And 20 Years After

The Soviet Union officially ended 20 years ago today.  There are two good articles in New York Times and Financial Times providing a retrospective of the past two decades.  Both are worth reading.  The Economist has provided a personal essay on this day.

An addendum to the Financial Times article is particularly interesting.  Having spent some of my youth in the Middle East, I am fully aware of the Oil Curse and its consequences.  It appears that current-day, oil-rich Russia is having to live with the same issue.

Role of resources: How the balance tilted when energy-abundant Russia ‘became too rich’ 

Among the biggest factors holding back the development of democracy in the former Soviet Union have been two three-letter words: oil and gas. 

Of the six post-Soviet republics deemed authoritarian by the Economist Intelligence Unit, three – Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan – have big hydrocarbon reserves. Russia, with the largest reserves, is a “hybrid” state, showing authoritarian features. 

All have to some extent suffered classic symptoms of the “oil curse”. Oil and gas revenues have enabled cronyist leaderships to establish or maintain firm rule, while buying off opposition by raising wages and pensions. Apart from Kazakhstan, which has carried out some market-friendly reforms, energy wealth has also stunted the growth of other sectors. 

Russia is perhaps the starkest example. Throughout the 1990s, when oil prices were low, Russia was a democracy, albeit a highly imperfect one. For the first three years of the last decade, under president Vladimir Putin, liberal reforms continued. “But finally oil prices rose and Russia became too rich,” says Nikolay Petrov of the Moscow Carnegie Center, a think-tank, “and the leadership decided there was no longer a need to undertake new reforms, as they enjoyed huge revenues coming from nowhere.” 

Oil and gas have played an important role not just in countries that possess them, but also as leverage Russia has used to maintain influence over neighbours that lack them. 

Ukraine, the biggest ex-Soviet republic by population after Russia, relies on cheap Russian natural gas to fuel its heavy industry. Twice since 2006, Russia has cut supplies in winter amid pricing disputes. In Belarus, smallest of the three Slavic republics, energy subsidies from Russia have sustained the autocratic Alexander Lukashenko in power. They have compelled him, too, despite a poor personal relationship with Mr Putin and Dmitry Medvedev, his successor as Russian president, to remain essentially a vassal of Moscow. 

Belarusian industry, like Ukraine’s, benefits from cheap Russian gas. Belarus also receives cheap Russian oil, refines it in two Soviet-built refineries and sells the products to western Europe for a fat profit. “Who knows how Ukraine or Belarus might have developed if Russia had not exerted such an influence using oil and gas,” says Mr Petrov. 

By the same token, however, the lack of energy revenues has prevented Ukraine’s leaders from establishing as heavy-handed rule as Moscow. Local analysts cite this as a key limiting factor on Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovich’s attempts to create a Putin-style system. 

In Russia, meanwhile, parts of the political and business elite have realised that without modernisation to nurture other sectors, it risks the kind of economic stagnation it suffered in Soviet times. Mr Medvedev portrays himself as a reformer who will try to help Russia escape the oil curse if granted a second term as president next year. But oil revenues may yet help propel Mr Putin, currently prime minister, back to the Kremlin.

Economics is not Accounting

In the economics sphere, a common misconception is “my loss is someone else’s gain” and vice versa.  While this conception is true in competitive situations involving pecuniary exchange, it does not hold when it comes to the wealth of nations.  As such, populist remarks like “rich people are getting richer on poor people’s back” is basic rubbish. 

Unlike accounting, economics is not a zero-sum game; that is, someone else’s loss does not necessarily translate to your gain.  Generally, when wealth is generated, it lifts all boats (the question of equitable distribution is a legitimate one – but that is a whole other topic).  Likewise, when wealth is destroyed, it generally hits everyone across the board (and it does hurt the less wealthy proportionally harder).

The same is true for international wealth of nations.  In today’s highly interconnected financial markets, a single nation’s economic faltering (unless it is North Korea or a similarly disintegrated locale) is indicative of a larger contagion that has the potential of affecting other nations.  And, if the contagion is in a large center like US, EU, or China, it has a high probability of making everyone sick. 

In October 2008 while I was in the US, I received more than one call from Russia where my contact gleefully lamented the “American crisis,” the undertone of the conversation being “America had it coming” and “Russia is rising again.”  While the crisis was American-made, it became the world’s crisis; in turn, it affected Russia more severely than it did its American epicenter. 

The brief period of gleeful lament came about again this year when (the American) Standard and Poor’s rating agency downgraded America’s credit rating from AAA to AA+.  In the early periods of market gyration, a few Russian acquaintances indicated that they lamented the latest difficulty in America while hardly containing their giddiness.  It was not before long before the Russian ruble declined some 10% against the American dollar as the greenback was spiraling downwards against other major currencies.  Their moods changed quickly.

The fall of the Russian ruble against the dollar deserves a quick explanation:  Russia has an oil-driven economy.  Oil markets are priced in US dollars.  A slowing American economy signals less consumer demand, which implies less production and hence less energy usage.  Because America has the largest world economy and the world’s largest importer of foreign goods, a slowing American economy slows the world economy.  Oil is the source of a good portion of the world energy.  Hence, a slower world economy means less demand for oil, therefore falling oil prices denominated in dollars, and therefore more pressure on the Russian economy and currency as measured against the dollar.

Let’s get back to the difference between accounting and economics.  The emotional kick that comes from a competitive situation between two parties involving money exchange is understandable.  These are gaming situations where there could be a clear winner and loser.  The same emotional sensations are misplaced, if not stupid, in the broader economic sense.  In the short run – that is in a timespan that matters for the individual – the poor do not get richer when the rich get poorer; in fact the poor are likely to get poorer under these circumstances.  Likewise, and country X does not benefit when country Y declines.  Countries X and Y tend to rise and fall together.

Very unfortunately, populist political rhetoric – often purposefully – confuses the differences between economics and accounting.  Elections can become battles between the haves and the have-nots instead of about policies that benefit everyone.  And nationalistic feelings lead to a brief satisfying tinge once a former enemy declines; it is also those feelings that very often get in the way of effective national policy for economic diversification (away from oil in Russia’s case), better integration with world markets, and a more sustainable, predictable prosperity engine that lifts everyone’s boat.

La Gente Está Muy Loca

Walking around Novosibirsk late one night, I stumbled across an outdoors dance floor.  The dance floor was filled with mostly Siberian young men having a blast tearing it up with their own unique dance moves.  By "unique," I do not mean "good" or "skillful."  I mean "unique:"  I had never seen anything like it before.

Resembling a pack of schoolboys collectively under the spell of an epileptic fit, these kids where absolutely having a blast making rather uncoordinated movements to some repetitive dance tune made from a scratched record, or perhaps by scratching a record.  I tried to make sense of what I was seeing and finally excused the situation by a dismissive remark to the tune of "these folks are just crazy."

Just then, the disco tune's riffs stopped and a female's voice rang over the repetitive beat by saying "Johnny, la gente está muy loca*"  [the people are (in a transitive state of being) very crazy].  No lyric could have fit the moment any better - or could have been funnier at the time.

Another "funny" aspect of Novosibirsk was how I was frequently received by strangers on the road.  As I was hiking around the city, I noticed that as I approach people on isolated sidewalks, I found them startled to the degree that they switched the side of the road in order to avoid crossing paths with me.  That was a somewhat empowering experience, knowing that I could frighten strangers by merely walking down their streets' sidewalks.  But, when I was barred entry into two restaurants in the downtown area, I realized that something more sinister was afoot.

The explanation, as it turns out, is that my complexion resembles that of person coming from the Caucuses region of Russia, including folks from Chechnya (referred to in Russia as Caucasians).  Time and over again, I was told strange tales of massive criminal activity by every Caucasian (just "because that's who they are").  More reasonable explanations were along the lines that there is a massive emigration flow from the Caucuses (true) and emigration waves can have a disproportionally high representation of criminals among them.  As such, people's attitudes become tainted and stereotypes set in.

And, it follows that I am to be barred entry into some Novosibirsk eating establishments.  While this is amusing to me personally, I can see its pernicious effects at the social level if it is (and it appears to be) practiced at a wide scope.  One only needs to consider the self-destruction that racism in America has created as it has systematically locked out otherwise productive members of the society from the mainstream.

To put things in perspective, racism is not a Russian or American problem; it is a sad human condition.  Years ago, a Swedish friend was complaining to me about a sign on a Swiss restaurant that read "No dogs or Swedes allowed."  More recently, while I was discussing the merits of various Lithuanian cities with a young Lithuanian man, he stated that Kaunas (a smaller city) was a much better place than Vilnius (a larger city and Lithuania's capital).  When I asked why, he said "there are too many Polish people in Vilnius.  Kaunas is much nicer."

Let's go back to the aforementioned lyrics on the torturous dance floor:  La gente está muy loca. How unfortunately true ...


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* Loca People - Sak Noel

That Fine Line

Sometimes, there is a fine line that separates a sensible democracy from a screwball dictatorship, both figuratively and literally.  In this case, it is literal.

Which Side Would You Rather Be On?

There are two border postings separated by a gully in this photo.  The gully can be visually traced into the horizon.  Lithuania and the EU is on the right side; Belarus is on the other.  

If you are an entrepreneur or an ordinary citizen that wants a better life and a possibility to improve himself, which side would you rather be on?  What if you are part of a select few who manages to use the state's resources as a means of empowering and enriching himself, which side would you chose then?  

Just to be clear, these are not trick questions:  The mere and simple matter of ethics make one answer right and the other wrong.

Siberian Experience

I had the opportunity to spend a week in Siberia.   Specifically, I was in Russia's third largest city, Novosibirsk.

NE:  The American Siberia

The American image of Siberia is this frozen, wolf-packed tundra where people are sent to die.  The mental image may look like the picture above, except what you see above is actually in Nebraska, USA.

My experience of (admittedly, the southern portion of) Siberia indicates that it resembles the American Midwestern landscape quite a bit, except that the winters are somewhat longer (but not necessarily colder).  The country side is vast, the sky is big, there are few natural structures that provide any relief, and there are plenty of bloodsucking critters flying around during the summer night.  In other words, one could be in Kansas -  or Siberia -  if the visual clues where just taken from the nature.

NY Bronx in 1975, Like Some Parts of Novosibirsk

Novosibirsk is like a Rust Belt city.  Once a thriving manufacturing city that armed the Soviet Army with tanks, the city is in middle of an economic restructuring and attempting to reuse its aged manufacturing capability for other means.  The downtown area is revived and rather nice.  Walk away from there, as I did in fairly significant hikes across the city, and you will find yourself in what seems to be in New York's public housing areas of the 1970s and 1980s.  Incidentally, those same housing structures seem to exist in any major Russian city, Moscow included.  The massive apartment blocks where once a wonder to behold as they provided private housing for families that used to live in shared apartments after WW II.

I followed a friend's tip and visited the Novosibirsk zoo.  Generally, I do not like zoos; in this regard, the Novosibirsk zoo did not disappoint.  It was yet another place where magnificently large beasts are kept in relatively tiny cages.  But, some of the animals on display there, specifically the Siberian eagle, were rather impressive.  These massive birds of prey were some three-feet tall and had a wingspan of at least twice as much.

Novosibirsk's Ob River:  A River Runs Through It

Following the same friend's tip, I took a river boat tour of the very large Ob River.  Ob River cuts Novosibirsk in half and, contrary to expectation, flows northward.  After studying Siberia's topography, this drainage pattern becomes obvious.  Blocked by the majestic Altai Mountains to the south, Siberia's abundant snowfall has to drain somewhere; and the path of least resistance is northward to the Kara Sea and eventually into the Arctic Ocean.

What I saw was just a tiny spec on the vast Siberian front and, from a nature perspective, I liked it.  There is more of Siberia to see, including Altai Mountains, Lake Baikal, and Kamchatka.  

The Millenium-Long Cold War

The Cold War, it seems, is a construct of the Twentieth Century.  The end of the World War II marked the birth of two superpowers locked in ideological, political, and proxy military conflicts.  The dissolution of one of those superpowers, the Soviet Union, in 1991, marked the end of an era.  With it, one supposed, would come a world where Russia, a prominent world power with an immense potential, would be more tightly integrated into the Western fabric of democratic institutions.

That world may come; indeed there is recognition in some quarters of Russia that the current de facto one-party-rule and highly concentrated power structure should be reformed if Russia is to maintain her prominence.  However, there have been aspects of the Russian psyche that have puzzled me since I took residence in Moscow.  For instance, I have been puzzled about why Russia insists on defining itself is "not Western," as evidenced by its asynchronous Christmas holiday season, among other facts.

Take modern Turkey, for instance.  Turkey, a Muslim country and the remnant of the powerful and enduring Ottoman Empire, is a radically transformed nation.  Formerly using the Arabic alphabet, Turkey adopted the Latin alphabet under the leadership of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.   The country also swapped its weekends from the Muslim Friday to the Christian Saturday and Sunday, in line with Western Christian powers.  Turkey is now seeking EU membership in its quest to become more tightly integrated with Europe.  Basically, there is precedence of massive realignment by a former power in order to march in a more lockstep formation with prevailing world trends.

So, what is happening in Russia?  For one, it is clear that neither Mr. Yeltsin nor Mr. Putin, Russia's most influential leaders post Soviet Union, have been the types of transformative leaders that Mr. Atatürk was. Second, Turkey's transformations came after a very long and relative rapid periods of decline that left Turkey in a very weakened state (as compared to its Ottoman days) badly in need of transformation. In other words, there have been both the lack of a sufficient reason and a lack of a right type of leader to make the transformation.  But, there is another reason:  The third reason, I believe, has to do with the strength of religion, and the culture that it brings with itself, in Russia.

And So Began The Cold War

The history of the East-West Schism of 1054 is rather long and involved to be discussed in a respectable form here.  The key elements are that Christianity's center shifted to Constantinople with the Roman's sacking of Jerusalem. As Christianity became legalized and increasingly influential in the Roman Empire, a rift started between churches in Rome and Constantinople.  Roman's adoption of Christianity were followed by a series of changes to Christian practices.  Those changes were looked upon suspiciously as potentially heretical acts by the eastern practitioners of the faith.  This multi-century rift between the East and the West became increasingly exacerbated as the Roman Empire lost control over its territory and was increasingly incapable of uniting its Latin and Greek centers through a common structure.  All this culminated with the mutual excommunications of what are now the Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church in 1054. The sacking of Constantinople in 1204 and the looting of The Church of Holy Wisdom (Hagia Sophia) by the Fourth Crusade was also a key event that further pushed the Eastern and Western churches apart.

The Church of Holy Wisdom, Unwisely Sacked by Crusaders

While there were a few reunion attempts, such as the Second Council of Lyon and the Council of Florence, they all ultimately failed.  A subtext of these failures was an Eastern suspicion of the West; the motive, it was perceived, was less of a reunion and more of an expansion of Western Church's influence of its eastern counterpart.  That eastern sentiment was fully reinforced when Ottomans sacked Constantinople while the West failed to send any meaningful military reinforcement to defend the city against Muslim invaders.  In this context, the Eastern Church viewed the sacking of Constantinople as the West's attempt to destroy the Eastern Church once and for all.

Isolated from the West for centuries, the Eastern Orthodox Church operated independently but found new hope and influence with the rising powers of Moscow.  And with Tsar Peter I's abolishment of patriarchate in 1721, the now-Russian Orthodox Church effectively became a governmental department. With that, came the infusion of suspicious opinions of Western powers and their expansive ambitions into the Russian psyche.  It should be noted that Russia's most memorable conflicts, wars against the Poles (Catholic), Swedes (Lutheran), French (Catholic), Germans (Catholic and Lutheran), and ultimately the Cold War with Americans (Protestant and Catholic), was waged against Christians whose faith was rooted in the Rome Catholic Church and derived from there.  Conversely, there have never been lasting or memorable conflicts with a nation of Eastern Orthodox faith, like Ukraine or Bulgaria (two former empires that waged many wars).

Clearly, the above text is rife with generalizations and inaccuracies in the details, but the arc of the story holds.  Within this context, it is easier to understand why Russians are Russians first and generally suspicious of the West.  There are centuries of legacy in this point of view, and the Cold War was a modern manifestation of this backdrop heavily influenced by new factors of the evolving world.

The Sputnik Moment:  Still Keeping a Suspicious Eye On the West After All Those Years

Because the Cold War is a relatively new, powerful construct in world's history, it is natural to evaluate many current-day affairs in its context.  However, a longer perspective on the East-West rift may shed better light on why the world is today as it is.

The Alphabet of Religion

Serbia and Poland are Slavic Eastern European countries. On opposite ends of Eastern Europe, Serbia is relatively close to Italy while Poland is nearby Russia. Yet, despite their geographical position, Polish and Serbian alphabets are juxtaposed in that Polish writing is more Italian-like while Serbian writing is more Russian like.  The Polish language uses Latin letters (like these) while the Serbian alphabet uses Cyrillic letters (Кириллица). One wonders why that is.

Latin and Cyrillic alphabets are both Greek alphabet derivatives.  Latin alphabet was borrowed and modified from yet another Greek alphabet derivative, called Euboean alphabet, by Etruscans, rulers of the early Rome.   From there, it took its hold and became the most widely-used alphabet in the world today, in great part thanks to Rome's expansive multi-century dominance.

Cyrillic alphabet, whose origin is attributed to two 9th Century Byzantine Greek brothers, Saints Cyril and Methodius, was first developed in Bulgaria in 10th century AD.  From there, it traveled, mostly eastwards, with those who were motivated to educate, namely Christian monks.

Serbia was Christianized by the Byzantine Papacy, which adhered to Eastern Orthodox Christianity.  Over the years, Serbian Orthodoxy survived the Muslim Ottoman Empire, Croatian domination, World War II, and a suspicious socialist regime led by Tito.  Throughout this time, Serbia maintained its character and culture, propagating the Cyrillic alphabet to today.

Poland was Christianized by Mieszko I, Poland's first ruler.  Perhaps opportunistically, Mieszko chose to be baptized in Rome to strengthen his hold on the relatively new state of Poland.  With that Roman Catholic Christendom, Mieszko also brought Latin letters, propagated by church's teachings, to Poland.

Take a look at the maps below.  The first shows the distribution of Cyrillic alphabet in the world.  The second shows how Latin alphabet is distributed.  Areas in lighter shade of green show countries where multiple alphabet systems are used.

The World of Cyrillic Alphabet

The World of Latin Alphabet

Now, exclude the non-Western portions* from the Latin alphabet map.  You basically have North America, Western Europe, and Australia.  Compare that with the Cyrillic alphabet map.  You have the Soviet Union and a good chunk of the "Iron Curtain."  In other words, you have a nice proxy for the 20th century East-West conflict.

My hypothesis is that the 20th Century Cold war ("East-West Conflict") was part of a longer historical arc that started with the East-West Schism of 1054.  This topic shall be discussed in more detail in the next blog.

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*  The alphabet map just shows how each church, the Roman Catholic Church or the Eastern Orthodox Church, spread throughout the world.  Latin America, by virtue of Catholic Spanish and Portuguese conquests, adopted the Latin alphabet.  North America got its alphabet from England, France, and Spain, all of which were under the influence of the Roman Catholic church at some point in their history.  Australia, thanks to British prisoners, became Christianized and Anglicized.  India, Africa, and Southeaster Asia all have the Latin alphabet system thanks to aggressive colonization efforts by Western European powers.

Church in Russia

Moscow is sometimes referred to as 40x40, in reference to the 1,600 or so churches located in the city.  While Russia's official religion -  Russian Orthodox Christianity - plays a prominent role in Moscow and St. Petersburg, its influence in the city is minuscule compare to its reach and influence outside of major cities.  Russia mirrors the US, in that the larger cities play a more secular role while smaller, more provincial cities reflect deeper religious beliefs and faiths of the people.

Per Wikipedia, the Golden Ring, or a group of smaller cities to the north and east of Moscow, are a group of ancient towns that "played a significant role in the formation of the Russian Orthodox Church."  Sergiyev Posad, the closest of the Golden Ring cities to Moscow, is only 75 km (45 miles) away.  Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius is "the most important Russian monastery and the spiritual centre of the Russian Orthodox Church."  This beautiful city has a palpable sense of holiness, especially around the main church complex, and its role in Russian history and modern-day politics cannot be understated.

Trinity of Lavra of St. Sergius, As It Was Then, Pretty Much As It Is Now

The Russian Orthodox Church, officially recognized by the state, played (except during the Soviet era) and plays a central role in governing Russians.  Its role is to preserve the memory of the most important and significant events in Russian history, legitimize governments (of tzars or presidents - if you can tell the difference), and provide a cultural foundation upon which most Russians build their lives and create their identities.  In this sense, its role is the same as roles of Anglican Church in England (mostly before WW II), Church of Sweden in Sweden, or the Catholic Church in Poland.

I have written previously that Russia "continues to define itself in opposition to the West, damn be the consequences."   Having a better sense of the Russian Orthodox Church, I may have a better insight into this "non-Western" Russian phenomenon.  In this context, the Cold War of the Twentieth Century was a continuation in the arc of history that began with set of events that culminated in the Eleventh Century with the East-West Schism of 1054, when the Eastern Orthodox Church, based in Constantinople, and the Catholic Church, based in Rome, formally and mutually excommunicated each other.

More on this later.

What is Latvia?

National identities can be thorny issues.  In "new" countries like the US and Canada,  national boundaries are well defined, and ethnicity is typically not a question of defining nationality.  In post-colonial countries, like some of those in the Arab World, national boundaries exist, but they are generally meaningless.  This is because national borders were drawn by foreign powers in places where group allegiance is defined by tribal or religious bonds [the creation of these artificial countries partially explains this region's perennial instability].

Hint:  Straight Lines Point to Fake Borers

In Europe, national boundaries are mostly well-defined, suggesting years of precedent and history that have cemented frontiers for generations.  Europe also has an additional layer of identify that does not exist in any appreciable force in the US:  Ethnicity is also a "nationality" identifier.  As such, it is common to hear about ethnic Germans living in Poland; while these ethnic Germans are officially Polish citizens, they have the possibility of claiming German citizenship if they can prove that their ancestors, generally at most two generations back, were also German citizens.

Lots of National Precedent, Few Straight Boundary Lines

I had the occasion of spending a long weekend in and around Riga, Latvia.  Latvia, a nation of 2.4 million, is now a member of the European Union and NATO.  Latvia was introduced to Americans in the early 1990s as a liberated, sovereign Baltic state that was overrun by the Soviet Army in the 1940s in Stallin's efforts to expand the Iron Curtain into Eastern Europe.

Visiting Latvia and doing a quick study of this country's history made me wonder what, precisely, Latvia was.  Present-day Latvia seems to define itself as anti-Russia while heavily depending on Russian teat to feed it.  There are several interesting factors that jump out after this short visit to this Baltic nation:

Identifying Sign:  The Museum of Occupation of Latvia 1940 - 1991

• Everyone speaks Russian.
• The Latvian man on the street says that 50% of the population is Russian; official census numbers put the Russian population at 25-30% of the total Latvia population.  As Latvians put it, there are only 1.2 million of them; according to more official records, there are up to 1.8 million Latvians.
• Latvia is a tourist destination for Russians; Russian dialects on the street have regional Russian flavors, like those of Moscow and St. Petersburg.
• Despite having (and still going) through a massive financial crisis, Latvian real estate prices are Moscow-high.  One finds Moscow real estate prices in a relatively provincial part of the world.  This suggest that many buyers of Latvian real estates are from major Russian cities and pay prices with which they are familiar.
• Latvia has a deal for you:  Buy real estate, and Latvia will extend EU residency to you.  If you are a Russian that needs to launder money while getting access to a Western-leaning safe haven in case things go south on you at home, there is no place better than Latvia.
• According to the Latvian president, about 80% of Latvia's tourism and commerce is generated from Russian sources.  Despite this, Latvia does not make life easy for visiting Russians that bring precious liquid currency to the country:
• No one accepts Russian rubles
• There are no state-installed (traffic, tourism, etc.) signs that are in Russian 

So, what precisely is Latvia, a country that defines itself as fighting against years of Russian occupation while so heavily depending on Russia for its economy?  A quick look back at Latvian history shows a region that was occupied by Polish, German, and Russian forces successively with brief periods of independence only in the Twentieth Century, the longer of which started in 1991.  So, there is actually surprisingly little national precedence for Latvia, although there has been a long precedence of the Latvian ethnicity (that were once Polish, then German, then Soviet, and now seemingly Russian).

As it happens, if you are the United State and the arch enemy of the Soviet Union, it is to your interest to fan the flames of independence in a land that has very little history of it, but whose independence (and eventual accession into EU and NATO) serves to weaken your erstwhile mortal enemy, a former enemy that may once again find its old ways for various reasons.

So, what is Latvia, if it is not a crossroad for the confluence powerful foreign forces?  Perhaps, it is just a people who find independence nice in concept, but difficult in implementation because they are just too small.

Victory Day Humor

Some Russians consider it rather funny to congratulate a German on Victory Day.  The irony is clear, but the joke seems a bit in poor taste.

I am reminded of an instance when I was working on a project in London on July 4.  An American colleague, rather innocently and carelessly, asked our British hosts why they did not celebrate Independence Day in the UK like they do in the US.  That question was followed by a palpable silence in the room, followed by a few quizzical glances back and forth, and a laughter explosion.