AHC: Russia part of EU and NATO

kernals12

Banned
With a POD after 1991, have Russia be a member of both NATO and the European Union by 2010. And please be more specific than just "no Putin".
 
Not happening with a POD after 1991 IMO. Russia will be a political and economic mess that the west simply cannot and will not stick their hands too far into. Even if you avoid the resurgence of nationalism after the complete chaos that was the 90s.
 

kernals12

Banned
Not happening with a POD after 1991 IMO. Russia will be a political and economic mess that the west simply cannot and will not stick their hands too far into. Even if you avoid the resurgence of nationalism after the complete chaos that was the 90s.
How come Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic etc. managed it?
 
How come Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic etc. managed it?

By being an order of magnitude smaller, having a much closer geographic relationship with the west and not to mention that they really hate Russia (latter being about 2/3rds of the criteria). They are in short much more manageble. Russia isn't.
 
A civil war in 1991 shatters Russia into a pro-Western section and a Soviet remnant in the east. Pro-Western Russia joins NATO as a means to save itself from the Soviets.

Beyond that though, I don't know what else could make this happen.
 
Are you really comparing NATO to al-Qaeda?

Well, you can in a certain way: both are military alliances of groups that would otherwise be semi-dispersed in their interests and thus much less co-operative barring the fact that their largest and most pressing enemy all happen to be the same entity. If Russia is IN NATO, just like of the U.S (ASB as it would be) somehow went through the massive cultural shift required to align with Al-Qaeda, neither would really have the impitus to continue and would probably naturally decay.

Which is why you get a catch 22 on the second half of this AHC: Russia can't join NATO because its Russia being/potentially being hostile that gives NATO its reason detra
 
Russia can never join the EU, even it would turn into a perfect, wealthy, non-corrupt, non-hostile democracy. It is simply too big and would completely dominate the EU.
 
Joining the EU would be impossible, but Russia as a NATO member could be possible. Maybe post-Soviet Russia goes through a major economic slump, which leads to insurgents. The West provides Russia with economic aid and helps hunt down insurgents in joint military operations (maybe the insurgents could have been sponsored by the Middle East). This intervention leads to a more pro-West Russia. China decides that the age of Russian dominance over Asia is over, and expands their influence into Central Asia and Siberia. With Russia being on far more friendly terms with the West, and the presence of a military rival that challenges their sphere of influence, Russia joins NATO.
 
Russia can never join the EU, even it would turn into a perfect, wealthy, non-corrupt, non-hostile democracy. It is simply too big and would completely dominate the EU.

The opposite is actually true. Russia would not join the EU out of fear of what such membership would do to its political and economic independence.
Russia is primarily a resource extraction economy, the historical examples of what happens to resource extraction economies when married to production centred economies is not a pleasant prospect for Russia. Which is part of why they have so assertively protected thier geopolitical independence over the last two decades. The idea of becoming a dependant economic appendage of the EU terrifies the Russians.

If the Russian leadership thought they could have achieved economic dominance of Europe by pursuing closer relations with the EU, they would have done it.
 
The opposite is actually true. Russia would not join the EU out of fear of what such membership would do to its political and economic independence.
Russia is primarily a resource extraction economy, the historical examples of what happens to resource extraction economies when married to production centred economies is not a pleasant prospect for Russia. Which is part of why they have so assertively protected thier geopolitical independence over the last two decades. The idea of becoming a dependant economic appendage of the EU terrifies the Russians.

If the Russian leadership thought they could have achieved economic dominance of Europe by pursuing closer relations with the EU, they would have done it.
I think both are correct. The EU doesn't want Russia to join because it is too big (when Yeltsin while drunk suggested it, European leaders quickly tried to talk it out of him) and Russia does not want to join (as long as its leaders are sober), because it is ruinous for their economy.
 
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Maybe if a civil war broke out in 1991 in regards to the coup, and that the reformist side wins in the long run yet is devastated by the conflict (with NATO support), I can see it being more pro-NATO and pro-EU but I'm not sure if being in both groups would be in Russia's best interests. If anything they be a non-NATO ally, a big one a that; and that can lead to some interesting changes on the world stage (for one no "Second Cold War" with Russia in the 2010's and no "Russian hacker/troll/something" allegations).
 
Tom Clancy had a novel where China attacked Russia, and they joined NATO so as not to lose.

It would likely take something like that for this scenario to happen.

Also, in reply to why eg Poland was able to join both, in addition to the reasons so ably set forth above, there's also the fact that the former East Blok countries made serious efforts to reform both their economies and their political structures.

Russia only made a half-hearted effort at either.

Note that eg Slovakia took perceptibly longer to meet the criteria than Czechia did, and the Balkan nation's longer yet, in fact some are still in process.

Yet another point is that Poland and Czechoslovakia for instance still had people alive who remembered how capitalism worked. Whose fathers ran stores, say. Russia? Not so much.
 
Make China much more hostile, much much earlier.

Then, have the idea of a second Marshall Plan for the former Warsaw Pact and USSR gain steam.

Have NATO expand not only to the former Soviet Bloc, but include nations outside the North Atlantic, like Japan, Australia and the like, and evolve into a global democratic bloc.
 
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