[thriftwy]

You can't control a 200 mln strong nation from 100 mln remote location with different language. One thing that had zero chance of working in XX century.

Moreover, Allies will meanwhile fick said Germany with rake. That's actually what got Russia, being biggest fish in a pond and unstable at the same time.

[coldtea]

>You can't control a 200 mln strong nation from 100 mln remote location with different language.

And yet, a few western powers had enslaved and controlled 2/3rd of the world.

[thriftwy]

That wasn't in XX century however. They were universally gone by mid-century.

Russia is a crypto colony of UK anyway, so no way it could be worse.

[coldtea]

>That wasn't in XX century however. They were universally gone by mid-century.

Mostly because of those pesky Bolsheviks being a new worry of the colonial powers, standing in as an idea that their rule can end, and socialism inspiring all kinds of anti-colonial national revolutions (from Vietnam to China, and from Africa to Latin America). So, there's that.

Besides, neo-colonialism still dominates the developing world. It's the bigger fish like India, Japan, China, Brazil and a few others like Indonesia, that got away from it and managed (more or less successfully) to take their fate into their own hands instead of being played and meddled.

[thriftwy]

You know what? I don't care if colonialism stayed, if it also made Bolsheviks in Russia go away. I would be just happy.

I didn't get anything for me out of this decolonization-by-communist-competition deal. Anything but humiliation.

[mythrwy]

I think the population of India in 1890 was nearly 300 million. Controlled from thousands of miles away by a tiny island and had been for a long time.

If Russia had still been at the state they were in 1912 they may well have gotten rolled by the Axis. Perhaps the appearance of the Bolsheviks saved them from that fate. We'll never know for sure.

I'm not a Bolshevik supporter btw. I'm aware they caused a lot of suffering and I don't attempt to justify that.

[thriftwy]

> If Russia had still been at the state they were in 1912 they may well have gotten rolled by the Axis

Wut?? They didn't the first time. What makes you think second time is the charm? Without a crippling 10 years civil war, Russia will have a huge head start.

But even if they did, I doubt it would be worse than what we have now. You can infer that what we have now is pretty bad.

They did roll Poland. Does Poland have it worse than Russia? Nope, the opposite is true. French understood that and abstained from the fight.

[coldtea]

>But even if they did, I doubt it would be worse than what we have now. You can infer that what we have now is pretty bad.

Today's Russia would be worse than a Nazi-occupied Russia?

It's a typical eastern European country, with the typical corruption and political power patterns that come with it. Nothing more, nothing less, except its size.

The image of Russia as some global rogue power is ludicrous, especially coming from a global rogue power itself, which has invaded, occupied, took the oil, toppled, etc, places tons of miles outside its borders for the best part of the last 30 years, creating a hell of a mess in the process.

>French understood that and abstained from the fight.

That's a novel way to look at WWII. Perhaps somebody should have told the allies that all those sacrifices and blood toll wasn't needed, because they'd win anyway.

[thriftwy]

Nazi occupation won't stick. That's unprecedented in modern world.

No. Russia has it worse than any other Eastern European country. Shorter life span, worse wealth inequality, higher incidents of murder and drug use, AIDS epidemy, weaker political system. We're done pretty well. That's the result of the whole communist XX century.