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T. A. R. G. E. T. GIFT. CARD!
I know you want a gift card from target!! I just need to know which one!
I guess being a global pariah has some drawbacks.
In Soviet Russia, (bad) idea execute you
In Putin's Russia bad idea execute you
FTFY
Ees same
Legit question: is Putin's Russia actually worse than Soviet in terms of the disappearing and defenestration and shit?
Putin can only dream of achieving the levels of evil Stalin did. However, life of a nonpolitical commoner may have been a little more hopeful in the old days.
When Stalin committed genocide in Ukraine, he took their grain harvest and left them to starve. When Putin commits genocide in Ukraine, he ships their children to "reeducation" camps in Russia. He wants to make them Russian. The scale is entirely different.
I just find these assholes amazing in that they would have zero peace or abillity to relax the way they escalate the shit out of creating a dystopia. Stalin was drinking so much and forcing his buddies to basically drown themselves in alcohol on the daily, like, who wins from all this?
Madness!
Putin's Russia is more gentle on its own population, but it is potentially more dangerous internationally. Soviet Union more or less abided by the rules of international order, contributed to the demise of old-world imperialism, and almost never issued nuclear threats. Putin's Russia is an outright bandit state, openly ignoring any international rules and conducting acts of terror - like the Islamic State. If not stopped now, it can start in the future a devastating world war without any remorse.
@Ulara @cheese_greater Not really sure it is true that it is more gentle on its own population as a blanket statement. That would depend on the era we are talking about. Stalin certainly was worse but Gorbachev wasn't.
That guy had some balls, holy shit.
Yes, the Gorbachev era was a golden time of unheard of freedom and international cooperation. You could observe how people joyfully opened up to new opportunities.
Hilarious that the country that not so long ago tried to force the west to pay them in Rubles now has to take Rupees as payment and has a "preferred" currency of Yuan. Russia is getting bent over so hard by India and China. It's basically a vassal state to China now.
It’s basically a vassal state to China now
This is really true. China had just released a new standard map (they do this every other year), and on the map it included Russian territories. Namely the islands of Bolshoy Ussuriysky, located in at the confluence of the Amur and the Ussuri, and right next to the major Russian city of Khabarovsk, has given it great strategic importance.
The island was taken by the Russian in the 1860s, and China have been wanting it back ever since. The two countries had signed a agreement in 2004 which China takes the souther part of the island while Russian take the north. But now the Chinese map shows the whole area as Chinese and the Russians are not making a beep. Currently its just political move, but it ultimately might be a start where China seek to take back its lands while Russia is weakened.
How indebted are the Russians to the Chinese now.
They're completely at the mercy of the Chinese government which tightly controls the Yuan
They're getting deeper into debt with Chinese banks, borrowing the equivalent of USD$10 billion as of last March, although the article doesn't say what currency the loans are in. Likely USD$.
To put that amount into perspective, Russia's USD$ currency reserves were about $599 billion as of May 2023.
The Chinese economy isn't doing so hot either
And tossing billions into the black hole that is Russia probably won't help those banks stay financially stable.
I thought the US had like 20 trillion in debt. 10 billion seems pretty small
It's not the amount of the debt it is the ratio of debt to gdp. Russians gdp is not huge.
They're talking about foreign currency reserves. Basically to buy stuff on the global market you need an exchangeable currency that people trade in. This is mostly USD. It's getting increasingly hard for Russia to buy goods internationally because a ton of their foreign currency reserves were seized. Coupled with the fact that no one wants to take their currency now.
The figures the comment you replied to is discussing is the foreign currency reserves. Not debt. A lot of the economic collapses we see these days are because the local currency devalues in USD and they run through their stockpile of USD. Ones this happens they have a real hard to buying anything with their unstable currency no one wants to accept.
"Sorry, Russia! I don't give credit! Come back when you're a little... mmm... richer!" - Morshu when Russia tried to buy some bombs from him.
I know a guy trying to move a bunch of gold out of Nigeria, maybe he can help them out?
They probably won't accept Rubles either.
I think rubles are supposed to be called rubble(s) now, given the state of their economy