Sort is that, sort of isn't. I've heard that the major reason the USSR collapsed was because they tried to outspend the US with numerous programs that simply didn't need to happen (such as the Space Race and the production of far more nuclear war head then were really needed). Lets say that from day 1, the USSR did not do this and that all spending was reasonable and practical.
So, with that in mind:

1. Was this (in your view) one of the major things that would have prevented the collapse of the USSR?
2. Would the Cold War have gotten Hot?
3. Would the USSR still be around?
4. Would the USSR have put up a 'Great Fire Wall of Russia'?
5. Would the USSR have supported al Qaeda and the Taliban in Iraq and Afghanistan (respectively) as a way to continue the war by proxy that happened in Korea and Vietnam?
6. Would 9/11 have even happened, or would some influence of the USSR have prevented/altered the events?
7. Would you move to the USSR?
8. Would conflict have started with China over it's economic cooperation with the US?
9. Would the USSR be affected by the current depression?
10. Would the presence of the USSR have affected the economic policy of the US enough to have altered/prevented the depression?
11. If the USSR hadn't collapsed, how popular do you think Reagan would be?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057012/quotes

You know, me trying to stimulate the forum will generally go easier for me if you actually respond. You have 11 questions you can answer Lensky.

Although it might sound like a dull economics 101 answer, the problem with the U.S.S.R. wasn't fundamentally spending too much on any particular project, but that the Soviet system didn't direct investment efficiently within the economy, thus ultimately economic growth fell behind that of the USA and they then couldn't keep up with the projects you mention.

WRT to the space programme, I'm not sure that the Russians ever did try to outspend America in that area. The U.S.S.R. was certainly ahead in a lot of areas for a long time, but the USA spent an absolute fortune sending men to the Moon and the U.S.S.R. never bothered to send a manned mission. Also the U.S.S.R. never used reusable space craft - another very expensive American prestige project (each mission cost more than a disposable rocket).

As for the quantity of nuclear weapons, well I wonder about the reasons for that. It could be that they were not of the same quality and tried to make up for this with numbers, but I'm not knowledgeable about such things, so I'll let someone else pick up that point. However, it could also just be that the Soviet system didn't really calculate the cost of such items as accurately as in the West. There were not proper market prices in the U.S.S.R., Gosplan and the bureaucracy would have just directed the resources required to build these things and some calculations would have been done on the cost, but without markets these things are exceedingly difficult to calculate. Quite possibly it was just a massive mis-allocation of resources leading the Russians to think they were ahead, when ultimately they were sowing the seeds of their future collapse.

Remember though, the Russians would have been pretty paranoid after their experiences in the civil war and then WWII. It's easy to see why they got carried away with defence.

The main point of the thread was the questions. You've both answered the first, but that was about it.

The Soviet space program, like the US one, served as a spur to development of technologies and was one of the few things the average Soviet citizen could be unequivocably proud of. The lead in warheads makes a bit more sense (but still isn't totally convincing) when you consider that the Soviets had more targets to hit than the US, like China. They were also an advantage of sorts in diplomacy, since part of diplomacy can be getting the other side to take your threats seriously.


I'm guessing you don't want to know why this is pretty unlikely?


Absolutely. If you somehow solve the economic problem, then all other problems disappear or have already been solved in the process.


The Cold War nearly ended in the 1960s-70s with detente, and it was coming to an end again with the Gorbachev period. Not only was a 'hot' war unlikely, it's likely the cold part was ending in favour of more traditional rivalry.


If it were, it would be in a form unrecognisable to its leaders/citizens in say, 1989. Some political tensions never go away, and one of those tensions is against autocratic systems which only gets worse when the economy goes through certain cycles, usually a collapse/depression, but also in a boom if the government is perceived as a fundamental barrier to a bigger boom.


This is a bit hard to forecast without knowing how the Soviets sort out their economy. The USSR was behind in terms of computer technology for a range of reasons, and early experiments with computer networks suggest that the Soviet government might have had a different vision to the internet. On the other hand, those experiments didn't exactly work... so maybe they end up with 'Google USSR' anyway .


No. The Soviets had fought the Taliban essentially before they even existed, in the form of Afghanistan's warlords. IIRC they weren't particularly close to fundamentalist terrorist groups in the Middle East either, prefering nominally Marxist groups. Maybe you could see them selling weapons to a state-based entity as part of a deal but they wouldn't be allies. Pretty much what Russia does with Iran today.


Assuming they could afford it, and the warlords never got organised, Afghanistan would still be under a pro-Soviet government. Najibullah managed to keep the 'core' of the country relatively secure after Soviet withdrawal thanks to aid in the form of arms, fuel and money. He was even able to go on the offensive against the warlords, who lacked central command/motivation and hence tended to turn on each other. Boris Yeltsin however pulled the plug, and without the trappings of a modern military the Afghan government was soon crushed. I suppose the situation is similar to the US with Vietnam. The failed Easter Offensive showed that with US support Saigon could stand, but in the end the government had become tired of it and cut aid, making way for the Ho Chi Minh campaign.

Anyway, no warlords, probably no Taliban and thus no Al Qaeda camp in Afghanistan. If they did exist they might have just kept fighting locally. I suppose Al Qaeda might have set up shop elsewhere, but Afghanistan was a pretty good deal for them.


Probably not. Maybe go there on business... I'm assuming their tolerance of foreign businesses would eventually improve.


More likely to see rapproachment, since the 'triangle' dynamic was collapsed by that stage. The Chinese and USSR wouldn't be readily played against each other, and neither was as fundamentally anti-US as they had been, by the late 1980s. Perhaps China and the latter day USSR would make good initial markets for each other? Reduce the dependence on US/European capital and markets and give a boost early in the piece when neither could build to overseas market expectations.


Too hard to tell.


I think the seeds of the current US crisis were sown in the 1980s, and I don't see why the USSR would have offset their development path.


He would probably still be unfairly credited with any progress in relations with the USSR. Probably more emphasis on 'tear down this wall' instead of the new arms race.

Next time fewer questions please.

Hey, I just named a few things that spending was made on, that it didn't actually have to be made on. And I've heard that the combined nuclear arsinal of the US and USSR is enough to make the earth uninhabitable 100 times over. Seems a little unreasonable to me. And the invasion of Afghanistan is now coming to mind as a better example of something that was basically a waste of money.



This is a hypothetical, practicality doesn't matter.



Sorry.

I think this depends on fallout and such, which is fairly heavily debated in terms of effects and quantities. Nuclear brinkmanship also had an apocalyptical logic of its own, the ability to destroy the enemy no matter how freakishly luck they got in trying to destroy you first is part of that. Perhaps the only way for a weapon that 'no one would ever use' could be taken seriously was to pose a totally disproportionate risk?


Not quite. Like the US in Vietnam, Afghanistan could be seen as a test for the USSR.
1. Would it 'stand up' to Islamic extremism (just as the US had to 'stand up' to communism in Vietnam)?
2. Would it support an ally, and an explicitly communist one at that? IIRC Taraki had requested Soviet troops to enter prior to his assassination (might have been someone else)
Failing to do either could have damaged their standing in the world and domestically.

Afghanistan was probably also perceived as a threat to the other 'stans' that were part of the USSR. Regional seperatism was already a problem, and a war in Afghanistan could destablise neighbouring states either with the war itself spreading, or refugees and such. Last but by no means least, the Soviets had no idea that Afghanistan was going to be such a hard job. They probably figured it would be like Hungary. Only with hindsight is it so apparent that it was a tough job.

That's all true, but 100 times is still a bit much.



Interesting that both failed. I don't know if the Soviets had the same problem as the US, but one of the biggest problems we probably had in Vietnam was that we decided to invade a country we knew nothing about (Few people knew much about the history, culture, or geography of the country, for example). Had we known, we would have probably thought twice about sending in troops, or atleast how we invaded.

Yes and no. They both certainly lost a lot of credibility in terms of military prowess, but both did demonstrate that they would 'step up'. Poland, which was also in a state bordering on rebellion in the early 1980s appears to have taken the threat of Soviet intervention seriously enough. Maybe not so if Afghanistan had fallen?

To get back on track, this political dimension was one of the great barriers for Soviet reform. For example no leader wanted to be seen as abandoning socialism/communism, so some reforms were dismissed out of hand, like dismantling the kholkozy. Even before we get into the murk of interest group politics there were broad forces against reform.

Eh, I've not spent much time studying the history of the USSR, so I'm not in much position to argue.