this is not to eliminate -- this is not to eliminate those countries from, misrules. yeltsin decided to liberate delayed -- in neighboring soviet republics from communist rule. neither of them expected nato to move to take this space. russia considers post-soviet space as an area of legitimate interests. and it really is. the only problem is russia does not formulate its interest in a tangible and clear way. that has been my problem for many years. i tried to persuade them if they would formulate in a very precise way what are your economic and other interests in each particular neighboring country, the west might look at it in a much less hostile way rather than one russia says this is our area of national interest which is often seen as neo-imperial attempts to dominate. russia does not want nato to take over post-soviet space under whatever pretext and deprive russia of its legitimate interests toward russia as nec minorities and economic investment and everything russia has with respect to that space. there is concern that some conflict in the caucuses, which stil

history, the european imperial powers, the portuguese have the longest stay, they rule some often misrule, they reform and deform. native societies around the world, for up to six centuries, up to six centuries. now, this is not a pitch for neil young's line back in the 1970's about the aztecs being now where children, etc., etc. many of thate of societies that were impacted by european imperialism were pretty darn gone nasty. the aztecs and mayans really weren't nice. other tribes else where had relatively passiv passivist vief the world. but they worked out systems that functioned for them. they might have been grisly like the aztecs, they might have been war-like, they might have been mercantile, but it worked for them. and then the european impact comes. and for a variety of reasons, do not seek single causes, for a variety of reasons, europe is so powerful civilizationly, but it overwhelms the native cultures for better or worse, and it's not all bad. i mean, up until this last decade, anything that worked in india had been built by the brits. they're getting beyond it now. but my po

this is not to eliminate -- this is not to eliminate those countries from, misrules. yeltsin decided to liberate delayed -- in neighboring soviet republics from communist rule. neither of them expected nato to move to take this space. russia considers post-soviet space as an area of legitimate interests. and it really is. the only problem is russia does not formulate its interest in a tangible and clear way. that has been my problem for many years. i tried to persuade them if they would formulate in a very precise way what are your economic and other interests in each particular neighboring country, the west might look at it in a much less hostile way rather than one russia says this is our area of national interest which is often seen as neo-imperial attempts to dominate. russia does not want nato to take over post-soviet space under whatever pretext and deprive russia of its legitimate interests toward russia as nec minorities and economic investment and everything russia has with respect to that space. there is concern that some conflict in the caucuses, which stil