Transnistria is a nowhereland hugging a narrow valley near the Black Sea. No bigger than Cornwall or Rhode Island, the unrecognised country is a Soviet museum long occupied by Russian ‘peace-keepers’. Its oligarchs in Adidas track suits hunt wild boar with AK-47s. Its young people train for revolution at the Che Guevara High School of Political Leadership. Its secret factories have supplied arms to African insurgents and electrical generators for Iran’s nuclear power programme. Yet its isolation and sliver-size belie the real threat it poses to the West, above all since Russia's invasion of Ukraine. ‘We know our people and how to treat them,' bragged a local-boy-made-good oligarch. ‘And I tell you that the only way to get them to act or to change their ways is to point a gun at their heads, and threaten to shoot.’ ‘And if they still don’t change?’ I asked, shocked by his arrogant candour. ‘Then one pulls the trigger.’ Re-issued with a new Introduction, Back in the USSR is a snapshot in time - presented in a social realist style - and a chilling reminder of the fate that awaits the conquered.
