Yes. Yes it was. The USSR has very little in common with kleptocracy Russia. My wife was raised under their educational system and she was studying organic chemistry in the eight grade. Today she is one of the top people in her field (easily top ten) and she says that most of her career she’s mostly leaned on her early education. Especially math and science.

It is wild to see this. It’s amazing how quickly things change.

Yeah, Russia was incredibly powerful in its heyday, both in global influence and military power. Think about how people are worried about climate change now, then double it. That was the threat of nuclear war that kept people awake at night for decades.

After the time of the collapse we found out how empty a lot of their power was. How much of their achievements were less an unstoppable train and more of a rocket that couldn’t be refueled. They had power but they never figured out how to make it sustainable.

Remember that the USSR included not just Russians but Ukrainians.

In its heyday under Peter / Catherine the Great, depending on who you ask, Russia was a true world superpower. Richest royals, biggest population, massive food supply.

In the 50s and 60s, if the nuclear deterrent hadn’t existed they could have taken over most of Europe through a combination of capture of democracy and invasion.

Even after than, Russian hard-science education was extremely good (biology they got screwed by ideology).