>>>The communists are no longer a major factor in Russia.
I posted a few articles from the Ukraine that says communism is a major factor. Did you read them?
I didn't see your articles about communism being a major factor, but I believe they said that.
I think "communism" is being used as a catch-all word. The "communists" didn't really believe in the communist ideas any more than you or I, they merely used that as convenient propaganda to stay in power. Most "communist" leaders were and are just power hungry politicians, would-be dictators.
Putin used to be a communist, and having worked in the KGB, he is no "genle soul", but he is also very smart, and knows that communism, as a system, is dead, as in DEAD, and he is balancing a lot of different things and agendas of various people in Russia.
Russia's Nuclear Shield
Moscow ARMEYSKIY SBORNIK, Dec 95 No 12,
(Signed to press 25 Nov 95) pp 7-11
by Colonel General Igor Sergeyev, CINC Strategic Missile Troops
In the past training year forces in the Strategic Missile Troops were upgraded by introducing missile regiments armed with the Topol missile complex to the order of battle and placing them on alert duty. Work continued on creating the modernized Topol-M missile complex.
Today the Strategic Missile Troops [SMT] are the most powerful and most combat-effective branch of the Russian Federation Armed Forces, the main component of strategic nuclear forces, and a real guarantor of national security. SMT nuclear missile weapons give fullest consideration to Russia's geostrategic position and the directions and scale of threats, they are distinguished by global reach and enormous destructive power, and they objectively equalize the correlation of economic, technical, demographic and other parameters of state strength that do not favor Russia.
http://www.fas.org/news/russia/1995/druma076_s96001.htm May 10, 2001
By Valentin Tikhonov *
MOSCOW -- Since the collapse of the Soviet Union nearly a decade ago, the West has been concerned about the fate of Russia's vast stockpile of nuclear weapons, materials and expertise.
http://www.nyu.edu/globalbeat/syndicate/Tikho051001.html Russia's Nuclear and Missile Technology Assistance to Iran
By Michael Jasinski
Russian assistance for the Iranian nuclear program has long been an irritant in the U.S.-Russian relations. The revelations concerning Iran's hitherto unknown uranium enrichment efforts, which propelled Iran's nuclear ambitions to the center of the world's attention, added a new dimension to the controversy. In a report released on June 18, 2003, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) criticized Iran for failing to report a number of nuclear activities. Nevertheless, the IAEA did not impose sanctions on Iran, though it did enjoin it to sign an additional protocol pursuant to its nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) obligations, which would enable the IAEA to inspect any suspected nuclear site in Iran, rather than just declared nuclear sites. These developments have signaled a new phase in the long U.S.-Russian dispute over Russia's nuclear projects in Iran.
http://cns.miis.edu/research/iran/rusnuc.htm India and Pakistan: Nuclear Capabilities
India and Pakistan are rivals and have maintained hostile relations since they gained independence from the British in 1948. Three times these two nations have gone to war, twice over disputes about Kashmir. The two have been involved in a conventional arms race since the beginning, allocating huge percentages of their budgets to defense.
While war has always been imminent between these two countries, the threat to the entire region has never been as great as it is now. The threat of a conventional war is always cause for political tension in any region and it is no secret that India and Pakistan have amassed huge stockpiles of conventional arsenal.
But as of May 1998, it is clear that the threat is much greater to the region should India and Pakistan embark on another war. It is evident these two rival nations are now also capable of producing and using nuclear weapons.
http://www.pakalert.net/articles/nuke_cap.asp