> The original point being disputed was that SU and Soviet people "never achieved much"

But they didn't achieve much in reality. That's why they have to copy most of their technologies from other countries during all their 70 years.

They did not achieve much in comparison to the rest of the world. Come on, it's obvious:

     - a non-hungry society?  NO
     - wealthy society?  certainly not
     - advanced and commercially successful airliners?  no (but you'll pick a nit here, I'm sure)
     - advanced medicine?  no (cue BS about how wonderful medicine is in Cuba, but still no)
     - advanced computing devices?  no, certainly nothing like those available in the West by 1991, much less anything since
     - the Internet?  NO
     - putting a man on the moon?  (hardly important, but) no
     - a myriad of consumer products of varying technological content, from the trivial to the highly advanced?  NO, see the first item
     - how about... cars... anti-lock brakes, catalytic converters, airbags...?  no

I could go on. But really, no, the USSR did not come close to the U.S. as to innovation, not because the USSR lacked talented people (it had them in spades) or a decent tech education system (it had a very good tech education system), but because its economic system could not make the best of those resources. It's that simple.