On: Doomsday planning for less crazy folk

[oblio]

After '90, if you discount all the Russia-provoked conflicts, there's basically only ex-Yugoslavia as far as conflicts are concerned. Every other event on that list would basically count as a normal day in Baltimore :)

You can never predict the future but I'm willing to bet that the following countries will be peaceful for at least the next 20 years:

- Czech Republic

- Slovakia

- Poland

- Hungary

- Slovenia

- Croatia

- Romania

- Albania

Places like the Czech Republic will probably be among the safest places on Earth, both regarding economic, political stability and possible outside aggression, for the next half a century, in my opinion.

On the other hand, people were saying similar things before WW1 :D

[nl → oblio]

if you discount all the Russia-provoked conflicts

Hmm. I'm not sure that is a great way of looking at it while Russia is still there.

Poland

I'm not sure about that. The Kaliningrad Oblast is a real problem - historically oblasts haven't been very stable politically.

Generally speaking though, I think most of those countries are NATO members (not sure about Albania?). That means that if any NATO member country is attacked they will all be dragged in.

If the US got dragged into a war on the Korean peninsular then I'm not sure Putin could resist the temptation of Estonia or Latvia. And I'm not sure what would happen then.

Or who knows what will happen in (NATO Member) Turkey. Three years ago they nearly got in a shooting war with Russia. Now they are good friends.. at the moment.

I've spent some great times in Central Europe, and I'm cautiously optimistic about the area. But that doesn't mean there aren't real, significant risks.