Is Soviet collapse likely to be hastened?
Well, Lorien was a bit mean here, but still...
- a '68 Reagan would have to deal with Vietnam, a 70s Regan with its aftermath. I doubt he could that directly do the arms-race vs the Sovjet Union.
- also I wonder what are the consequences if we butterfly Nixon's China politics away? I am not informed enough to judge it, but I do worry.
- even a collapse takes its time. Before the 1980s, it would be less obvious that the Warsaw Pact loses such an arms race and would completely ruin its economy in its course.
- even when you collapse, your leadership has to understand (and even accept) that. This is the thing about Gorbi. He realized he somehow had to bail out of this situation (it was not his initial idea to completely destroy the SU and its empire within half a decade). What I wanted to say is, that this realization takes time. Also, even if an earlier Reagan presidency speeds up the process a bit, one of his successors would reap the fruits (a bit like Brandt and Kohl, some would argue).
- as I understand it, it is a technology gap which allowed the West to gain and edge in the arms race of the 80s. Was that possible earlier? As long as we just talk about building more stuff (tanks, planes, nukes), that is exactly what the East was good at. But things like Stealth technology and SDI, and any progress made possible by IT...those changed things.