Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!hpda!hplabs!ucbvax!NOTE.NSF.GOV!fbaube From: fbaube@NOTE.NSF.GOV (Fred Baube) Newsgroups: comp.society.futures Subject: Re: UUCP to USSR Message-ID: <8710301201.aa19657@note.nsf.gov> Date: Fri, 30-Oct-87 19:22:28 EST Article-I.D.: note.8710301201.aa19657 Posted: Fri Oct 30 19:22:28 1987 Date-Received: Thu, 5-Nov-87 04:29:31 EST Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: The ARPA Internet Lines: 40 In article <959@percival.UUCP> James Deibele writes: >In article <8710271119.aa21258@note.nsf.gov> fbaube@NOTE.NSF.GOV (Fred Baube) writes: >>Let us not attribute boundless evil to the Soviets. >>[they] perhaps figured >>there's no point in humiliating a rebellious province (1917) that >>serves as a window to the West. >Interesting. The Soviets are not "boundlessly evil" because they didn't >take the whole country, just part. >[..] >You attribute selfish reasons to the Soviets for letting go of part of >Finland---that they want an area where computers, etc. can be more easily >slipped past export controls, where they have to put in yet another army >of Occupation, where they have to worry about uprisings. None of that >sounds very nice to me... These points are important. But still, my point is that they were not as punitive/abusive to a country that worked with the Nazis as they could have been. To forego territory grabs in favor of cultivating just enough goodwill to be able to smuggle computers and other hi-tech (that didn't hardly exist yet :-), or in favor of making less work for the army, doesn't really sound like the stereotypical Soviets we all know and hate. To get back to the original idea, UUCP .. the Soviets are undergoing internal convulsions whose magnitude we can only guess at. Can't we (just once) give them the benefit of a doubt and open a private line of communication to them ? In our mythology, the godless communist hordes of "Red China" have (since Kissinger) become politically troubled masses yearning to breathe free. Why is this absolutely not possible with not the Soviets ? IF glasnost is for real, and IF we want to encourage it, can't we amateur diplomats deign to let their computer cognoscenti talk with us ? The free travel of information is supposed to be a Good Thing.. #include