The countries that got tea via China through the Silk Road (land) referred to it in various forms of the word "cha", countries that traded with China via sea (through the Min Tan port) called it in different forms of "te". Source:
Regarding mobilisation, Putin can declare it, indeed. But it will be a risky decision. The USSR maintained a massive infrastructure for the total mobilisation which has been mostly dismantled in post-Soviet Russia. Mobilisation is more likely to trigger political chaos
short🧵
I'm gonna post long reads on my substack. Here's a text on how did Russia get so big and so cold. It's outlining the logic of Russian imperial expansion political economy-wise. It explains why Russia expanded northward much earlier than southward
Was the Byzantine Empire really just the Roman Empire? In a word, yes. In this thread, I explore some arguments for and against that answer, as well as alternatives to the use of the term "Byzantine." Read on. 🧵
#Roman
#Byzantine
#History
1. Every major military industrial complex in the world relies upon the CNC cutting machines to mass produce precise components -> weaponry
2. No one is capable of producing them without the continuous import of machines, machine parts and expendables
3. From the U.S. allies
Map of ‘imperial density’, the number of years an area has spent inside a state bigger than 500 000 km2 from 1000 BC to now. Persia and China emerge as the imperial heartlands. Source:
Then vs Now :
Sumerian city of Uruk, considered first civilized city in the world 6500-4000 BC.
Uruk is located in southern Iraq. This city was first discovered in 1849 AD, by english archaeologist William Lofts.
#archaeohistories
In case of mobilisation, there will be:
1) tons of new, unmotivated recruits
2) aware they'll be sent to Ukraine, where they likely die or get maimed
3) stuck in Moscow, in proximity to the seat of power
That's revolutionary situation
The Byzantine Empire used a system of beacons (an optical telegraph) to transmit messages across Asia Minor to Constantinople. The main line of beacons stretched over some 450 miles (720 km). A message could be transmitted the entire length of the line within an hour.
#Seshat
There will be no "popular uprising" in russia
Hundreds of thousands of ru have perished, their economy continues to degrade, and there are hints of succession planning (e.g. statements by Nadezhdin and Zatulin). 1/
Isn't Ukraine just a separatist Russian province? Many foreigners ask themselves this question. The same way many Eastern Slavs think that all British Isles are just England. And yet, dynamics of Russian-Ukrainian relations are different from the dynamics of Anglo-Celtic ones🧵
Despite its massive industrial production, Nizhny Tagil is one of the most quickly shrinking cities in the region. People die or leave. All the revenues from the industry are sucked by the insatiable Moscow, while the locals get only the poisoned air and water
Let's imagine that China had the "Han Autonomous Republic". Imagine that within China there was a polity encompassing most of its population, industry, resources. This "Han Republic" would be absolutely, 100% predetermined to come into a mortal fight with the central government
Russia is not a "nation". It's the last colonial empire. Its metropole is localised in the Furstenstadt of Moscow. It is the northernmost megapolis of the world, located furthest from the waterways and on the infertile soil. It is too expensive to feed
This is Kamchatka. It is located half the world away from Ukraine, just across the Bering Sea from Alaska. And this sparsely populated region that has 38 times less people than Moscow, lost more people in Ukraine than the capital
How is that possible?
What is peculiar about Russia is not that its practices are unprecedentedly evil or hideous. They very much remind of what Western powers did with their colonies. It is that Russia is the last European colonial empire that still exists. The end
National Divorce
Within the next year Russia will spiral into a deep political crisis. There is a nonzero chance that it may scale up existing separatist tendencies leading to the breakup of the empire. In this thread I will outline a model of how this process could look like🧵
Not really. And that is because medieval Russia has nearly zero *documented* history.
12th c - 8 legal documents
13th c - 15 legal documents
14th c - 163 legal documents
15th c - 2048 legal documents
That is exactly zero. In comparison to what your average Italian city has
Nizhny Tagil is located in the Urals. It's one of the most heavily industrialised Russian cities. Metallurgy, chemicals, machinery. Uralvagonzavod which is usually considered to be the largest Russian military producer is located in this city
Prigozhin was a junior member of the St Petersburg gang. A vassal of Putin's vassal. Still, a rightful member of the gang that constitutes the core of the ruling elite. Consequently, his death will make an impression of the regime killing its previously untouchable core members
The towns of Europe, North Africa and West Asia with over 40,000 residents as per 1050. A thousand years ago we needed to live on farms to ensure everyone was fed. Map explains why towns on the map still think so highly of themselves too. Source:
In such a centralised empire as Russia, opinion of Muscovites is of critical importance to Kremlin. They invest every effort and resource so that Moscow wouldn't feel any discomfort at all. The rest of empire will be sucked dry for the benefit of Moscow