Russia is a demographic disaster. In the first ten years after the collapse of the USSR, Russian population fell by about six and a half million. It is rebounding slightly now but only because of high birth rates in Muslim ethnic regions like Chechnya and Dagestan and immigration from former Soviet republics in Central Asia. These are not places Russia wants its Russians to come from. Russia’s mortality rate is horrific. According 2012 World Health Organization statistics, a fifteen-year-old Russian male has a life expectancy that’s three years less than a fifteen-year-old Haitian boy’s. The life expectancy of a fifteen-year old Russian female is sixty-one, three years less than in Cambodia. Russians die from cardiovascular disease and from accidents, murder, and suicide. They smoke, they drink, they despair. Russia’s great wealth is based on extraction of oil and gas. Even so, the value of Russia’s exports in 2013 barely exceeded Belgium’s. And energy prices are falling. The likelihood of the economy being transformed from extractive to knowledge-based is slim in a country rife with slogans like “How can you believe in anything?” and “Everything is PR.” Long-term economic progress, depends on improving productivity through new knowledge . . . Patent awards and application provide a crude but telling picture . . . Consider applications under the Patent Cooperation Treaty . . . Russia comes in No. 21—after Austria—racking up less that 0.6 percent of the world’s total. The population of Russia is more than fifteen times that of Austria. Russia’s ‘yield’ of patents per university graduate is vastly lower than Austria’s—thirty-five times lower. By this particular metric Russia is only fractionally better placed than Gabon.” So what we need to do is this. Start with a little bit of George Kennan’s Containment Policy. Leaven that with a large dose of Reagan Doctrine, arming the dickens out of Ukraine, Georgia, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and any other sane polity feeling pressure from the Evil Post-Empire. . And sit back and watch the Putin regime rot.
Posted on: Fri, 12 Dec 2014 19:50:39 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015