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Samuel Ross
Samuel Ross
1 year ago

A shining jewel in Unherd’s listing of articles is this article. My thanks to the author.

Samuel Ross
Samuel Ross
1 year ago

A shining jewel in Unherd’s listing of articles is this article. My thanks to the author.

Alex Stonor
Alex Stonor
1 year ago

When I was a student of Soviet Studies around 1985 & on, we learned about Schumpeter’s theory of convergence: that all economies would merge and start copying each other.
I’ve noticed the UK becoming ever more Soviet; the authoritarianism demonstrated during covid, the way neighbours were weaponised to police each other, and before all this, creeping bureaucratisation, and the facade of fairness & justice falling away to expose the tattered fabric of a country left to look after itself on a diminishing budget.

Phil Jones
Phil Jones
1 year ago
Reply to  Alex Stonor

Just so Alex. As referred to above Churchill told the crowd in 1924 “one of the worst tyrannies that has ever existed in the world. It accords no political rights. It rules by terror. It punishes political opinions…” With the present woke indoctrination & bullying & the recent tyranny of COVID restrictions our society today is not a great deal different.

Last edited 1 year ago by Phil Jones
Roddy Campbell
Roddy Campbell
1 year ago
Reply to  Phil Jones

It is enormously different. One single person who died from police brutality creates national headlines and years of investigation. 10,000 per day in the USSR? A statistic.

Last edited 1 year ago by Roddy Campbell
Roddy Campbell
Roddy Campbell
1 year ago
Reply to  Phil Jones

It is enormously different. One single person who died from police brutality creates national headlines and years of investigation. 10,000 per day in the USSR? A statistic.

Last edited 1 year ago by Roddy Campbell
Alex Stonor
Alex Stonor
1 year ago
Reply to  Alex Stonor

Yesterday I was in the County Council Building and there was a ‘No Photography’ sign!! I commented that I had only seen such notices in the Soviet Union and I believe photography is also discouraged in North Korea. The receptionist chuckled that it wasn’t that bad and I chuckled “We’ll see”.

Phil Jones
Phil Jones
1 year ago
Reply to  Alex Stonor

Just so Alex. As referred to above Churchill told the crowd in 1924 “one of the worst tyrannies that has ever existed in the world. It accords no political rights. It rules by terror. It punishes political opinions…” With the present woke indoctrination & bullying & the recent tyranny of COVID restrictions our society today is not a great deal different.

Last edited 1 year ago by Phil Jones
Alex Stonor
Alex Stonor
1 year ago
Reply to  Alex Stonor

Yesterday I was in the County Council Building and there was a ‘No Photography’ sign!! I commented that I had only seen such notices in the Soviet Union and I believe photography is also discouraged in North Korea. The receptionist chuckled that it wasn’t that bad and I chuckled “We’ll see”.

Alex Stonor
Alex Stonor
1 year ago

When I was a student of Soviet Studies around 1985 & on, we learned about Schumpeter’s theory of convergence: that all economies would merge and start copying each other.
I’ve noticed the UK becoming ever more Soviet; the authoritarianism demonstrated during covid, the way neighbours were weaponised to police each other, and before all this, creeping bureaucratisation, and the facade of fairness & justice falling away to expose the tattered fabric of a country left to look after itself on a diminishing budget.

Ian Stewart
Ian Stewart
1 year ago

Its a truly incredible documentary about the chaos in Russia, referenced in the article and which is available on BBC IPlayer – the best documentary I’ve seen in years, maybe ever.
And watching it begged the question…..perhaps the west should have done more to help Russia during the nineties.
The Russians were begging for assistance and we largely ignored them – except for our capitalists who didn’t miss the opportunity to exploit it for fantastic rewards.

Andrew Buckley
Andrew Buckley
1 year ago
Reply to  Ian Stewart

My thoughts for a long time Ian. After the implosion of the USSR there was such a gung ho “ra ra” we won attitude across the west and, as so often, no thought about winning the peace. Lots of talk about a peace dividend and cutting defense budgets but little else.
And, to me, an unseemly rush to embrace the old Eastern Europe as “friends” (lots of people to sell things to!), financial support for Poland and the Baltic States and little but a thumbed nose to the new Russia.
Could things have turned out differently? Who knows, but some thought to supporting the new Russia through it birth ups and downs would have been helpful I am sure and, perhaps, have reduced recent problems.
After all, both Germany and Japan received a lot of support after WW11 and wouldn’t something along similar lines have helped stability and peace if offered to Russia even though no actual war had happened?

Catherine McMullen
Catherine McMullen
1 year ago
Reply to  Andrew Buckley
Catherine McMullen
Catherine McMullen
1 year ago
Reply to  Andrew Buckley
Liam Brady
Liam Brady
1 year ago
Reply to  Ian Stewart

What exactly do you think the West could have done to help that would have been accepted by Russia? I remember those times, the West bent over backwards to be friendly to Russia and its leaders. So genuine question, what should we have done?
Thanks for the recommendation re BBC IPlayer, I’ll watch it.

Andrew Buckley
Andrew Buckley
1 year ago
Reply to  Ian Stewart

My thoughts for a long time Ian. After the implosion of the USSR there was such a gung ho “ra ra” we won attitude across the west and, as so often, no thought about winning the peace. Lots of talk about a peace dividend and cutting defense budgets but little else.
And, to me, an unseemly rush to embrace the old Eastern Europe as “friends” (lots of people to sell things to!), financial support for Poland and the Baltic States and little but a thumbed nose to the new Russia.
Could things have turned out differently? Who knows, but some thought to supporting the new Russia through it birth ups and downs would have been helpful I am sure and, perhaps, have reduced recent problems.
After all, both Germany and Japan received a lot of support after WW11 and wouldn’t something along similar lines have helped stability and peace if offered to Russia even though no actual war had happened?

Liam Brady
Liam Brady
1 year ago
Reply to  Ian Stewart

What exactly do you think the West could have done to help that would have been accepted by Russia? I remember those times, the West bent over backwards to be friendly to Russia and its leaders. So genuine question, what should we have done?
Thanks for the recommendation re BBC IPlayer, I’ll watch it.

Ian Stewart
Ian Stewart
1 year ago

Its a truly incredible documentary about the chaos in Russia, referenced in the article and which is available on BBC IPlayer – the best documentary I’ve seen in years, maybe ever.
And watching it begged the question…..perhaps the west should have done more to help Russia during the nineties.
The Russians were begging for assistance and we largely ignored them – except for our capitalists who didn’t miss the opportunity to exploit it for fantastic rewards.

Tom Lewis
Tom Lewis
1 year ago

“What if the USSR hadn’t collapsed?”
Maybe the West would be a saner place today !

Tom Lewis
Tom Lewis
1 year ago

“What if the USSR hadn’t collapsed?”
Maybe the West would be a saner place today !

Jeff Butcher
Jeff Butcher
1 year ago

‘They knew for sure, because they were certain that history was on their side. We all know what happened next.’

And then, 80 odd years later Blair and Bush invade Iraq, convinced of exactly the same thing, partly because of the collapse of the USSR….

John Riordan
John Riordan
1 year ago
Reply to  Jeff Butcher

I am surprised that anyone believes that Blair and Bush believed the WMD narrative. Nobody else did, surely it’s obvious they didn’t themselves.

Iraq got invaded for one simple reason: to show global Islamism the price of attacking the USA. The reason Iraq was chosen as the target is simply that Saddam Hussein’s regime was the most prominent example of an Islamic nation that had defied America’s will in the past and had got away with it.

The first Gulf War was the first major geopolitical event that I experienced as an adult. I may have been still a callow youth at the time, but I was still surprised that so few people called the ejection of the Iraqi forces from Kuwait a victory. It wasn’t, it was a draw at best, leaving Iraq’s regime mostly unpunished. The Gulf War in 2003 was a belated attempt to undo that mistake as far as I’m concerned – a failed attempt justified through lies, carried out in the face of colossal public opposition and with colossally damaging unintended consequences, but that’s still what it was.

Last edited 1 year ago by John Riordan
Mark C
Mark C
1 year ago
Reply to  John Riordan

Iraq had nothing to do with “global Islamism”. It was a secular regime.

Last edited 1 year ago by Mark C
Ted Ditchburn
Ted Ditchburn
1 year ago
Reply to  Mark C

Quite.

Ted Ditchburn
Ted Ditchburn
1 year ago
Reply to  Mark C

Quite.

Ted Ditchburn
Ted Ditchburn
1 year ago
Reply to  John Riordan

I agree with that…the planes that hit the twin towers and pentagon, and fell short of the White House were stuffed with Saudis, and I am not sure there was even one Iraqi in them, but we invaded Iraq.
I also agree the Gulf War was just finishing off the unfinished business of the earlier operation in Kuwait.
It was Bush and America of course, Blair was incidental. He was happy to go along with it of course, to stay close to America, but he was just a ‘go-along guy’ really, along with the other members of the freedom alliance or whatever it was called.
In the spirit of counterfactual history. If we hadn’t gone into Iraq and created an utter mess we may have had more success focusing on Afghanistan , which was where they were all training, and creating a more stable society with more chance of standing against the Pakistani supported Taliban.
And we wouldn’t have had the same mess in Syria, or any of the Isis created chaos of the last decades.

But all that on one side; there is no alternative universe in which the twin towers ‘War on Terror’ decision to invade Iraq was not the very worst possible decision in the wide range of possible course of action.

Mark C
Mark C
1 year ago
Reply to  John Riordan

Iraq had nothing to do with “global Islamism”. It was a secular regime.

Last edited 1 year ago by Mark C
Ted Ditchburn
Ted Ditchburn
1 year ago
Reply to  John Riordan

I agree with that…the planes that hit the twin towers and pentagon, and fell short of the White House were stuffed with Saudis, and I am not sure there was even one Iraqi in them, but we invaded Iraq.
I also agree the Gulf War was just finishing off the unfinished business of the earlier operation in Kuwait.
It was Bush and America of course, Blair was incidental. He was happy to go along with it of course, to stay close to America, but he was just a ‘go-along guy’ really, along with the other members of the freedom alliance or whatever it was called.
In the spirit of counterfactual history. If we hadn’t gone into Iraq and created an utter mess we may have had more success focusing on Afghanistan , which was where they were all training, and creating a more stable society with more chance of standing against the Pakistani supported Taliban.
And we wouldn’t have had the same mess in Syria, or any of the Isis created chaos of the last decades.

But all that on one side; there is no alternative universe in which the twin towers ‘War on Terror’ decision to invade Iraq was not the very worst possible decision in the wide range of possible course of action.

John Riordan
John Riordan
1 year ago
Reply to  Jeff Butcher

I am surprised that anyone believes that Blair and Bush believed the WMD narrative. Nobody else did, surely it’s obvious they didn’t themselves.

Iraq got invaded for one simple reason: to show global Islamism the price of attacking the USA. The reason Iraq was chosen as the target is simply that Saddam Hussein’s regime was the most prominent example of an Islamic nation that had defied America’s will in the past and had got away with it.

The first Gulf War was the first major geopolitical event that I experienced as an adult. I may have been still a callow youth at the time, but I was still surprised that so few people called the ejection of the Iraqi forces from Kuwait a victory. It wasn’t, it was a draw at best, leaving Iraq’s regime mostly unpunished. The Gulf War in 2003 was a belated attempt to undo that mistake as far as I’m concerned – a failed attempt justified through lies, carried out in the face of colossal public opposition and with colossally damaging unintended consequences, but that’s still what it was.

Last edited 1 year ago by John Riordan
Jeff Butcher
Jeff Butcher
1 year ago

‘They knew for sure, because they were certain that history was on their side. We all know what happened next.’

And then, 80 odd years later Blair and Bush invade Iraq, convinced of exactly the same thing, partly because of the collapse of the USSR….

Peter Drummond
Peter Drummond
1 year ago

One thing I do know: Chelsea FC would have continued being mediocre and the Premiership might have been spared some of the current excess.

Peter Drummond
Peter Drummond
1 year ago

One thing I do know: Chelsea FC would have continued being mediocre and the Premiership might have been spared some of the current excess.

martin logan
martin logan
1 year ago

The USSR was simply the last of the early modern empires, of which Putin’s Russia is but a pale reflection.
Half its population wasn’t even Russian. Moscow had no more chance of dominating the Baltics, the Caucasus, and Central Asia than Paris had of dominating Algeria, or London had of dominating India.
Marxism also insured it was a very inefficient empire. That made it impossible to compete in the modern world. It was either autarky or collapse. Even then it could not survive without relatively high petro prices.
Nothing is inevitable in history. But for the USSR to have survived, it needed to become a very large North Korea, sealed off from the rest of the world, and armed to the teeth. That’s the path Putin is pursuing right now.
For any Muscovite state, no other model is possible.

Last edited 1 year ago by martin logan
martin logan
martin logan
1 year ago

The USSR was simply the last of the early modern empires, of which Putin’s Russia is but a pale reflection.
Half its population wasn’t even Russian. Moscow had no more chance of dominating the Baltics, the Caucasus, and Central Asia than Paris had of dominating Algeria, or London had of dominating India.
Marxism also insured it was a very inefficient empire. That made it impossible to compete in the modern world. It was either autarky or collapse. Even then it could not survive without relatively high petro prices.
Nothing is inevitable in history. But for the USSR to have survived, it needed to become a very large North Korea, sealed off from the rest of the world, and armed to the teeth. That’s the path Putin is pursuing right now.
For any Muscovite state, no other model is possible.

Last edited 1 year ago by martin logan
Jonathan Nash
Jonathan Nash
1 year ago

As Fred Kite (Peter Sellers) put it in “I’m alright Jack”: “All that wheat and ballet in the evenings”.

Jonathan Nash
Jonathan Nash
1 year ago

As Fred Kite (Peter Sellers) put it in “I’m alright Jack”: “All that wheat and ballet in the evenings”.

Tony Taylor
Tony Taylor
1 year ago

I recently watched the latest Tom Clancy / Jack Ryan series on Prime, and although it stretched the bounds of plausibility to breaking point, it warmed the cockles that the CIA was back to its core business of dealing with rogue Russians. Who doesn’t love traditional rivalries.
Contra Jack Ryan, I also recently watched Cambridge Spies. I can do without my traitors being given sympathetic go-overs, thank you very much.
Oh. And the West needed the USSR like Rome needed Carthage.

Last edited 1 year ago by Tony Taylor
Tony Taylor
Tony Taylor
1 year ago

I recently watched the latest Tom Clancy / Jack Ryan series on Prime, and although it stretched the bounds of plausibility to breaking point, it warmed the cockles that the CIA was back to its core business of dealing with rogue Russians. Who doesn’t love traditional rivalries.
Contra Jack Ryan, I also recently watched Cambridge Spies. I can do without my traitors being given sympathetic go-overs, thank you very much.
Oh. And the West needed the USSR like Rome needed Carthage.

Last edited 1 year ago by Tony Taylor
Allison Barrows
Allison Barrows
1 year ago

And who knew that the US would adopt so enthusiastically the hideous Stalinist surveillance/punishment state only 30 years later?

Roddy Campbell
Roddy Campbell
1 year ago

It hasn’t. Don’t be silly.

Roddy Campbell
Roddy Campbell
1 year ago

It hasn’t. Don’t be silly.

Allison Barrows
Allison Barrows
1 year ago

And who knew that the US would adopt so enthusiastically the hideous Stalinist surveillance/punishment state only 30 years later?

Steve Farrell
Steve Farrell
1 year ago

There’s still a strange attachment to Russia amongst a weird bunch of people in weird parts of the internet. Rabidly anti-USA figures who probably claim to be communists are willing to shelve their self-proclaimed anti-war/anti-imperialist principles when Russia rolls in with the tanks.

Steve Farrell
Steve Farrell
1 year ago

There’s still a strange attachment to Russia amongst a weird bunch of people in weird parts of the internet. Rabidly anti-USA figures who probably claim to be communists are willing to shelve their self-proclaimed anti-war/anti-imperialist principles when Russia rolls in with the tanks.

Ben Dauber
Ben Dauber
1 year ago

Great stuff Sandbrook. The collapse of the Soviet Union hasn’t had its historic day in the sun that it probably deserves. This, coupled with the fact that most people in the West have no real idea of how bleak life was in 90’s Russia, makes it easy to chalk up the 21st-century Putin state as wanting a return to the “glory days.”
History is messy
Putin does look back with admiration on the former empire. Yet he is no communist. And he knows that trying to recreate the USSR would be to rebirth all of the eternal contradictions that killed it.
As he said himself:
“Whoever does not miss the Soviet Union has no heart. Whoever wants it back has no brain.”

L Walker
L Walker
1 year ago
Reply to  Ben Dauber

Sounds stolen to me. He really said that?

Daoud Fakhri
Daoud Fakhri
1 year ago
Reply to  L Walker

Sounds similar to what Churchill is supposed to have said: “if you aren’t a liberal in your 20s, you haven’t got a heart. If you’re still a liberal in your 30s, you haven’t got a brain.”

Ted Ditchburn
Ted Ditchburn
1 year ago
Reply to  Daoud Fakhri

There’s an identical Socialist /Conservative, & heart/brain duopoly quote as well.

Ted Ditchburn
Ted Ditchburn
1 year ago
Reply to  Daoud Fakhri

There’s an identical Socialist /Conservative, & heart/brain duopoly quote as well.

Daoud Fakhri
Daoud Fakhri
1 year ago
Reply to  L Walker

Sounds similar to what Churchill is supposed to have said: “if you aren’t a liberal in your 20s, you haven’t got a heart. If you’re still a liberal in your 30s, you haven’t got a brain.”

L Walker
L Walker
1 year ago
Reply to  Ben Dauber

Sounds stolen to me. He really said that?

Ben Dauber
Ben Dauber
1 year ago

Great stuff Sandbrook. The collapse of the Soviet Union hasn’t had its historic day in the sun that it probably deserves. This, coupled with the fact that most people in the West have no real idea of how bleak life was in 90’s Russia, makes it easy to chalk up the 21st-century Putin state as wanting a return to the “glory days.”
History is messy
Putin does look back with admiration on the former empire. Yet he is no communist. And he knows that trying to recreate the USSR would be to rebirth all of the eternal contradictions that killed it.
As he said himself:
“Whoever does not miss the Soviet Union has no heart. Whoever wants it back has no brain.”

Simon Diggins
Simon Diggins
1 year ago

Tell the woke warriors, who proclaim that ‘history is on their side’, the story of the Bolsheviks.

Last edited 1 year ago by Simon Diggins
Simon Diggins
Simon Diggins
1 year ago

Tell the woke warriors, who proclaim that ‘history is on their side’, the story of the Bolsheviks.

Last edited 1 year ago by Simon Diggins
John Dewhirst
John Dewhirst
1 year ago

The central theme in the history of the USSR is surely that of economic failure. Of how the USSR ultimately failed to keep up with the west not only in terms of individual standards or qualities of living. Its inability to maintain military competitiveness and its technological backwardness notwithstanding the conquering of space.
 Even in 1990, metropolitan Russians were relatively ignorant about the west. But how long could the USSR have maintained its firewalls? Not surprisingly the collapse of the USSR was initiated from its loss of control over Eastern Europe and the aspirational demands of citizens in Poland and East Germany etc. Given the rise of the Internet it is difficult to see how Soviet control could have been maintained indefinitely over Eastern Europe and the loss of the vassals was surely inevitable. In turn the USSR – and metropolitan Russia – would have struggled to control the curiosity of its citizens about developments in Eastern Europe which would have led to demands for the sort of material improvements that the USSR could not afford to provide.
The survival of Communist regimes in Cuba and North Korea benefited from relative geographical isolation and racial homogeneity, neither of which the USSR possessed. Ironically it seems that Putin’s Russia has rested upon disillusionment about the West / democracy. However the collapse of the USSR was still necessary to give people the lived experience of capitalism albeit with the cronyism and particular characteristics of Russian capitalism.
 As the Curtis BBC series demonstrates, the USSR was dysfunctional and had been proven backward in so many areas by the 1980s that some form of painful transition was both unavoidable and inevitable. Given the economic and nationalist contradictions of the USSR, with hindsight the implosion of the USSR was always going to be on the cards.
 As to why no-one in the west saw the collapse of the USSR coming is a massive question. The lack of understanding about the USSR might also explain how the west responded to its collapse. The demise of the USSR was considered a validation of liberal capitalism and there was a naive belief that Russians would instantaneously become transformed into the mirror image of western consumers. It seems that very little thought had been given in the west to what a successor(s) to the USSR might be and arguably the same errors may be repeated about a post-Putin Russian Federation.
 Putin has revived Russian imperialism but faces the same contradictions of the Soviet Union in terms of satisfying material and nationalist aspirations within his empire. The current isolation of Russia also condemns the empire to future economic weakness and the prospect of a painful correction in the future. As in 1991 there remains the question of what happens to all those nuclear weapons.
 The Soviets understood the contagion risk of bordering states from Poland through to Afghanistan and so too does Vladimir Putin, as the special operation in Ukraine demonstrates.
 That the USSR – or indeed a modern day Russian empire – is not a viable proposition is the worrying issue. Thirty years after its collapse and a century after its creation we still have little idea about what a viable successor to the USSR could be. Existing tensions in the Balkans postdate the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire by a century and something similar seems likely to persist in the former territories of the USSR.
In years to come, maybe the west will become equally nostalgic as Putin about the USSR and the old certainties of the Cold War. 

John Dewhirst
John Dewhirst
1 year ago

The central theme in the history of the USSR is surely that of economic failure. Of how the USSR ultimately failed to keep up with the west not only in terms of individual standards or qualities of living. Its inability to maintain military competitiveness and its technological backwardness notwithstanding the conquering of space.
 Even in 1990, metropolitan Russians were relatively ignorant about the west. But how long could the USSR have maintained its firewalls? Not surprisingly the collapse of the USSR was initiated from its loss of control over Eastern Europe and the aspirational demands of citizens in Poland and East Germany etc. Given the rise of the Internet it is difficult to see how Soviet control could have been maintained indefinitely over Eastern Europe and the loss of the vassals was surely inevitable. In turn the USSR – and metropolitan Russia – would have struggled to control the curiosity of its citizens about developments in Eastern Europe which would have led to demands for the sort of material improvements that the USSR could not afford to provide.
The survival of Communist regimes in Cuba and North Korea benefited from relative geographical isolation and racial homogeneity, neither of which the USSR possessed. Ironically it seems that Putin’s Russia has rested upon disillusionment about the West / democracy. However the collapse of the USSR was still necessary to give people the lived experience of capitalism albeit with the cronyism and particular characteristics of Russian capitalism.
 As the Curtis BBC series demonstrates, the USSR was dysfunctional and had been proven backward in so many areas by the 1980s that some form of painful transition was both unavoidable and inevitable. Given the economic and nationalist contradictions of the USSR, with hindsight the implosion of the USSR was always going to be on the cards.
 As to why no-one in the west saw the collapse of the USSR coming is a massive question. The lack of understanding about the USSR might also explain how the west responded to its collapse. The demise of the USSR was considered a validation of liberal capitalism and there was a naive belief that Russians would instantaneously become transformed into the mirror image of western consumers. It seems that very little thought had been given in the west to what a successor(s) to the USSR might be and arguably the same errors may be repeated about a post-Putin Russian Federation.
 Putin has revived Russian imperialism but faces the same contradictions of the Soviet Union in terms of satisfying material and nationalist aspirations within his empire. The current isolation of Russia also condemns the empire to future economic weakness and the prospect of a painful correction in the future. As in 1991 there remains the question of what happens to all those nuclear weapons.
 The Soviets understood the contagion risk of bordering states from Poland through to Afghanistan and so too does Vladimir Putin, as the special operation in Ukraine demonstrates.
 That the USSR – or indeed a modern day Russian empire – is not a viable proposition is the worrying issue. Thirty years after its collapse and a century after its creation we still have little idea about what a viable successor to the USSR could be. Existing tensions in the Balkans postdate the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire by a century and something similar seems likely to persist in the former territories of the USSR.
In years to come, maybe the west will become equally nostalgic as Putin about the USSR and the old certainties of the Cold War. 

Malcolm Webb
Malcolm Webb
1 year ago

“What if” in an historical context is the most redundant of questions. The past simply cannot be undone. To pretend otherwise is to engage in a delusion. Better to challenge ourselves with the question “So, what now?” When trying to address that question, lessons from history can be very helpful – albeit that the last century and more of Russian history is somewhat depressing in that regard. Maybe, in that context, it very much matters who is writing the history.

Tony Price
Tony Price
1 year ago
Reply to  Malcolm Webb

In the politest possible way I disagree! ‘What if’ is usually an interesting diversion, but more usefully a sort of ‘gaming’ exercise. Historical situations recur time and time again, so thinking how they might have turned out is a way of considering how to handle any current crisis, or would be if we had any sane, historically aware politicians in power (how Blair let the invasion of Afghanistan proceed given the abject failure of every previous attempt is still a mystery).
I have just read a fascinating book on the New Model Army in the English Civil War. Cromwell’s Commonwealth decided into military dictatorship after his death, which very quickly unravelled into the Restoration of the monarchy as the army commanders realised that without popular support it was simply untenable – but that was in a country where liberty from oppression, albeit slowly evolving over centuries, was built into the national psyche – and no following you around with your smartphone!

Malcolm Webb
Malcolm Webb
1 year ago
Reply to  Tony Price

Thanks – I will buy the book! But I have to beg to differ too! I fear the repeated mistake is to believe that, with a slightly different approach to last time, history can be repeated but more successfully this time (though it in truth everything has changed so it never can be) – though maybe that is what Blair thought? – and on that I completely agree with you – that is a real mystery .

Tony Price
Tony Price
1 year ago
Reply to  Malcolm Webb

The New Model Army by Ian Gentles. Excellent although as I try to evolve my previously dire knowledge of the middle of the 17th century every book seems to assume that I start from a greater knowledge than I actually have! This one is very good if it meanders a bit towards the end, but the dear reader is supposed to know something more than I do about the basis of the politics and economics – I guess that I shall have to find a book to tutor me on that now!

Tony Price
Tony Price
1 year ago
Reply to  Malcolm Webb

The New Model Army by Ian Gentles. Excellent although as I try to evolve my previously dire knowledge of the middle of the 17th century every book seems to assume that I start from a greater knowledge than I actually have! This one is very good if it meanders a bit towards the end, but the dear reader is supposed to know something more than I do about the basis of the politics and economics – I guess that I shall have to find a book to tutor me on that now!

Malcolm Webb
Malcolm Webb
1 year ago
Reply to  Tony Price

Thanks – I will buy the book! But I have to beg to differ too! I fear the repeated mistake is to believe that, with a slightly different approach to last time, history can be repeated but more successfully this time (though it in truth everything has changed so it never can be) – though maybe that is what Blair thought? – and on that I completely agree with you – that is a real mystery .

Tony Price
Tony Price
1 year ago
Reply to  Malcolm Webb

In the politest possible way I disagree! ‘What if’ is usually an interesting diversion, but more usefully a sort of ‘gaming’ exercise. Historical situations recur time and time again, so thinking how they might have turned out is a way of considering how to handle any current crisis, or would be if we had any sane, historically aware politicians in power (how Blair let the invasion of Afghanistan proceed given the abject failure of every previous attempt is still a mystery).
I have just read a fascinating book on the New Model Army in the English Civil War. Cromwell’s Commonwealth decided into military dictatorship after his death, which very quickly unravelled into the Restoration of the monarchy as the army commanders realised that without popular support it was simply untenable – but that was in a country where liberty from oppression, albeit slowly evolving over centuries, was built into the national psyche – and no following you around with your smartphone!

Malcolm Webb
Malcolm Webb
1 year ago

“What if” in an historical context is the most redundant of questions. The past simply cannot be undone. To pretend otherwise is to engage in a delusion. Better to challenge ourselves with the question “So, what now?” When trying to address that question, lessons from history can be very helpful – albeit that the last century and more of Russian history is somewhat depressing in that regard. Maybe, in that context, it very much matters who is writing the history.

John Riordan
John Riordan
1 year ago

To judge whether it’s better that the USSR collapsed sooner rather than later, surely we need to know the cost in lives per year of its continued survival, to be compared with the admittedly atrocious costs following its collapse?

That said, I personally have no doubts. It was a vicious anti-human system that didn’t deserve to last a week, let alone 70-odd years. Communism was and remains a disgrace to our species.

John Riordan
John Riordan
1 year ago

To judge whether it’s better that the USSR collapsed sooner rather than later, surely we need to know the cost in lives per year of its continued survival, to be compared with the admittedly atrocious costs following its collapse?

That said, I personally have no doubts. It was a vicious anti-human system that didn’t deserve to last a week, let alone 70-odd years. Communism was and remains a disgrace to our species.

Hardee Hodges
Hardee Hodges
1 year ago

A work in progress, Russia. Who could have imagined the Union collapsing and turning into a kleptocracy? And of the citizens who must accept their fate, those who get the crumbs hail their masters, others silent in fear. But we saw much the same with the restrictions of the pandemic. Fear prevailed among nearly all liberals accepting the diktats of their leaders. Nearly constant repression of the people via controlled media. The West not so different from Russia aside from accepting the kleptocracy of capitalism wrought anew via the pandemic. Mr. Gates investments gaining 20:1 as an example. Wonder if the history of the 1920’s is set to repeat, but in the West as a growing inequality arrives. Lets hope that cycle does not repeat.

Hardee Hodges
Hardee Hodges
1 year ago

A work in progress, Russia. Who could have imagined the Union collapsing and turning into a kleptocracy? And of the citizens who must accept their fate, those who get the crumbs hail their masters, others silent in fear. But we saw much the same with the restrictions of the pandemic. Fear prevailed among nearly all liberals accepting the diktats of their leaders. Nearly constant repression of the people via controlled media. The West not so different from Russia aside from accepting the kleptocracy of capitalism wrought anew via the pandemic. Mr. Gates investments gaining 20:1 as an example. Wonder if the history of the 1920’s is set to repeat, but in the West as a growing inequality arrives. Lets hope that cycle does not repeat.

Jerry Carroll
Jerry Carroll
1 year ago

The Russians are different, they just are. They were shaped by centuries of serfdom. It’s in the DNA.

Samir Iker
Samir Iker
1 year ago

“Ronald Reagan infamously called it an “evil empire”, run by people who “preach the supremacy of the State, declare its omnipotence over individual”
Ah, the irony. If he could see what views are espoused and imposed by certain influential groups in Western politics and academia.

The crossroads in history, the what if moment, was not the collapse of the USSR. In retrospect, that was bound to happen.

The biggest decision point rather was what happened AFTER that. Whether
A. the Western countries would step in to help Russia become strong and prosperous. Or
B. Enjoy the spectacle as Russia imploded, while encouraging “businessmen” to loot the country and “invest” those billions in London and elsewhere.

What we are reaping today is the impact of the West choosing option B. But not only that decision, but the mindset behind it.
Because the West did, after all, choose option A in 1945 for the far more evil Germany and Japan (at that time).

The underlying problem is that the West has always had a virulent contempt and hatred for the “inferior” Russians.
All the talk of evil Putin and how he is going to invade Sweden, scratch the surface and you soon figure out it’s not the leader but his people that are detested.
There is no way the West would have pumped in the equivalent of a Marshall plan to help Russia become powerful and robust. Ironically, that would have made Russia much more pro West, immensely strengthened the Western coalition, and cost far LESS than what the West are burning in Ukraine. But that would have meant considering the Russians as equals.

Last edited 1 year ago by Samir Iker
polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Oh dear! It really is the regime that is despised, Samir. And of course its apologists.

Samir Iker
Samir Iker
1 year ago
Reply to  polidori redux

Which regime are you referring to in 1990-2000 Russia? Which was also the period of rapid expansion in NATO towards Russian borders, incidentally.

Tony Price
Tony Price
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Of course NATO expanded – those states released from the Russian yoke wanted some form of guarantee against Russia coming back to take them over again. The shame is that more of them, especially Georgia and Ukraine, didn’t immediately join NATO, then maybe Russia would have realised that further imperial expansion was untenable, instead of releasing death and destruction once again to its West. Actually in hindsight what might have been a more acceptable solution would have been all of the previous Soviet republics and Warsaw Pact states to start their own version of NATO to bind together in a US and nuclear-free Pact of mutual defence co-operation, which would give Russia fewer paranoid excuses to destroy them again. Is it too late for that?

Stephen Wright
Stephen Wright
1 year ago
Reply to  Tony Price

yes the irony is that in the West we were cautious and timid with Russia worried about their feelings, so not allowing Ukraine and Georgia in. So Ukrainians and Georgians had to pay with their lives. So when Putin complains and brainwashes Russians about NATO what he is really saying is ‘I want to be able to control and invade those countries, killing the citizens if it suits me’. He knows NATO is not a threat to Russia, it is a threat to him controlling and killing his neighbours. Thats why they are desperate to join. It is a sorry tale.

Stephen Wright
Stephen Wright
1 year ago
Reply to  Tony Price

yes the irony is that in the West we were cautious and timid with Russia worried about their feelings, so not allowing Ukraine and Georgia in. So Ukrainians and Georgians had to pay with their lives. So when Putin complains and brainwashes Russians about NATO what he is really saying is ‘I want to be able to control and invade those countries, killing the citizens if it suits me’. He knows NATO is not a threat to Russia, it is a threat to him controlling and killing his neighbours. Thats why they are desperate to join. It is a sorry tale.

Ian Stewart
Ian Stewart
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

So if you were Lithuanian you’d have welcomed the Russians back then?

polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Putin’s regime, the one that invaded a sovereign nation and is now deliberately targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure. That regime.
I call such actions war crimes. What do you call them Samir?

Tony Price
Tony Price
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Of course NATO expanded – those states released from the Russian yoke wanted some form of guarantee against Russia coming back to take them over again. The shame is that more of them, especially Georgia and Ukraine, didn’t immediately join NATO, then maybe Russia would have realised that further imperial expansion was untenable, instead of releasing death and destruction once again to its West. Actually in hindsight what might have been a more acceptable solution would have been all of the previous Soviet republics and Warsaw Pact states to start their own version of NATO to bind together in a US and nuclear-free Pact of mutual defence co-operation, which would give Russia fewer paranoid excuses to destroy them again. Is it too late for that?

Ian Stewart
Ian Stewart
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

So if you were Lithuanian you’d have welcomed the Russians back then?

polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Putin’s regime, the one that invaded a sovereign nation and is now deliberately targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure. That regime.
I call such actions war crimes. What do you call them Samir?

Samir Iker
Samir Iker
1 year ago
Reply to  polidori redux

Which regime are you referring to in 1990-2000 Russia? Which was also the period of rapid expansion in NATO towards Russian borders, incidentally.

Ian Stewart
Ian Stewart
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Agree with you about the options, and we failed to pick A. But disagree with you about Putin – he’s a standard evil megalomaniac on a par with Stalin – and the submissive Russian culture unfortunately keeps producing these bampots.

Stephen Wright
Stephen Wright
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

The collapse of the USSR is a little different to the situations post WW2 Samir. You seriously think the USA could have gone in and taken control of that massive dysfunctional state? The West had just got through the Cold War by the skin of their teeth, where the USSR had stockpiled and insistently tested a huge collection of nuclear weapons as a threat to the USA and you expect them to immediately trust that state and help them get going?
People love to blame the USA for their own failures – and the USSR was their own failure. At the same time lets blame USA for not helping create a great society such as modern day Japan or Germany. lol. Russia has everything it needs in resources and human capital to succeed yet it fails because of it’s own decisions and frankly I find it depressing and would welcome a prosperous, functional Russia. Yet it spends all its time creating insane conspiracy about the USA because of its own ego problems, but also you expect the USA to come in and fix it and make it great….

Last edited 1 year ago by Stephen Wright
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

I do not know why you were down voted. Seems a reasonable analysis to me

polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago

To say that The Western powers miscalculated is an analysis that I think has merit. But Samir goes far beyond that. He is trying to clear Putin and his regime of responsibility for its actions. Putin is a grown man, and is as responsible for his actions as the rest of are for our actions. It is Putin’s army that is murdering women and children in The Ukraine – Not mine.

Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
1 year ago
Reply to  polidori redux

I do not think he is trying to clear Putin. I think he is offering a reasoned explanation of why we ended up where we are now in much the same way as historians explain the origins of the Second World War in terms of the failures at the end of the First Wold War.
Instead of extending an olive branch to the Russians following the collapse of communism the Americans took the opportunity not just to beat down on them but also to asset strip the country.
This may have been motivated by purely predatory instincts. Then again it could have been motivated to ensure that a prosperous and successful Russia did not emerge from the ashes as a global rival particularly with the likely outcome of Europe being weened off dependence on the US.
Before the invasion of the Ukraine I think the above analysis was fairly mainstream, and the invasion of the Ukraine does not make it any less valid. Nor does referencing the analysis make you a support of the invasion any more that critiquing the Treaty of Versailles makes one a supporter of Hitler.

Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
1 year ago
Reply to  polidori redux

I do not think he is trying to clear Putin. I think he is offering a reasoned explanation of why we ended up where we are now in much the same way as historians explain the origins of the Second World War in terms of the failures at the end of the First Wold War.
Instead of extending an olive branch to the Russians following the collapse of communism the Americans took the opportunity not just to beat down on them but also to asset strip the country.
This may have been motivated by purely predatory instincts. Then again it could have been motivated to ensure that a prosperous and successful Russia did not emerge from the ashes as a global rival particularly with the likely outcome of Europe being weened off dependence on the US.
Before the invasion of the Ukraine I think the above analysis was fairly mainstream, and the invasion of the Ukraine does not make it any less valid. Nor does referencing the analysis make you a support of the invasion any more that critiquing the Treaty of Versailles makes one a supporter of Hitler.

polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago

To say that The Western powers miscalculated is an analysis that I think has merit. But Samir goes far beyond that. He is trying to clear Putin and his regime of responsibility for its actions. Putin is a grown man, and is as responsible for his actions as the rest of are for our actions. It is Putin’s army that is murdering women and children in The Ukraine – Not mine.

Wim de Vriend
Wim de Vriend
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

“the West did, after all, choose option A in 1945 for the far more evil Germany and Japan.”
Granted that all three were loaded with evil, by that time already the USSR had accumulated an unsurpassable record of it, in the shooting of the Czar’s entire family, the civil war, the creation of the gulag archipelago, lethal slave-labor projects to create grandiose boondoggles, the violent suppression of religion, the manufactured famine in Ukraine, the late 1930s show trials, Stalin’s quotas for mass-executions of other disfavored groups and nationalities, his 1939 deal with Hitler that divided Poland between the two and started WWII, the Katyn massacres … I’m sure there was more yet, but does this help?

Last edited 1 year ago by Wim de Vriend
Dominic A
Dominic A
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

You must not think much of Russia & Russians if you think they couldn’t make it by themselves; you also seems to embue the USA/West with God like power. Japan & Germany rebuilt themselves after the war, and South Korea, China, many ex SSRs and other countries pulled themselves into relative wealth and happiness through their own choices.

CHARLES STANHOPE
CHARLES STANHOPE
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

“The underlying problem is that the West has always had a virulent contempt and hatred for the “inferior” Russians.”

Complete nonsense and a gross exaggeration. Our (England’s) first major chartered joint stock company was the Muscovy Company founded in 1555, (well before we got around to pillaging India). This Company happily traded with Russia up until 1917.

We also welcomed Peter the Great to the Royal Dockyard at Deptford to learn the ‘secrets’ of warship construction in the late 17th century.

During the Napoleonic Wars we were delighted with Czar’s massive contribution to the destruction of the Corsican pygmy.

True in the 19th century we became suspicious of Russian designs on the Mediterranean and also in Central Asia However we were quite happy to see them seize larger areas of China in the 1860’s.

In 1914 and 1941 we were delighted that they were our Allies were we not?

The only nation of the West with similar historical links is France and there is little evidence of them regarding the Russians as “inferiors”, particularly during the period 1970-1914.

Perhaps you are the confusing the “West’s contempt” with that say of England with regard to Scotland?

Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
1 year ago

In 1914 and 1941 we were delighted that they were our Allies were we not?
In 1941 I think Churchill justified the alliance with Russia in terms of making a favourable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons. He had no illusions about the nature of the Soviet regime.
In 1914 and even in the Napoleonic wars it was more a case of my enemies enemy is my friend.

CHARLES STANHOPE
CHARLES STANHOPE
1 year ago

Yes but I don’t think we thought of them as “inferiors”. Leaving aside our political ties, how could we, given their vast contribution to both literature and music?

CHARLES STANHOPE
CHARLES STANHOPE
1 year ago

Yes but I don’t think we thought of them as “inferiors”. Leaving aside our political ties, how could we, given their vast contribution to both literature and music?

Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
1 year ago

In 1914 and 1941 we were delighted that they were our Allies were we not?
In 1941 I think Churchill justified the alliance with Russia in terms of making a favourable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons. He had no illusions about the nature of the Soviet regime.
In 1914 and even in the Napoleonic wars it was more a case of my enemies enemy is my friend.

martin logan
martin logan
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Sorry, the character of Russians themselves determined their country’s fate in the 80s and 90s, not the cruel Dickensian West.
Both Germany and Japan lost millions in the war, and saw much of their industry obliterated. Yet neither Germans nor Japanese post-WW2 engaged in mass theft of every valuable enterprise. Both nations took decades to recover, but they also had something called Rule of Law.
In sharp contrast, Russia’s infrastructure was entirely intact, and it had not suffered millions of battlefield deaths. But Marxism, as practiced in Russia, made everyone a criminal in order to survive.
And because Putin never tried to change it, he’s destroyed his country.

polidori redux
polidori redux
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Oh dear! It really is the regime that is despised, Samir. And of course its apologists.

Ian Stewart
Ian Stewart
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Agree with you about the options, and we failed to pick A. But disagree with you about Putin – he’s a standard evil megalomaniac on a par with Stalin – and the submissive Russian culture unfortunately keeps producing these bampots.

Stephen Wright
Stephen Wright
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

The collapse of the USSR is a little different to the situations post WW2 Samir. You seriously think the USA could have gone in and taken control of that massive dysfunctional state? The West had just got through the Cold War by the skin of their teeth, where the USSR had stockpiled and insistently tested a huge collection of nuclear weapons as a threat to the USA and you expect them to immediately trust that state and help them get going?
People love to blame the USA for their own failures – and the USSR was their own failure. At the same time lets blame USA for not helping create a great society such as modern day Japan or Germany. lol. Russia has everything it needs in resources and human capital to succeed yet it fails because of it’s own decisions and frankly I find it depressing and would welcome a prosperous, functional Russia. Yet it spends all its time creating insane conspiracy about the USA because of its own ego problems, but also you expect the USA to come in and fix it and make it great….

Last edited 1 year ago by Stephen Wright
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
Ethniciodo Rodenydo
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

I do not know why you were down voted. Seems a reasonable analysis to me

Wim de Vriend
Wim de Vriend
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

“the West did, after all, choose option A in 1945 for the far more evil Germany and Japan.”
Granted that all three were loaded with evil, by that time already the USSR had accumulated an unsurpassable record of it, in the shooting of the Czar’s entire family, the civil war, the creation of the gulag archipelago, lethal slave-labor projects to create grandiose boondoggles, the violent suppression of religion, the manufactured famine in Ukraine, the late 1930s show trials, Stalin’s quotas for mass-executions of other disfavored groups and nationalities, his 1939 deal with Hitler that divided Poland between the two and started WWII, the Katyn massacres … I’m sure there was more yet, but does this help?

Last edited 1 year ago by Wim de Vriend
Dominic A
Dominic A
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

You must not think much of Russia & Russians if you think they couldn’t make it by themselves; you also seems to embue the USA/West with God like power. Japan & Germany rebuilt themselves after the war, and South Korea, China, many ex SSRs and other countries pulled themselves into relative wealth and happiness through their own choices.

CHARLES STANHOPE
CHARLES STANHOPE
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

“The underlying problem is that the West has always had a virulent contempt and hatred for the “inferior” Russians.”

Complete nonsense and a gross exaggeration. Our (England’s) first major chartered joint stock company was the Muscovy Company founded in 1555, (well before we got around to pillaging India). This Company happily traded with Russia up until 1917.

We also welcomed Peter the Great to the Royal Dockyard at Deptford to learn the ‘secrets’ of warship construction in the late 17th century.

During the Napoleonic Wars we were delighted with Czar’s massive contribution to the destruction of the Corsican pygmy.

True in the 19th century we became suspicious of Russian designs on the Mediterranean and also in Central Asia However we were quite happy to see them seize larger areas of China in the 1860’s.

In 1914 and 1941 we were delighted that they were our Allies were we not?

The only nation of the West with similar historical links is France and there is little evidence of them regarding the Russians as “inferiors”, particularly during the period 1970-1914.

Perhaps you are the confusing the “West’s contempt” with that say of England with regard to Scotland?

martin logan
martin logan
1 year ago
Reply to  Samir Iker

Sorry, the character of Russians themselves determined their country’s fate in the 80s and 90s, not the cruel Dickensian West.
Both Germany and Japan lost millions in the war, and saw much of their industry obliterated. Yet neither Germans nor Japanese post-WW2 engaged in mass theft of every valuable enterprise. Both nations took decades to recover, but they also had something called Rule of Law.
In sharp contrast, Russia’s infrastructure was entirely intact, and it had not suffered millions of battlefield deaths. But Marxism, as practiced in Russia, made everyone a criminal in order to survive.
And because Putin never tried to change it, he’s destroyed his country.

Samir Iker
Samir Iker
1 year ago

“Ronald Reagan infamously called it an “evil empire”, run by people who “preach the supremacy of the State, declare its omnipotence over individual”
Ah, the irony. If he could see what views are espoused and imposed by certain influential groups in Western politics and academia.

The crossroads in history, the what if moment, was not the collapse of the USSR. In retrospect, that was bound to happen.

The biggest decision point rather was what happened AFTER that. Whether
A. the Western countries would step in to help Russia become strong and prosperous. Or
B. Enjoy the spectacle as Russia imploded, while encouraging “businessmen” to loot the country and “invest” those billions in London and elsewhere.

What we are reaping today is the impact of the West choosing option B. But not only that decision, but the mindset behind it.
Because the West did, after all, choose option A in 1945 for the far more evil Germany and Japan (at that time).

The underlying problem is that the West has always had a virulent contempt and hatred for the “inferior” Russians.
All the talk of evil Putin and how he is going to invade Sweden, scratch the surface and you soon figure out it’s not the leader but his people that are detested.
There is no way the West would have pumped in the equivalent of a Marshall plan to help Russia become powerful and robust. Ironically, that would have made Russia much more pro West, immensely strengthened the Western coalition, and cost far LESS than what the West are burning in Ukraine. But that would have meant considering the Russians as equals.

Last edited 1 year ago by Samir Iker