Russia is the world’s largest exporter of wheat and second-largest exporter of weapons. Ignorant comments like these do nothing to reduce tensions between Russians and the West.
Oops, forgot about wheat -- that's a real concern. I was going to add weapons to my list but it was more along the lines of "consumer oriented" goods.
On the other hand, my comment does diddly squat to our relations. Please go on and explain how I'm contributing to international tensions with my not-fully-informed question.
Russian literature, ballet, gymnastics, classical music among other things. Come on, you can't possibly equate a 144M country with gas, vodka or Putin.