mat@hou5d.UUCP (11/03/83)
Being caught up in arguments and questions, etc about Grenada and Cuba and the USSR, I got to wondering. The USSR is known for oppressing its people as well as the people of the lads that it rules by might and terror. Food shortages are the order of the day in the USSR and its satellites; alchohlism is said to be rampant, ... . Question is, did other large empires in history face these problems in the chronic fashion that the Soviet Union does? Has lightr-speed communications made Soviet mismanagement more effective (?) than the management/mismanagement of the empires of Ghengis Khan or the Caesers or Napoleon (who was supposed to have been a masterful logistician) or ... ? Kind of wondering, Mark Terribile hou5d!mat Duke Of deNet
notes@fortune.UUCP (11/08/83)
#R:hou5d:-72900:fortune:17300007:000:197 fortune!norskog Nov 7 17:54:00 1983 The Soviet Union is the first empire in history which supplies its satellites, rather than the other way around. It is squandering its vast but mismanaged resources on small mismanaged colonies.
mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor) (11/16/83)
===== The Soviet Union is the first empire in history which supplies its satellites, rather than the other way around. It is squandering its vast but mismanaged resources on small mismanaged colonies. ===== References, please? I had the impression that the USSR was bleeding its European satellites pretty badly, not to mention Russia taking advantage of the rest of the Soviet Union. Martin Taylor
eich@uiuccsb.UUCP (11/20/83)
#R:hou5d:-72900:uiuccsb:11000061:000:1018 uiuccsb!eich Nov 17 11:15:00 1983 /***** uiuccsb:net.politics / fortune!notes / 9:50 pm Nov 8, 1983 */ The Soviet Union is the first empire in history which supplies its satellites, rather than the other way around. It is squandering its vast but mismanaged resources on small mismanaged colonies. /* ---------- */ Wrong. The Soviets, through such tricks as the `transferable ruble' that they foisted on the Poles a few years back, which was undervalued by 30% in the terms of the agreement and was not transferable, have been siphoning off the fruits of their satellites' production. Some rural Polish communist party officials reported this a few months before martial law. The particular result was an unnatural scarcity (Polish farmers would only produce enough food for their own needs, because there were no goods to buy with profit from surplus effort); this compounded the usual dreary performance of planned economies in the east (Hungary is an exception, owing to economic liberalization), and helped contribute to Solidarity's rise.