Henry Kissinger, Colossus on the World Stage
The late statesman was a master of realpolitik—whom some regarded as a war criminal. Read More Here
Tag: Soviet Union
End Of An Era: Gorbachev Is Dead
The last leader — Secretary General — of the Soviet Union was also, in many ways the architect of the superpower’s collapse. Mikhail Gorbachev has died Gorbachev’s Disputed Legacy Mikhail Gorbachev, Soviet Leader Who Ended Cold War, Dies at 91 Turning Point At Chernobyl The Revolution And Perestroika
Southeast Asia’s New-Old Cold War
The Soviet Union lost the Cold War, but China is now giving the West a run for its money in the sequel. And, as with the twentieth century’s decades-long superpower conflict, Southeast Asia is once again emerging as a major theater. Read More Here
Xi Jinping Won’t Let His Communist Cadres Forget Soviet Humiliation
After the Sixth Plenum, Xi Jinping’s “Historical Resolution” makes it clear that he views the telling of Chinese Communist Party history as a tool of regime survival—to succeed where Moscow failed. Read More Here
How A Great Power Falls Apart
All countries end. Every society has its own rock bottom, obscured by darkness until impact is imminent. Already in the sixth century, Amalrik wrote, goats were grazing in the Roman Forum. As a theorist of his own condition, he was in many ways a fatalist. He believed that the Soviet Union lacked the nimbleness to engage in system-shaking reform […]
The Jokes Always Saved Us: Humour In The Time Of Stalin
Stalinism. The word conjures dozens of associations, and ‘funny’ isn’t usually one of them. The ‘S-word’ is now synonymous with brutal and all-encompassing state control that left no room for laughter or any form of dissent. And yet, countless diaries, memoirs and even the state’s own archives reveal that people continued to crack jokes about […]
The Island That Changed History
There was once an uninhabited islet lying close to the Chinese side of the Ussuri River, which marks the border between Russia and China in the Far East. “Was,” because it has since attached itself to the Chinese bank in a defiant act of geographic irony. But during the turbulent spring of 1969 this little […]
How U.S., Soviets, India, Pakistan Vied To Shape A New Afghanistan In Late 1980s
U.S. Ambassadors Dean and Raphel warned Washington unconditional support to Pakistan and fundamentalist factions of mujahedin was destabilising the region. The Reagan administration supported India’s active role in connection with Soviet withdrawal, but changed position when Delhi tried to keep extreme fundamentalists from coming to power. Pakistan’s nuclear weapons program was major Indian concern in […]
The New Disappeared
From the military juntas that ruled Argentina and Chile in the 1970s and 1980s to Joseph Stalin’s iron-fisted regime in the Soviet Union, dictatorships have a long history of making their detractors “disappear.” Today, this sinister practice seems to be making a comeback. Read Here – Project Syndicate
Trump’s Soviet Approach To Intelligence
Collecting intelligence for someone who doesn’t want it is at best a waste of money, and at worst a prescription for disaster. Again, the Soviet example is a good one. In the lead-up to the second World War, and repeatedly during the war years, the Soviet Union squandered intelligence from the best spy network ever. […]
looking beyond borders 