Did the Soviet Union ever have a realisitic chance of winning the Cold War

[Razgovory]

Was there ever a realistic chance for the Soviet Union to have become the dominate superpower after WWII?  Speculate and post!

[Viking]

Define Victory.

[Razgovory]

I did, in the opening post.

[CountDeMoney]

Not with Ronald Reagan on the case, pal.

[Darth Wagtaros]

To be fair Seeds, Tailgunner Joe did his part.

[CountDeMoney]

Sorry, but Joe Biden was a marginal player at best.

[Caliga]

 

[Grey Fox]

Yes, they only needed to shoot some nukes.

[PDH]

Define of

[jimmy olsen]

Not really. They could have strangled China in the cradle back in '69 though and still be in second place.

[Barrister]

You could maybe make the argument that communism could win the cold war with communist parties wining elections in western europe after the war, but the USSR by itself did not have the population or resources to be dominate the globe.

[Valmy]

The problem with this scenario is it requires something that was not true to be true: that Communism, at least the USSR version, would have to work as an economic and political system longterm.  That problem was just not going to be overcome.

[Barrister]

The problem with this scenario is it requires something that was not true to be true: that Communism, at least the USSR version, would have to work as an economic and political system longterm.  That problem was just not going to be overcome.

Disagree.  Communism worked well enough in the short term (not well, but well enough) that other considerations could overwhelm the long-term advantage of free market democracy.

[Zanza]

I guess they could not have won it outright as the USA was and is too strong and stable, but I don't think them losing it was not the only possible outcome. If they had reformed along the lines of China, the Soviet Union could still be around and be a superpower. They would inevitably have lost their grip on Eastern Europe though, so their power would decline, but they'd still be ahead of everybody but the USA and now China.

[Valmy]

I guess they could not have won it outright as the USA was and is too strong and stable, but I don't think them losing it was not the only possible outcome. If they had reformed along the lines of China, the Soviet Union could still be around and be a superpower. They would inevitably have lost their grip on Eastern Europe though, so their power would decline, but they'd still be ahead of everybody but the USA and now China.

Is that possible?  It seemed the economic dogma was far more important to the Russians than it was to the Chinese.  Besides what happened in China was hardly easy, reforming along those lines required the nearly miraculous career of Deng.  There was no comparable Russian figure.