Re: Economics and law/bureaucratic order made real

[Chris Doss <lookoverhere1@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Daniel,

You may be right -- I am no expert. I believe Soviet
airplanes were the world leader in the 50s (I may be
wrong). The great virtue of the Kalashnikov is that it
is easy to make, shoot, and almost never breaks down.
That said, Sukhoi and MiG make superb fighter planes
to this day. (PS I saw Mikhail Kalashnikov in an
interview on TV recently -- he said that "I am glad I
was able to serve the Motherland, but I wish I could
have invented something useful to peasants, like a
lawnmower.")

--- Daniel Davies <dsquared@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> chris wrote:
>
> -----Original Message-----
> >> Note that in areas where the Soviets _did_
> discipline
> >> labor -- the military and aeronautics, for
> instance --
> >> their goods were surburb.
>
> mate, this isn't true in aeronautics at least.  The
> Tupolevs were the Ladas
> of the airways, without the reliability.  Air China
> still has a few of them
> which crash with dispiriting regularity.  Air
> Vietnam got rid of all theirs
> in the 90s, IIRC because several SE Asian airports
> had got sick of their
> tendency not only to crash themselves but also to
> bump into safe aircraft.
> The African airlines all got rid of them too as soon
> as they could afford
> good ones.  I am told that the Tu-144 supersonic
> airliner was pretty
> amazing, but in general Soviet civilian aeronautic
> products are not well
> respected.
>
> I seem to remember being told by a gun nut that
> Russian Kalashnikovs were
> not well made either, and that the AK-47 of choice
> among bad lads was a
> Czech copy.  But I may not be remembering this one
> right.
>
> dd
>




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