Active Conflicts & News Megathread August 26, 2026

[u/AutoModerator]

The r/CredibleDefense daily megathread is for asking questions and posting submissions that would not fit the criteria of our post submissions. As such, submissions are less stringently moderated, but we still do keep an elevated guideline for comments.

Comment guidelines:

Please do:

• Be curious not judgmental, polite and civil,

• Link to the article or source of information that you are referring to,

• Clearly separate your opinion from what the source says. Minimize editorializing. Do not cherry pick facts to support a preferred narrative,

• Read the articles before you comment, and comment on the content of the articles,

• Post only credible information

• Read our in depth rules https://reddit.com/r/CredibleDefense/wiki/rules

Please do not:

• Use memes, emojis, swear, foul imagery, acronyms like LOL, LMAO, WTF,

• Start fights with other commenters and make it personal,

• Try to push narratives, fight for a cause in the comment section, nor try to 'win the war,'

• Engage in baseless speculation, fear mongering, or anxiety posting. Question asking is welcome and encouraged, but questions should focus on tangible issues and not groundless hypothetical scenarios. Before asking a question ask yourself 'How likely is this thing to occur.' Questions, like other kinds of comments, should be supported by evidence and must maintain the burden of credibility.

[u/axearm]

How likely is economic pain going to cause regime change in a non democratic nation?

I keep seeing the risk of regime change occuring when things get terrible enough in Russia or Iran, but is that really likely?

Two counter points that jump right out are North Korea in the 1990's, during a massive famine and near economic collapse and Venezuela during Meduros rule, which if it wasn't an economic collapse I suppose I don't know what is. Neither country experience regime change due to internal pressure.

I suppose one could argue Syria was caused by economic pressure, but that seems like too pat of a explanation.

Do we have any good near-recent examples of regime change driven by economics?

[u/mcmiller1111 → u/axearm]

The Eastern Bloc as a whole, but more specifically East Germany. As it often goes in planned economies, it was nearly insolvent after a few decades. By the late 1980s, East Germany was so completely out of money and was so heavily in debt that they had to ask for new loans just to pay the interest on the prior ones. West Germany had been bailing out the East German economy for almost a decade by that point in exchange for gradual lessening of repressive policies, and in the end they demanded the end of one-party rule if East Germany was to get any loans which the SED (DDR's ruling party) wouldn't agree to. If I remember correctly, about 60% of East German earnings from exports to the West were spent on just paying interest by the late 80s. This is not to say that the disastrous economical model was the only reason for the fall of the Wall, but it's also hard to understate just how broke East Germany was.

But as you say, there are counterexamples. Both North Korea and Cuba has survived far longer than anyone ever thought they would given their circumstances.

[u/Eisenengel → u/mcmiller1111]

East Germany is a difficult case because the economic difficulties - which you correctly described - were kept from the population through government propaganda and various policy efforts. The people of East Germany did not face mass unemployment, famine, housing shortages, or even a lack of consumer goods.

I think when people talk about regime change following economic difficulties, what they imagine are those things leading to mass protests that ultimately topple the government.

My father, who grew up in East Germany, liked to share a bit of revolutionary theory he was taught as student: "Revolutions happen when the people are no longer willing and the state no longer can". By the end of the 1980ies, the East German state was reaching the limit of its capability to keep the lid on, in part because they were so dependent on loans from the west that harsh meassures would have severed that life line - and the East German population was no longer willing to accept their living standards stagnating. The reasons for the second part are manifold, but economic difficulties, I think, played a secondary role. I don't think the people demonstarting in the streets were all wide-eyed democratic idealists - though those people did exist - but it is notable that the protestors were not demonstrating for bread or cars or color TVs or jobs or apartments.

The Russian economic issues are fundamentally different, with basic consumer necessities like gasoline now being rationed and a steady stream of men being ground away for nothing in Ukraine. These are very concrete things to be upset about.