The First US Onslaught To ‘Weaken’ Post-Cold War Russia
The first post-cold war assault on Russia by the West began in the early 1990s well before the expansion of NATO. It took the form of a U.S.-induced economic depression in Russia that was deeper and more disastrous than the Great Depression that devastated the U.S. in the 1930s. And it came at a time when Russians were naively talking of a “Common European Home” and a common European security structure that would include Russia. The magnitude of this economic catastrophe was spelled out tersely in a recent essay by Paul Krugman who wondered whether many Americans are aware of the enormous disaster it was for Russia. Krugman is quite accurate in describing it - but not in identifying its cause.