Tag: soviet union

Putinomics: Putin’s Economic Inheritance

The following is an excerpt from Chris Miller’s Putinomics: Power and Money in Resurgent Russia. When Vladimir Putin first took power in 1999, he was a little-known figure ruling a country that was reeling from a decade and a half of crisis. In the years since, he has reestablished Russia as a great power. How did he do it? What… Continue Reading Putinomics: Putin’s Economic Inheritance

Russia and the former Soviet Union: A Recommended Reading List

If you’ve been following recent events, you may have seen that Russia has invaded Ukraine. Last week, Russia launched a large-scale invasion of Ukraine, one of its neighbors to the southwest. It marked a major escalation between the countries, which had been in a state of conflict since 2014. Russia and Ukraine were also two of the largest republics responsible… Continue Reading Russia and the former Soviet Union: A Recommended Reading List

Xiaoming Zhang: Deng Xiaoping and China’s Invasion of Vietnam

Deng Xiaoping’s paramount political status and strength of personality played a major role in shaping China’s foreign policy during the last decade of the Cold War, opposing Soviet hegemony while allying with the United States and other Western countries in order to gain their support for China’s economic reform. Continue Reading Xiaoming Zhang: Deng Xiaoping and China’s Invasion of Vietnam

Zubok among Washington Post’s Best Books of 2008

The Washington Post published its Holiday Guide yesterday, featuring the Best Books of 2008. Included in “The World” section is Vladislav Zubok’s A Failed Empire: The Soviet Union in the Cold War from Stalin to Gorbachev. At the beginning of the year, Richard Rhodes reviewed Zubok’s book along with Melvyn Leffler’s For the Soul of Mankind: The United States, the… Continue Reading Zubok among Washington Post’s Best Books of 2008