>
> So how'd the USSR keep things peaceful?
>
> Doug
Several reasons. First off, it was never totally peaceful, but the media did not report on such things. For instance, a friend of mine did his military service in the Far East in the 70s and he said there were violent ethnic clashed between Russians and Koreans there. Second, I think it was a combination os the ideology, which stressed that "we are all together as Soviet peoples," the fact that it had a very effective police apparatus, and the economy hadn't gone all to hell. Also the USSR was not awash in guns, as the Caucasus is today.
The instant after the USSR fell, look what you had -- bloody smoldering hatred flaring up between Georgians, Ossetians and Abkhaz, Ingush and Ossetians, Romanians and Russians, Armenians and Ajerbaijanis...
These things are deep. A former coworker, an ethnic Armenian, visted LA a few years ago. When she returned she said that there was a very nice Armenian community there, but also "a lot of fucking Ajerbaijanis!"
__________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? New and Improved Yahoo! Mail - 100MB free storage! http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail