I was in the Soviet Union twice before my journey to the USA. It was not all that bad. Of course it might have been different for visitors who had hard currency and were able to exchange these to Rubles and spend time in hotels in the SU. But it is my opinion that it was much worse that came after the SU during the Yeltsin era, I am glad he resigned in the end of 1999.
Here is something that came after the Soviet Union, not so nice.
It is interesting that my thoughts happened in 1999. Back in March 1999 when I was still married in the USA I told my former US spouse in France that Boris Yeltsin must be fired in six months, it took nine months and Boris Yeltsin resigned. Back in the summer of 1999 I wrote on the net that Russia needs a strong leader and soon after this Vladimir Putin became the Prime Minister and later the President of Russia. He has been in power since 1999, 16 years, and so my thoughts became true. The fact was that Boris Yeltsin had surrounded himself with wrong people such as Boris Berezovsky who was also the head of some security committee of the post Soviet states which was a totally wrong choice. Boris Berezovsky wanted just money for himself and was eventually exiled from Russia and hanged himself in a restroom of his London mansion few years ago I suppose it was.
Back when Russia was the Soviet Union I was emphatic that we spend more on defense. We did, and things worked out well. Now, I just as emphatic that we take a less confrontational approach to Russia. If Russia was medling in Mexico or Canada the way we are in the Ukraine we would react with vigor. We shouldn’t be in the Black Sea. Michael Gorbechev changed Russia’s direction and took real risks for peace. It’s easy to see how Russia would feel we betrayed that by pushing the frontiers of NATO right up to their borders.
I think that the whole situation in Mexico has gone badly wrong. I was in Acapulco in 1991 and it was a peaceful tourist city, but today they have a lot of violence in the area which surely affects its tourism. Sadly to say but the main market for these drugs going through Mexico is America. Somehow I view that the USA has not in any way won the war on drugs, but it has become worse as years have passed. I am happy that I have never seen any drugs in my life, but I am sure that this drug problem in America is quite widespread in the same way as it is in Russia. Countries have not just been able to influence people not to buy any illegal drugs,
I think that the USA is a member of this Western alliance that tries to influence governments of the post Soviet states such as Ukraine, Georgia and so on to move towards the European Union. When I was young back in the early 1990s I was also on the side of the enlargement of the EU, but not any longer. There are many problems with the EU as the financial crisis of Greece has shown us. Some nations such as Denmark, Sweden and Norway have never become the member of the EU or if they have they have not adapted EURO and it looks like these nations are doing much better than some other EU nations. Ukraine should choose the path of the independency without efforts to become the member of the EU or EURO, but sadly their financial situation after this latest revolution in 2014 has just become worse. Quite frankly in these EU enlargement matters I do not know who to believe any longer.
You’re forgeting there’s Europe in-between. Things don’t look so safe from here. Russia has invaded a free European country that was only trying to westernize itself. And they won’t even admit what they’re doing. Why? Because the know it’s wrong. And aggressive. If Russia wanted peace, well they already had it before they chose to attack other people.