Russian Bear,

The one valid point in your links is the sale of phosphorous oxychloride, a precursor chemical for nerve gas. I do not know the scale of the sales or whether if can be accounted for by other legitimate uses. Interestingly, the links indicated that the US sold much less material to Saddam than other western countries.

Japan started from nothing, China started from a planned economy more primitive than the Soviet Union’s.

The irony here is that if I wanted to boycott Russian goods, there isn’t anything available to me to choose not to buy. The only thing that I have ever seen with a “Made in Russia” label is low quality textiles.

For a nation as well educated as Russia, it is impossible to understand why she is so unable to develop as a proper country. Soon, India will overtake Russia as an industrial power.