Astral Codex Ten

Belarus

3 min read

Belarus

Article

Belarus is a recurring place in the Astral Codex Ten archive, appearing 3 times across 3 issues between March 01, 2022 and November 02, 2023. The archive places it in contexts such as “Commenters bring up Belarus (if they start seeming less loyal)”; “I think “Ukraine becomes Belarus 2” is more likely”; “another company imported trucks from Belarus, Chavez’s European ally”. It most often appears alongside America, Iraq, Putin.

Metadata

  • Category: Places
  • Mention count: 3
  • Issue count: 3
  • First seen: March 01, 2022
  • Last seen: November 02, 2023

Appears In

Source Context

Recovered passages from the original issue text. When the raw archive preserved outbound links inside the source passage, they are listed directly under the quote.

Ukraine Warcasting
March 01, 2022 · Original source
Commenters bring up Belarus (if they start seeming less loyal), Moldova (if part of Russia’s plan was to create a corridor to Transdnistria), or Georgia (Russia likes invading Georgia). Relatively few people think a Russia-NATO war is likely to be a big part of this. Zvi thinks this should be 20%.
Inline links: Zvi thinks
Ukraine Thoughts And Links
March 08, 2022 · Original source
But also, Russia keeps trying to turn nearby countries into puppet states, sometimes propping up really abhorrent dictators (eg Lukashenko) to do that. They already invaded Ukraine once, took some territory, and propped up some separatist movements. If Ukraine avoided requesting Western connections and military help, or the West avoided providing it, I think “Ukraine becomes Belarus 2” is more likely than “everything is great and war is averted with zero problems”.
Is it wrong for the West to support Ukraine in its efforts not to become Belarus 2? In terms of the lines-in-the-sand and vague-rules-of-international-diplomacy that prevent nuclear war, I think not really. Is it imprudent? It’s a risk, but at least it was taken in the defense of real principles, which is better than most of the imprudent things we do.
Dictator Book Club: Chavez
November 02, 2023 · Original source
Political managers from Caracas with no background in industry. Ideological schools set up in factories. Investment abandoned, maintenance skimped, machinery cannibalized. A catalogue of grievance detailing blunders, looting, and broken promises. Venalum, they said, had for a time stopped exporting to the United States to vainly seek “ideologically friendlier” markets . . . after months of stockpiling, aluminium managers returned to US buyers, but by then the market had crashed, losing the company millions. To curry favor with [the government], another company imported trucks from Belarus, Chavez’s European ally, but the cabins were too high for the region’s twisting paths, terrifying drivers. The trucks were abandoned.