(In which Manual Scan/Lemons Are Yellow vet Paul Kaufman finds himself back in the USSR.)
Here’s Part Two in a short series of examples of how my young self was Dead Wrong on some major issues of our time.
A defining event for our generation is that we were the last to come to adulthood during the Cold War. Remember the Cold War, kids? Soul-crushing, Gulag-filling Soviet dictatorship on one side, anyone-against-them-is-our-friend (nevermind the atrocities) NATO on the other, both armed to the teeth. This lead to deadly, pointless quagmires on both sides (Afghanistan for them, Vietnam for us). For all the vile waste of life and resources this arrangement created, it was a form of stability.
So, did anyone here think the Soviet Union would just sort of melt away like a wet witch, without nuclear holocaust, bloody civil war, or even hardly a shot fired? I didn’t.