f0c3d600   
   7c8e44ea   
   XPost: soc.culture.baltics, soc.culture.czecho-slovak, soc.culture.russian   
   From: ddfr@daviddfriedman.nopsam.com   
      
   In article   
   ,   
    holman@mappi.helsinki.fi (Eugene Holman) wrote:   
      
   > In article   
   > <35ddc3c0-7afb-4fce-a552-81aac898c0f5@34g2000hsh.googlegroups.com>,   
   > constantinopoli@gmail.com wrote:   
   >   
   >   
   >    
   >   
   > > Eugene's comparison to Canada is silly for the reason James states.   
   >   
   > And I stand by my comparison. The Canada-USA and Finland-USSR   
   > relationships are both examples of methodologies for managing the   
   > relationship between disproportionately large and small neighoring states.   
      
   Are you suggesting that Canada bases its internal policies on the fear   
   of offending, and being invaded by, the U.S.? Perhaps I am misreding the   
   thread, but it looks to me as though you concede that Finland's policies   
   were in considerable part based on a similar fear with regard to the   
   Soviet Union.   
      
   > As it stands today, Canada is a virtual economic colony of the United States.   
   >   
   > The now defunct USSR, from which Finland exported mostly raw materials and   
   > to which it sold mostly consumer goods, often made from those raw   
   > materials, with high added value, was a virtual economic colony of   
   > Finland.   
      
   You think the defining characteristic of a colony is that it exports raw   
   materials? So Australia is also a colony? Who is its colonial power?   
   Presumably the U.S. was, by your standards, a colony long after the   
   American Revolution.   
      
   You seem to be confusing a political relationship with an economic   
   relationship. I may be mistaken, but I believe East Germany also   
   exported produced goods to the Soviet Union. Was the USSR their colony   
   too?   
      
   > Canada and the United States are culturally and economically quite   
   > similar, except for the relative size of their populations, the US having   
   > roughly ten times more people than Canada does. If they did not share such   
   > a long border, they would be be trading rivals rather than partners in an   
   > the present asymmetrical, American-dominated relationship.   
      
   In some respects they are trading rivals--I'm pretty sure both are net   
   exporters of wheat, for instance. Presumably your argument implies that   
   Canada keeps down its wheat production in order not to offend the U.S.   
   by competing for the world market. It's true that one of the two   
   countries intervenes in its agriculture in order to hold down output,   
   but I don't think that fits your argument.   
      
   What, in your view, are the Canadian economic policies that reflect the   
   domination the U.S. exercises by virtue of that long border?   
      
   > Finland and the USSR were culturally and economically quite different;   
   > Finland was a prosperous first-world market economy, while the USSR was a   
   > stagnant third-world command economy that could not even feed itself.   
   > Their relationship was symbiotic. Finland could do things for the USSR   
   > that the USSR did not have the ability or credibility to do on its own.   
   > The USSR, in turn, could supply Finland with natural resources at a more   
   > favorable price tha Finland would have to pay for them on the world   
   > market.   
      
   Why was it in the interest of the Soviets to provide Finland resources   
   at prices below the world market price? And what is the evidence that   
   they did so?   
      
   So far as produced goods, there wasn't any western embargo of the Soviet   
   Union, so, with a few exceptions, they could buy them from anyone who   
   produced them. Including the U.S.   
      
   > Canada, which has not been involved in armed conflict with the USA since   
   > the War of 1812, has no difficulty expressing anti-US views or defending   
   > its own interests, even if these are not completely consistent with those   
   > of the USA.   
      
   Which suggests that the comparison of Canada to Finland is mistaken. But   
   I thought you were the one making it.   
      
   > Nevertheless, American policy towards Cuba, the Dominican   
   > Republic, Grenada, Panama, Nicaragua, Chile, and recently Venezuela   
   > clearly demonstrate that the United States draws lines and acts when it   
   > perceives its neighbors to be taking too anti-American a line.   
      
   The U.S. invaded Venezuela? Shows what I miss by not having a television.   
      
   Or were you referring to the strikingly pro-American policies of the   
   current Venezuelan government?   
      
   I wouldn't be surprised if you could find examples of Finlandization in   
   Central America over the past hundred and fifty years. But, on the   
   whole, Latin American countries have been pretty willing to say, and   
   permit their citizens to say, unkind things about the U.S.   
      
   > As early as   
   > 1823 the United States reserved for itself in the Monroe Doctrine the   
   > right to intervene in the affairs of any state in the western hemisphere   
   > that it considered to be acting against its interests, however defined.   
      
   I believe you are off by almost a century. The Roosevelt corollary to   
   the Monroe Doctrine only dates from 1904. The original doctrine was that   
   European powers were not permitted to colonize, or interfere with the   
   affairs of, the independent nations of the Americas.   
      
   > Finland, which was involved in armed conflicts with the USSR in 1939-1940   
   > and 1941-1944, reached a special accord with the USSR in 1948 according to   
   > which the two countries would do everything possible to avoid resolving   
   > any crises that erupted between them using military force. The primary   
   > force behind this accord was Urho Kekkonen, who became president of   
   > Finland in 1956 and functioned as the primary manager of the   
   > Finnish-Soviet relationship between 1956 and 1981. He was not above using   
   > his stewardship of the relationship to precipitate political crises in   
   > Finland and thus demonstrate his political indispensibility and the   
   > importance of re-electing him. Because Finland had far more credibility in   
   > the international arena than the USSR had concerning proposals to finalize   
   > the results of WW II, Kekkonen allowed himself to be a mouthpiece for   
   > Soviet policies, such as the 1975 CSCE conference. As all readers of these   
   > newsgroups should know, this event gave some legal validity to the border   
   > changes and other results of WW II, but it also internationalized human   
   > rights abuses in the eastern bloc. Viewed from the perspective of 2008,   
   > most of the WW II border changes have been revised, human rights abuse   
   > remains an internatuional issue, and the main violaters of human rights in   
   > Europe, the eastern block governments, have been consigend to the   
   > trash-heal of history.   
   >   
   > Thus I ask you: which relationship was the more productive both materially   
   > and politically?   
   >   
   > A. Canada-USA   
   > B. Finland-USSR (RIP), aka Finlandization.   
      
   The obvious question, with regard to the latter, is what the alternative   
   would have been. If the alternative was annexation of Finland by the   
   Soviet Union, then Finlandization was obviously preferable for the   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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