How bad did France and England’s fights get?

Pretty bad considering they had a quarrel preserve specifically constructed for them.

Let me just preface this by
clearing up the most common misconception about Russia; that is, he’s evil. In
canon, it’s the complete opposite. Russia is explicitly described as “not evil”,
albeit being “naturally scary.” Obviously, being scary in appearance and
possessing an evil mind are two entirely different things.

In the same character note,
it goes on to say that Russia thinks that Vodka and General Winter are his
friends. What’s more, everyone that he meets he thinks are his friends.
Strange, considering that aside from protecting Russia from invading nations,
General Winter attacks and torments Russia himself.

It’s this warped
understanding of reality and interpersonal relationships that I’ll be discussing
over the course of this post. To do that, we need to understand the core
influence of Russia’s childhood on his present person today.

In doing so, this will give
insight into the reasons why Russia wrongly sees violence as an answer; why he comes
off as cold; and why, despite having good intentions to make friends, he does
anything but.

To put it simply, Russia’s
childhood was brutal. For the most part, he spent his winters alone with little
help and no shelter. This strip darkly alludes to the fact that he grew
accustomed to freezing to death.

On top of that, Russia grew
up in oppressive circumstances. One example of this would be how he was
subjected to Tatar Rule (the Golden Horde).

In “The Yoke of Tatar”,
Lithuania first meets Russia and warns the latter that he’ll “freeze to death”
if he stays outside for too long. Of course, from the example above, we know
that Russia has already died this way several times before.

Here, Russia fantasizes about
becoming a bigger country and tells Lithuania that they’ll become friends one
day. Now, pay attention to what Russia says when Lithuania offers for them to
become friends in the present moment.

“We don’t have enough power.”
To me, that seems like a child with a twisted conception of what a healthy
relationship entails. Power in a relationship is what Russia’s been taught,
it’s all he knows.

He’s picked up on the
authority that the Tatars hold over him, and therefore applies it to how he
interacts with others. Put another way, the ruled strives to be the ruler.

This cycle of unhealthy
learned behaviour is also demonstrated in chapter 194 of World Stars. There,
Russia dismantles England’s naval brigade during the American Revolution. When
confronted about it, Russia’s response is so naturally oblivious that it
appears to have been internalized.

He’s literally equated power
with the ability to do whatever you want. Once again, you see how the influence
of his childhood factors in here. What Russia observed as a child is now being
repeated by himself.

Likewise, it’s not as if
Russia’s history has given him a break from suffering either. The damage only
keeps accumulating.

In the Bloody Sunday strip,
Russia’s brought to tears as he laments about how all his hard work to improve
his country has backfired, resulting in his people hating him.

Even darker is that at the end
the strip, it’s hinted that he’s been tasked with quelling the civil unrest.

Russia also hasn’t had any
mercy spared to him regarding his bosses. While we don’t get too much
information about them, what little that we do is heartbreaking.

When Russia is taken as a
prisoner of war in WW2 by Germany, he erupts with happiness and claims that
he’s in heaven. Out of everything, the most important comment is how he
mentions that he doesn’t have to deal with his boss.

Further, when he’s later
forced to build a railway by Stalin, Russia snaps. By snap, I mean that he
begins to fantasize about warm weather and loses all touch with reality.

This distance from/
misperceived reality is also to be taken into account regarding how Russia
doesn’t understand the consequences of his actions. He grew up with violence,
so violence is the only way he sees fit to solve his problems.

One example of this would be
when England’s caught sleeping at a meeting, and Russia offers to wake up
England by hitting him with a sickle. China’s comment, “violence is not the
answer!”, is the most telling indication of Russia’s troubled neuroses.

Another example of this
inability to recognize the consequences of his violent actions is when Russia
snaps Latvia’s neck in an attempt to get him to stop trembling.

That said, I would like to
end this by citing a favourite psychologist of mine, Karen Horney. She believed
that the “basic evil” (this is used loosely) in the world is parental
indifference, neglect, and hostility towards children.

While Russia may have had
Ukraine and Belarus, they weren’t around all the time. Centuries of oppressive
leaders, bloodshed, and isolation has taken a massive toll on Russia. What
Horney also said was that parents who exercised this basic evil of indifference
were incapable of treating their children with warmth and compassion as a
result of their own troubled childhoods.

Isn’t that what you see with
Russia? It’s not that he doesn’t want to be warm and compassionate towards
others, because he does. He wants nothing more than to make friends and help
ease his chronic loneliness.

The problem is
that he doesn’t know how.

The answer to the title is yes, yes indeed. While the nations
aren’t overtly terrified at the sight of America, they’re still nonetheless
wary of him. From their perspective, what’s worrisome about America is his
youth and impulsivity. Now add the fact that he’s one of the leading powers in
the world, and you’re in for some destructive outcomes.

What you’ll see is that America is often equated to a child
given how he had been isolated from the world after gaining his independence. He’s
unpredictable, naïve and bossy. In other terms, he’s inexperienced, and this
leads to a growing sense of wariness and caution among the other nations.

It’s like handing over the reigns of the world to a toddler.
They may have good intentions, but only end up creating an even bigger mess than
before.

This fear of America, then, is often the result of how ridiculous
and childish some of his ideas are. England even states that America has a “flawed
sense of reality.”

Again, given America’s dominant position on the world’s stage,
this isn’t something you want to see in a leader.

Here, America’s ideas are perceived as “nightmarish.” To be
fair, his world defense plan was to construct a ranger squadron, whatever that
means.

Either way, notice how he’s also referred to as a “brat” and “child.”

This child-like imagery comes up in how America interacts with
the other nations too. In that same meeting regarding his squadron defense plan,
America asks for a vote to be taken on it. What’s important here is that when
he offers the possibility of other nations disagreeing with him, he snaps a
bundle of spoons.

To me, that seems like an obvious intimidation tactic of someone
who is incapable of hearing alternative opinions. That said, I want to point
out how well child development patterns fit in with America’s characterization.

Children are inherently egocentric until about 6-8 years
old, as they lack the capacity to think outside of themselves. They only focus
on their own personal world and bubbles of fantasies before eventually
realizing that there’s a much larger world out there. Please note that this
egocentrism is not intentional; they just haven’t matured yet.

Still, this panel clearly illustrates that America believes himself
to be the only “player” [in the game of life].

America’s egocentrism for the most part is unintentional.
His isolation has made it hard for him to think from the perspective of others,
as he had previously grown accustomed to only looking after himself. That’s
where the “not being able to read the atmosphere” running gag likely comes
from.

However, as seen with the spoon incident, America is more
than capable of reading the atmosphere when he wants to if it means getting
what he wants…

…and that’s often other nations agreeing with him. Pay
attention to how uncomfortable South Korea gets here when claiming that he
agrees with America. Even more important is how in the panel above, South Korea
had no qualms in disagreeing with Japan.

No doubt, America is
bossy. Said bossiness and desire to get his way all the time is what’s
intimidating to the other nations.

Another display of this child-like bossiness would be when German-occupied
France and England are having an argument (big surprise), only for America to
step in and declare that he’ll decide on whose opinion is right.

There’s a bit of a discrepancy in the translation, but this
version has France say, “America, you scary boy!”

Meanwhile, my print version says, “What a frightening child,
you are!”

Regardless, both convey the same message. America does in
fact scare the other nations, sometimes.

One last example would be Netherlands warning Isolationist
Japan of America’s impending arrival. Once more, you see America’s youth being touched on.
Likewise, this youth is formulated as a reason of warning and caution.

With all that in mind, and for transparency’s sake, I’ll end
on this note: While America does often make the other nations feel uneasy, he’s
also frightened very easily himself.

Whether it’s ghosts, occasionally Russia, or sleeping alone, America is
possibly and ironically one of the biggest fraidy-cats in the series.

Barging through borders like, hands up, I got a big glock~

Is there any nation that you think people underestimate in their evilness?

Oh, definitely Sweden. He can be pretty mischievous at
times.

Remember when he came up with France’s punishment after the
2007 April Fools’ Event? Basically, he got France to praise and idolize
everything about England.