If we compare America with China, then yes there is a huge difference, China seems to be happy enforcing its values within its historical territory, without much desire to expand. (I think so; maybe I missed something.)
If we compare America with Russia (and former Soviet Union), in my opinion Soviet Union / Russia is even more missionary… only less successful at doing so, but certainly not because of lack of trying.
Just look at the cold war in Europe. How often did Soviet Union intervene militarily in its vasal countries, just because they tried some outrageous idea such as “socialism with human face”? (Ironically, if you were a member of Warsaw Pact, you were more likely to be invaded by the Warsaw Pact than by NATO.) On the other hand, if a country in Western Europe tried something like “capitalism with universal health insurance”, America was cool about it.
So seems to me that although both countries are quite missionary, Russia is much more of a micromanager, and probably that is why it gets more resistance. If you are generally allied with America, then America is usually happy about it. If you are allied with Russia, once in a while you will still have Russian tanks rolling on your streets to remind you that you got some detail wrong. So it is quite difficult to be friends with Russia, even if you try.
In a different context, sure, let’s talk about how USA sucks. But in a context of Russia, such comparisons are absurd, because whatever bad thing USA has, Russia has as least twice as much of it. (Even the slavery? Ha! There were ethnic groups in Soviet Union who would have loved to get an opportunity to be merely enslaved.)
I am not so sure whether it makes sense to put Russia and the SU in the same category when it comes to being missionary. The ideology of the SU was basically universal—an ideal end state would have been the conversion of every country in the world to communism. For Russia I don’t see that. Getting the former parts of the Russian empire back, yes, maybe being the leading slavonic country (especially an important motivation until 1917). But would Russia care how, e.g., Spain was governed? I don’t think so (SU or USA would care).
Ok, this makes sense. After the fall of Soviet Union, Russia got defensive rather than missionary. Still “the best defense is a good offense”, but the ambitions to conquer other countries are now proportional to their geographical distance.
I think that is an important distinction you are making. Russia’s (and Putin’s) motivations for aggression seem to be primarily defensive, made from a position of weakness, of vulnerability (which can make them extremely dangerous). That wasn’t the case with the SU.
Russia was the dominant force in the USSR. It is perfectly reasonable to treat the USSR as red paint over a Russian Empire, especially considering the geopolitical framework from which I wrote the original post.
If we compare America with China, then yes there is a huge difference, China seems to be happy enforcing its values within its historical territory, without much desire to expand. (I think so; maybe I missed something.)
If we compare America with Russia (and former Soviet Union), in my opinion Soviet Union / Russia is even more missionary… only less successful at doing so, but certainly not because of lack of trying.
Just look at the cold war in Europe. How often did Soviet Union intervene militarily in its vasal countries, just because they tried some outrageous idea such as “socialism with human face”? (Ironically, if you were a member of Warsaw Pact, you were more likely to be invaded by the Warsaw Pact than by NATO.) On the other hand, if a country in Western Europe tried something like “capitalism with universal health insurance”, America was cool about it.
So seems to me that although both countries are quite missionary, Russia is much more of a micromanager, and probably that is why it gets more resistance. If you are generally allied with America, then America is usually happy about it. If you are allied with Russia, once in a while you will still have Russian tanks rolling on your streets to remind you that you got some detail wrong. So it is quite difficult to be friends with Russia, even if you try.
In a different context, sure, let’s talk about how USA sucks. But in a context of Russia, such comparisons are absurd, because whatever bad thing USA has, Russia has as least twice as much of it. (Even the slavery? Ha! There were ethnic groups in Soviet Union who would have loved to get an opportunity to be merely enslaved.)
I am not so sure whether it makes sense to put Russia and the SU in the same category when it comes to being missionary. The ideology of the SU was basically universal—an ideal end state would have been the conversion of every country in the world to communism. For Russia I don’t see that. Getting the former parts of the Russian empire back, yes, maybe being the leading slavonic country (especially an important motivation until 1917). But would Russia care how, e.g., Spain was governed? I don’t think so (SU or USA would care).
Ok, this makes sense. After the fall of Soviet Union, Russia got defensive rather than missionary. Still “the best defense is a good offense”, but the ambitions to conquer other countries are now proportional to their geographical distance.
I think that is an important distinction you are making. Russia’s (and Putin’s) motivations for aggression seem to be primarily defensive, made from a position of weakness, of vulnerability (which can make them extremely dangerous). That wasn’t the case with the SU.
I can’t see how this is argument in good faith. Your choice of using Russia instead of USSR feels intentionally misleading.
Was Russia not the dominant force within USSR, the “unbreakable union of free republics, forever united by Great Russia”?
(Yes, I know that Stalin was not ethnicaly Russian. Anything else?)
Russia was the dominant force in the USSR. It is perfectly reasonable to treat the USSR as red paint over a Russian Empire, especially considering the geopolitical framework from which I wrote the original post.
Have you heard about Communist Party?