While English has certainly become the de facto tool of communication for everyone in this world. I would seriously WARN PEOPLE TO STAY AWAY from former Soviet Republics as I speak from personal experience as well as communicating with people who have worked or who still are working there. Common sense is at a premium in some places and the amount of racism may be something that people aren't prepared for.

You can develop the hardware and the software. But human capacity is hard to improve upon. Just giving people a heads up.