With all the money going into the Ukraine war and other ventures since Putin came to power, I imagine there’s a lot of stuff he could’ve done to make the world a better place and Russia a formidable world power.
With all the money going into the Ukraine war and other ventures since Putin came to power, I imagine there’s a lot of stuff he could’ve done to make the world a better place and Russia a formidable world power.
The Netherlands is absolutely not wealthy because of its natural gas. The Netherlands is a manufacturing center, a farming powerhouse (it’s literally the world’s number 2 food exporter). It was Europe’s original trading empire. Today it contains the closest thing Europe has to Silicon Valley, with world-class universities and the super-high-tech ASML. It’s been a wealthy country for centuries because it has invested in its people. The natural gas is an anecdote.
isn’t asml British?
You’re thinking of ARM
You’re one search away from the truth, my friend
holding? so looks like i will be going on the wikipedia app today
edit: hmm it truly is, must’ve confused ARM.
OK, but mostly it’s the imperialism.
Sweden and Finland, to take just two nearby examples, are roughly as wealthy as the Netherlands. Neither had an empire. Portugal, the world’s first superpower, with colonies on three continents, is far poorer than any of those three countries.
Russia is currently trying to re-establish its empire, and impoverishing itself in the process.
Imperialism is a red herring.