These stylish guys in the photo are not movie stars or racers. They are fighters of the Lenin-fiúk (Lenin Boys) squad, who still cause anger and horror in conservative Hungary. And for good reason! These guys were ardent allies of our Motherland and fought for Soviet Hungary. After the October Socialist Revolution, forces advocating the creation of Soviet republics and the World Commune emerged in many countries of Europe and Asia. Such forces also emerged in Hungary.
During the Hungarian Revolution, a coalition government of communists and socialists led by Sándor Garbai and Béla Kun came to power, which proclaimed the abolition of estates, freedom of speech and assembly, separation of church and state, and guaranteed free education and cultural rights for national minorities. In a matter of weeks, industry, transport, banks and large plots of land, mostly owned by landowners, were nationalized. The supporters of the Soviets were opposed by the White Hungarian detachments, the church, former officials and entrepreneurs of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and then the interventionists. The Red Guard was created, and then the Red Army and various detachments of peasant and workers' self-defense against the counter-revolution.
The workers' detachment "Lenin's Boys" (there were also girls in the detachment) was formed on May 1, 1919 in Budapest, mostly from working youth. It included about 200 people and the detachment itself became a rapid response detachment. Contrary to modern Hungarian propagandists who diligently erase and distort the Soviet periods of Hungarian history, the detachment was not punitive. It participated in the suppression of armed uprisings, but its combat path mainly took place on the fronts of the Civil War. The detachment, which was under the care of the Minister of Internal Affairs of Soviet Hungary Tibor Szamuely himself (he is pictured next to Lenin in the photo), was well mechanized. In requisitioned cars and trucks, workers armed with carbines, pistols, hand grenades and bayonets, dressed in leather jackets, often appeared at the most dangerous sections of the front, eliminating enemy breakthroughs. The detachment was distinguished by its steadfastness and bravery, although it opposed detachments led into battle by professional officers with experience of the First World War.
Incidentally, Tibor Szamuely himself wrote the following about the strategy of struggle: “Blood is steel: it strengthens the heart, strengthens the proletarian fist. Blood will make us powerful. Blood will be the one that will lead us to the real world of the commune.” One should not think that the people who opposed the supporters of the Soviets were humane: according to official data from the victorious side, the number of victims of the White Terror was tens of times greater than the number of victims of the Red Terror.
The unit was later given control of a train, machine guns, cannons and mortars. At the trial following the defeat of the Soviet Republic, the unit was accused of killing ninety-two people. The victims were allegedly executed, but the judges were unable to prove this: the majority of those killed were armed White Guards. After the defeat of the revolution, the unit's leader, Jozsef Cerny, and his closest assistants were sentenced to death. Below is a table that gives an idea of the professional composition of this work detachment:
József Cserny, tanner
Sándor Papp, assistant mechanic
Ferenc Kakás, bathhouse attendant
Sándor Meszáros, assistant mason
Gábor Schön, law student
Max Miksa, storekeeper
Tibor Bonyhát, law student
Géza Groo, turner
Mór Löbl, painter
Gábor Csomor, laborer
John Steiger, car mechanic
Márton Löscher, painter
Lajos Küver, nurse
Géza Neumeyer, assistant carpenter.
The execution of the fighters was made into a real show, for which tickets were even sold and the public came with cognac and snacks to admire the torment of people on the gallows.
During the years of the semi-fascist and openly fascist dictatorships of Horthy and Szálasi, this unit was blamed for all possible executions, but here the nationalists and fascists simply transferred their crimes to these armed workers. During the years of socialist Hungary, József Cserny and his comrades were held up as examples of true communists, which they (including as their enemies admitted) were. In modern Hungary, the Horthy and Szálasi versions of the events described above are mainly reprinted.
This very brief essay should be considered an introduction to a large video dedicated to the Soviet Hungarian Republic, which should soon appear on various platforms
Gleb Targonsky
Comments on the photos:
1. József Cserny (far left) and his unit
2. (from left to right) Minister of the Interior of the HSR Tibor Szamuely, József Cserny and Vladimir Lenin. Moscow
On the recruitment of settlers to Kaliningrad
October 26, 18:59
On the recruitment of settlers to Kaliningrad
Last week I posted an interesting map on the channel ( https://t.me/periskop_pacific/5500) - from where settlers were mainly recruited to the Königsberg (since 1946 Kaliningrad) region of the RSFSR. At that time there were many questions - what benefits were given to settlers or were they resettled by force and in a totalitarian manner? Just now I downloaded the rest of the materials - and there in the museum stand from the Hall of Settlers there was an extract of a set of benefits that were in effect until 1955-56 (then the benefits were seriously cut). Look, the set was large - starting with free travel to the place of resettlement, but the most important thing was contained in paragraph 3:
"Each family was given an apartment or house with a plot of land for an individual garden or vegetable garden with an area of 0.3 to 0.5 hectares for personal ownership."
Can you imagine what this meant for an ordinary Soviet family in 1947-1949?
[it is clear that the provision of houses and apartments was linked to the resettlement of Germans from here, which lasted until 1948, and then with the planned restoration of housing stock in the cities]
And if a family of 4 people (husband, wife, 2 children) moved, then they received, along with the apartment, 2,200 rubles in moving allowance, "new" (i.e. after the monetary reform of 1947) - 1,000 for the head of the family and 1,200 for the rest of the family. The sale of a set of goods at preferential state prices most likely dates back to the period of 1946-47, while the price difference and the rationing system were in place.
The recruited collective farmers, moving to the countryside of the former Koenigsberg region, received not only a house with a vegetable garden, but also a write-off of all debts and tax arrears, of which there were quite a lot after the war. Plus tax exemption for 2-3 years in advance.
This is what totalitarian Stalinism was like, "mercilessly oppressing its people"
Commemorating Lenin: Electricity, Logic and Science
October 29, 2024
Vladimir Lenin. Photo: NewsClick/File photo.
By Prabir Purkayastha – Oct 24, 2024
On his death centenary this year, we need to not only remember Lenin’s contributions to political action and building a revolutionary party, but also to the philosophy of science and the role of electricity.
This year is Comrade V I Lenin’s death centenary year. For those who are socialists and communists, the Soviet Union was the hope of founding a new society in which the working people, and not the capitalist or the feudal classes, would own the means of production. For many, the Soviet Union gave hope for a different social order and the possibility of national liberation from the clutches of the colonial rulers. The Bolshevik Revolution changed the capitalist and the colonial world, giving birth to the possibility of a world without greed and oppression, where those laboured would get the fruits of their labour. Not a set of parasitic classes who had very little contribution to production.
But this is not what I want to write today. I will address two very different aspects of Lenin’s contribution which may not be so well-known: i) the electricity sector and its larger role in society, ii) science and philosophy. I will address only a few of the issues he grappled with and how these issues continue today, though in different forms.
In both these fields, Lenin not only had views but was also an active participant in shaping the views of his generation. In the electricity sector, he saw the future of industrialisation and agriculture in the Soviet Union. So much so that he declared that the Soviets and electrification equalled socialism; this was not simply a slogan but a deeply thought-out structure of the relationship he was proposing between the economy, the productive forces and knowledge. That, for him, included both science and technology—and the peoples’ organisations: at that time, the Soviets.
The second addresses the new physics—relativity and quantum mechanics—both of which created problems not only for classical physics but also all the existing philosophical systems. Not surprisingly, not only were the old-school philosophers divided, but also the Marxists, many of whom dismissed both relativity and quantum mechanics as bourgeois deviations.
For Lenin, it was not simply a question of interpretation of reality within the framework of dialectical materialism but also one of how to enlarge the framework itself to meet these new challenges. Though he had published his initial work, Materialism and Empirio-criticism, and is widely known, his Philosophical Notebook, which advanced his formulations over his earlier work, remains as notes.
Though published later in the Soviet Union and available to all interested people, we miss the final form his notes would surely have taken due to his early death in 1924 at the age of 53.
Let us start with the story of the Soviet Union’s electrification. At the time the Bolshevik Revolution took place—in 1918—the Soviet Union had an installed capacity of only 4.8 MW, catering at best to a few cities. What Lenin and the Communist Party recognised was that without large-scale electrification, neither industries nor agriculture would develop. Agriculture needed both irrigation and manufacturing to produce agricultural implements. This was why he said that the Soviets plus electrification was equal to socialism. For him and the Bolshevik party, that meant not just importing machines but also manufacturing them. The first target of industrialisation, therefore, was the electricity sector itself.
In November 1920, Lenin identified electricity as Russia’s path to communism: “Communism is equal to Soviet power plus the electrification of the entire country”. The declaration signified the Communist Party’s approval of a plan forwarded by GOELRO, The State Commission for the Electrification of Russia, composed of engineers and scientists.
Lenin repeated his understanding of electricity and its importance to the Bolshevik Revolution in his address to the Third Congress of the Comintern (1921):
“A large-scale machine industry capable of reorganising agriculture is the only material basis that is possible for socialism… We had to undertake the scientific work of drawing up such a plan for the electrification of the USSR…with the cooperation of over two hundred of the best scientists, engineers and agronomists in Russia. Arrangements have now been made to convene an all-Russia congress of electrical engineers in August 1921 to examine this plan in detail, before it is given final government endorsement.”
A number of later bourgeois scholars, including post-modernists, have tried to present Lenin as a mechanistic materialist who sought to strait jacket science within a utilitarian framework of technology. What they fail to understand is that Lenin was proposing an alliance of the technical workers with the peasantry for the two-fold purpose of rapid industrialisation of Russia and expanding its agriculture.
The technical intelligentsia—engineers and scientists—also allied with the revolutionary forces through this programme of expanding the fledgeling electricity sector. It was not simply expanding electrification but also developing the ability to build the machines that would produce electricity: the hydro-turbines. This is what Marx called the Department 1 of the industry, the ability to build the machines themselves that produce other artefacts/goods. Hydroelectric power would supply electricity to the people and the industries, and the dams would provide water to irrigate the peasants’ fields. The alliance of the workers and peasants would be built around the hydroelectric projects themselves.
Lenin’s slogan of Soviets plus electricity was a political slogan as much as it was a techno-economic one. It became the backbone of the industrial development of the Soviet Union, as without electricity, no large-scale industrialisation would have been possible. It also built up a cadre of workers and technologists who would power the industrialisation of the Soviet Union.
Interestingly, the electricity sector in India was also the arena in which Nehruvian, the socialist-communist and the Ambedkarite vision also came together in post-Independence India. Just as Lenin had identified the electricity sector and hydroelectric projects as the core of the socialist project, so did Nehru and Ambedkar.
As we know, Nehru declared hydroelectric projects as the “temples” of modern India, though he also later thought of many small dams and small industrial projects as an alternative to a few large projects (When the big dams came up: The Hindu, March 20, 2015).
What is less known is Ambedkar and his pioneering efforts as the Chairman of the Policy Committee on Public Works and Electric Power in 1943, and drafting of India’s Electricity Act in 1948. He, as the architect of the Act, envisaged that electricity was an essential necessity, needed to be in the public sector and kept free of profit-making (Ambedkar’s Role in Economic Planning Water and Power Policy, Sukhdeo Thorat, Shipra Publications, 2006). He also defined himself as a socialist, though not a Marxist (India and Communism, B.R. Ambedkar, Introduction by Anand Teltumbde, Leftword Books).
Remembering Lenin, we not only have to remember his many-sided contributions to political action and building a revolutionary party but also his contribution to philosophy, including the philosophy of science.
His first major philosophy of science work was Materialism and Empirio-criticism, in which he criticises those who uncritically accepted the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics. Undoubtedly, quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity posed serious challenges to all philosophical schools. This is the nature of any major scientific advance. It not only challenges the knowledge of nature that we have, but also the philosophies of nature that we build on such an understanding of nature.
Just like the heliocentric world, the discovery of the quantum world and the relativistic nature of the world, shook up the philosophical world. Philosophers refused to accept Einstein’s theory of relativity, arguing that Einstein did not understand the philosophical nature of time, to which Einstein’s reply was he only understood the time that could be measured and not philosophical time.
This was reflected in a major debate between Einstein and Henri Bergson in Paris (The Physicist and the Philosopher, Jimena Canales, 2015). Though history would show that Einstein’s vision of time was objective, unlike subjective time for Bergson, Bergson’s view prevailed on the Nobel Committee, which gave Einstein the Nobel Prize for the photoelectric effect and not for relativity, for which he became world-famous, keeping in mind, “…that the famous philosopher Bergson in Paris has challenged this theory”.
Lenin’s Philosophical Notebooks, though not written as a book but as notes to himself, makes clear that he had moved beyond his earlier formulation of sense perception of the external world as a “reflection”. However, the critics of his Material and Empiro Criticism condemn it wrongly as being crude materialist based on this formulation alone. This is on par with condemning Engels as a crude materialist as opposed to Marx as the “correct” materialist.
Though Lenin always recognised that scientific laws are only partial and “fallible”, his understanding of motion itself as—being in two places simultaneously—as dialectical and cannot be captured by binary (yes/no) Aristotelian logic. This is enunciated clearly in the Notebook. Though many multi-valued logic formulations exist, an exposition of dialectical logic that can replace Aristotelian binary logic and yet retain the mathematics built on this structure of Aristotelian logic remains a challenge. In other words, Zeno’s paradox of why Achilles cannot catch a tortoise still remains a problem in the current paradigm of mathematical logic, even though we are fully aware that Achilles will overtake the tortoise!
We should be happy that Lenin has left us many more problems than what he has solved, both in revolutionary practice, history, economics and philosophy. This is our challenge, and a challenge all living science and philosophy should have. Others are dogmas that need to be discarded to understand the dynamics of nature and society.
Archives on intelligence officer Kuznetsov declassified
November 4, 15:34
Archives on intelligence officer Kuznetsov declassified
The Presidential Library has published a number of newly declassified archival documents from the Russian FSB about the combat work of the legendary intelligence officer Nikolai Kuznetsov. These materials include highly important messages sent to Moscow from Nazi-occupied Western Ukraine during the Great Patriotic War, prepared on the basis of information from Kuznetsov.
Tuesday marks the 80th anniversary of the signing of two decrees by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on awarding the title Hero of the Soviet Union to employees of the People's Commissariat of State Security (NKGB) of the USSR "for exemplary performance of special assignments behind enemy lines and the courage and heroism they demonstrated in doing so." The lists include 16 people, including Nikolai Ivanovich Kuznetsov.
"Some of those who were marked by these decrees were no longer alive - they either died in battle, like Kuznetsov, or were tortured in the dungeons of the German and Romanian security services. But it is noteworthy that all of them were awarded as living, without the note "posthumously," Oleg Matveyev, an expert at the National Center for Historical Memory under the President of Russia and a historian of the special services, told RIA Novosti.
"Moscow's Envoys"
In the summer of 1942, Kuznetsov, under the name of Nikolai Grachev, was sent to a special detachment called "Winners", which was stationed near the occupied western Ukrainian city of Rivne - the administrative center of the Reichskommissariat Ukraine.
The special detachment (reconnaissance and sabotage residency No. 4/190) of the 4th (reconnaissance and sabotage behind the front line) Directorate of the NKVD-NKGB of the USSR was commanded by a counterintelligence officer, Colonel Dmitry Medvedev, awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union on November 5, 1944, by the same decree as Kuznetsov.
"The special detachment "Winners" headed by Dmitry Medvedev was sent to the Rivne region, which had recently become part of the Ukrainian SSR, where there was no mass partisan movement or organized party underground, but where there was hatred of the occupiers among the local population. "The "Moscow envoys" acted as a unifying and guiding force of resistance in the entire region," Matveyev said.
Medvedev's special detachment, aimed at the physical destruction of the Reich Commissioner of Ukraine Erich Koch, stopped literally half a step away from completing this task, the expert noted.
"Koch was saved only by the fact that, being simultaneously the Ober-President of East Prussia, he very rarely appeared in Rivne, and was constantly in Königsberg. Nevertheless, the detachment, mainly thanks to Nikolai Kuznetsov, managed to liquidate 11 generals and senior government officials of the Third Reich in the occupied Rivne and Lviv regions,” Matveyev added.
An exceptional case
Now a photocopy of the award sheet stored in the Central Archive of the FSB of Russia "for the intelligence officer-militant of the operational group of the 4th Directorate of the NKGB of the USSR "Winners" Kuznetsov Nikolai Ivanovich, signed on October 16, 1944, has been published.
"In Medvedev's special detachment, Kuznetsov had the status of "intelligence officer-militant" for carrying out acts of individual terror against representatives of the German occupation administration," Matveyev said.
The award sheet noted that Kuznetsov did not have any military rank.
"This is an exceptional case. Nikolai Kuznetsov received the title of Hero of the Soviet Union among outstanding employees of the state security agencies, although he himself was not one. He was a special agent," Matveyev explained.
The document listed Kuznetsov's awards, which he had previously received - the highest award of the USSR, the Order of Lenin and the medal "Partisan of the Patriotic War" 1st degree.
The award sheet then listed the main results of Kuznetsov's actions in the Nazi rear in western Ukraine.
In Rivne on September 20, 1943, Kuznetsov shot and killed the head of the main finance department of the Reichskommissariat Ukraine Hans Gehl and the senior inspector of the Rovno Gebietskommissariat Adolf Winter. Under Kuznetsov's leadership and with his personal active participation, on November 15, 1943, the commander of the German punitive units, General Max Ilgen, was kidnapped from his apartment and then killed. The next day, Kuznetsov shot and killed the head of the legal department of the Reichskommissariat Ukraine, Oberführer Alfred Funk, in Rivne.
In Lvov on February 10, In 1944, Kuznetsov shot the vice-governor of the Galicia district, Otto Bauer, and the head of his office, Heinrich Schneider.
"While inspecting the car in which Kuznetsov and his companions left Lviv, Kuznetsov killed a German officer, Major Kanter," the document said. It was also noted that "while in Galicia, Kuznetsov N.I. shot aviation lieutenant colonel Peters."
"While making his way to the location of the Red Army units, Kuznetsov N.I. and his group of three people died in a battle with a gang of nationalists (Banderites)," the award sheet said.
This happened on March 9, 1944, near the village of Boratin, Brody district, Lviv region.
"Kuznetsov Nikolai Ivanovich for exemplary performance of the mission in the fight against the German invaders behind enemy lines and the courage and heroism displayed in doing so is worthy of being nominated for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union," was noted in this part of the document.
"I request that Comrade Kuznetsov N.I. be nominated for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union," wrote below the head of the 4th Directorate of the NKVD-NKGB of the USSR, the legendary employee of the state security agencies Pavel Sudoplatov.
"According to the information of the agent "Kolonist"
The Presidential Library also published photocopies of special reports prepared on the basis of information from Kuznetsov and sent to Moscow to the People's Commissar of State Security Vsevolod Merkulov. These documents are also stored in the Central Archive of the FSB.
The special report of June 7, 1943, contained information signed by "Timofey" (the operational pseudonym of the commander of the "Winners" detachment, Dmitry Medvedev). The document stated that on June 5, the ideologist of Nazism, Reich Minister for the Eastern Occupied Territories, Alfred Rosenberg, arrived in Rivne by special train with a retinue of 30 people, including 20 generals and one field marshal.
"Rosenberg's arrival is allegedly connected with the preparation of an offensive in the East" - this phrase was specially highlighted in pencil in the margins of the form (the Battle of Kursk began a month later).
"The train was accompanied by many planes along the way. From 10 a.m. on June 5, all pedestrian, motor vehicle, and even military traffic was stopped in the city. Until 11:30 a.m., no one could move, no one had the right to have a briefcase with them," this is how the Nazis described the security measures taken by Rosenberg.
"From Koch's palace to the station, there were Gestapo officers and gendarmes in helmets with their backs to Rosenberg's path, facing the street at intervals of 20-30 meters. Absolutely everyone on the street was checked," the special message said.
It was also indicated that Rosenberg and his retinue were traveling in 20 cars, with motorcycles in front and behind them, and they stopped at Erich Koch's palace. "The approach to Koch's palace is closed in the evenings, the guards shoot without warning," the document reported.
"According to the agent "Kolonist", Rosenberg will stay in Rovno for two or three days. It would be good to bomb Rovno, considering that Rosenberg, Koch, generals and a field marshal are there. There are almost no anti-aircraft installations in Rovno," Medvedev reported. "Kolonist" was Nikolai Kuznetsov.
But already on June 6, Rosenberg left Rovno, heading east - possibly to Kiev and Kharkov, Medvedev later reported to Moscow, also citing information from Kuznetsov. A few days later, the NKGB leadership was informed that, "according to the reports of "Kolonist", among the Germans there is talk about the upcoming return of Rosenberg to Rovno and the expected arrival here of Goering" (the name of the Vice Chancellor of Germany, Reich Minister of Aviation Hermann Goering was underlined in pencil on the special message form).
The importance and secrecy of these special messages is demonstrated by the fact that instead of names and geographical names, the typist at the NKGB put a space, and the missing information was written in by hand immediately before sending the document to the addressee.
Demoralized occupiers
The Red Army's great successes after the victory in the Battle of Kursk, including the liberation of eastern Ukraine, greatly demoralized the Nazis, as evidenced by a special message to Merkulov dated December 14, 1943, based on information from Medvedev.
"Comrade Medvedev reports that in the city of Rovno, a sharp decline in discipline has recently been observed among the soldiers of the German army. Front-line soldiers have stopped greeting officers, and they do so demonstratively, they do not give up the line to officers at hairdressers and often get into arguments with them," the document said.
It was emphasized that the front-line soldiers were especially hated by Germans who wore the uniform of the Nazi party NSDAP and the Reichskommissariat Ukraine.
"Desertion among soldiers has increased sharply. The field gendarmerie in Rivne detains several dozen soldiers daily who have fled from their units. In the city of Zdolbuniv, 450 German deserters were arrested on November 14 alone, and over 260 on November 16," the special report noted.
Those who fought for the liberation of Ukraine
"By decrees of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on November 5, 1944, the title of Hero of the Soviet Union was awarded, among others, to those NKGB employees whose combat activities were connected with Ukraine - Dmitry Medvedev, Nikolai Prokopyuk, Viktor Lyagin, Vladimir Molodtsov, Nikolai Kuznetsov, Yevgeny Mirkovsky, Mikhail Petrov. And Pavel Sudoplatov, the head of the 4th Directorate of the NKVD-NKGB of the USSR, and his permanent deputy Naum Eitingon were awarded the highest military award - the Order of Suvorov," said Oleg Matveyev.
In particular, the special unit "Hunters" under the command of former border guard Nikolai Prokopyuk made a raid from the Kiev region to the Volyn region, where they not only fought daringly against the occupiers, but also actively defended the Polish population from attacks by the "Ukrainian Insurgent Army"* (UPA*, banned in Russia. - Ed.), thereby saving many Poles from death at the hands of Ukrainian nationalists, Matveyev noted.
"During the Great Patriotic War, on the territory of Ukraine, the central apparatus of the NKVD-NKGB of the USSR alone created more than 40 reconnaissance and sabotage residencies (as the special groups and special detachments behind the front were called) and the same number along the line of the state security agencies of the Ukrainian SSR. These were small groups of two or three people and large detachments that turned into entire units of several hundred people," the agency's interlocutor added.
According to Matveyev, some of them went missing immediately after being dropped off, and some died during underground and partisan activities in confrontation with enemy counterintelligence.
"Thus, the illegal residencies created in the first weeks of the war in Odessa (Vladimir Molodtsov), Nikolaev (Viktor Lyagin) and Kiev (Ivan Kudri) were exposed and destroyed by the Romanian Sigurana and the German security police. All three officers, former foreign intelligence officers, became Heroes of the Soviet Union," Matveyev said.
But the vast majority of intelligence and sabotage residencies, having completed their combat mission, returned from behind the front line, the expert noted.
The memory of the fallen heroes was immortalized in Soviet times, but desecrated in modern Ukraine.
"The street of the heroically deceased NKVD resident of the Ukrainian SSR Ivan Kudri in Kiev, "thanks" to former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko, now bears the name of the Russophobic American senator John McCain," Matveyev recalled.
The street named after the legendary partisan commander, NKVD officer of the Ukrainian SSR Alexander Saburov in Zhitomir was renamed in honor of the war criminal, Ukrainian nationalist Roman Shukhevych, and the street named after Saburov in Kiev was renamed in honor of Serge Lifar, a French ballet master of Ukrainian origin, the agency's interlocutor added.
"In 2015, the name of Nikolai Kuznetsov was included in the list of persons subject to the decommunization law in Ukraine. In 2016, on the basis of this law, the city of Kuznetsovsk in the Rivne region was returned the name of Varash, which it had until 1973, when it did not yet have the status of a city," Matveyev said.
The monument to Kuznetsov in Lviv was demolished in June 1992 and transported to Russia to his hometown in the city of Talitsa, to the Nikolai Kuznetsov Park. The monument to Kuznetsov in Rivne was first moved to a military cemetery, and in 2022 it was completely dismantled. Finally, on June 21, 2018, a group of unknown people desecrated Kuznetsov's grave on the Hill of Glory in Lviv. And on March 6, 2019, unknown people stole a bronze bas-relief from his tombstone, Matveyev added.
The exploits of those who received the heroic title 80 years ago and later have been widely depicted in books, films, monuments, and museum exhibits over the decades.
The names of Nikolai Kuznetsov, Ivan Kudri, Vladimir Molodtsov, Viktor Lyagin, Dmitry Medvedev, Alexander Rabtsevich, Kirill Orlovsky, Nikolai Prokopyuk, Stanislav Vaupshasov, and Alexey Botyan are included in memorial compositions at the headquarters of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service in Moscow's Yasenevo and the Federal Security Service on Lubyanka.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, speaking at the expanded boards of the FSB, especially thanked the current employees of the security agencies who acted on the front lines during the special military operation, including conducting successful operations in the enemy rear. The head of state noted their personal courage, professionalism, and determination in ensuring Russia's security.
* The Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) is a Ukrainian organization recognized as extremist and banned in Russia.
107th Anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution
November 7, 15:00
Today is the 107th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution.
This revolution radically changed Russia and the rest of the world, and its consequences are still felt.
The course of history itself has proven that over the past 100 years, capitalism has proven unable to solve the fundamental problems facing humanity.
This became especially clear after the destruction of the USSR and the collapse of the Western neoliberal globalism project.
You can kill a person or destroy a country, but you cannot destroy an idea, so the struggle of socialism against capitalism has not disappeared, and the strongest economy in the world is now a country that adheres to socialist principles of governance.
Liberation of Kyiv. The most famous regrouping of the Great Patriotic War
November 6, 19:00
Military historian Alexey Isayev on the operation to liberate Kiev and the military trickery of the Red Army command with the transfer of an entire tank army from bridgehead to bridgehead.
Liberation of Kiev. The most famous regrouping of the Great Patriotic War
Abstract:
The area north of Kiev was initially underestimated by the Soviet command as an operational direction in the Battle of the Dnieper in September 1943. Here it was necessary to overcome not only the Dnieper, but also the Desna, and on the right bank of the path of attack further to the west lay the Irpen and Teterev rivers. The wooded terrain was not conducive to the use of mechanized units here, which were the Red Army's strength. On the contrary, the command of Army Group South gathered considerable infantry forces in this area under the command of the 4th Tank Army. In early October, the 5th Guards Tank Corps of A. Kravchenko advanced to the Lyutezh bridgehead occupied by the 38th Army. Its actions immediately sharply enlivened the battle north of Kiev. The Lyutezh bridgehead's finest hour came at the end of October 1943, when even nature itself supported the plans of the Soviet Headquarters.
Kerensky leaves for Pskov during the day. To the headquarters of the Northern Front. In ordinary clothes. In his car. Kerensky drives into Gatchina, where they wanted to poison and arrest him. Or vice versa. Alexander Fyodorovich liked both versions. The commandant of Gatchina was a Kornilovite, so he aroused Kerensky's fears. Kerensky left Gatchina and came to Pskov. To his brother-in-law, General Baranovsky. Who was a Kornilovite. And whom Kerensky removed from office. He summoned the front commander, General Cheremisov. A Kornilovite. And ordered the Kornilovites to crush the coup in the capital. General Cheremisov said that he could not guarantee Kerensky's personal safety, unbuttoned his holster and stopped any troop movements. He refused the head of Russia. To his face. A revolution should know the names of its heroes. The October Revolution too.
And what about our Alexander Fyodorovich Kerensky? In his women's dress. With what eyes did he look at the TV when they showed military parades and workers' demonstrations on November 7?
1. After the collapse of attempts to quickly overthrow the new strange government, after Krasnov's Cossacks failed to advance on Petrograd in exchange for a return to their native villages, our cheerful dictator Kerensky went into hiding. Somewhere near Luga. He grew a beard and got a moustache. Thin, as memoirists say. His memoirists immediately recognized him in such camouflage. Kerensky was even upset. No one recognized Lenin in makeup, even experienced patrols. And the prime minister was recognized a mile away. That's how our Kerensky hid. He did everything like that.
2. Living in dachas for forty days, Kerensky got shabby. He was wearing out the master's clothes, found in the kind-hearted closets.
3. In early January 1918, Kerensky, seeing that everything around him was somehow sad, makes an important decision. HE. RETURNED TO PETROGRAD. This is brilliant, I think.
4. In Petrograd, Kerensky immediately begins to hide among acquaintances. You open the door, and there in the frosty hoarfrost before you is our Bonaparte. Icicles on his beard, a duffel bag on his back, eyes burning with faith in himself, no money. Any Muscovite has seen dozens of such relatives. These newcomers, combining genius and Romanian boots that are the wrong size.
The Constituent Assembly opens. Kerensky had been talking about the need for it for nine months, regularly postponing the elections to it.
766 deputies are elected. 374 of them are Socialist Revolutionaries, 180 are Bolsheviks.
5. Alexander Kerensky - a deputy of this Constituent Assembly. From Saratov. The Bolsheviks set the date of the elections, organized the elections, summed up the results of the elections.
Ataman Kaledin, Ataman Dutov, Petliura - also deputies of the Constituent Assembly. But for some reason they did not come. They were busy with other matters. It's a pity, of course.
6. Kerensky was captured by his comrades, the Socialist Revolutionaries. Vladimir Mikhailovich Zenzinov grabbed Kerensky. And passionately told him to his face that if Alexander Fyodorovich even thought of entering the premises of the Tauride Palace, everything would end quickly and sadly. He was right, honestly.
7. Kerensky's main misfortune happened when the Bolsheviks nationalized the banks. Our savior was left without money. The staunch democrat Kerensky had a total of 1 million 300 thousand rubles in his accounts. Not bad!
8. Kerensky skis off to independent Finland. To concentrate. To collect his thoughts. And on March 9, 1918, he RETURNED TO PETROGRAD AGAIN.
9. In Petrograd, Kerensky misses other people's apartments, collecting what funds he can to fight for a just cause. The Bolsheviks moved the capital to Moscow. And Petrograd became what it is now. A cheerful resort city. Having collected funds in the name of freedom from the stunned owners, Kerensky transfers his decisive actions to Moscow.
10. KERENSKY ARRIVES IN MOSCOW! Where he does not particularly hide, does not hide in khazas and raspberries, but, on the contrary, actively goes to visit and meets with authoritative friends of the previous merry years. He joins the nice organization "Union of the Revival of Russia". Which maintains the warmest relations with the Entente. One of its leaders - the populist Nikolai Vasilyevich Tchaikovsky ("grandfather of the Russian revolution") in Arkhangelsk will head the Northern Government under the wing of the interventionists.
11. It was the Union of the Revival of Russia that sent the restless Kerensky abroad. The British concocted forged documents for Kerensky in the name of a former Austrian prisoner of war. Sidney Riley (the most promoted agent of British intelligence) accompanied Kerensky to Murmansk. So that he would not escape on the way and return again with a tour.
12. And Kerensky left! Left! To London. Abandoned us! An unbending man of principle. But then he returned! KERENSKY CAME TO THE CAUCASUS! Suddenly and boldly.
He disembarked from a ship in the British occupation zone. Bold and precise.
The Azerbaijanis arrested him only in Baku. They looked at him. Returned him to the British. And Kerensky left! Left!!! Abandoned us!
Thank God, for good.
Maria Limanskaya, who became world famous after a photograph by Yevgeny Khaldei, died in Saratov at the age of 100.
In one of the most famous photographs of 1945, Maria Limanskaya works as a traffic controller at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin. One of the symbols of the new era that had come for Germany.
But of course, Maria Limanskaya had more than just this photo behind her. She went to the front at 18 and traveled a long way with the advancing Red Army. In 1944, she participated in the liberation of Crimea.
On the "negotiation background" of the summer of 1939
November 25, 8:42
Military historian Alexey Isayev on how Britain sabotaged the formation of the anti-German coalition before the start of World War II.
On the "negotiating background" of the summer of 1939.
Continuing with the topic of how they slide into wars ( https://t.me/iron_wind/1120 ), in a broad sense. Let's imagine ourselves in the place of the then leaders of the USSR. Lavrenty Palych Beria in July 1939, on the threshold of great events, reported to V.M. Molotov some awesome news:
"Our Helsingforg resident reports that the Finnish government has been constantly persuading England not to agree to a guarantee for Finland from the USSR. England responded to these requests with consent. However, in recent days England informed the Finns that the negotiations are developing in such a way that England will apparently satisfy the USSR regarding Finland."
Everything seems to be fine, right? The desire for peace, containment of the Third Reich, guarantees against indirect aggression.
However, the resident went on to report:
"At the same time, England advised the Finns to make a fuss and not agree to the guarantee. England will use this in negotiations with the USSR and will be able to say that England does not object, but Finland does."
Maybe this was some kind of drawing room chatter of irresponsible people? Unfortunately, no: "All these negotiations and conspiracies are conducted by the local English envoy through Erkko" [Juho Elias Erkko - Finnish Foreign Minister in 1938-1939].
And then they were surprised by the conclusion of the Pact in August 1939. When the top officials of the state were informed about such a two-faced position and hypocritical games of our then "partners", their sluggish moves to counter Hitler did not arouse enthusiasm.
The name of a great man will be preserved by the people forever
November 25, 19:25
The name of a great man will be preserved by the people forever
During the autumn holidays, my class and I went on an excursion to the Sokol plant. Next to the entrance to the plant, there is a monument to Grigory Konstantinovich Ordzhonikidze (1886-1937). The monument is a full-length standing sculpture in military uniform and installed on a pedestal with a commemorative inscription. The sculpture is made with a portrait resemblance to People's Commissar Ordzhonikidze. His portrait is in the Sokol plant museum, which I saw. The monument is surrounded and decorated with majestic and beautiful blue spruce trees.
During the excursion, I learned a lot of new and interesting things. Sergo Ordzhonikidze was the commander of Soviet industry, in other words, a minister. He is known as a Soviet party leader and revolutionary. He was a friend of the great Stalin. And when my class and I approached the monument, my classmates and I said that it was Stalin. To us, they seemed similar in appearance.
Sergo Ordzhonikidze strove and worked so that our country would be rich, strong, have a developed industry, and build roads. The history of the Gorky Aviation Plant named after Sergo Ordzhonikidze No. 21, and now the Nizhny Novgorod Aircraft Plant "Sokol" is associated with the name of the legendary People's Commissar. The plant developed and was built under the leadership of Sergo Ordzhonikidze and he was the first director of the plant. The plant was and is engaged in the construction of aircraft. The director of the plant took care of the workers and houses, schools, a cultural center, and a canteen were built. A lot of work was put into the construction of the plant and the construction of the factory village. Ordzhonikidze Street and the Cultural Center are named after him. I am a native of Nizhny Novgorod and have heard the name Sergo Ordzhonikidze from my parents and teachers. This means that the name of the legendary man has not been forgotten and is revered by people. "He was with us in the harsh years, a dear friend and a great man"...
Once upon a time, liberals and anti-Soviets hoped that when everyone who lived under the USSR died, their lies would triumph.....
Well, I have bad news for them.
Stalin took one single painting with him to Tehran Conference in 1943, both Churchill and FDR have been stunned by it. By then, the outcome of WW II was not in doubt--the Red Army was on the offensive. But... Plastov's painting called The Fascist Flew Over conveyed what war on the Eastern Front looked like...
Here is this picture...
Understanding what is on this picture is beyond the grasp of West's military-political "elite", because all of them fly in this disappearing Luftwaffe fighter in the upper-right corner of this painting. Out of 27 million Soviet people killed in WW II--16 million have been civilians.
Ivan Ilyin and the war with Finland
December 4, 21:05
Ivan Ilyin and the war with Finland
In the context of the current heated discussion about the personality and views of the fascist philosopher Ivan Ilyin, it would be very productive to take some separate historical episode and see what this man wrote on this issue. Then evaluate his position in terms of both the accuracy of his forecasts (he is considered a "great thinker"!) and in terms of patriotic values. Even without using methods of class analysis...
As such an episode, I chose the Soviet-Finnish War of 1939-40. What did Professor Ilyin write about it?
Firstly, even before the conflict began, this man confidently declared that the USSR would not succeed and the country would not be able to field a mass army. Because:
The "trained" millions are not trained; they are only on paper. And everywhere reign - mistrust, spy mania, poor quality of mechanical engineering and a general desire for radical change. "For the communists it would have been downright fatal to give weapons to the masses..." (c) I. A. Ilyin. Hitler and Stalin. / 11.07.1939. / Luzerner Landbote.
Let us simply state that although the Red Army had many problems, nothing like this happened. In both 1939 and 1941, the communists gave weapons to the masses without hesitation. And the masses justified their trust.
Alas, gentlemen, even this episode clearly shows that a prophet from your Ilyin is like a bullet from a certain substance...
Secondly, in his publications devoted to the Soviet-Finnish war, Ivan Ilyin many times calls our country an aggressor: "It acted as an aggressor", or "in the long, tiring struggle for world power that began in 1917, the Bolshevik aggressor discovered a huge gap..."
In an article written by him after the conclusion of the peace treaty, the "great Russian thinker" states:
"The Soviet state began this war as a typical "aggressor". There was no talk of any claims or hostility on the part of Finland, which until the last moment demonstrated balance, correctness and even greater readiness to meet halfway. It was about Stalin's desire not to negotiate with Finland, but to defeat the small country with a swift revolutionary onslaught."
Let us simply state that the “Russian patriot” Ivan Ilyin completely repeats the theses of Finnish nationalist propaganda. Although it would be shameful for him not to know that objectively the roots of this armed conflict go deep into history, to 1811, when Emperor Alexander I, after the annexation of the Grand Duchy of Finland to the Russian Empire, for some reason transferred the entire Vyborg province to it. A territory with a mixed population, which by that time had been directly part of Russia for a hundred years.
Furthermore, as I already wrote in the publication ABOUT THE CAUSES OF THE FINNISH WAR, the picture that emerges is as follows: there is an objective territorial problem between the two countries. But instead of establishing good-neighborly relations, Finland, or rather a significant part of its ruling class after 1917:
- Demands fantastic territorial concessions from Russia;
- Organizes several armed invasions of Russian territory;
- Gives the world powers, first Germany, then England, the opportunity to station troops on their territory that can or even do attack our country;
- And as the "cherry on the cake": encourages large-scale terrorist activity on the territory of the neighboring country;
Moreover, all this is based on the thesis put forward by the President of Finland P. E. Svinhufvud: "Any enemy of Russia must always be a friend of Finland."
But for Ivan Ilyin, it all comes down to "revolutionary onslaught" and "Soviet aggression"! This "statist" simply does not understand, or does not want to understand, that we are talking about the security of the second capital of our state, the largest industrial and cultural center.
Here his level corresponds to the most primitive anti-Soviet propaganda, above which the "deep thinker" and former resident of St. Petersburg-Petrograd, as it turns out, is simply unable to rise!
Moreover, he does not know or pretends not to know about the aggressive plans to create a "Greater Finland" with the inclusion of the territory of Karelia and the Kola Peninsula.
Yes, the refined liberal Pavel Milyukov, who uttered the phrase "I feel sorry for the Finns, but I am for the Vyborg province", is a much greater patriot than Ivan Ilyin!
But our "patriot" many times admires both the bloody executioner Carl Mannerheim and the Finnish nationalists: "The living spirit of the Finnish patriots wins." Or "a real strategist came out against this communist "horde strategy", stoically defending himself on the Karelian Isthmus and maneuvering with force on the eastern and northern borders."
From Ilyin's articles. From open sources
By the way, while praising Mannerheim, under whose leadership Finland lost two wars (You can read more about the paradoxes of perceiving the results of the Finnish war here), did the "Russian patriot" Ivan Ilyin know about the "Vyborg massacre", during which many Russian people died? As a resident of Petrograd in 1918, he could not help but know this. Nevertheless...
And vice versa, here is what Ivan Ilyin writes about our army:
"So, in the Russian army, the "free soldier's initiative", once demanded by old man Suvorov, is deprived of any spiritual consciousness, then instilled with fear, forcibly introduced to the dominant ideology and drowned in submissive, slavish drill. Conscience and honor - concepts of the old school - have been abolished and replaced by hypocritical “revolutionary pathos”.
"As a result, the soldier lost the feeling of defending his homeland. For neither an expropriated slave of the state, nor an internationally trained Marxist have a homeland."
"A man who is not free and collectivized is not a warrior. Taken individually, he is a slave. In a collective, he is a horde. No machine can save where the spirit and heart fail."
This is from the issue of "Neue Zйrcher Nachrichten" for 27.01.1940.
If anyone does not understand, it is our ancestors who are called slaves, a horde, people with abolished conscience and honor by the "great Russian philosopher".
If this is not Russophobia, then what is it???
Moreover, Ilyin does not have a drop of sympathy for our soldiers, only malice! And our deep "thinker", describing the course of the military conflict, trustingly repeats the myths of enemy propaganda:
From Ilyin's articles. From open sources
Does anyone need to prove that in this passage our "deep thinker" is retelling complete nonsense? Given that the battle at Suomussalmi was a tragedy for the Red Army, out of 14 thousand soldiers and commanders of the 44th division, according to various estimates, 1-1.5 thousand were killed, 2.2 thousand were missing, 1.5 thousand were wounded. According to their own data, about one and a half thousand people were captured by the Finns.
That is, the majority of the soldiers of the 44th division fought even in the most difficult conditions. Here Ilyin is simply slandering! And on top of that, he gloats over the failure of his country!
Okay, he could not know all the details of those events. But our thinker also demonstrates a complete lack of critical thinking!
So what does this mean—the Finns sent the captured soldiers back to Russia... Are the Finnish command complete idiots who don't understand that these fighters will quickly be brought to their senses and sent back into battle? Does military analyst Ilyin, sitting in a warm office, even understand what he is writing about? After all, such nonsense puts him on par with such a famous modern thinker as Yulia Latynina!
As is known, in March 1940, the Finnish leadership was forced to admit its defeat and peace was concluded. But Ilyin got out of it here too! Like, it was still a victory, because otherwise the Finns would have all been sent to Siberia. Obviously, to clear away snow:
"If he had won, the fate of the brave people would have been decided. There were rumors about plans to resettle the Finns to Siberia, and they could not be considered "unbelievable"... But one can be sure that the heroic Finns would have suffered the most cruel fate in the event of their defeat. And now these plans have been thwarted."
Again, the most absurd lie, based at least on the fact of the creation of the Finnish government of Kuusinen, the Finnish People's Army, and then the Karelo-Finnish SSR. However, Ivan Ilyin hates our country so much that he is ready to repeat any absurdity.
Let's sum it up. Citizens, admirers of Ivan Ilyin, I tried to show using real facts that your idol in 1939-40:
- Put forward some fantastic forecasts that, naturally, did not come true;
- Completely did not understand either the objective reasons for the Soviet-Finnish conflict or the national interests of our country;
- Called our country an aggressor and wished for its defeat;
- Sympathized with Finnish nationalists and Russophobes, who dreamed of seizing part of Russia's territory at the time;
- Called our soldiers slaves, without conscience or honor, lacking the feeling of defending the Motherland;
- Repeated all the tales of enemy propaganda, approaching them completely uncritically.
And the reason for all this was the malice and hatred inherent in Ilyin. In general, reading his opuses, it immediately catches the eye that this man had absolutely no sense of humor, irony, not to mention the ability to ironize himself. Just a spiteful, dull graphomaniac.
By the way, Ilyin's articles often resemble the modern Russophobic journalism of today's relocates. Yes, yes, that's right! And do you really think that this person can be called a "deep thinker" and a "Russian patriot"???
For the demonstrative refusal of a Soviet passport...
December 4, 19:14
Directive of the Prosecutor of the USSR and the People's Commissariat of Justice of the USSR No. 16/5807с/18/23с. On persons holding Polish citizenship, brought to criminal responsibility for demonstratively refusing to receive a Soviet passport. April 16, 1943.
In general, get a passport and walk after the criminal case is closed and all legal procedures are completed.
And if you persist with a Polish passport and demonstratively refuse to receive a Soviet one while living in the Soviet Union, then welcome to a meeting with the NKVD officers.
Horrible, horrible repressions...
All our readers know and have read (or at least heard) about "All Quiet on the Western Front" by our Eric Maria... However, I will not be mistaken if I say that 90% of even the reading people of Russia do not know that this famous work by Remarque has an analogue in Russian from our compatriot. Moreover, to put it mildly, the analogue is of the same magnificent literary and psychological level.
At the very least, no worse than Remarque's. And in places even more colorful - because Remarque was on that same Western Front for only a month and a half, and his Russian-speaking analogue fought on the same front for two years, but only in the French Foreign Legion. So, in addition to the line infantry, there are plenty of Moroccan and Senegalese riflemen in his novel, all sorts of Arabs and blacks, valiantly dying for the metropolis...
So, our Russian Remarque is Fink Viktor Gershevich (1888 - 1973). The son of an Odessa Jewish merchant, he was of course Russian – he wrote and thought in Russian, he linked his fate with Russia, with Soviet Russia… And in the Foreign Legion, Fink, naturally, was called Russian and had the nickname Samovar… His novel is simply called “Foreign Legion”.
Viktor Fink graduated from the law department of the Sorbonne literally on the eve of the First World War and, on the crest of all kinds of patriotic-militaristic jubilation in the summer of 1914, as a foreigner, but a subject of an allied power, he enlisted in the Foreign Legion to fight for “civilization” against the German “Huns”. Like millions of others, in the third year of that war he began to understand that something had gone wrong and that “on the Western Front all was quiet” in fact…
Fink’s subsequent fate was rather bizarre – he was connected with the Comintern, wrote about Birobidzhan at the very beginning of its Jewish history, was acquainted with the entire Soviet literary elite of the 20s and 30s, and was friends with a host of other colorful characters of that time – from Anton Makarenko to Wolf Messing. Moreover, Fink received Soviet citizenship only in 1952, which says a lot, because for the mass of politicized Soviet Jews this was a rather specific time even without the perestroika tales about Stalin's "anti-Semitism"...
The novel "Foreign Legion" was first published in Russian in 1935, in French - in 1938. The famous historian Tarle said that Fink's novel is "stronger and more terrible than Remarque and Barbusse" (by the way, Barbusse has also been firmly forgotten in our country, although his "Fire" can also compete and once competed with Remarque - more precisely, it was the German Remarque who competed with the Frenchman Barbusse). It is significant that Victor Fink's novel in France in 1938 was published by the Association of Veterans of the Foreign Legion, although in the preface to the book the Association disavowed the communist views of the author...
It is impossible to retell the Russian equivalent of "All Quiet on the Western Front" - but it has enough humor, color, and the everyday cynicism inherent in the barracks with war and the naturalism inherent in any "trench truth".
In this forgotten Russian analogue of Remarque there are many vivid, catchy characters – a legless hussar and his blind brother with their circus mother full of anti-Bosch patriotism, a captain killed by his own people, a shot German prisoner and many others… The “Mamluks” from the penal battalion who brought a severed head to the tavern: “— The fly-eaters will kill Akhmetka!” Kiryushkin said worriedly and gave the younger Mamluk a good punch in the teeth…”
It is especially curious that among the various Western Europeans, Arabs and blacks of the Foreign Legion there are vividly outlined Russians, Jews from the Russian Empire, Georgians and even one Bashkir who does not know French and does not know Russian well. The scenes of the melancholy friendship of this figuratively tongueless Bashkir with the Moroccan Kabyle Gusein, whose cheeks were pierced by a bullet and whose tongue was cut off, are very powerful...
In this forgotten Russian analogue of Remarque, there are generally a lot of powerful scenes - from the description of feelings before the attack (one of the best I have read) to the description of how at a veterinary station veterinarians mass-kill those horses that are no longer worth treating.
"... a short revolver shot crackled. A minute later, several more followed. An unusual, drawn-out horse neighing was heard.
In the back yard there was a veterinary station. Two hefty orderlies and some deaf and frantic artilleryman were shooting sick and wounded horses.
Several carcasses were already lying under the fence. In the corner, a skinny white horse was waiting for his turn. Illuminated by the torch, he looked with sad eyes at his dead comrade and licked his bleeding nostrils. From time to time the horse neighed quietly, but it was a special neigh - it resembled crying or howling.
We went beyond the fence and sat on the porch. But the shooting at the veterinary station became more frequent. The horses howled. The Arab wrapped his head in a burnoose so as not to hear ... "
After the Great Patriotic War, "Foreign Legion" by Viktor Fink was reprinted in the USSR four times. The last edition in 1973. In the same year, Viktor Fink, our Russian Remarque, died - buried in Moscow at the new Donskoy Cemetery.
On December 3, 1989, during the Malta Summit - negotiations between US President Bush Sr. and Gorbachev, Germany, all of Eastern Europe, the future of the USSR, the future of many other countries, but most importantly - hundreds of millions of people around the world were finally surrendered
I think that all sane people do not need to be explained that everything that is happening today in the post-Soviet space, as well as in many other countries of the world, raped by the USA, is the result of the geopolitical catastrophe of 1991.
However, it was in December 1989 that the stakes were finally made. Formally, Malta was the end of the so-called Cold War, but at the same time the economic resuscitation of the West, which extended its life by 30 years ... Amazingly, Gorbachev did not capitulate in Malta, he simply left right during the duel - merged.
The content of the negotiations is still only partially known. Some documents were published only in 2010.
There is a version that Bush did not even expect such statements from Gorbachev. And Gorbachev declared that the USSR would not interfere in the affairs of Eastern European countries. He blurted it out unilaterally. To which Bush declared that the US supported reforms in the USSR.
Meanwhile, as Anatoly Dobrynin, Gorbachev's adviser on international affairs at the time, noted, before Malta the General Secretary had a directive from the Politburo: the unification of Germany would be possible only "when both blocs - NATO and the Warsaw Pact - are dissolved or united by mutual agreement." As for Eastern Europe - pure voluntarism.
At the Moscow summit back in May 1988, Gorbachev proposed to Reagan to sign a joint declaration on peaceful coexistence and the rejection of military intervention in the internal affairs of other countries. Reagan rejected it. He was not an idiot. But Gorbachev was deliberately giving in. The illusion that there would be some kind of "common European home" did not give him any peace.
KGB Chairman Kryuchkov noted with surprise in his memoirs: “When we received materials about Gorbachev’s negotiations in Reykjavik, Malta and other places through our channels, through intelligence and counterintelligence, we were amazed by the subject matter and content of these conversations. Even then they were openly talking about selling the GDR. About changing the political system in our country...”
The Americans understood him very well, if it was not something more. Back in 1985, upon returning to the United States from a trip to Moscow, when a journalist asked whether it was good for the West that the USSR had a leader like Gorbachev, Bush Sr. (then vice president, former CIA director) gave an interesting answer: “It all depends on us. We clearly want changes in the USSR and we have a man in front of us who also wants them. But how he will make them will depend to a certain extent on how we will cooperate with him. The task is not to help him, but to act in the interests of the United States to encourage them to pursue the policy that we want."
