WI Russia has the same gdp per capita as the EU average.

Your thesis is flawed. Look up "resource curse" or "dutch disease". The best opportunity to reform was actually what happened. Execution was flawed because all the economists and policy wonks were operating under some flawed assumptions.
 
It's interesting to note that during the 1950s at least the USSR and Soviet client states had robust economic growth that wasn't too far off from other developing countries in Europe. However, growth in Western Europe started to outpace Soviet Bloc growth, particularly in the 60s.

Below is a comparison in GDP per capita growth amongst the poorest of the PIGS, showing how their growth outpaced the Soviet Bloc, with the exception of Ireland. I also wanted to highlight the growth that continued in the PIGS, compared with the lower growth in much of the Soviet Bloc in the 1970s and 1980s. Finally the economic depression in most of the former Soviet Bloc during the 1990s.

1950-1973
Greece 300%
Spain 250%
Portugal 239%
Bulgaria 220%
Romania 194%
Yugoslavia 181%
Hungary 126%
Poland 118%
USSR 113%
Czechoslovakia 101%
Ireland 99%

1973-1989 per capita GDP Growth
Ireland 58%
Spain 51%
Portugal 47%
Yugoslavia 42%
Greece 32%
Czechoslovakia 24%
Hungary 23%
USSR 18%
Romania 13%
Poland 6%

1989-1998 per capita GDP Growth
Ireland 83%
Portugal 29%
Spain 28%
Poland 23%
Greece 15%
ex-Czechoslovakia -2%
Bulgaria -24%
Romania -34%
ex-Yugoslavia -34%
ex-USSR -72%
 
A much earlier POD where Lenin uses a centralized approach for catch-up industrialization, where it does a pretty good job. Rolls with NEP (New Economic Policy). No rise of Stalin, thank goodness.

Now, not everything is perfect, you still have two interesting systems playing off each other.

Western capitalism goes from outward in, meaning laissez faire and non-regulation of particular industry unless a clear political case is made otherwise. Soviet Union keeps industry in house, unless clear political case made otherwise. . . Well, you see how this could be interesting.
 
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