Corruption Scandal That Shook the USSR - Cold War DOCUMENTARY 

Lobby congras with money is normal 😂

Tru.

"Corruption Scandal That Shook the USSR [10 hours, part 1/387]"

Arbitrary decision making is a commonly phenomena in communism countries.

What a testimony, thanks for sharing.

It's crazy how they could order something to be done with little to no knowledge of what it takes to get a specific crop grown in massive numbers without considering the cost of growing that specific crop in massive numbers.

The US can almost grow any crop on Earth. What lack in abundance is rice fields. Other than that, we have abundance in everything. Especially when it comes to corn. The entire Midwest is an endless cornfield. Fruits, nuts, vegetables, all are grown in California because of its perfect agricultural environment. Oranges, peaches, and other fruits are grown in Florida, New Jersey, and Georgia. So we can get everything all year round. The Soviet Union had that potential. However, the Soviet system was never sufficient enough to be on par with the US. A free market capitalist economy is the best way forward. A command economy is efficient to do just one thing at the cost of another thing.

@@black10872 That's ignorant nonsense. You're comparing 21st century technology and techniques (with their own set of ecological problems) with post-WW2 Soviet states - where just seeing a tractor was the equivalent of an automated robotic farm today. Further, for the US escapades from technologically similar periods look up the dust bowl, rampant alcoholism, prohibition, even the Great Depression... and that's all just before WW2 and the idea of ecology and the realization of what pesticides were doing to the biosphere. All provided by the "free market capitalist economy". In the modern era the same system has led to destruction of individual producers in favor of corporations, further ecological devastation and continuous boom-bust cycles of the global economy. FFS, modern corn is not even edible - it has to be industrially processed into starch and high fructose corn syrup before it can be consumed. Leading to a growing pandemic of a whole range of diseases - all a product of pursuit of profit. Just the other day, there was another Nestle scandal around them adding sugar into baby formula and infant food - but only in the poor countries where regulations are not as precise. But that's nothing compared to billions who will die before we manage to fix the effects of global warming alone. Also, free market my ass. There's no such thing as a deregulated or free market. Even completely illegal "products and services" are strictly regulated. There's only regulations favoring either the producers and consumers OR the middlemen and stock market parasites. "Freeing" the economy has inevitably always resulted in huge profits for the latter, the capitalists, while impoverishing or outright destroying the working class. And even if there were... look no further than the state of US economic and other conditions BEFORE there were modern regulations. From bank crises to adulterated and outright poisonous food and "medicines".

That one’s a global meme/joke.

Russian wikipedia says 17 times... Edit: Might be all together though

Those could be quotes from Hillary Clinton

Obviously a hero of freedom™️ who escaped the clutches of Godless Communism™️😉

Turkmenistan oil scandal now 2024

Hate to brake it to you, your father was the corrupt person. You cannot be a good person and be member of the most evil regime of all time.

i read that they used Satellites to spy on the cotton fields to see if the paper worked matched the output.

Out of curiosity, what did an economics degree in the USSR generally entail to earn?

Your father must have been terrible to have lived with, always wondering if you were being used against him, must have been a very paranoid lunatic, sorry you were raised up by such evil.

@@youthoughtaboutit6946 Плановая экономика это тоже экономика. В ней есть свои законы, они не похожи на рыночные, но в плановой экономике тоже не бесконечные ресурсы.

You need to understand Russian mentality. They are a colonial power since the times of Ivan the Terrible and they started expanding eastward. And just because they had a revolution in 1917, it doesn't mean they got rid of their mentality. They were and still are a colonial power. The magnitude of that "power" is up to debate, but the will was and still is there.

In Douglas Porch's book "Wars of Empire", Russian imperialism is unique because it is intrinsically tied to national security. Them being the largest country on earth was not because they saw potential for riches in those places but rather saw potential for security in those places...

@@theotherohlourdespadua1131 it's an argument, I think at best it tells half the story. Every empire descended from Rome has justified its imperial actions through claims of self defense because that was what Rome did. Empires that weren't descended from Rome generally found other ways to justify their actions, like the Chinese and their "Mandate of Heaven". Brits sometimes argued that their empire was necessary to keep the Royal Navy preeminent, so that it could always defend the English Channel, which was the only way to keep the massive armies of Europe at bay. The US likewise defends its current informal empire as a means of "National Security". Even the Crusades were pitched as "Defensive" actions. So again, I'm not saying that Russia didn't face a unique set of circumstances, but I question if it was truly as unique as that, when other empires made similar claims.

He did, he also set up an extremely privileged regime for Georgian SSR while deporting ethnic "minorities" from it's borders.

They weren't "nations" how you think they were

Boris is the most corrupted leader, to the point of being a traitor.

Everyone is young once and full of idealism.

"It should have been me! Not them!"

Maybe he took inspiration from what he saw in Uzbekistan

Of course, he’s Russia. ‘Do as I say, not as I do’.

actually, this is an ancient land of civilizations, some cities there are several thousand years old

​@user-dl3nc4jx7k Every region in the Eurasian landmass has ancient civilizations and old cities. Nothing exceptional about Uzbekistan in that regards.

@@user-dl3nc4jx7ksure but the nation state known as Uzbekistan, is relatively new

So Soviet central government sen 4 billion To buy cotton that doesn't exist 😂

Ah another Jingles man

You better believe that's a paddlin'...

​@@TheColdWarTV didn't anyone who watches johnny Harris if they saw a video this week about uzebeckisan? I could have swore he put out a video on that country and especially about it's corrupt government, specifically the presidents daughter who was taking tens of millions in bribes and literally torturing those who didn't pay up. crazy story

Stabbin*

I think there was plenty of cotton, the DDR made their cars out of cotton, it was just of shitty quality. Luckily all they did was drain the Aral sea in the process, and made the world's youngest desert!

There was plenty of roubles to throw up and down the line to not rock the boat, you saw that table just piled with them.

@smalltime0 They, Russian and later Soviet scientists said the Aral sea was just a waste because the water just evaporated, so why not divert it for extremely water intensive agriculture. And why line the ditches with clay or concrete, just a waste of resources, so what if 90% of the water diverted was sucked into the ground or evaporated.

@@300guy Ironically the salt being blown across the fields means the irrigated fields use even more water, why the hell anyone would go 'lets divert water flows and make a salt lake' is beyond me

​@smalltime0 Short term Gains, within a 5 year plan were much more important than long-term consequences. Look at Krustchev's virgin lands initiative, definitely increased crop yields for a couple of years but without any infrastructure to support the new production a lot of it just went to waste.

Cotton IS harmless.

Something like "you can totally enslave people even without communism, and indeed in a capitalist economy"

@@anzaca1the cotton industry however, not so much

Believe it or not, responsible for 53% of violent crime in America

This kind of goes into the whole object/tool vs potential uses debate.

The mistake was using a canal instead of a pipe

You realize the entire operation was a soup sandwich.

Yes. Privatize everything. No government. Corporate control of everything

Thank YOU!

Green politics in western countries

Pick any country and you'll see a similar picture. In some, it involves invasion of other countries.

Lobbying in usa Aso

I thought Borat was from Kazakhstan?

@@rooneytutoring Yeah he was.

Yes, and one of the Borat jokes is always to denigrate Uzbekistan

@@ftwcrazyman thx for the clarification.

​@@rooneytutoring we all know what Kazakhstan's number one problem is however the lesser known number two is Uzbekistan.

Независимость республик СССР это не свобода народов. Это независимость местных элит, которые могут управлять своими народами без вмешательства Москвы.

USA: Hold my beer

as bad as the USSR corruption was it is not nearly the absolute scale of modern China

USA more debt

Completely uncomparable: Some bubbles are counted yes, but they are counted consistently and corruption itself is in fact being rooted out. All that does is a set inflation that has side effects and can be contained locally. Also it provides some economic activity even if the intent is corrupt to begin with. The 'real estate bubble' for example has ensured people can actually afford to live in and near cities. It eliminates the risk from the property development market. I've sat in on a pretty corrupt land deal in China and I own an appartment block in a small village. Wait Velsen, didn't you just say corruption in China isn't comparable? That's pretty corrupt! Well yes, the building is mostly derelict. It's worth 1 rmb and can't ever be rented out again. It's economically done but who wants to shell out for demolion? Aint even builders left to knock it down: half the village is a ruin, everybody moved to the city. But we needed my grandmother-in-law to sell it to someone so she could free a slot in the maximum amount of property she can legally own; She's reliable and you can inherit above your legal limit. Reliable, unlike a drunken uncle they previously used as a strawman who simply seized their 'his' appartment. We basically explained that nobody would buy it and surely he would help lovely grandma? Plus do you mind if we store these bottles of excellent liquor in your office fridge while we go shopping? By the by, if anything is wrong, just seize the property off me, I don't mind and you'll look good for getting free assets for the local government. With his ass covered and knowing there'd be no trace of the payment, clerk happily signed off on it. That's how I bought a 1 RMB building off an old lady for 190K RMB (that I then write off as a foreign investment loss on my taxes AND I can prove it bought something and was a loss, so that's fully legal) and the same week my grandmother in law bought property for 190K rmb in a place which I know for a fact would become Guangzhou's new expansion. Fast forward six years to now, and it is the next big thing, they'll talk your ears off at the Museum of Urban Planning. The family made a pile of money and pay us back at a rate of € 1500 per family visit so it stays within cash allowance and reporting ranges. Corrupt? Totally. Harmful to society? Naah. It basically ensured a significant private investment into a government project that otherwise wouldn't be done.

@@nvelsen1975 corruption doesn’t only mean bribery and acceptance of bribes which distort fair trade and assessment of quality, it also meant corruption of system, including government administration, which leads to diminishing returns for society and ultimatums leading to need for more corruption such as bribery, in order to keep the leapfrog the broken system.

Because the Soviet Union's economy was sanctioned by the United States, it was difficult to import.

I'd no idea this was happening and really hope that the leaders of those countries are having serious discussions regarding this.

All the more reason for Kazakhstan to dam the western half of the Aral Sea as well.

​@@trizvanov just use war

Votka overdose :)

СССР разрушили не идеалисты ради свободы. Его разрушили преступники, ради бесконтрольного воровства, ради возможности легализации преступных доходов под видом бизнеса, ради возможности не скрывать иностранные предметы роскоши, ради возможности уехать с украденным за границу.

@@user-yj8fg3pc9h No one said they were idealists. But the idealism of the Soviet Union lasted only through the first generation and those who had direct experience with WWII. The trouble with communism as a system is that it's not incentive-compatible. It needs almost everyone to be somewhat idealistic to work because it goes against human nature and human weaknesses. By the time you get to the 1970s, large numbers of people were either covertly or openly corrupt and it went all the way to the top - like Brezhnev tolerating the open corruption of the Muslim SSRs. Well designed economic systems must be robust to human nature, the fact people are largely self-interested, at least on the scale of national economies.

@@cv990a4 Есть большая разница между тем, чтобы дать людям возможность обогащаться с помощью труда и обогащаться с помощью воровства. Примером для молодого поколения должны быть честные, трудолюбивые, изобретательные люди, а не бандиты и мошенники. В 90-е годы каждый школьный хулиган хвалился своими связями с настоящими бандитами. Они держали в страхе каждый город, им завидовали, стремились подражать (уголовный жаргон, татуировки, спортивная одежда, в которой удобно драться и бегать). С горькой усмешкой люди вспоминали слова про частную инициативу, собственность, бизнес, права человека - самыми богатыми людьми стали преступники. Честность стала уделом слабых, неудачников. Каждый бизнесмен либо становился жертвой преступников либо сам становился преступником. Либо ты убьешь конкурентов (и компаньонов) либо тебя убьют конкуренты (и компаньоны). Крах СССР был выгоден не тем, кто хочет честно трудиться, а тем, кто украл миллиарды.

Tyranny to compensate for the economic limitations exposed by the US's military budget.

USA Afganistan 2.0 baby

The central Asian republics were dictatorships since their establishment during the soviet era and their situation now is just a consequence of what happened back then, in a way central Asia never really changed.

"Middle Asian" was the term established during the colonialism and should really be abandoned

@@trizvanov why? it's accurate enough description of position.

@@krzysztofkolodziejczyk4335 No, not really. "Middle Asia" is a term that was invented during the colonial expansion by Russia. It is best not to be used to avoid ambiguity and colonial connotations.

@@trizvanov "not really"? it is LITERALLY description of position. as such not really an "invention".

So Russia Empire Doesn't count

Is sosialis you have money but don't have Product In capitalis you have many tipe of Product But don't have money

Why not?

Uzbekistan is rather dry (except in the mountainous areas) and has a sufficiently warm climate. Being north, or growing the plant in general, was never the problem. The need for irrigation in and due to the arid environment, was. And while life in the Soviet Union was certainly not "wonderful", "hell on earth" is really just unnecessarily overblown and unrealistic.

Yes, they renamed it to hide the fact that the USSR originally entered the war as an aggressor in 1939 alongside the Nazis.

The reason is simple. The WW2 has been started by nacional socialistic Germany together with international socialistic Russia + colonies known as USSR. Hitler.and Stalin attacked Poland together and later wehrmacht and red army have common victory parade in Brest. The Great patriotic war begins in 1941, when former nazi ally attacked russia and everybody pretend, that there is no history before 1941. This is the reason.

Because the video is about the Soviet Union so it makes sense in that context? And i don't think only Russians called it that but all or most of the Soviet Union did as well.

Indeed, "Great Patriotic War" was invented in order to conceal the aggressive and occupying nature of the Soviet involvement in 1939-41.

@@xandervk2371they were demons dealing with the devil

Time to report yourself to the closest reeducation center. Everyone knows the imperialist west promotes the lie of Soviet corruption.

Yeah, it's almost like it was a capitalist society.

"Corruption" is what they called stealing from the poor in communist states. In capitalist states they simply called it "lobbying", "electoral contribution", "consumption tax", or simply "law".

@@BTScriviner not real commulism?

​@@Tupadre97 Freedom to be American with worsening standard of living?

Hi, this is an absolutely huge topic but I can try to give a reasonably concise answer (for context I'm the writer of this video and of the Soviet-themed videos on this channel). In effect, when Soviet states became independent during/after the collapse of the USSR they tried to transition from state-controlled, socialist economies to free market ones through various types of privatisation processes. However, there were broadly two issues with this. First, most ordinary Soviet citizens had never grown up in a free market economy, so were not really familiar with the concept of private property or ownership and therefore the potential benefits of them. Two, there was an assumption that creating a class of individuals with private property would encourage the development of institutions to protect property rights, for example the rule of law and a more representative political system. In reality though, these problems meant that well-connected and knowledgeable officials who controlled state-owned assets basically took advantage of the privatisation process and hoarded massive wealth for themselves (hence the oligarchs). Thus, political institutions in these countries have largely ended up protecting these individuals as they have the wealth and therefore the power, excluding those who own very little. Ukraine is a really good example of this - with the exception of Zelensky's party, pretty much every political party in the Ukrainian system remains funded or led by an oligarch and serves to advance their interests. Now, why is this corruption so difficult to get rid of? Well, in part its because of what I mentioned above (wealth = power), but its also because of how the Soviet economy operated. Basically, corruption and informality were commonplace as people sought access to goods that the inefficient Soviet economy could not provide. As such, these informal methods of economics have become pretty normalised in most post-Soviet countries and are just the standard way of doing business (with some exceptions). It is also worth noting the divergent paths of post-communist countries in Eastern Europe who were NOT in the USSR (for example, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bulgaria etc.). Their political systems were largely based on parliamentary systems due to the legacy of the interwar period, and as such their privatisation processes ended up being much more representative of the population as a whole compared to post-Soviet countries where their systems were largely presidential and thus more prone to power concentration. In Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania - which were in the USSR but managed to successfully get rid of these legacies - their success was basically because they were so desperate to get rid of any and all legacies of Soviet rule that the entire population was far more unified in doing whatever it took to do so. In Russia, Ukraine, etc., there was significant opposition to the economic transition amid the short-term suffering caused by privatisation and price liberalisation, which played into the oligarchs' hands to help them seize control of the political system. Sorry, I said this answer would be concise but its really quite hard to summarise...hope this helped though!

@@omnidroid70 Thank you very much. I really appreciate the detailed response. That's some interesting development throughout the decades. Are there any books you would recommend for some deep diving into the failures and successes of Russian/Soviet economics? Cheers.

@@legionofyuri the most accessible/non-academic book I could recommend would be Chris Miller's Putinomics: Power and Money in Resurgent Russia, but if you're looking for something a bit more theoretical Henry Hale's Patronal Politics: Eurasian Regime Dynamics in Comparative Perspective is an excellent look at the post-Soviet space more broadly

@omnidroid70 thanks! I'll check them out.

While socialistic economies depend on infinite resources and cash flow wreaking havoc on the environment and the treasury often ending up adopting capitalist reforms, relying on foreign aid and/or resigning themselves to be isolated, backward and obsolete hellholes.

So atlantropa project can ?

Btw you should make video on delimitation of Soviet Central Asia, if you haven't already

It was always a fairy tale. Nomenclatura was the ruling class, and it wasn't going anywhere. As a matter of fact, they reinvented themselves as the masters of the new Russia.