WI: Soviet bloc defaults on its debts in the 80s

Seriously has Russia always just been a resource provider and little else? I mean pre-WW1 they were Germany's supply of cheap coal, wood, food, and various other resources, in the interwar period they did roughly the same, and post-1950s they were pretty much back into propping up their budget with oil exports (and weapons).

In the 19th Century Russian industry put the Iranian artisan class out of business for the most part. The entire country was reduced to the status of plantation and rug-making factory (and even then, Russian Azerbaijan was such a major manufacturer of carpets that the Iranian industry was hamstrung by the competition).

fasquardon
 
The net result IMO depends on how collapse happens. OTL"s collapse was largely peaceful even if the 90s were terrible economically. If you get a civil war in USSR where more than one side has nuclear weapons for instance it would have being a lot worse.

I have difficulty seeing any collapse scenario where the USSR has a real civil war. What would the sides be? What causes would they fight for?

The problem is I don't think anyone past maybe late Khrushchev in the USSR actually believed those things.

Yes, which is why I think it would convince exactly no-one.

fasquardon
 

RousseauX

Donor
I have difficulty seeing any collapse scenario where the USSR has a real civil war. What would the sides be? What causes would they fight for?

Had the August Putschists cemented their power, they would have 1) probably fired on the Moscow crowds ala Tienanmen at some point and 2) Opposed the independence/autonomy for the Republics as defined by the New Union treaty.

So there's a lot of possibilities for civil war in there: between the Yelstinites in the Russian Republic's government vs the Soviet government, between the Soviet government and the Ukrainian SSR etc etc.
 
and post-1950s they were pretty much back into propping up their budget with oil exports (and weapons).

More like "post-1960s". In the 1950s and 1960s there was real and solid growth in the manufacture and purchase of consumer goods before the defects of the planned economy caught up with them.
 
Seriously has Russia always just been a resource provider and little else? I mean pre-WW1 they were Germany's supply of cheap coal, wood, food, and various other resources, in the interwar period they did roughly the same, and post-1950s they were pretty much back into propping up their budget with oil exports (and weapons).

It wasnt until the mid to late 60s that oil really became a big thing. I forget what fields they found but I remember reading a quote from a Soviet general who said that they would have been better off never discovering the Siberian fields. It allowed them to forgo needed reforms while they petrodollars flowed. His statement, not mine.
 
More like "post-1960s". In the 1950s and 1960s there was real and solid growth in the manufacture and purchase of consumer goods before the defects of the planned economy caught up with them.

Even then they couldn't sell much of it outside their colonies in Eastern Europe and Third World hell holes. Neither of which provides money to pay off debts to Westerners.

Another problem that they ran into was what usually happens with colonial powers. Their colonies drained more resources than they gave. By the 1970s or latest 1980s the tribute they extracted from Eastern Europe via one sided traded agreements was less than the occupation costs.
 
It wasnt until the mid to late 60s that oil really became a big thing. I forget what fields they found but I remember reading a quote from a Soviet general who said that they would have been better off never discovering the Siberian fields. It allowed them to forgo needed reforms while they petrodollars flowed. His statement, not mine.

He has a point. Google "resource curse" if you don't know what that means.
 
He has a point. Google "resource curse" if you don't know what that means.

"resource curse" - my favorite Ah topic because nobody here gets it or believes it. The Congo is the next great power because of their wealth of natural resources. The late USSR and modern day Russia exhibit 1 for the resource curse.
 
Well I'm quite familiar with the "resource curse" concept, although I have always wondered how the US avoided it... I guess it is a curse that can be overcome but doing so requires the right balance of factors and more then a little bit of luck.
 
Well I'm quite familiar with the "resource curse" concept, although I have always wondered how the US avoided it... I guess it is a curse that can be overcome but doing so requires the right balance of factors and more then a little bit of luck.

My best guesses:

As a percent of its economy, I dont think natural resources ever accounted for a huge percentage of the economy after the industrial revolution began. Agriculture doesnt seem to apply as it has often with fragmented ownership.

And if you dont accept all this, the big oil companies were never state owned and Roosevelt broke up Standard Oil.

Finally, I think slavery acted similarly as the resource curse in antebellum south with a long lasting legacy. So, a chunk of the US didnt escape it.

A bigger question is how Canada and Australia seem to have avoided it. I think there is something to the English legacy but couldnt really tell you what about the legacy seems to help. Or perhaps, like the US, agriculture dominated enough. I dont know.
 

RousseauX

Donor
Well I'm quite familiar with the "resource curse" concept, although I have always wondered how the US avoided it... I guess it is a curse that can be overcome but doing so requires the right balance of factors and more then a little bit of luck.

A section of the US did fall to the resource curse: namely the deep south US states before the mid 20th century.

Because of easily available money to be made from cash crops due to the climate and soil fertility, the government of the American south looked awfully lot like countries suffering from the resource curse.
 

Deleted member 1487

A section of the US did fall to the resource curse: namely the deep south US states before the mid 20th century.

Because of easily available money to be made from cash crops due to the climate and soil fertility, the government of the American south looked awfully lot like countries suffering from the resource curse.
Or Texas and oil.
 
Well, a Soviet default would hurt NZ pretty badly, in the late 80s, as they both took a fair bit of our agricultural surplus whilst also owing us several hundred million dollars for such. We were not particularly in good shape at the time either
 
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