I just found out my kid's kindergarten class is teaching Russian 40 mins per day.

[DFW]

192. If it were up to me (and the OP will be very glad that it is not)................

These are tremendously widely spoken languages of our biggest rivals, enemies and trading partners.

I would have them learn Russian, Mandarin Chinese and Arabic for starters. Japanese, too if I could. And except for Russian, I don't speak any of them. My sister-in-law IS Japanese, and one of her sons is proficient in Arabic. My two granddaughters will be fluent in English by the time they are nine, but for now, their preferred language is German--normal, since that is where they live.

One time, about 40 years ago, the girlfriend of a well-off friend of mine wanted to visit the Soviet Union with another girlfriend. She was an outgoing, generous type. Relations weren't too great at the time--Brezhnev/Andropov, those guys. My friend didn't want to let her go. I said the best thing you could do for America is to let her go. He asked why? I said that the more contact Russians had with Americans of her pleasant nature, the more damage we would do to their propaganda about how awful we evil capitalists were. And so it was.

I get big smiles from Chinese, Arabs, whatever, for just speaking my ten words or so of their language, in the case of one I don't know. If we were all fluent in Russian, Chinese and Arabic, there would be a lot less in the way of enmity, mistrust or easy-to-spread hate. As it is, in my job, I get things done because I speak nine languages (nine and a half if you include Schwyzerdüütsch), and I promise you, I have more European friends in the field, including Russians, than all of my colleagues combined.