From: jaskew@spam.ua.oz (Joseph Askew)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.misc
Subject: Re: The collapse of communism and the role of the U.S.
Summary: I'll buy that
Date: 17 Dec 92 00:10:53 GMT
Followup-To: talk.politics.misc
Distribution: world
Organization: Statistics, Pure & Applied Mathematics, University of Adelaide

In article <lisr99INNn7p@spim.mti.sgi.com> mpolen@suntory.mti.sgi.com (Mike Polen) writes:
>Joseph Askew) writes:
>|> Julie Kangas) writes:
>|>
>|> >I think it might be better to say the western ideology won the
>|> >Cold War.  The West was not the only one fighting against Communism.
>|> >Yeltsin and his people were working from the inside to try to destroy
>|> >it for quite some time.
>|>
>|> Since when was Yeltsin working from the inside to destroy Communism? Since
>|> 1977? Since 1965?
>|> The truth is he was a life long Communist Apparatchik who deserted the CPSU
>|> like a rat from a sinking ship and has done very well for himself since. But
>|> only after the Collapse was obvious. And exactly who are 'his people'? All
>|> those refuseniks? dissenters? What does it take to be included as one of 'his
>|> people'?
>|>

>As with everything else, this is a complex system with thousands of
>variables.  To assign credit or blame to any of them is hardly worth
>the effort.  Frankly, I thought Gorby had a lot to do with it, and
>the above exchange implies he didn't exist.

I certainly think it is very hard to assign credit and blame, it is even
harder to do it in a fair and impartial manner. An English historian once
said that Napoleon's reign was too soon to write about impartially and I
would definitely apply that to the USSR. I am not sold on Gorbachev either.
I think there is too much mindless idolisation of him and Yeltsin. It is a
sign of the trivalisation of news and information that all the media can do
is say "He's our boy" or "What a hero"!

>How about back to the original thread which assigned credit for the
>collapse of communism to Reagan and Bush.  The implication, of course,
>is that if we had elected Democratic Presidents, Communism would not
>have collapsed.  In fact, Communism might have won and Western
>"Democracies" would have collapsed.  Interesting theory, but
>untestable and unsupportable.

I agree about the untestable stuff! As for the claims of the Republicans
I would point out that Soviet lifeexpectancies had been declining for a
long time. Indeed the USSR stopped publishing them, making them in effect
a State secret, in the late 70's when the average Russian had a lower
life expectancy than a Russian in the 60's. Now health care is a serious
matter. If they are too imcompetant and/or corrupt to run a medical system
properly - even for those who can pay - then they aren't going to last
long. The Republicans are like the thief who stands on the slain giant
after the hero has killed him, crowing of his success. The USSR would
have collasped regardless. Maybe Reagan et al sped the process up a little
maybe not. In any case it wasn't worth destroying the US economy over.


Joseph Askew


-- 
Joseph Askew, Gauche and Proud  Barbarian horns draw out the northern wind;
jaskew@spam.maths.adelaide.edu  Paler than water lies the Thistle Pass;
Disclaimer? Sue, see if I care  Sky swallows up the road to Kokonor;
One China One Korea One Eire32  Moonlight, a thousand miles along the Wall.
Xref: sparky talk.politics.misc:63986 rec.humor:36291