$ In 1917 it took Russia 10 days to shake the world. Last week it took just one. Although the latest revolution unfolded peacefully at the ballot box, the aftershocks were no less unsettling than those triggered by the Bolshevik coup. Ultranationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky, a golden-tongued demagogue who has been compared with Adolf Hitler, looked to have swept enough votes to establish a powerful bloc for his neofascist party in the State Duma, the lower house of the new Russian parliament.
Although Moscow watchers in the West played down the possibility of a revanchist Russia, panicky East Europeans renewed their entreaties...
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