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Crisis in the Kremlin is a political sim, an old DOS game from back when software shipped on floppy disks.  Like others of its time, Crisis didn't sport many fancy graphics, but packed a lot of gameplay into a small space. 

Crisis in the Kremlin simulates the latter days of the Soviet era.  I grew up during the Cold War and was in college while Mikhail Gorbachev held office.  As a political science major who partly specialized in Soviet studies, I watched developments of the Gorbachev era with excitement.  In the West at the time, there was plenty of speculation about it all.  Would he be able to turn the USSR around, make it a more reasonable country with free elections and freedom of the press?  Did he actually want to, or were glasnost and pyerestroika a ruse to lure us into a false sense of security?  Or would he go too far at some point and be overthrown?

This game lets you succeed Chernenko in 1985, and try to pull the country out of the stagnation and decay it inherited from the Brezhnev era, without going too far too fast and being run out of town.  Of course there are other options: you can clamp down and continue the old ways, holding onto traditional Soviet methods for as long as possible, or you can forge ahead with abandon, agitating for progress no matter the cost.  Whatever you do, you're in potential danger of being ousted by the Politburo, or even finding yourself overthrown by a popular revolution.  No pressure, but...if you get your political ass handed to you, there won't be a glorious Yeltsin-style rescue to bail you out.  You may, however, manage to avert a coup (or defeat a motion of no confidence) by appealing to the will of the people; in my experience, that only works if you're playing the Nationalists...which makes sense.

Factions

The game lets you play as a member of one of three factions.  The one you select will have an effect on your political situation and viable options, so choose based on how you feel like playing.

	Hard-Line – You were Chernenko's hand-picked choice for a successor.  As you might expect, the hard-liners want to continue the old Brezhnev ways of doing things: strict wage and price controls, straight-up authoritarian politics, etc.  Oh yes, and a strong military and KGB.  Choose this faction if you want to be a real Stalinist bastard or you feel comfortable leading the USSR into the future slowly and incrementally.  This is often considered the easiest faction to play early in the game, since you're on the side of the establishment--but the country's economic conditions will make it difficult later on.
	Reformist – Gorbachev made just a few too many enemies to be elected, but he was strong enough to get you installed.  This is the middle course in the game; here you're really walking Gorbachev's tightrope--try not to look down.  The Reformists want to pull the country toward openness and democracy, and get along with the West, but they do still want to hold the Union together; it's the middle position in the game.  This is often considered the easiest faction to play overall, such as it is.
	Nationalist – You were selected because the Hard-Liners and Reformists kept blocking each other's candidates, leaving you the only option that either would agree to.  The Nationalists want to scrap the Soviet system, going to democratic elections and complete, irresponsible laissez-faire capitalism as quickly as possible--and letting satellites and Union Republics go their own way.  Choosing this faction will give you a mandate to make sweeping changes (though still not all at once).  Pick the Nationalists if you want to change the country quickly and don't mind if the Warsaw Pact states and the Union Republics split off quickly.  This faction is often considered the toughest to play, since in effect you head a minority government with powerful opponents.
	That's what the manual says, anyway.  My experience is that you're expected to more or less follow your faction's party line.  You can't make the others too upset, of course, but if you don't govern the way your faction wants things done, you'll have trouble holding onto power.  So for instance you can't choose the Nationalists and quickly turn the unrestricted-market stuff way down.  Apparently, even though they're supposed to be a weak minority government, they still basically control the country and can topple your administration if they want to.  Note that that contradicts what the manual says about the Nationalist faction: in effect, you head the majority government, even though the manual and the game itself tell you differently.  In fact, I actually think the Nationalist faction is the easiest to play.

Gameplay

The game begins in 1985, the year of Chernenko's death, and continues well past the end of the historical Soviet Union.  (You take office in January, but historically, Chernenko lived into March.)  If you make it to 2000, you have the option to stop the game and see your score; if you choose to keep playing, I hear that your score won't be affected by events after that date.  If you do keep playing, the object is to survive to the year 2017.  That's a very difficult goal; I've never done it, though I did make it to 2015 once.

If you have any familiarity with the Gorbachev era, it will come as no surprise that survival itself is a challenge.  The three factions are always busy behind the scenes and always shifting in political strength.  Having good relations with one faction doesn't usually help you, but having bad enough relations with any of them is likely to cause trouble.  Worse, your GNP tends to decline, which puts a squeeze on your budget and pressure on you.

You'll probably start to lose the Warsaw Pact countries after a few years, followed gradually by the Union Republics.  Holding onto any of them is quite the challenge, and it may be impossible to survive all the way to 2000 without losing most of them (though you may hold onto one or two if you're lucky).  Just making it to the end of the millennium is a sizable accomplishment all by itself.  Around 1991, you'll be offered the option to restructure the Union as a confederation (the Union of Sovereign States) or dissolve it altogether in favor of a commonwealth (the CIS).  If you've never heard of the Commonwealth of Independent States, you're not alone.  It's really a loose economic cooperation sphere, something like what the European Union was before the adoption of the Euro--but when this game was released, the CIS was brand-new.  At the time it looked like it would become the focal point of a new Union, or perhaps a British-style Commonwealth, which is what the game assumes.

If you do survive past 1991, you'll start to see events that didn't happen historically--since at that point you've certainly changed history.  You'll also start to lose Union Republics, if you haven't already.  Your population will drop as a result, and at the end of every year that you lose republic(s), you'll find that your GNP drops suddenly--apparently a secession doesn't affect your economy until the start of the following year, when you draw up your next budget.  This puts real pressure on your administration as you try to provide enough for food, manufacturing, housing, transportation, the military, and so on, without plundering the environment or letting crime run rampant.  At times like these it can be very tricky to avoid cutting so much from some powerful group that it's motivated to engineer your downfall.  In very bad times, you may even face extreme food shortages that lead to your violent overthrow by popular revolution (oh, the irony!).

The game has random and nonrandom events (called crises), which include major policy decisions (like whether to implement Glasnost, see right).  Some of these are events like Chernobyl that happen at set times to mimic the flow of history.  Unfortunately the historical events are hard-coded and their occurrence can't be randomized, which limits replayability.  In any case, each crisis gives the player options for what action to take, which adds greatly to the feeling of being in the game.  The action chosen has an effect on the player's political position (and sometimes other things, such as the country's economic condition).  This is another area where your faction expects you to follow its party line--unfortunately the game doesn't indicate which choice your faction expects you to make, so in that way you're playing blind.  The player can in fact choose to do nothing, by clicking on the teacup in the bottom right.  Ignoring a crisis is unlikely to make it go away, of course.

Crisis in the Kremlin is remarkable as the first computer game to give the player granular control over items in the budget.  That is, each year the player is given a proposed budget and can raise or lower spending on any part of it, down to the level of, say, how much will be allocated to agriculture or to space research.  Halfway through the year the player also determines his/her position on a number of policy areas:

Style of Government	Despotic	Transitional	Democratic	Ultra Liberal
Military Posture	Agressive [sic]	Transitional	Defensive	Pacifistic
Diplomatic Policies	Hostile	Transitional	Cooperative	Passive/Submissive
Trade Policy	Closed/Protective	Transitional	Some Restrictions	Few Restrictions
Civil Rights	Restricted	Transitional	Modern Democracy	Near Anarchy
Media Freedom	Very Restricted	Transitional	Modern Democracy	Uncontrolled
Economic Policies	Central Bureaucracy	Transitional	Controlled Market	Uncontrolled Market
Work Week	Forced Labor	Transitional	Typical 1st World	Extreme Leisure
Wage Controls	Complete Control	Transitional	Few Controls	Uncontrolled
Type of Ownership	State Owned	Transitional	Private and State	Highly Privatized

Your initial policies will be set depending on which faction you choose.  If you're playing the Nationalists, you'll be surprised just how un-Soviet your starting policies look!  Whatever your personal preferences, though, you won't want to change any policies too fast--that's a good way to lose the game instantly.  Instead, change them gradually, one notch at a time (or occasionally two), as you're called upon to announce your current policies at the start of each year through the Five-Year Plan.  Yes, you can change your policies in between, but do so in moderation.  You can make radical changes in this game, but you'll have to boil the frog to do it.  Try not to end up like this:
     

The Main Screen

In the main screen, you'll see a map of the northern hemisphere, from the Americas in the west (including Cuba) to the far tip of Siberia in the east.  Only part of it is visible at any given time, but you can scroll side to side.  This map is handy for getting a bird's-eye view of your international situation:

• Red indicates a loyal part of the USSR (including Union Republics)
• Magenta indicates a solid ally (the Warsaw Pact, Cuba, and Mongolia at the start of the game)
• Green indicates other countries (such as Western Europe and China, later former Warsaw Pact states and breakaway republics)


• Orange seems to indicate a republic whose loyalty is starting to waver
• Pink seems to indicate an ally whose loyalty is starting to waver
• Yellow seems to indicate a republic or ally which is starting to consider secession from the Union or withdrawal from its alliance with the USSR


• Slow Blinking indicates a crisis is brewing in an area
• Fast Blinking means a crisis is imminent (you will usually face one there in a moment)

Below the map is information that helps give you an idea of your overall situation.  On the left is a series of bars indicating how your country is doing in various categories: food, health, education, etc.  The farther the sliders are to the right the better: if they go too far to the left (in the red) you're likely to face real trouble, especially in things like food.  If they're in the middle (in yellow) you could be doing better.  If you can get several of them toward the right (in green), you're doing very well indeed.
  
In the middle, you'll see some of your country's important statistics: GNP, total population, etc.  It's here that you'll notice sharp declines when you lose big Union Republics like Ukraine.  You'll also see the date and a reminder of which faction you chose.  On the right is another set of slide bars which give some indications of your political strength at home and abroad, and under these are some switches to turn things on and off: sounds, names of places on the map, and dispatches (don't turn this one off unless you know what you're doing!).

In addition to modeling the political situation of the late Soviet Union pretty well, the game includes some nice historical extras, including actual jokes of the period.  Soviet jokes were a phenomenon all their own; humor was one of the few ways people could speak out about the conditions they faced and the censorship they were under--even though using that humor could be dangerous.  A fine example (though not one used in the game) was one joke which referenced the legendary sloth and poor workmanship of the Soviet work force, while at the same time criticizing the artificial nature of Soviet currency:
  The government pretends to pay us, so we pretend to work. 

The player also occasionally receives letters from family and even ordinary citizens, which are stored in a binder and can be reviewed later.  These letters offer some feedback on how you're doing, and sometimes warn you of signs of danger in your administration--such as that your leadership style is causing your subordinates to tell you what you want to hear rather than give the unvarnished truth.

So, it's time I gave you some links so you can try out the game.  Good luck, Comrade!

Links

      Resources

• Updated Manual (includes corrections from the readme to the 1.01 patch)
• Original Manual (as shipped in the box)
• Strategy Grid (as shipped in the box)


• The game itself (with 1.01 patch applied)
• The game itself (original v.1.00)
• 1.01 Patch to the original game


• MrDie's Mod - Enables post-1989 events that are normally disabled (details)
• Touchup Mod - Touches up formatting, spelling, grammar, etc. in the game (updated 11/4/2014)


• Download & Install Guide for Crisis (including how to run it in DOSBox)
• Copies of the original disks (the data from the set of five 5¼" floppies)
• Scan of an original disk (in case you want to see what they looked like)
• Rubles - You're gonna spend 'em.  Why not see what they looked like?  (also includes images of some post-Soviet republics' currency)

• Crisis in the Kremlin on Wikipedia
• Crisis in the Kremlin on Abandonia
• Crisis in the Kremlin at Home of the Underdogs [hotud.org] (includes download)
• Crisis in the Kremlin at Home of the Underdogs [homeoftheunderdogs.net]
• Crisis in the Kremlin on C:DOS Abandonware
• Crisis in the Kremlin on MyAbandonWare (includes lots of screenshots)

Before   (from a record my dad brought back from the Soviet Union in the late '70s / early '80s)
• Crimson Moon
• My Ring [Kolyechko] (a song about how she misses her friend who's gone away)
• 'Twas Getting Dark, I Was Standing at the Gate
After   (I don't know much about these--even what the names mean)
• Kak Poshla Nasha Paranya
• Ot Vorot Povorot
• Oy, Ta Nye Vyechyer
• Nye Dumala nye Znala
• Za Rekoy

Bugs & Enhancement Requests

These are things I've noticed that don't work quite right, and things I've thought of that would improve gameplay--roughly in order of importance, as I see them.

• It would be helpful if the game offered an up-to-date indication of your current relations with the three factions.  As it is, you don't really have much of an idea where you stand and how your decisions are affecting your position, or even just what a given faction might be upset about.  One minute you get a message out of the blue chiding you for your "extreme conservatism" or your "radical policies" or whatever, then suddenly you face a coup attempt or a vote of no confidence.  Then, having survived that, next year you might find yourself summarily voted out of office without a chance to do anything about it.  These things seem to happen almost at random, because of everything else that's happening while you're governing the country--it's hard to steer the ship of state without a compass.
  • The indicators at the bottom of the screen could include three status bars, one for each faction, with the same red-yellow-green color scheme as for other things like food, education, etc.  That way you could see your political standing shift between the three, and take corrective measures before you find yourself facing an angry Politburo.
  • Maybe you could also have a screen (perhaps accessed by a button on the left, between, say, BUDGETS and CRISIS.  That screen could list the three factions and what each is happy or upset about.  Maybe the happy/upset listing could use the red-yellow-green color scheme as the status bars (green=happy, yellow=disappointed, red=angry), or maybe it could have a happy and an unhappy column for each, and a list of things they're very happy or upset about.
  • While we're at it, it might also be handy to have some indication of the relative strengths of the three factions (though I don't know if the game factors their relative strengths, or just factors your standing with each one).
• Things occur in places where they should no longer apply:
  • Events take place when they shouldn't.  For example:
    • The player is sometimes asked about dissolving the Union even after he/she has already done so.
    • Protesters sometimes demand the release of Sakharov after he's already been released.
    • The player sometimes gets the Warsaw Pact prosposal of nonintervention in member states long after the proposal was adopted, and even after the Warsaw Pact itself has broken up.
    • Crises in breakaway republics still occur after they've seceded.  I've been asked to deal with the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, even after they've both left the Union.  This would actually be pretty neat if the text and options changed when the republics have left, maybe with more serious international repercussions for direct intervention.  But as it is you still have the same options including sending in troops, as if it were still your territory.
  • Republics sometimes secede multiple times ("How'd they manage that?"), and allied states sometimes leave your orbit more than once.
  • Yeltsin is still mentioned as one of your supporters, even if you're playing the Hard-Liners, and he still criticizes "your" program of pyerestroika even if you refused to implement it.
• There should be an option to randomize the appearance of historical events such as Chernobyl and the miners' strike, so the player could choose to play either Historical or Random.  Maybe there could even be an option to create a Custom set of dates for historical events.
• The game always calls you President of the USSR, even though the office didn't exist until 1990.  Basically, the title went something like this:
  • 1985-1990  General Secretary of the CPSU
  • 1990-1991  President of the Soviet Union
  • 1991-Now   President of Russia (and equivalent offices in other republics)
  What it should probably do is set a variable for the player's title, setting it initially to General Secretary.  It would change to President on dissolution or reforming of the Union.  Also, before the breakup, maybe there could be a "crisis" where you're offered the chance to create the office of President of the USSR as a means of shoring up your political authority (like Gorbachev did when his reforms started to weaken his power as head of the Communist Party).
• Sometimes your response to a crisis doesn't have the sort of effect on the game that it should.  For instance, a hard-line coup may demand that you declare a state of emergency and grant extraordinary powers to the KGB, offering only that "You will be allowed to retain your nominal position if you do exactly as we say."  If you give in to their demands, the game continues as if nothing happened.  It probably adjusts some figures like your political strength etc., but you continue in office with the same powers as before.  Seems to me that giving in to their demands should put the game into a restricted mode where:
  • After you submit your annual budget, line items that are important to the hard-liners are automatically adjusted (with a nasty note telling you they've changed them)
  • Following the coup, when you face a crisis your options should be limited--maybe options that are unacceptable to the hard-liners should be grayed out.
  This should give you the feeling that, while you haven't quite lost the game, you've really handicapped yourself by giving in.  Perhaps also there could be a random event that frees you from restricted mode--say, your faction gains a majority vote in the Politburo and restores your full rights and authority as President.
• When you choose to dissolve the Union in favor of a commonwealth, the game should make a more pronounced break from the past.  The remaining Republics that want to secede should do so immediately (instead of piecemeal, as happens now).  All references to "USSR" should change to "Russia", "Soviet" to "Russian", etc.  Also the Soviet emblem should be replaced with the Russian one used today.  Instead, it's almost as if nothing changed.
  • I realize this is a bit tricky since these words are written into the DAT files rather than the game's code.  But maybe there could be two sets of DAT files: the game would use the first set until a commonwealth is established, then switch over to the second set.
• Similarly, if the reformed union treaty is adopted, perhaps the game should take steps to make the change more apparent.  For a start it could mention the new name of the country: the Union of Sovereign States (maybe change "USSR" to "USS" and "Soviet" to "Union" or something like that).  The Union of Sovereign States was going to be a confederacy of the republics, minus Georgia, Armenia, Moldavia, and the Baltics; it was just before the signing of this treaty that the hard-liners struck in the August Coup.  Like the switch to a Commonwealth, changing to a confederation should have some substantial effects on game dynamics.
• Maybe there should be an option somewhere to initiate talks for a restructured Union, or even for a commonwealth, rather than having to wait for events to overtake you.  That would give the player some more options for potentially avoiding the complete breakup of the USSR.
• When any republic is about to secede, maybe the player should be given the chance to try to prevent secession with bribery or sanctions or military force, instead of having such options only for the Baltics.  That might allow the player to exercise some selective secession so he/she can try to hold part of the Union together--rather than having to simply watch republics leave one by one, as it is now.  Of course, the chances for military prevention of secession should depend on things like your current military budget, the people's determination to leave, whether Soviet troops are tied up elsewhere, and how much (including in Afghanistan), and so on.
• When you're given the option to try to prevent the Baltic states from leaving, you can choose to intervene militarily there, or give them the green light to leave, or try (always in vain, in my experience) to renegotiate the terms of their status in the Union.  But maybe there should be an option to declare them a special case, because of their established independent status prior to World War II.  Maybe the republics could see that as less of a precedent to allow them to leave.
• There should be a way to see how your GNP and population are distributed across republics: maybe a separate screen that shows a breakdown by republic, starting with Russia.  This would give a feel for how important each republic is to your country's well-being, and how much impact various secessions would have on your population and GNP.  Maybe also, when a republic is about to secede or has successfully done so, the player could see how much population and GNP will be lost.  A quick warning at the end of the year that they're about to drop due to secession(s) would be helpful.
• When your researchers come up with a new technology, the announcement mentions what it's likely to help out with (better foreign relations, improvements in agriculture, etc.), but then you never hear about it again.  It would be helpful if some place in the game gave you a better feel for what your advances have done for you: otherwise, why keep pumping rubles into R&D?
• It would be helpful if the GNP, population, etc., would show the change from last year: e.g., "GNP   2104 (+55)", or if there were a place you could easily go to view a chart of those figures over time.
• The game complains in your review if your crisis decisions haven't followed the party line (i.e., the party line for your faction), but it's never clear exactly what that party line is.  Maybe crisis dialog boxes could indicate which choice(s) are consistent with your faction's party line, or maybe even show which choices are favored by which party--that would help your political juggling.
• When you load a saved game that's fairly advanced in time (say, post-1990), places that have broken off still show in green on the map, but you get the messages that they've left, all over again.  What gives?
• There are times when the game sends you several notifications about an impending crisis, saying you need to take immediate action to prevent it--but they keep popping up and not allowing you to click anywhere to take some kind of action...then suddenly you're faced with the crisis that you haven't been allowed to try to prevent.  That's pretty frustrating.
• How about some new crisis events?  Here are some ideas:
  • Having to deal with separatists in Chechnya, following secession of the three Caucasian republics
  • Being asked to take a stand on the unification of Yemen (which occurred historically in 1990)
  • Being asked to respond to the 9/11 attacks (do you offer typical condolences and sympathy, or gloat in order to appease the hard-liners?)
  • Maybe China could overrun Mongolia, probably after it's cast off its ties to the USSR.
  • Maybe Tuva could declare its independence, announcing the restoration of Tannu Tuva!
  • Maybe Mongolia or China could annex Tuva, whether it's broken away or not.  (It was annexed from newly independent Mongolia in 1914 after the Chinese Revolution, then was occupied in 1920 by the Red Army during the Russian Civil War and made a technically independent satellite state the following year.)
  • When the Communist Party starts to lose its monopoly on power, you could be offered the chance to create the office of President of the Soviet Union (see above), as Gorbachev did to try to shore up his power as head of the country.  This could improve civil rights and your standing with the people (since it was an elected office, sort of), but would hurt you with the hard-liners.
• Under Style of Government, why does Nicholas II's portrait show in the Democratic range, of all places?  He was as autocratic as Stalin himself, just not as powerful.
• Why do allies and republics often turn green a bit before breaking away?  Shouldn't you get the message saying so-and-so has declared independence, then see it turn from yellow to green?
• When you normalize the border with China, there is presumably some adjustment of the boundaries, yet the map doesn't change.  Seems like the map should reflect the new Sino-Russian border.
• It's a little thing, but: when you click on the teacup to put off taking action, is it really necessary to slurp one's tea so loud?  (Of course, this would probably mean redoing the sound file the game plays during the animation.)
• Another little thing: why does the map show North Korea as not bordering the USSR/Russia?

You may have noticed that the box cover uses the backward R ("Я") to spell "KREMLIN".  This is called "faux Cyrillic"; of course it's used to try to create a Russian look and feel--whether the end result makes any sense or not.  Maybe it's just me, but because I can read the Cyrillic alphabet (though not Russian), I find this kind of thing annoying.  Consider that KЯEMLIN would be pronounced "kya-emlin" and you get some idea how nonsensical faux Cyrillic can look.

But that's just a silly thing, really.  I take a bigger issue with common transliterations of Russian into English.  You may have wondered why, say, Brezhnev is pronounced "brezhnyev", and Khrushchev is pronounced "Khrushchov", when they're not spelled that way.  It's because of transliteration conventions.  Russian has a letter е, which looks like the English e, but is pronounced "yeh".  And it has a letter ё, which also looks like e, but is pronounced "yoh".  There is a letter that's pronounced "eh", but it looks like this: э.

Well, most of the major conventions just write them all as "e", which in my opinion is stupid.  Just because it looks like an e is no reason to write it as one--the whole point of transliterating from another alphabet is so people will know what things sound like.  How about the Russian в, which is pronounced "v"?  How about н, which is pronounced "n"?  How about р, which is pronounced "r"?  (And yes, those are all lower-case in Cyrillic.) They look like B, H, and p respectively.  By this line of reasoning, it should be GorbacheB who enacted the policies of glasHost and pepestroika.  It's absurd.

I've even occasionally seen Yeltsin's name written as "Eltsin".  Most people realize that the convention fails embarrassingly here, that leaving off a Y or I at the start of his name is just begging people to mispronounce it--but a few do stick to their guns and start his name with an E anyway.  To my mind this is the best example of how inadequate the convention is on е and ё.  A less striking example (and one that occurs in the game) is Yerevan, the capital of Armenia, being transliterated as "Erevan".

But to come down off my soapbox and rejoin everyone in the practical world, I realize that we're used to seeing certain names written a certain way: Khrushchev, Gorbachev, etc., so I go ahead and leave those alone.  But less familiar words I transliterate in a more--well, accurate--manner: so I write "pyerestroika" rather than "perestroika", for instance.

Ok, I'm done now.  Moving right along...

Historical Context

The game was released in 1992, so it would have been written around 1990-91, a time when people watching events in the Soviet Union increasingly expected it to break up soon.  I suppose that's probably why the game was written in the first place, and also why it trends (almost?) inexorably toward dissolution of the USSR.  Still, it's pretty impressive that the game actually continues far into the future (to well past today, in fact), while still being a somewhat in-depth political sim, especially one that fit on a handful of old floppy disks.

Your Friends and Allies

In Crisis, there are three basic groups in the East Bloc: the Union Republics, the Warsaw Pact countries, and other allies.  Ever wonder what all the different Union Republics were?  There were 15 in all (briefly 16); the European ones, at least, were briefly independent during the Civil War, which is why they got special status as Union Republics in the Soviet system...though not all of them got that status.

Union Republics
These were the provinces of the Soviet Union, the equivalent of states in the US, Australia, and other countries that call their provinces "states".  The descriptions I give of their peoples are what Russians tended to think about them.

Central/Western          
Have you ever heard the term "Tsar of all the Russias" and wondered what "Russias" they were talking about?  It turns out there were three.


• Russia (the RSFSR) - Formerly called Great Russia (by the Russians, of course).  Russia itself was just one of the fifteen Union Republics, though it was the one that actually called the shots.  Partly thanks to Siberia, it includes an awful lot of small ethnic minorities.
• Ukraine - Formerly called Little Russia, also known in the 19th century as the Breadbasket of Europe.  As the Ukrainian People's Republic, it was the strongest and longest-lasting of the countries that briefly split off during the Civil War.  Not surprisingly, it was fairly eager for independence by 1990, though its agricultural and industrial contribution to the Union made secession a tricky matter (and will be a big blow to you in the game).  Its importance to the Union also made it impossible to ignore: Ukrainians were the second most powerful nationality in the country (though not a close second), and actually got a few seats in important bodies like the Politburo and Central Committee that few other nationalities could aspire to.  Chernenko himself was of Ukrainian descent.  Ukrainians had a reputation for being sturdy and reliable.
• Byelorussia (now Belarus) - Formerly called White Russia.  Sometimes mistransliterated "Belorussia" (see "Transliteration and Faux Cyrillic" above).  After the Tsar's abdication it declared independence as the Belarusian People's Republic, though it existed mostly on paper.  It did have one significant military engagement at Slutsk, however.  Its capital, Minsk, is the capital of the CIS today.  Belarusians are the nationality that's closest and most similar to the Russians, so the two bear a close affinity, which is reflected in the Union of Russia and Belarus.  The Union Republics in Europe (except Moldavia) were established as short-lived independent states during the Civil War, and after absorption by the USSR they maintained governments in exile in the West.  Following recovery of their independence after 1991, they returned their mandates to the newly de facto independent republics.  Belarus is the exception, however, because of the authoritarian and pro-Soviet policies of Lukashenko's government.
• Moldavia (now Moldova) - Ethnically Rumanian, but part of Russia before World War I (as Bessarabia).  It was added to Rumania after the war, but then taken back during the Soviet liberation of Eastern Europe in World War II.  Moldavia was known for its wine which was exported all over the USSR; its people were sometimes thought of as being like the Romani (Gypsies) because of their proximity to Rumania--which doesn't make a lot of sense: they should be similar to Rumanians because they're close to Rumania.  This was probably a folk etymology caused by people assuming the name "Romani" had something to do with "Romanian"; in reality it has a separate origin.
  
  The Baltic States          
  These countries are very similar to one another.  Like Moldova/Moldavia (and Finland), they had been part of Russia before World War I.  They were fully independent during the interwar years (though they became dictatorships by the mid-1930s), but were forcibly reabsorbed by the Soviets during World War II.  They had the most prosperous economies in the USSR, which made them difficult to let go; at the same time they had the closest ties to the West and strongly resented Soviet occupation, so they were the most restive of all the republics.  None of them has shown interest in joining the CIS.  As you might expect, they are almost certain to break away from you in the game--though, at the same time, their secession is the only one you're offered a chance to do something about.  See here for a side note about Baltic currency.
  
  
• Estonia - The Estonians are closely related to the Finns, and given Finland's history it's understandable that Estonia would want to separate from the Soviet Union.  Estonia had the most advanced economy of all the republics, though also perhaps the most endangered native population.  Population growth of ethnic Estonians lagged behind the nationalities of all other Union Republics.
• Latvia - The area now known as Latvia was the scene of a crusade against one of the last remaining pagan peoples of Europe.  Following that, it became the region known as Livonia and was a significant player in east-west trade, participating in the Hanseatic League.  Livonia/Latvia never really became its own state until 1918; prior to conquest by Russia it tended to be dominated by Lithuania and Poland.  Its capital city, Riga, dates to 1206 and has a beautiful medieval Old Town (or at least it did in 1985).
• Lithuania - Lithuania was part of a large Polish/Lithuanian state for many years, something its people haven't forgotten.  It was probably the most independently minded of all the Union Republics.  It may be the first to declare independence in the game, as it was in real life.
  
  The Caucasus                
  You want petty squabbling? Come to the Caucasus.  During the Civil War, the region split off and formed an independent country.  But its members couldn't get along, so it broke up three months later into three separate countries: Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.  To the north of Georgia and Azerbaijan there was also the Mountainous Republic of the Northern Caucasus. The fighting in Chechnya in the 1990s was an echo of the old Mountain Republic; it never got its own Union Republic, so after the fall of the USSR it found itself still part of Russia.  The Chechens figured they should get their independence too, but the Russians disagreed.
  
  
• Georgia - A Christian European people, with a long history of fiercely independent mountain kingdoms.  During World War I, Georgia was occupied by Germany; during the Civil War it was an independent state with a Menshevik government, the Democratic Republic of Georgia.  Georgians had a reputation for being clever, and shrewd businessmen (in both the legal and black markets).  Georgians would fly to northern cities to sell oranges, making large profits in the exchange.  Georgian men also had a reputation as womanizers.  Georgia has three main ethnic minority areas, which have caused it trouble when Georgian nationalists have enacted anti-minority policies such as making Georgian the sole official language.  The country has been wracked by several wars as a result, and today two of these minority areas--Abkhazia and South Ossetia--are de facto independent states.  The other, Adjara, was for a while but has been forcibly reunited with Georgia.
• Armenia - A Christian Asian people, with a long history of prizing its independence and hating the Turks.  During World War I, Armenia kept fighting as an independent state (the First Republic of Armenia) after its neighbors had surrendered to occupying forces.  Armenia and Azerbaijan don't get along, partly because Azerbaijan has an exclave in Armenia, which it was given by Stalin.  Armenians had a reputation for being highly intelligent.
• Azerbaijan - A Muslim Asian people, with closer ties to Iran and Turkey than Russia.  During World War I, Azerbaijan was occupied by the Ottoman Empire; during the Russian Civil War, it was independent as the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic.  There is an ethnic Armenian area in Azerbaijan, which was not granted as an exclave to Armenia, while Azerbaijan did get one in Armenia, for political reasons.  This region, Nagorno-Karabakh, was the scene of substantial racial violence shortly before and after the breakup of the USSR, which you may see in-game.  Azerbaijanis had a reputation for being corrupt.
  
  Central Asia              
  These countries are poor, arid regions whose native populations were largely nomadic (meaning pastoralists, not just wanderers) prior to the Soviet era.  They're also strongly Muslim.  Because of these Republics' poverty, they benefited more from government subsidies than other parts of the country; as a result, they tended to favor some form of Union and were slower to secede than other areas.  In fact, none of them declared independence before 1991, and then only after eight other Republics had done so.
  
  
• Kazakhstan (not Kazakistan, as it's sometimes misspelled--even once in the game!) - Kazakhstan is the largest of the Central Asian republics (by area), and is home to the main Soviet--now Russian--spaceport, Baikonur.  As you might expect, that's led to some tension: Russia leases it and pays for cleanup from the toxic propellants used on its Proton rockets, but Kazakhstan has taken advantage of its opportunity to gouge Russia from time to time.  Consequently Russia is looking into building an alternative spaceport within its own borders.  Kazakhstan was remarkable in that its population wasn't dominated by its nominal nationality; only about 40% were ethnic Kazakh in the late USSR (Russians were another 40%, Ukrainians and Germans another 5% each, and various others made up the balance).  A fair number of high government officials came from Kazakhstan, but they were mostly ethnic Russians.  During the Civil War, Kazakhstan enjoyed a brief period of nominal independence (the Alash Autonomy), though in practice the area was controlled by White forces.
• Uzbekistan - This arid region was heavily irrigated in Soviet times in order to grow a lot of cotton.  That was probably a good plan, except that most of the water came from the Aral Sea, which has largely dried up as a result--causing some serious environmental damage in the area.  (Before you place too much blame on the Communists for this, it's worth noting that independent Uzkbekistan has done nothing to stop the deterioration.)
• Turkmenistan - Maybe the poorest of the Republics, it consists largely of barren desert.  Still, like Uzbekistan, it produces a lot of cotton; it also exploits large reserves of natural gas, though strained relations with Russia have made it hard to export it.
• Kyrgizia (now Kyrgyzstan) - Acquired from China by treaty (one-sided, no doubt) in the late 1800s, its people initially revolted against Russian rule--but the area settled down and its history remained fairly quiet until late in the Soviet period.  Independent Kyrgyzstan has adopted Russian as a second official language as a gesture to show that its ethnic Russian population is welcome within its borders--partly to avoid a brain drain.  On the other hand, there are large numbers of Uzbeks in the country, which has occasionally led to ethnic conflict.
• Tajikistan - Whereas the other Central Asian republics are homelands to various Turkic peoples, the Tajiks are a Persian people--and their language, Farsi, is Indo-European (which makes it distantly related to Russian, English, and most other European tongues).  The area is heavily mountainous rather than desert.  Right after achieving independence, Tajikistan was wracked by civil war.  Russians, Jews, and other non-Muslims fled the country.

• Poland - A strongly Catholic country with a history of dusting it up with Russia.  If you feel sorry for Poland for being generally trodden on by its neighbors (including Russia), remember that it wasn't all one-sided.  Poland got in its licks against Russia too, most recently following World War I when Russia was weak: the Polish took the opportunity to invade and grab some territory.  Stalin returned the favor after the war, with interest of course, shifting Poland westward into ethnic German lands.  (Basically he annexed the eastern third or fourth of the country and gave Poland about the same amount of territory on its western border, which was carved out of Germany.)  The independent trade union Solidarity was legalized in 1989 and swept that year's election, taking 99% of seats in the legislature and ushering in the first non-Communist government in the Warsaw Pact.
• East Germany - After World War II, Germany was split into four occupying zones, each controlled by a different Ally: the US, the UK, France, and the USSR.  The rest of Central and Eastern Europe was divvied up between Soviet and Western control, but the two sides couldn't agree on who would dominate Germany.  So in the end, the Soviets made their zone into East Germany while the other Allies joined theirs into West Germany.  Berlin was similarly divided into occupation zones, which the Soviets unsuccessfully tried to reverse, leaving the West with an exclave in East Germany's largest city.  People who lived through the partition of Germany dreamed of reunification for decades, leading to the absorption of East Germany into West Germany in 1990.  This usually happens during the game as well, at least if you don't send in the tanks.
• Czechoslovakia (now the Czech and Slovak republics) - Of all the countries in Eastern Europe where democracy was imposed after World War I, this was one of the few where it really took root.  Then, of course, it was sold out and abandoned by the Western democracies during the buildup to World War II.  In the end, France and the UK drew the line at Poland, a military dictatorship, after democractic Czechoslovakia was already overrun.  After the war, of course, it was absorbed into the East Bloc.  Dubček enacted a series of reforms in 1968-69, which included abolishing censorship and enacting a mixed economy.  What he did was probably less than you'll do in the game, but it was a bit too much for Moscow at the time.  After negotiations failed, Soviet troops occupied the country and put a stop to it.  Dubček was expelled from the party and given an unimportant post, but in 1989 he made a comeback when the president appointed a majority non-Communist government, which elected him speaker.  In 1990 the first democratic elections were held since the War.
• Hungary - Hungary is home to the Magyar people (pronounced "mah-jar", not "mag-yar"), who speak one of the few non-Indo-European languages in Europe.  A little-known historical tidbit is that Hungary was the second Communist country ever (following Russia, of course): it became the Hungarian Soviet Republic for four months in 1919.  Following that during the interwar period, the people wanted a reestablishment of the monarchy under Karl, King of Hungary, who had also been Emperor of Austria during World War I--but the Allies wouldn't allow it.  Then after World War II they were denied a shot at real self-determination as they were drawn into the Soviet circle.  In 1956 the people rose in spontaneous revolt against the communist government, which was one of the more oppressive ones at the time; unfortunately they lost sympathy from the outside by publicly murdering Soviet sympathizers.  Ironically, starting in 1962, Hungary managed to soften its approach to socialism--it became the most liberal of the Warsaw Pact countries for the remainder of communist rule, under a policy nicknamed Goulash Communism.  The country enacted major reforms in 1988, and gave up Communist government in 1989.
• Rumania - Rumania was occupied and its natural resources heavily exploited by the USSR after the War.  But in 1965, Ceaușescu took power and began to pursue a semi-independent foreign policy, though not so independent as to force the Soviets' hand.  However, starting in the late '70s and early '80s his financial policies placed a heavy burden on the citizens, his secret police became increasingly repressive, and he began to impose a cult of personality, leading to his overthrow and execution in a spontaneous uprising in 1989.
• Bulgaria - During World War II, Bulgaria refused to declare war on the USSR, even though that hurt relations with Nazi Germany.  As the war turned against the Axis in 1944, the USSR declared war on Bulgaria, at which point a communist-dominated resistance movement took power by coup and negotiated a cease-fire with the USSR, sparing the country from the worst effects of Soviet conquest.  The country then followed the Soviet political and economic model, with a largely Stalinist planned economy until close to the fall of communism (though with some experiments in market economics).  The Bulgarian Communist Party gave up its political monopoly in 1989.

• Cuba - Ruled by monarchs and brutal dictators for most of its history--the Castro regime is just the latest dictatorship.  Cuba is your most reliable ally in the game, but it's probably also the least important--it never seems to do anything, except act as the site of the Bay of Pigs II crisis.  In my experience it doesn't leave your orbit even if you've reduced foreign assistance to zero and sided against it in Bay of Pigs II--although apparently there's coding in place to allow for it to leave.
• Mongolia - The world's second lasting Communist country (after Russia), it entered the Soviet circle after being occupied by the Red Army and guaranteed its independence from China in 1921.  It seems to break away from you about the same time as the Warsaw Pact states; historically, its democratic revolution came in 1990.

  Interested in playing the USSR during the Space Race?  Check out my fan site for Buzz Aldrin's Race Into Space.