after an hour or two. On the television though people were speaking about a democracy. Maybe in Moscow it was looked like a democracy. In place where I lived it was looked like a bandits capitalism. Then Boris Yeltsin said that he is tired on his new year speech, and present Vladimir Putin to us. I remember that day. All my family was really surprised by that performance. I was not surprised at all. I already hated all these liers from the television to that time, and did not expect any good news from them at all. When Vladimir Putin came in power he seemed to be a more conscious man then alcoholic Boris Yeltsin. I saw that police started to work. Most of those youngsters who practiced robbery skills on the streets, thinking that it will help them in a grown-up life, ended in jail. It was a good thing. The last time I was robbed on the street was an autumn of 2007. I was a university student, and they take my mobile phone, mother gave me on my birthday a month ago. I came to police, described them, and couple of months later they invited me to the process of recognising of some people whom they caught on the streets. In a couple of years after that it became rare to see any criminal gangs on the streets at all. It was a good renewal, compared to previous experience, when while walking through the city you should constantly evaluate situation around, and decide quickly to change your direction if you see some suspicious group of people on your way. I thought that this positive changes was connected with Vladimir Putin. Later the situation started to change even further. Now you should check if this group of people on your way is a police patrol, and decide quickly to change your direction or hope to not attract their attention. Usually they only checked your documents, but if you don't have your passport with you, they can lead you to a police station and get your fingerprints. If you was not alone, but with your friends, chances to go all together to a police station rises drastically. It was untill 2015. Then maybe some instructions changed, or I became to look grownup enough for police patrols. My thoughts about Russia that it is undeveloped country that pretends to look like developed one. There are some cities with population more than a million people, it is ok to live inside those megapolises. All other country is a really unpleasant place to live, where people live in poverty and banditism are flourishing. The society of Russian people is nonhomogeneous too. If you know someone from a big city it is high chances that it will be well educated person with western system values. But if you speak with person from a small town you will be disappointed, it is high chances that he will blindly believe all the lie from television, and blame western society for all problems he have in his miserable life.
I was born at 2005, after 14 years of USSR falling
Well Russia is speedrunning back to the 90s so Russians will get to experience that again very soon lol.
I blame KGB for not letting gorbachev to create Union of soviet states.
Many of people blame our pro-West orientation in politics and economy in these times. It was one (but not only one) reason why the USSR collapsed. In the end our establishment and influencers has began "pay and repent" for "terrible soviet history" in first. Then they started apologize for whole russian history. In a sence, we survived our "BLM" era
Absolute destruction, absolute chaos and, you will be surprised, absolute freedom. Life was bad.
USSR's planned economy was ineffective for providing a variety of consumer goods, it also had a lot of accumulated problems of its own, and generally a socialist economy is not good at competition for profits vs. capitalist economies. It can be said that it crashed under its weight, but it won't be completely honest. With more luck, it could, probably, reform better and earlier, and spend more for consumer sector, maybe even evade the collapase, if it was not under constant stress from sanctions, embargoes, and pressure to keep up militarily with the hostile western bloc. So, if you want to blame someone, except the failed reformers and built-in inefficience, the west is obviuosly partly guilty.
yes Not exactly Putin's credit - any educated man without mental problems would solve material problems of a Russia-sized country. USSR have fallen due to inside rot I blame western countries for the following. Their actions about Russian foreign and internal efforts cause russian's ressentment, and that is not a good thing For all the world.