Book Review: The Siberian Curse, by Fiona Hill and Clifford Gaddy

book cover

      Ms. Fiona Hill had her 15 minutes of fame recently as she was exposed to massive media coverage during the impeachment proceeding in the US House of Representatives.  Her background as an advisor/professional on the National Security Council gave her the cachet as a person of note who could make authoritative statements about the Russyan government and its recent dealings with America and the Trump organization and the Trump family and its dealings with the Kremlin.
     Their book was published by the Brookings Institute where Ms. Hill is a senior fellow in the Foreign Studies program.  Clifford Gaddy is a senior fellow in the Foreign Policy Studies and Governance Studies at the Brookings Inst. and is a visiting professor of economics at Johns Hopkins University.   So both authors are serious people, well informed and well thought of in their fields.
Being professional researchers, they understood the many parts of the project that resulted in this book.  They set about assembling a team of researchers and experts who would aid them in the work needed to accomplish the goals of providing a timely report on conditions in the post-Soviet Union Russya at the turn of the millennium in 2000.
       The Mayor has a deep background in geography having studied it and lived it as a global traveler
and most recently a student of geopolitics courtesy of associations with others in foreign services.  This book is essentially a study of the economic geography of Siberia during the last 75 years up to 2003 when the book was published.  The authors analyze conditions as they exist today in Siberia and then provide history(the close associate of geography), climate studies, economics, sociology, and human geography.   Reading this book could leave one cold-literally.  The descriptions of Siberian environments elicits a feeling and desire to flee to warmer weather and a warmer location somewhere south, anywhere actually.   Ms. Hill sights one example after another of cities in Siberia that host weather and climate unfit for human occupation, much less industrial development and commercial activity.  During the tsarist period, Siberia was seen as a place to send criminals and other undesirables.   During the Soviet/Stalin period, Siberia was seen as a place of internal exile and prison location.  The GULAG was the name given to the system put in place to forcibly populate this most uninhabitable landscape.   Millions of Russyans were dispatched to the GULAG, and once there, few would ever survive long enough to leave and return to European Russya, west of the Ural Mountains.   It was only after Stalin's death that the system began to be reduced and closed down, not the least of which was the great cost in maintaining even a minimum level of livable conditions.
       The primary theory of the authors is that the Kremlin over the centuries looked upon Siberia as the great Russyan Asian part and must be considered, like the American West, the land of opportunity and wealth.  Hence, Siberia must be developed at all costs, ignoring economics and geography.  Even today, the Kremlin balks at altering the course of history regarding Siberia.
Evidence is overwhelming that current policies regarding Siberia do nothing to overcome insurmountable obstacles related to the cold.   Basic comforts required by citizens: heat and food and housing are extremely expensive throughout Siberia.  Often these requirements are not met and the federal government in Moscow must intervene.  This is an annual effort without let up.   The desire to protect the 6000 mile border also contributes to the Siberian problem.
       In the Far East, to the Pacific Ocean, Russya shares an extensive border with China.  This causes great concern especially when the Kremlin looks at population figures in that region.  There aren't enough Russyans there to fill any need, either for occupation or defense.
     Vladimir Putin has made various attempts to solve many of these problems with little success.  He would have to spend the rest of his life trying to change the attitudes inbred into the thinking of generations.  It won't happen anytime soon.
       Given the current international situation, an in depth understanding of Russya is essential for any US citizen who wishes to have some background into Russyan politics.   This book will contribute greatly in that effort.