Questions tagged [soviet-union]
The Union of Soviet Socialists Republic (USSR), was more commonly known as the Soviet Union worldwide. Best known for being a Communist state, it played a large role in world affairs in the intervening years between the end of World War II and its disbanding in 1992. Use this tag to refer to the Soviet government only. Use the [russian-federation] tag for the successor government.
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"Communism in the Soviet Union, China, etc., wasn't real communism" - is that true? [closed]
To my knowledge, communism is a classless society in which everyone contributes and receives according to their ability and needs.
When people bring up the Soviet Union or China as examples where ...
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How do Realists explain US intervention in the Korean War?
Many sources argue that President Harry Truman went into Korea to prevent the conquest of an independent nation by the communist North. His motivations stemmed from the urge to resist the advancing ...
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Did Soviet Union ever apologize for its alliance with Germany before 1941?
Inspired by the similar question about Poland.
We all know what Soviet Union and Nazi Germany became deadly enemies, but this is after A. Hitler broke all agreements and invaded.
Looks like before ...
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What else did Zhou Enlai say about the Czech-Soviet situation (Romanian embassy in Beijing on 23 August 1968)? Is an English translation available?
Fizz's answer to Has post-revolutionary China ever backed down in international (plus SARs, TAR and cross-straits) affairs? quotes Wikipedia's Sino-Soviet border conflict; Eastern border: Heilongjiang ...
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Soviet funding for Communists
Russia has spent over $300 million on influencing foreign elections since 2014, US officials say
How does this amount compare with the money that the USSR spent on supporting various communist parties ...
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Were treaties made with the Soviet Union automatically applicable to Russia?
Motivated by this other question which refers to a peace treaty made with the Soviet Union.
The Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. What then happened with the treaties made with the Soviet Union: were ...
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Does Putin want to restore the USSR?
Joe Biden's speech in Poland has attracted much attention due to some of his off-cuff remarks (see, e.g., the discussion here). I found another curious passage:
A dictator bent on rebuilding an ...
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Does the US designate Russia as an *authoritarian state*?
Russia is frequently called authoritarian - in discourse by western politicians, in the news and in casual discussions. Is it however officially designated by the US (or any western country) as an ...
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Why had Soviet Union always sided with India?
Soviet Union and present day Russia is always regarded as close ally of India.
It is well demonstrated by the 6 Soviet vetoed UN resolutions against India.
Even when India declared it's policy of non-...
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Why is Russia not considered a European Country?
Russia looks very much like mainland Europe, it dresses like mainland Europe, but it is not considered part of Europe. This is not a recent phenomenon. Even since the time of the Tzar's, especially ...
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What was the effect of the fall of the Soviet Union on African economies?
In a speech about Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Jordan Peterson claims that the fall of the Soviet Union had a very good effect on Africa, he claims that African economies are booming like mad now and that ...
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Do/did former Soviet republic leaders generally attend the May Victory Day parade in Moscow?
It's been noted in a 2017 article that that year only Moldovan president Dodon attended the May Victory Day parade in Moscow:
Dodon was also the only head of state from the former Soviet republics in ...
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Why do one-party states still have a party at all?
In single-party states like the former eastern bloc (Soviet Union, East Germany, ...), there is only one dominant party. One thing that has always bothered me is that this is a contradiction in itself:...
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What obligations does Russia have towards the cleanup /maintenance of Chernobyl?
As a successor state of the USSR, what legal responsibilities does the Russian Federation have towards aiding the cleanup of Chernobyl and the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone(such as rehabilitation, building ...
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What is the symbology of this pin?
I found this recently among old belongings and can't remember when or where I received it. Very curious about its source but more importantly its symbology. Sorry if this is the wrong place, there's ...
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Why does Russia choose to depend on the Bosporus Strait for shipping?
According to the Wikipedia article on the proposed Istanbul Canal, it is said that the Bosporus has nearly 3 times the amount of ship traffic as the Suez Canal. Presumably this ship traffic comes ...
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Why does Russia have so many nuclear weapons? [closed]
In the Cold War, Soviet Russia produced 55,000 nukes, and it made 30,000 warheads in 1991. [Source]
Russia became one of the nations to have the largest nuclear stockpile and it has a deteriorating ...
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Who controlled the Soviet Army when the Russian Federation was created?
At 41m55s in this video, it is said that after the Russian Supreme Council voted to leave the USSR there was a period of dual authority. During this period when the Soviet Union wasn't completely ...
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During the breakup of the Soviet Union, on what basis was citizenship granted or withheld for each of the fifteen new republics?
The politics and economics of the Soviet Union caused large numbers of people to be transplanted from one region to another, for example:
The Crimean Tatars were deported to Central Asia;
Ethnic ...
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Why do so many Russians approve of Joseph Stalin's regime?
I read polls suggesting that 70% of Russians today support Joseph Stalin's actions when he was in charge of the Soviet Union as its Premier. Why is his approval rating so high in Russia despite of all ...
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Does the talent or luck of Egypt's political leaders explain why Egypt hasn't experienced a 1917 like the one experienced by the Russian Empire? [closed]
We will return to the question of the title, and it is the primary question, but I would like to begin the train of thought with a somewhat different question:
Was it negligent for Jewish people to ...
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Soviet or Russian equivalent of the Church Committee?
Following the Watergate scandal in 1972, the US senate created a select committee (the Church Committee) to investigate the abuse of power by US intelligence agencies.
Has there ever been a Soviet ...
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Why does North Korea test their nuclear weapons underground?
When the U.S. and the Soviet Union were testing their nuclear bombs during the Cold War, they did the testing above ground. Why does North Korea test their nuclear weapons below ground, and how is it ...
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Why was procedure so important under Stalin's regime?
In Nadezhas Mandelstams memoir of life under Stalin's totalitarian regime, she wrote:
Procedure meant a great deal to our rulers, and the whole farrago of nonsense was meticulously committed to ...
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What's the highest level of official recognition that an African country gave to their "brothers" in the US?
I'm guessing that some African countries might have given their "brothers" (see further below a discussion what this could possibly mean) over the Atlantic, meaning African Americans, some kind of ...
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Could countries rejoin a new Soviet Union? [closed]
Since countries like Hungary and Poland are having arguments with the EU at the moment about things like immigration, might they quit the EU or even be pushed away towards Russia and a new Soviet ...
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Why do one party states hold elections? [duplicate]
A comment on this question led me to think. Why do one party states hold elections? And why is voter turnout so important to them?
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How did Russia retain the UNSC veto power of the Soviet Union?
I am not sure what the criteria are to be a permanent member of the UN Security Council, but I do wonder how did Russia manage to keep its veto power after the dissolution of the Soviet Union?
I ...
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Defining fascism in the background of communism [duplicate]
We have an intense discussion going on between the fact of whether the Soviet Union was a fascist state or not.
Our doubt lies in fascism as an opposite to communism and we wonder if the Soviet ...
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What percentage of Soviet immigrants to the US are Jews?
Let me start off the bat by saying that this question is NOT about Russian Federation, it is NOT about Judaism (the religion) and it is not about Putin's recent (possibly mistranslated) comments about ...
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International opinion on the fall of the USSR
I am familiar with the American narrative that president Reagan (or perhaps the Hoff) was personally responsible for the collapse of the USSR. However, I am less familiar with international opinions ...
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Did most French people change their opinion about who contributed most to the defeat of Nazi Germany?
Did most French people change their opinion about who contributed most to the defeat of Nazi Germany? It seems implausible, but I have found many sources citing this image:
The title translates to: ...
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Why was homosexuality unacceptable in USSR?
USSR was all about fighting for the working class rights against capitalism being inherently multicultural - so there seems to be nothing in its ideology that would go directly against homosexuality. ...
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Left, right change on Russia
In the 60's the left was always politically closer to Russia, now it seems the right (Trump, LePenn, etc) are more pro Russia. Why?
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Does it make sense to label Lenin as a 'social democrat'?
I am confused by tim's great answer to this question on Bernie Sanders's political orientations. To summarize the answer, though Sanders labels himself as a socialist, it seems that social democrat ...
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Why did the former SSR countries like Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia face no trouble joining NATO and EU?
Why did the former SSR countries like Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia face no trouble from Russia to join NATO and EU, while countries like Georgia and Ukraine facing Russian military invasions?
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Why are almost all of the United Nations headquarters located in Europe or America?
Why are almost all of the United Nations headquarters located in Europe or America?
Why aren't there any headquarter of UN department in Asia or Latin America or Africa?
See this Wikipedia list:
user4514
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Why have the Venona materials not yet vindicated McCarthyism?
Even though, Joseph McCarthy's efforts were perfectly in line with Truman's "Loyalty Order" -- Executive Order 9835 -- as well as the public disclosures of the Venona project (in 1995).
Why has the ...
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Evidences proving or refuting the role of Russian KGB in creation of the modern day leftist ideology?
There are people who believe that much of modern leftism boils down to anti-western sentiment.
For example, ex-KGB agent Yurl Bezmenov has gone on record (video, YouTube, 1h 20m) stating that the ...
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What is the basis for Putin describing the collapse of the Soviet Union as "the greatest geopolitical catastrophe" of the 20th century?
what is the basis for this commonly-quoted statement by Vladimir Putin? As reported on Politifact:
Above all, we should acknowledge that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a major geopolitical ...
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What is the legal background for Russia's seat as a Permanent Member of UNSC?
At the UN's founding in 1945, the Soviet Union became one of the five permanent members of the Security Council.
When in December 1991, the Soviet Union collapsed, the Russia was arguably recognized ...
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What are the ideological differences between the Soviet Union and Noam Chomsky?
What the Soviet Union used to be is usually considered a socialist state.
Noam Chomsky is a political activist who is also considered a socialist.
Still, Noam Chomsky appears to have a very ...
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Soviet Union, state capitalism and socialism [closed]
I believe that the soviet union really wasn't socialism, it was redefined to mean state capitalism. And I think state capitalism and socialism are inconsistent. Socialism always meant that workers ...
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How significant was the contribution of crime rate on the breakup of the USSR?
For the generation born in the 1970s in the USSR it was not uncommon to have nearly all of the classmates to be imprisoned for various crimes either during the school years or shortly thereafter. This ...
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Why do Communist states (e.g. USSR, China) oppose religion so much?
Why did both communist people and Communist states oppose religion so much, sometimes with violence and arson. There are many other secular non-Communist states in the world that do not have such a ...
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Has the world ever seen pure Communism? [closed]
I'm not an expert in politics so there are a few gaps in my understanding of the subject, but I was thinking that all the so called communist countries that have been around don't seem to me to be ...
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How many non-partisan (independent) legislature members in the USA compared to the USSR? [closed]
How many legislature members who are not members of any party in the USA compared to the USSR?
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Do "closed cities" exist outside the former Soviet Union?
A closed city is a city to which foreign residents and perhaps even domestic residents cannot travel freely. Wikipedia has an informative article on closed cities. The list of closed cities today ...
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