When in C++ I had 2 direct dependencies it resulted in 6 total dependencies (direct + transitive).
In Rust I had 5 direct dependencies (because some standard stuff is not in the standard lib) and it resulted in... 300 total dependencies.
> but it is by no means determined by language or even context.
Not sure what you mean there. My feeling is that making it super easy to pull 50 transitive dependencies without realizing it does not help. If you have to manually handle every single dependency, first it forces you to look at them (that's a good thing), and second it encourages you to minimize them.
What is it that makes you think that C/C++ does not do this also?
[ EDIT: this also has something to do with the typical size and scope of C/C++ libraries ]
My experience. I haven't worked in a single C++ project that had hundreds of dependencies, but I encounter those regularly in Rust/npm.
I think there's a bit of a misconception here.
Ardour is written in C++ and depends on 80+ other libraries.
The dependency situation may be exacerbated by packaging culture that encourages the use of lots of relatively small dependencies, but it is by no means determined by language or even context.