Libertas~enwiki

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Hello, and welcome to Wikipedia. Thank you for your contributions. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:

I hope you enjoy editing here and being a Wikipedian! By the way, you can sign your name on Talk and vote pages using three tildes, like this: ~~~. Four tildes (~~~~) produces your name and the current date. If you have any questions, see the help pages, add a question to the village pump or ask me on my Talk page. Again, welcome! -- Graham ☺ | Talk 15:36, 18 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Sockpuppet?

The "contributions" of this user strongly suggest that he is a sockpuppet of User:Chuck F, a chronic libertarian POV pusher whose actions are currently under review at Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Chuck F. He's just begin reverting Ron Paul and Libertarian Party (United States), Chuck's only targets that aren't currently protected as a result of his edit warring. Please take this into account if he pleads ignorance to the three-revert rule. RadicalSubversiv E 08:16, 19 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I am not Chuck and I am not involved in any revert wars. Libertas

Now I'm not so sure, mostly because you've made some reasonable contributions with correct spelling, though something fishy is definitely going on. Are we supposed to believe it's a coincidence you're editing almost exclusively the same articles Chuck has been starting edit wars over? Libertarian Party (United States), Ron Paul, Wal-Mart, Exxon Mobil, McJob. Reithy, perhaps? RadicalSubversiv E 21:47, 19 Dec 2004 (UTC)

ARGH! I am not Chuck! I am not Reithy! I am not anyone except Libertas. Libertas

For myself it has no matter if you are Chuck or any other. Comrade Libertas, I don't want to talk with you on any topics, so, please, don't pollute my talk page with your labels any more :) User:Cmapm 20:53, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Singleton quote

My apologies, I missesd the attribution to Singleton. (Seems Paul really has trouble keeping his staff in line.) I don't think it belongs in the lead, though, so let's try to find a better place for it in the article. RadicalSubversiv E 21:08, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)

In regards to L. Paul Bremer

Libertas,

In regards to L. Paul Bremer, you and a few others seem to believe that his service to the United States are for reasons other than a sense of patriotic duty. If you have evidence to back your claim, I'm certain there are those who would be interested to read all about it. Please DO include external links and published articles to substantiate your claim.

Paradigmbuff 17:26, Dec 20, 2004 (UTC)

Soviet Union

I have added some further considerations of you 11 specific proposals for the Soviet Union article on the talk page. If you respond in good faith, I have confidence that we can work together in clarifying the discussion of collectivization and Soviet Union in terms of the famine in Ukraine and estimates of the causality toll. I am confident that we all can work together to get the page unlocked eventually. I have also pointed to excerpts from the article demonstrating that most of your points were already addressed in the framework of the current structure of the article. 172 07:32, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I have not been making allegations. I have expressed an interest in finding out whether or not some speculation by other users can be investigated. This is not to put you on the defensive but rather to give me a better idea on what I should expect from you. For now, nothing has been confirmed, so I will continue to respond to you based on the assumptions of good faith on your part and that you have nothing to do with Chuck or Reithy. 172 07:50, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I never said that you were Chuck or Reithy. I implied that I was interested in finding out if this were the case. At any rate, this doesn't matter. I will assume for now that you are not. This discussion isn't going to accomplish anything constructive. Let's try to focus our conversations on the edits and the proposals, not the personalities. 172 08:01, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Yeah, I said that. You've been confrontational from the start. Yet, I am still spending a considerable amount of time trying to work with you and respond to your comments. 172 08:11, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I would like to formally complain about you discussing my ___location with others. How do I do this.

I don't know. Maybe Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration. However, IP addresses are more or less designed to enable internet systems to find out what network or ISP you're on, otherwise how would any system be able to send you information? Looking up someone's internet ___location from an IP address is trivial, ie see here. And you revealed your IP address by editing while logged out. I didn't make you do that. 82.41.35.171 23:46, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

There's my IP address, for example. It resolves to the UK ISP Blueyonder. You can even tell that I'm in Edinburgh from it. This enables other machines trying to contact mine to send data to the correct place. Isn't that neat? Evercat 23:48, 30 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Now I do recall that the Washington Times acquired a stake in UPI, leading to the resignation of Helen Thomas... Nevertheless, this is a rightwing newspaper and was quite hawkish in the Cold War. Do you think that they have a pro-Soviet agenda… I haven't seen evidence of significant changes in editorial policies from UPI in recent years; and their articles seem to appear as frequently in papers across the country as before. I'm no fan of the Washington Times; but I see no evidence that UPI should be generally any less reliable than (say) AP or Reuters... BTW, this is a diversion from the point of posting the link to that article. 172 07:22, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I stand by the accuracy of that report. I have seen similar figures reported over the years scores of times... This is my last comment on this issue. I will not let this issue divert attention from the initial purpose of posting the link to that article any longer... Also, don't bother to post anything on my talk page any longer. I will start ignoring them unless they directly pertain to articles... I have reviewed your comments and changes to the aritcles; and I have no desire to interact with you any further. Other users can now deal with you on the Soviet Union page. 172 16:09, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Trolling and disingenous comments

You are quickly developing a habit of trolling and otherwise making disingenous and backhanded comments in edit summaries and on talk pages. For example, taunting 172 by writing: "suggest you check with UPI/Rev. Moon to find out" and "not sure what Rev Moon thinks" for edits totally unrelated to either the UPI or Rev. Moon. Please see Wikipedia:What is a troll and Wikipedia:Wikiquette for guidance. You've made some very useful edits -- please stick to that instead of being intentionally disruptive. RadicalSubversiv E 23:39, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Firstly, please do not interpret my comments as a request not to edit on Russia-related articles -- any deciison on your part not do so is your own. Secondly, NPOV policy applies to all of Wikipedia, and I (and I'm sure others) will continue to keep an eye on your editing regardless of what topics you choose to work on. RadicalSubversiv E 00:32, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

You speak with forked tongue. You certainly don't want me editing anything relating to left-wing issues. Your actions undermine the project you spend so much time on. Libertas

The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) (Russian: Сою́з Сове́тских Социалисти́ческих Респу́блик (СССР); tr.: Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik (SSSR)), also called the Soviet Union (Сове́тский Сою́з; tr.: Sovetsky Soyuz), was a state in much of the northern region of Eurasia that existed from 1922 until 1991. Its formation was the culmination of the 1917 Russian Revolution, which overthrew Tsar Nicholas II.

The territory occupied by the Soviet Union varied, and in its most recent times approximately corresponded to that of the late Imperial Russia, with notable exclusions of Poland, Finland, and Alaska. With the exception of a brief period immediately following the "revolution", the political organization of the country was defined by the only permitted political party, the Communist Party of the Soviet Union which brutally repressed all other parties, imprisoned activists and enslaved the nation.

Союз Советских Социалистических Республик
Soyuz Sovetskikh Sotsialisticheskikh Respublik

	Soviet coat of arms
(In Detail)

State motto: Пролетарии всех стран, соединяйтесь! (Workers of the world, unite!)

Official language

None, Russian was de facto

Capital

Moscow

Area
- Total
- % water

1st before collapse
[[1 E13 m%B2|22,402,200 km²]]
xx%

Population
- Total
- Density

3rd before collapse
293,047,571 (July 1991)
13.08/km² (July 1991)

Establishment
- Declared
- Recognised

1922

Dissolution

UTC +3 to +11

The Internationale
(1922-1944)
Hymn of the Soviet Union
(1944-1991)

Internet TLD

.su

History

Main article: History of the Soviet Union.

Revolutionary activity in Russia began with the Decembrist Revolt, uncovered in 1825, and although serfdom was abolished in 1861, its abolition was achieved on terms unfavorable to the peasants and served to encourage revolutionaries. A parliament, the Duma, was established in 1906, but political and social unrest continued and was aggravated during World War I by military defeat and food shortages.

The February and October Revolutions (see also Russian Revolution) were followed by the Russian Civil War, in which the Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic (RSFSR) and other Bolshevik led states came to control most of the former Russian Empire.

During the civil war, the Communist regime sought to exert control through a series of drastic measures that came to be known as war communism, including the eviction of the landlord class and the subdivision of land among peasant families. Peasants generally did not directly and immediately benefit from the latter until Lenin announced the New Economic Policy (NEP), which saw an end to the policy of requisitioning agricultural surpluses during the civil war. Peasants marketed most of their produce at free prices during the years of the NEP.

On 6 July 1923 the RSFSR, the Transcaucasian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic, and the Byelorussian and Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republics signed a Treaty of Union forming the Soviet Union.

After the death of the Soviet Union's revolutionary founding figure Vladimir Lenin (1924), Joseph Stalin finally emerged as uncontested leader following a power struggle in the upper echelons of the Communist Party, defeating Leon Trotsky and ultimately having him exiled from the Soviet Union in 1929 and later assassinated.

Under Stalin, who replaced Lenin's NEP with five year plans and collective farming, the Soviet Union (established 1922) became a major industrial power, but with effective political opposition eliminated in the 1930s through a harsh system of internal exile (see Gulag) and a severe period of repression known as the Great Purges. The conclusion of World War II (the Great Patriotic War, 1941–1945) established the Soviet Union as one of the two major world powers, a position maintained for four decades through military strength, aid to developing countries, and scientific research, especially into space technology and weaponry. Growing tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States, its former wartime ally and the other superpower, led to the Cold War.

After Stalin's death in 1953, Nikita Khrushchev was elected first secretary of the Communist Party Central Committee. In 1956 he condemned Stalin and a period of "de-Stalinization" began, including amnesty for some political prisoners.

Communist Party General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev promoted Soviet glasnost (openness) and perestroika (economic restructuring). A U.S.-Soviet summit meeting in 1986 and 1987 and a meeting of U.S. President Ronald Reagan and Gorbachev in late 1988 brought a reduction in arms in Europe.

The disintegration of Communist allies in Eastern Europe heralded the dissolution of the Soviet Union. As the Russian republic's Boris Yeltsin eclipsed Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in power, the Soviet Union was peacefully dissolved in December 1991. Most former Soviet republics joined the Commonwealth of Independent States.

Politics

Main article: Politics of the Soviet Union

According to the most recent Soviet Constitution of 1977, the Soviet Union theoretically was a federal state consisting of fifteen republics joined together in a voluntary union and the government had a federal structure (see Constitution of the Soviet Union). In fact, authority was highly centralized, with the governments of the republics hand-picked by Moscow.

The government implemented decisions made by the Communist Party (see Organization of the Communist Party of the USSR). As a rule, the Communist Party did not permit any other political group to challenge its leadership, and over the decades, especially under Stalin, Soviet citizens who dissented openly with CPSU policies faced numerous forms of repression, including imprisonment and executions.

The organization of the CPSU was based on democratic centralism, the Leninist method of intraparty decision making. According to democratic centralism, lower party bodies executed the decisions of higher party bodies. The lowest bodies started from the town and district levels, working up to the Central Committee, the highest party body. The party, using its nomenklatura authority, placed reliable individuals in leadership posts throughout the government. CPSU bodies monitored the actions of government ministries, agencies, and legislative organs.

The leader of the Communist Party was the General Secretary. The highest government legislative body was the Supreme Soviet. The party chief would sometimes hold other positions, such as the state presidency or premiership (see Leadership of the Soviet Union). The General Secretary and the chiefs of key state bodies comprised a decision-making committee, the Presidium or Politburo.

Foreign relations

Main article: Foreign relations of the Soviet Union

The Soviet Union was denied recognition by most countries when it was founded in 1922. It joined the League of Nations in 1934, but was expelled in 1939 amid the start of the Winter War. However, World War II established the USSR as one of the two major world powers, a position maintained for four decades through military strength, aid to developing countries, and scientific research, especially into space technology and weaponry.

Soviet foreign policy played a major role determining the tenor of international relations for nearly four decades, and the Soviet Union had official relations with the majority of the nations of the world by the late 1980s. The Soviet Union became a member of the United Nations at its foundation in 1945. It also became one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council which gave it the right to veto any of its resolutions. (see Soviet Union and the United Nations)

The CPSU Central Committee Politburo determined the major foreign policy guidelines. The overarching objectives of Soviet foreign policy were national security and the maintenance of hegemony over the Warsaw Pact.

As the Soviet Union achieved rough nuclear parity with the United States, Cold War superpower competition between the Soviet Union and the U.S. gave way to Détente and a more complicated pattern of international relations in which the world was no longer clearly split into two clearly opposed blocs in the 1960s and 1970s. Less powerful countries had more room to assert their independence, and the two superpowers were partially able to recognize their common interest in trying to check the further spread and proliferation of nuclear weapons (see SALT I, SALT II, Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty). Since the early 1970s, the Soviet Union concluded friendship and cooperation treaties with a number of states in the noncommunist world, especially among Third World and Non-Aligned Movement states.

After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Russia claimed to be the legal successor to the Soviet Union on the international stage. Russian foreign policy repudiated Marxism-Leninism as a guide to action, soliciting Western support for capitalist reforms in postcommunist Russia.

Republics

Main article: Republics of the Soviet Union.

The Soviet Union was a federation of Soviet Socialist Republics (SSR). The first Republics were established shortly after the October Revolution of 1917. At that time, republics were technically independent one from another but their governments acted in close coordination, as directed by the CPSU leadership. In 1922, four Republics (Russian SFSR, Ukrainian SSR, Belorussian SSR, and Transcaucasian SFSR) joined into the Soviet Union. Between 1922 and 1940, the number of Republics grew to sixteen. Some of the new Republics were formed from territories conquered by the Soviet Union, others by splitting existing Republics into several parts. The criteria for establishing new republics were as follows:

to be located on the periphery of the Soviet Union so as to be able to exercise their alleged right to secession,
be economically strong enough to survive on their own upon secession and
be named after the dominant ethnic group which should consist of at least one million people.

The system remained almost unchanged after 1940. No new Republics were established. One republic, Karelo-Finnish SSR, was disbanded in 1956. The remaining 15 republics lasted until 1991. Secession remained theoretical, and very unlikely, given Soviet centralism, until the 1991 collapse of the Union. At that time, the republics became independent countries, with some still loosely organized under the heading Commonwealth of Independent States.

Some republics had common history and geographical regions, and were referred by group names. These were Baltic Republics, Transcaucasian Republics, and Central Asian Republics.

Soviet Republics	Independent states
Armenian SSR	Armenia
Azerbaijan SSR	Azerbaijan
Byelorussian SSR	Belarus
Estonian SSR	Estonia
Georgian SSR	Georgia
Kazakh SSR	Kazakhstan
Kirghiz SSR	Kyrgyzstan
Latvian SSR	Latvia
Lithuanian SSR	Lithuania
Moldavian SSR	Moldova
Russian SFSR	Russia
Tadzhik SSR	Tajikistan
Turkmen SSR	Turkmenistan
Ukrainian SSR	Ukraine
Uzbek SSR	Uzbekistan

Economy

Main article: Economy of the Soviet Union

Characteristics

Based on a system of state ownership, the Soviet economy was controlled by an elaborate system administrative planning from the drafting of the first Five Year Plan (1928) to the dissolution of the Soviet Union (1991). Major industries (agriculture, banking, communications, public services, trade, and transportation) were controlled by the state's agents through Gosplan (the state planning commission) and Gosbank (the state bank) according to the priorities of the Communist Party. The Soviet planning bureaucracy determined prices, allocation of resources, and distribution of goods and services. The supply-demand mechanism was absent. Money was distributed as salaries or rewards, and people could freely decide which of the offered goods they want to buy. Their buying decisions, however, had relatively little influence on planning and shortages of in-demand consumer goods were common. Special access to certain consumer goods was a privilege of high-ranking state, Party and military personnel, prominent scientists, veterans of the war, recipients of certain orders and medals, cosmonauts, liquidators of the Chernobyl disaster, survivors of the Leningrad blocade and many other categories of Soviet citizens. This contrasted with the lower living standard of the average Soviet worker.

Private property was legal but limited; people could own property for personal use, but not for commercial use. See the main article for more detail.

Economic development

The Soviet rejected - for the most part - the market mechanism as a method of resource allocation. It adopted central planning to make these decisions. The Soviet determined that after 1928 heavy industry needed to be emphasized rather than providing the people with food or basic consumer goods. The emphasis on heavy industry caused great starvation and misery throughout Russia. It did however permit the military-industrial complex of the Soviet Union to emerge as a superpower. Overall, indicators of public health and economic welfare showed some improvements from the low base prevailing under the Tsars, but production in the consumer and agricultural sectors was often inadequate (see Agriculture of the Soviet Union). Crises in the agricultural sector reaped catastrophic consequences in the 1930s under Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. A lack of investment in the consumer and service sectors resulted in black markets in some areas. Much of Russian economic potential was wasted by their system of central planning and the massive resultant misallocation of resources.

Growth was sclerotic throughout the history of the Soviet, even with the injection of borrowed funds from the West, and looted property stolen from Eastern Europe after the World War II. It slowed even further in the 1960s and then stagnated from the mid-1970s, due to the inefficiencies of central planning and active corruption. This encouraged attempts to implement economic reform (Perestroika) in the 1980s, as the Soviet economy collapsed. Since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, most former Soviet Republics, including the largest (Russia), have moved towards a system of private ownership and market-based allocation of resources.

Geography

Main article: Geography of the Soviet Union

The Soviet Union occupied the eastern portion of European continent and northern portion of Asian continent. Most of country was north of 50° north latitude and covered a total area of 22 402 200 square kilometres. Due to the sheer size of the state the climate varied greatly from temperate to Arctic continental. 11 percent of land was arable, 16 percent were meadows and pasture, 41 percent was forest and woodland, and 32 percent other (including tundra).

Demographics

Main article: Demographics of the Soviet Union

The Soviet Union was one of the world's most ethnically diverse countries, with more than 100 distinct national ethnicities living within its borders. The total population was estimated at 293 million in 1991. The Soviet Union was so large, in fact, that even after all associated republics gained independence, Russia remains the largest country by area, and remains quite ethnically diverse, including, e.g., minorities of Tatars, Udmurts, and many other non-Russian ethnicities.

Culture

Holidays

Date	English Name	Local Name	Remarks
January 1	New Year's Day	Новый Год
February 23	Red Army Day	День Советской Армии и Военно-Морского Флота	February Revolution, 1917, Formation of the Red Army, 1918 Is currently called День Защитника Отечества
March 8	International Women's Day	Международный Женский День
May 1	International Labor Day (May Day)	Первое Мая - День Солидарности Трудящихся
May 9	Victory Day	День Победы	End of Great Patriotic War, marked by capitulation of Nazi Germany, 1945
November 7	Great October Socialist Revolution	Седьмое Ноября	October Revolution 1917; it is currently called День Примирения и Согласия;

External links

Russia News, News Searches, and Reference
Teaching about the Soviet Union
Images of the Soviet Union - a collection of photos showing everyday life in the Soviet Union
Impressions of Soviet Russia, by John Dewey
Soviet Union Time Posters / Plakat /

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Personal attacks

Please refrain from accusing me of being a Stalinist. I'm not, and I consider it a personal attack. See Wikipedia:No personal attacks. Also, while I'm not aware of a policy officially presenting, selectively removing comments from your talk page goes against community practice is not likely to be well-received. RadicalSubversiv E 05:08, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

If you are going to vandalize my user page, at least have the honesty to do it under your main username [1]. 172 05:18, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

3 Revert Rule

Hi, you have reverted edits to History of post-Soviet Russia three times in the past 12 hours or so. Please be aware that Wikipedia has a rule, the Wikipedia:Three revert rule, against reverting an article more than 3 times in any 24 hour period.

Please also note that the community consensus (see WP:AN#Three revert rule) is that a reversion with an edit added into it (e.g. adding some text changes, or linking dates) is still a reversion, and still counts against the 3RR.

As you will see from reading the Wikipedia:Three revert rule page, violating the 3RR can get you blocked from editing. I've already had to block two people today for violating the 3RR, and I don't want to have to do it again. Thank you. Noel (talk) 05:36, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Note that Libertas has been here for several weeks, and should be well aware of the 3RR, having participated in discussions where it's been referenced (see Talk:Ron Paul for an example). Also note that he already erased my note here about his violation. RadicalSubversiv E 05:45, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)

3RR appears to have been broken. Note no change here except for an attempt to disguise a reversion (not sure who removed the word, checking that now). Pakaran (ark a pan) 05:47, 1 Jan 2005 (UTC)