As the world wonders whether Saddam Hussein means it when he says of his intentions Just Kuwait! or whether he is simply using the intrusive Arabic K, the very ill wind blowing from the Gulf will not be entirely unwelcome to companies like Siemens AG, IBM Corp and Densitron International Ltd, all with giant orders for personal computers from the Soviet Union and wondering where the hard currency to pay for them will be found: the USSR is the world’s biggest producer of oil, and the windfall price increase will give Moscow a welcome increase in hard currency earnings – but what’s good for the Soviets is a disaster for the likes of Hungary, Poland and Czechoslovakia, which from January 1 will have to start paying world market prices in hard currency for Soviet oil.
