Word: moscow
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...counterbalance stands "an axis of democracy" - led, inevitably, by the U.S. - that includes the E.U., India and Japan. India's transformation is in many ways the most extraordinary, turning an underdeveloped former ally of Moscow into an emerging power firmly linked to the democratic fold. India's chief strategic concern is China, which has close ties to Pakistan and an expanding naval presence in the Indian Ocean. In response, India hosted a massive naval exercise in the Bay of Bengal in 2007, along with the U.S., Japan, Australia and Singapore. China, needless to say, was not pleased, and made formal...
...called the collapse of the Soviet Union "the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century." During the cold war, Russia would celebrate Victory Day each year on May 9 by holding a parade to honor its triumph over the invading forces of Nazi Germany. Eager to flaunt its modern might, Moscow would showcase its intercontinental ballistic missiles, tanks would rumble past the Kremlin, and MiG jets and strategic bombers would roar overhead. After the end of the cold war such a spectacle was not seen in Red Square for 18 years - until May 9, 2008. There was no denying it: history...
...Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, whose London-based soccer team Chelsea was beaten 6-5 on penalty kicks by Manchester United in the European Champion's League final played in the Russian capital. But the banker's complaint was simply that he had no way to move around the Moscow to keep appointments, given the traffic restrictions all over the city to allow smooth passage for the 970 special buses whisking Chelsea and United fans, separately, from airports to specially equipped "fan towns" at opposite ends of the mammoth Luzhniki stadium. All serious business in the city would cease...
...better, however, for cafes and pubs equipped with large TV screens. Russian fans, short of the $790 to to $4730 needed to buy a Luzhniki ticket, had booked all the city and suburban joints well in advance, eager to catch every detail of the biggest sports even staged in Moscow since the 1980 Olympics. Inevitably, it produced a bizarre mix of politics and business, diplomacy and security, sports and ideology...
...finding: a grandfather of Yeltsin's was persecuted as a rich peasant when Stalin imposed agricultural collectivization. Colton also spoke to acquaintances from Yeltsin's period as Communist Party boss in Sverdlovsk. He justifiably concludes that Yeltsin was already a rambunctious politician before Gorbachev promoted him to head the Moscow City Party in 1985. Yeltsin was like a bull in a china shop in the Soviet capital. As Colton points out, Gorbachev had ignored warnings that his protégé would smash all the crockery as both of them pursued reform. Plenty of Yeltsin's victims volunteered their testimony...