The Soviet Union

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Sat Feb 08, 2020 2:13 pm

History’s Thieves
With the historical memory fading, aging Cold Warriors are seizing the opportunity to portray twentieth-century socialism as an abject failure, a human tragedy of enormous dimensions. With fewer of the millions who sacrificed to achieve it still alive, enemies of socialism enjoy a clean slate to reconstruct the history of the Soviet Union as they please. And they are availing themselves of that opportunity. Shamefully, academic historians who know or should know the historical record remain silent.


Last year offered a special moment to demean the legacy of twentieth century Communism and the Soviet Union-- the eightieth anniversary of the German-Soviet non-aggression pact. Absurdity exceeded old bounds with the European Union resolution charging that the pact "paved the way for the outbreak of World War II." The European Union has on numerous occasions sought to equate Communism with Fascism, Communism with “totalitarianism;” it has justified the banning of Communism in several constituent countries; but August 23, 1939 provided an excuse for an even more outrageous EU resolution.


Any serious, honest account of the factors leading to the outbreak of World War II would likely begin with the Treaty of Versailles, which saw the victors in the First World War imposing impossible terms on the vanquished. The Anglo-American banks feasted on the usurious loans necessary for Germany to make its reparation payments, leaving German economic development stunted.


Moreover, the blame for the rise of Nazism lies squarely on the extreme nationalism and rabid revanchism fostered by the German bourgeoisie. The Social Democratic parliamentarians bear blame as well for tolerating Nazism and treacherously turning armed gangs of fascists (Freicorps, Stahlhelms) on genuine leftists and the workers.


And, of course, the collapse of global capitalism, beginning in 1929, provided nourishment for right-wing populism, with its chauvinism, demagoguery, and aggression -- critical conditions for the outbreak of world war.


Isolated, but immune to the ills of capitalism, the Soviet Union was largely untouched by the Great Depression. Alarmed by the Nazi capture of state power in 1933, Soviet leaders immediately embarked on a peace offensive.


As early as December 14, 1933 (Hitler became German Chancellor on January 30, 1933), the Soviets proposed a joint Polish-Soviet declaration, resolving to protect the peace in Eastern Europe in the event of a war threat. On the following January 26, Poland signed a friendship and non-aggression pact with Germany. On February 3, the Polish government rebuffed the Soviet offer.


A month later, the Soviet Union proposed a protocol to be co-signed with Germany to reject any actions directly or indirectly against the Baltic states. Nazi Germany rejected the offer.


In May, Soviet Foreign Minister Litvinov addressed the International Disarmament Conference suggesting strengthening peace by imposing sanctions and encouraging additional non-aggression pacts (the Soviets had concluded one with France in 1932). He proposed all-European and regional agreements of mutual assistance against aggression. British opposition and US indifference effectively killed the initiative.


Late in 1933/early 1934, French Foreign Minister Barthou, along with the Soviets, enthusiastically sought a broad collective security pact (the Eastern Pact) covering many European countries and directed against German aggression. Several governments, especially the British, insisted that Germany be included! While France and the Soviet Union conceded this, Germany and Poland refused to sign onto the pact. With a shift in French diplomacy after Barthou’s assassination and British intransigence, the pact subsequently foundered. Many see this as the moment of the birth of French/British appeasement. Clearly right-wing governments in Poland, Finland, and the Baltics were more anti-Soviet than fearful of Nazi aggression.


When Italian fascism set its sights on Ethiopia in 1935, the French and British diplomats signaled that they would not act against the aggression. In September, Litvinov chastised the League of Nations for inaction, demanding that the League “[must] spare neither efforts nor means to prevent an armed conflict between two members.…” In a subsequent telegram Litvinov stated that “the resolute application of sanctions by the League against Italy will be a stern warning to Germany as well.” The Western “democracies” opposed sanctions, military action, or a blockade to forestall aggression. Instead, they rewarded invasion by selling out Ethiopia with the onerous Hoare-Laval agreement. The US underscored its passivity on fascist aggression by passing a Neutrality Act.


The Soviet Union continued its peace offensive throughout 1935 and 1936, objecting strenuously to the inaction over Germany’s occupation of the Rhineland in March and Germany’s remilitarization.


But the real measure of anti-fascist, anti-Nazi commitment came in response to the fascist assault on the Spanish Republic on July 17, 1936. With the treacherous Franco, aided by the Italian and German military, rising against the elected government, the shameful Western “democracies” chose to turn away from a sister republic, allowing Nazism and fascism to act freely. Only the Soviet Union (and Mexico, to a lesser extent) offered material, human, diplomatic, and political assistance to the besieged Spanish Republic.


By contrast, the British and French governments enacted an arms embargo and sealed the borders, raising obstacles to the true anti-fascists rushing to the defense of the Republic.

The US extended its Neutrality Act to Spain, a neutrality that proved porous, as US corporations found ways to help the insurgents. The US and Western European governments adopted a bizarre non-intervention policy against Nazi intervention! For generations, much of the international left viewed the war in Spain as the first staunch resistance against fascist aggression. Today, that perspective seems to have been erased from the twenty-first-century collective memory.


It should be noted that Soviet foreign policy was consistently one of solidarity against aggression. When Japan attacked China in July of 1937, the Soviet Union was the only major power to lend material assistance to China.


Chamberlain and the British government rewarded the Italian fascists for their intervention in Spain with a treaty of friendship and cooperation on April 16, 1938.


Soviet diplomats received clear signals that the British and French governments were determined to exclude the USSR from any pacts and were equally determined to turn German aggression eastward toward the Soviet Union. In private conversations, British Lloyd George and US Sumner Welles intimated as such. Western powers believed that they could both contain Germany (at the expense of small countries and the USSR) while preserving their empires.


When Germany entered Austria in March of 1938, only the Soviet Union objected strongly. Pravda wrote ominously of the Western indifference to the Anschluss: “It is a policy with inevitably fatal consequences. And those who pursue it must be held responsible for helping to increase the war threat in Europe.” [my emphasis] In the Soviet view, Western complicity “paved” the way for the war to come, a consideration seemingly lost on the bureaucrats of the European Union, who are today so anxious to blame World War II on the Soviets.


The Anschluss emboldened other rightists in Europe. In March of 1938, the military, crypto-fascist government of Poland, acting in tacit agreement with Germany, instigated a provocation aimed at occupying part of Lithuania. The Soviet Union strongly stood them down.


Throughout 1938, the Soviets advanced collective-security plans, anticipating German aggression against Czechoslovakia. Their initiatives in September were favorably received by Winston Churchill, who was not then in government. Ignoring the initiative of the Soviet Union and the wishes of the Czechoslovakian government, Britain and France gifted the Germans the Sudetenland (the infamous Munich Agreement). Hitler later bragged that Czechoslovakia had been “presented to him on a plate by her friends.”


Poland also demanded the cession of the Teschen region, while the Western powers were dividing up Czechoslovakia.


The following March, 1939, Germany occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia. On March 18, the Soviet government proposed a conference of the USSR, Britain, France, Poland, Rumania, and Turkey to address the war danger. Without discussion, Chamberlain and Halifax rejected it and the French government never replied. A subsequent offer in April to sign a treaty of mutual assistance with Britain and France was treated dismissively.


After years of peace initiatives, offers of collective security, mutual defense, and common cause against fascism, the Soviet government understood that the European powers were determined to appease Hitler in order to direct his attention eastward. In May of 1939, the Soviet architect of collective security, Maxim Litvinov, was reassigned, replaced by V. Molotov.


The Japanese aggression against an isolated Soviet Union in May of 1939 only added to the urgency of the Soviet need for peace-preserving agreements (the Soviets defeated the Japanese at Khalkhin Gol in September, relieving the immediate threat of a two-front war).


Despite the shift in foreign policy leadership, in June, the Soviet government offered Britain and France a draft treaty of mutual assistance in the event of an attack upon any of the three parties. In addition, the draft proposed assistance to Belgium, Greece, Turkey, Rumania, Poland, or the Baltic states in case of aggression. The two major powers sent low-level emissaries to Moscow to discuss the draft. Since the discussants had no power to negotiate, but were mounting objection after objection, the Soviets concluded that they were not serious. Negotiations were dragging on well into August and promising to last, at least, to October.


At the same time, the British were discussing further concessions with Germany, offering a revision of the Versailles treaty regarding mandates and colonies against the security of its empire.


Despite at least three rejected overtures from the Germans for a mutual agreement, the frustrated Soviet government accepted a non-aggression, mutual assistance pact with Germany on August 23, 1939.


Western critics of the so-called Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact should be reminded of Stalin’s words at the 13th Congress of the CPSU in March of 1939: “1. We stand for peace and the strengthening of business relations with all countries… 2. We stand for peaceful, close and friendly relations with all the neighboring countries… 3. We stand for the support of nations which are the victims of aggression and are fighting for the independence of their country.” He added the USSR should “be cautious and not... allow our country to be drawn into conflicts by warmongers who are accustomed to have others pull the chestnuts out of the fire for them.”


Of course, there were many more initiatives, and peace proposals on the part of the Soviets beyond those documented here. This is a mere sketch. But the facts are incontestable.

Moreover, they are well known to serious historians of the period. The facts paint a picture of an isolated Soviet Union actively pursuing a peace policy and challenging an indifference, even encouragement of movement toward war.

At no time in the period after the Nazi assumption of power did the leading Western so-called “democracies” mount a stiff resistance to aggression (it was not merely Munich and Chamberlain). At every moment, it was the Soviets who raised the alarm and, in the case of Spain, met fascism on the battlefield.


Perhaps the Soviets were guilty of some miscalculations or faulty assessments in crafting their peace initiatives, but it was a rational response to the threat of what proved to be an unprecedented, deadly war. In addition, it was, from the first effort through the German-Soviet non-aggression pact, directed at guaranteeing the peace and security of the Soviet Union.


Therefore, it is unconscionable that professional historians can remain silent before scurrilous resolutions offered by unprincipled, political charlatans serving European Union capitalism.

Maybe intellectual cowardice should not be surprising in an era of bought-and-sold intellectuals inhabiting cash-rich think tanks, impervious to objectivity and honest scholarship.

Perhaps it should not be unexpected from spineless academics.


Such are our times…


Greg Godels
zzsblogml@gmail.com

http://zzs-blg.blogspot.com/
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Thu Apr 30, 2020 1:31 pm

On the resistance of the "counter" and revolutionary humanism in the Soviet state
04/29/2020

Conclusions Based on Ancestral Experience
One of the main components of social progress is the development of humanism. But class struggle is always a tough and sometimes cruel phenomenon.
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According to the Omsk historian A.A. Shtyrbul, a characteristic feature of official historiography at all times of class society is the obligatory exaggeration of the cruelty and the number of victims of the power of workers (including attributing to it all those who died at one time or another) - from the "Jewish War" of Josephus Flavius ​​to the bourgeois historiography of Paris Commons, and if you take the XX century - to the "Gulag Archipelago" and the "Black Book of Communism". In these works, much more fiction is invented than real, in addition, the authors, not sparing black colors, increased the number of victims of "totalitarianism" in the best traditions of unscientific fiction. Therefore, any figures in such "studies" should be treated with a fair amount of skepticism.

Neoliberals and guardians of all stripes in this matter are also adjoined by the so-called “left anti-communists”, who hold anarchist or Trotskyist views. They demonize the political and social experience of the Leninist and Stalinist Soviet Union (1918 - 1953) and other socialist countries, pulling here the Polpotian Kampuchea. They are contrasted with “positive examples” of the Paris Commune, Soviet Hungary of 1919, Chile from the period of S. Allende, present-day Nicaragua and Bolivarian Venezuela, etc.
At the same time, it is generally not accepted to speak about the cruelty of the counter-revolution at all. This is easily explained - the winners, as you know, write history, and in the vast majority of countries of the world bourgeois regimes are now in power.
We proceed from the fact that the “softness” or “rigidity” of popular revolutions is determined not by the subjective desires of the leaders of these revolutions and especially not by their pathological cruelty and bloodthirstiness, which bourgeois historians and journalists write about, but by the specific balance of social and class forces, and first of all, the desire of the overthrown exploiting classes to return to power.

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Of course, history knows many examples when certain representatives of the propertied classes became propagandists and organizers of revolutionary movements. It is enough to recall the names of J. Zizka, B. Khmelnitsky, K. Marx, F. Engels, P.A. Kropotkina, V.I. Lenin, F.E. Dzerzhinsky, G.V. Chicherin, F. and R. Castro and many others. However, seriously considering the possibility of the transition of all, without exception, or at least the majority of representatives of these classes to the side of the revolution, would be the height of political naivety. They never forgave in the past (and will not forgive in the future) the victorious people of the means of production they lost (land, banks, factories, factories, mineral deposits), as well as exclusive rights and privileges.

In this struggle, the overthrown urban and rural bourgeoisie, landowners and the upper strata of the clergy use all means, from acts of sabotage, sabotage and terror, and ending with the civil war (often with the "invitation" of foreign interventionists). And in these conditions, for the state of working people, the Leninist phrase becomes the main guide to action:

“Every revolution is only worth something if it knows how to defend itself.”

Full disclosure of this topic will require more than one dissertation research. Therefore, in our article we will touch upon only a few pages of Russian history of the 20th century.
During the Great October Socialist Revolution of 85 of the 100 largest provincial and district cities of Russia, Soviet power was established peacefully in 85. True, in some cities (for example, in Omsk) this peaceful path was combined with military confrontation between the warring parties. But the counter-revolution did not dare to use force, postponing historical revenge until better times. Where it was necessary to fight, hostilities, as a rule, were launched by counter-revolutionary forces.
So, military operations in Moscow began after the Kremlin seized the junkers on October 28 (November 10), 1917, and committed massacre of soldiers of the 56th regiment.

In Orenburg, by order of Colonel A.I. Dutov, and by decision of the anti-Soviet “Rescue Committee” created by the Socialist Revolutionaries on the night of November 6-7, 1917, the Cossacks arrested “for calls for an uprising against the Provisional Government” of the six most prominent Bolsheviks of the city, including Chairman of the Council A. Korostelev.

But, despite this, the revolution could not be stopped, and the Soviet government from October 1917 to March 1918 established itself throughout almost all of Russia.

From the very first days of its existence, the workers' state was faced not only with counter-revolutionary rebellions, economic sabotage and slander from the "free" press, but also with rampant banditry. And if the counterrevolutionaries were treated fairly softly in the first months after October (even such iconic figures as PN Krasnov and VL Baranovsky were released “on parole”), then criminal criminals were required to act more harshly.

Note that the shooting on the spot and the death penalty in court were considered by the Bolsheviks and the Soviet government as exceptional measures caused by the sharp intensification of the hostile activities of the counter-revolutionaries. The breadth of their application depended entirely on the political situation in the country. So, a famous politician, a member of the Board of the Cheka, M.Ya. Latsis indicated that in the first half of 1918, 22 criminals were executed.

So, for example, on February 26, 1918, the Cheka shot the well-known gangster adventurer, the self-proclaimed prince Eboli (aka de Gricoli, Naidy, Makovsky, Dolmatov) and his accomplice Britt for a series of robberies committed under the guise of searches on behalf of the Soviet authorities.

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On February 28, 1918, by order of the College of the Cheka, bandits V. Smirnov and I. Zanoza (aka Gaydamak Strogov) were shot, who, calling themselves commissioners of the Extraordinary Commission, arrived with a gang of armed men at the Medved Hotel and robbed the visitors there. The criminals were detained in the act - looted money.

The case of the former officers of the Life Guards of the Semenovsky Regiment, brothers A. and V. Cherep-Spiridovich, had a certain political background. According to the Brest Peace Treaty, the Soviet government had to pay for all Russian securities presented by Germany. Using this clause of the contract, German agents, at the direction of the German ambassador Mirbach, bought up shares of nationalized enterprises for nothing, in order to present them for payment. The Cherep-Spiridovich brothers, who were large shareholders and board members of the Veselyansky mines, were detained while trying to sell 5 million rubles worth of nationalized mines to the German representative office. For this crime, regarded as high treason, the Skull-Spiridovich brothers and their commission agent, exchange broker B. Beilinson, were shot dead on May 31, 1918.
Indeed, it is surprising that in today's capitalist Russia, all these worthy people have not yet been erected monuments, as the first victims of political repression!
In the future, a wide wave of conspiracies and the most unbridled white terror, in particular the murder of V. Volodarsky, M. Uritsky, the attempt on V.I. Lenin, demanded increased punitive measures in relation to the counter-revolutionary bourgeoisie.

An important milestone in Soviet history was the summer of 1940, when 4 new republics — Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Moldova — entered the USSR at once.

The thesis about the "Soviet occupation", which has been introduced into the mass consciousness by politicians and a large part of the scientific community of Moldova and the Baltic countries for more than 30 years, does not hold water. Firstly, no organs of the occupation power, similar to those created in 1941 in the Baltic states by the German fascists, and in Moldova by the Romanian invaders, were not created there in Soviet times. And, secondly, socialist transformations (nationalization of factories, factories, banks, large commercial enterprises, agrarian reform, the creation of Soviet law enforcement agencies) were carried out not by the Red Army, but by the working people of these republics.
Here is an example, though not often, but sometimes of a peaceful transition of power in the hands of the working people. The presence on the territory of Moldova and the Baltic States of the regular units of the Red Army not only did not allow the former property classes to start a civil war here, but also delayed imperialist aggression from Nazi Germany and its allies.
The famous writer Vilis Latsis in the novel “The Tempest” truthfully described the political atmosphere of Latvia in the first months after the restoration of Soviet power:

“Observing the events of the Soviet regime, Wilde came to the conclusion that the regime is not very severe and the Bolsheviks are condescending to their former opponents. They left many of the former senior officials alone and even provided them with responsible posts. They held back the extremists and took under the protection of some old cultural figures, in the hope of re-educating them, making them Soviet people. The agrarian reform carried out in the village was tolerant: up to 30 hectares of land were left to the old owners. If they are allowed to act this way for several years, they will, well, rebuild life in a socialist way and do without using extreme means - this is obviously their purpose.

But is that permissible? The twenty-year-old idea of ​​the Communists as a kind of scarecrow quickly dissipated, and a new, opposite idea was rooted in the minds of the people. It seemed to Wilde that the soft regime was an expression of the weakness of the Communists: as soon as they had to face resistance, it immediately turned out that they could not cope, chaos, confusion and, most importantly, a calm course of political life would begin to cloudy. That's what Felix Wilde and his like-minded people needed.

... Speculating on the tolerance of the Soviet regime, the counter-revolutionary underground stirred.

... fires started. Sawmills, warehouses burned, factories lighted up. But always this happened "for unforeseen reasons ..."

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In the summer of 1941, on the eve of World War II, the internal political situation in the Baltic was significantly complicated. In order to avoid a nationalist uprising, the Soviet government decided to deport "unreliable elements" to the interior of the USSR. According to V. Karaliun, in the Latvian SSR repressive measures affected a total of 14476 people. Of these, 4,550 were arrested, and 9,926 (5,520 families) were deported.

In modern bourgeois Latvia, all who were subjected to repression in the Soviet period are considered to be “innocently injured”. However, the social composition of the deportees indicates something else.

The reactionary officers of the former tsarist and former bourgeois army, about whom it was reported that they actively fought against the Soviet power in Latvia in 1919-1920, participated in the killings and tortures of Soviet people - 380 people.
The leading cadres of police and prisons during the reign of the bourgeoisie, the royal gendarmes, other employees of the mentioned punitive bodies, on which there were compromising materials - 601 people.
The leaders and activists of the former bourgeois parties, participants and activists of anti-Soviet, nationalist and White Guard organizations - 2329 people. According to the newspaper Neatkarība (Independence), about 80% of the Aizsarg command personnel were deported.
Former landowners and manufacturers, large merchants and the largest homeowners, as well as the highest ranks of the fascist state apparatus - 1240 people.
Repeat offenders, as well as professional prostitutes - 807 people.
The remaining 4469 displaced were members of convicted families.
Further developments in the Soviet Baltic showed the validity of these measures.
However, the problem of revolutionary humanism is not only a legacy of history. It may become relevant already in the not too distant future, when a wave of new socialist revolutions will rise in the world and one of the key issues will be the question of the attitude of the working people to the representatives of the overthrown exploiting classes.
In our opinion, it is necessary to actively attract highly qualified "bourgeois specialists" to participate in the construction of a new life. But it is necessary to observe two conditions. Firstly, they must be loyal to the existing state system, and secondly, their loyalty must be proved not by loud phrases, but by everyday painstaking and hard work for the good of society.

At the same time, persons who will secretly or openly fight against popular power should be “cleansed” not only of the state apparatus, economic structures and the media, but also of all educational, medical, scientific and cultural institutions without exception.

That is, the true manifestation of revolutionary humanism lies not only in creating the conditions for the comprehensive development of each member of society, but also in taking effective measures to prevent capitalist restoration.

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USA. Exhibition of Soviet Poster

Literature:

The World History. - T.VIII. - M., 1961.
Golinkov D.L. The collapse of the anti-Soviet underground in the USSR. - Book 1. - M., 1986.
Karalun V.O. On the movement of opponents of Soviet power, capitalist and declassified elements on June 14, 1941 // Latvia on the verge of eras. - Riga, 1988. - Issue II. - S.78-94.
Lacis V.T. Storm. - T.1. - M., 1957.
Shtyrbul A.A. States and workers' societies: historical heritage. - Book I. - (From ancient times to the beginning of the 20th century). - Omsk, 2010.
Neatkarība. - 1990. - 27.aprilī.
About the author:

Lotkin Ilya Viktorovich - Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor of Omsk State Transport University. Historian, ethnographer, political scientist. In the Resistance Movement - since September 1991. Member of RUSO - since 1994. Non-partisan, shares the programmatic provisions of the ROT FRONT party.

https://www.rotfront.su/o-soprotivlenii ... volyutsio/

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"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Sat May 09, 2020 12:07 pm

Friendship of peoples defeating fascism
05/09/2020

Когда все народы государствообразующие

The Great Patriotic War ended 75 years ago ...

The bosses of the Third Reich, who unleashed the Second World War, considered the USSR a colossus with feet of clay, which would fall apart after an attack from the outside. Including due to national conflicts. The incitement of ethnic hatred, the opposition of the peoples of our country to each other, was one of the components of the strategic plan of Nazi Germany.


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Poster "For our great Motherland!" Author: Vatolina NN / Publishing house "Art". 1944

But to implement this strategy failed. The multinational Soviet Union did not split into national fragments. All its peoples came forward as a united front in the struggle against the enemy.

The leader of the resistance by the Nazi invader was, of course, the Russian people. But representatives of other nations made a great contribution to the Victory.

The fact that the fight against Nazi invaders is a common cause of all the peoples of our country was clearly stated at the end of 1941 during the propaganda campaign around the heroic deed of 28 Panfilov heroes who stopped fascist tanks at Dubosekovo’s crossing on November 16 . And those who repeated the feat of 300 Spartans in the Thermopyllic Gorge.

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The painting “The Feat of 28 Panfilov”, D.K. Mochalsky, 1942

In strip 16 of the army , commanded by the future Marshal of the Soviet Union, Konstantin Konstantinovich Rokossovsky (1896 - 1968), there were several such episodes.

On November 16, at the village of Petelino, 15 fighters led by political instructor P. B. Vortex destroyed five tanks. All fighters died. The last surviving political instructor, who alone destroyed two more tanks. He left the last bullet for himself.

November 17 at the village of Mykanino 17 soldiers under the command of Lieutenant V.G. Ugryumov and political instructor A.N. Georgiev was stopped by 25 enemy tanks. 8 tanks were shot down. Killed 15 fighters.

November 18 near the village of Strokovo 11 sappers led by the platoon commander P.I. Firstov and Politruk M.A. Pavlov repelled the attacks of the enemy infantry battalion, supported by 20 tanks. All fighters died.

On November 19, at the village of Fedyukovo there were 37 Kuban Cossacks led by political instructor M.G. Ilyenko destroyed 28 tanks. All fighters died.

These events are slightly different in the number of fighters participating in them and the number of destroyed fascist tanks. But the general battle pattern is exactly the same.

However, of all these episodes, only one was promoted. The key word in this promotion was the word "Panfilov".
The 316th division, commanded by Ivan Vasilyevich Panfilov (1893 - 1941), was formed after the outbreak of war in southern Kazakhstan . Most of the Panfilovites were Kazakhs and Kyrgyz. And there can hardly be any doubt that the fighters of the division were far from being trained in the best way. There was simply no time to train them well. And yet, they did what they did.

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The commander of the 316th Infantry Division, Major General I.V. Panfilov at the location of the division headquarters. 1941

The propaganda campaign around the Panfilov heroes showed both their own and enemies that the dreams of the aggressors to destroy the unity of the peoples of the USSR failed. Together with the Russians, representatives of other peoples of the USSR came out to fight the enemy.

During the Great Patriotic War, the Byelorussian SSR lost a quarter of its population. A powerful partisan movement unfolded on the territory of the republic, putting forward its heroes, among whom were Russians, and Belarusians, and representatives of other peoples of the USSR.

The Nazis mercilessly dealt with the underground and partisans. Vera Zakharovna Khoruzhaya (1903 - 1942), Dmitry Andreyevich Korotkevich (1904 - 1942) and many other patriots were captured and executed after severe torture .

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Postage stamp with the image of V.Z. Khorujey, USSR, 1964

The legendary partisan Kalmyk commander Mikhail Vankayevich Khoninov (1919 - 1981), nicknamed the “Black Misha”, was very famous in Belarus . For his head, the Nazi invaders promised 10 thousand occupation marks. However, Black Misha himself, without false modesty, believed that more could have been promised for his head. After the Great Patriotic War M.V. Honinov became a major writer.

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Partisan "Black Misha" - writer M.V. Honinov

Large partisan detachments in the forests of Belarus were commanded by Georgians Vladimir Manuilovich Talakvadze (1913 - 1999) and Ivan Georgievich Shubitidze (1908 — 1978), евреи Тувья Давидович Бельский (1906 — 1986) и Иосиф Лазаревич Фогель (1922 — 1990).

The legendary Belarusian partisan was Vasily Isaakovich Talash (1844 - 1946), better known as “grandfather Talash”. At the beginning of World War II he was 96 years old. However, such a venerable age did not prevent him from joining the partisans. In December 1942, in the partisan forest, he celebrated his birthday and, according to not entirely reliable information, took an active part in the libation on this occasion. In 1943, grandfather Talash was taken to the mainland and used as a propagandist. He spoke to the workers, dictated to the secretaries figurative appeals to the inhabitants of Belarus. Grandfather Talash died at the age of 101.

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V. Talash and a connected partisan detachment to them. Kirova N. Sheshko
The only woman to accomplish a feat similar to that of Alexander Matveevich Matrosov (1924 - 1943) was the seventeen-year-old Belarusian partisan Rimma Ivanovna Shershneva (1925 - 1942). Two years later, the same feat was performed by 16 -year-old Belarusian partisan Mikhail Andreevich Belush (1927 - 1944).

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Mikhail Andreevich Belush
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Rimma Ivanovna Shershneva

One of the youngest (at the time of the feat) Heroes of the Soviet Union was the Belarusian partisan Marat Ivanovich Kazey (1929 - 1944). He was the son of a party worker who was repressed in the late 1930s. In the battle of May 11, 1944, a fourteen-year-old boy, not wanting to fall alive into the hands of the enemy, blew himself up with the last grenade. In the same 1944, 11-year-old Belarusian boy Tikhon Maksimovich Baran (1932 - 1944) repeated the feat of Ivan Susanin.

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Tikhon Maksimovich Baran
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Marat Ivanovich Kazei

At the very beginning of the war, the feat of the Belarusian pilot Nikolai Frantsevich Gastello (real name Gastilo) (1907 - 1907) became widely known . On June 26, 1941, he directed his burning plane at an enemy tank column. The navigator in the crew of N.F. Gastello was Ukrainian Anatoly Akimovich Burdenyuk (1922 - 1941), and Nenets Alexey Alexandrovich Kalinin (1919 - 1941) was the radio operator and radio operator . The next day, Nikolai Gastello’s feat was repeated by the pilot, Jew Isaac Zilovich Presayzen (1911 - 1941), in November 1942, by Georgian pilot Nikolai Georgievich Abramishvili (1918 - 1942), in December 1942 by Kazakh pilot Nurken Abdirovich Abdirov (1919 - 1942), and in April 1944 Kyrgyz pilotIsmailbek Taranchiev .

[/img]https://www.rotfront.su/wp-content/uplo ... stello.jpg[/img]
Engraving by B.Ya. Ryauzova "The Feat of Captain Gastello", 1942
Apparently, Hitler counted on the support of the Ukrainian population, believing that memories of the famine of 1932-1933 would force Ukrainians to oppose the USSR. Therefore, the Nazis flirted with Ukrainian nationalists until a certain point. However, the population of Ukraine did not support Hitler, and Ukrainian nationalists enjoyed any serious support only in the western regions. Most Ukrainians bravely fought in the Red Army and in partisan units. Hitler failed to drive a wedge between Russians and Ukrainians.

Some Western authors claimed that most of the Ukrainian partisans were Russians and Belarusians, but not Ukrainians. However, Soviet researchers showed that this is not so: about 60% of Ukrainian partisans were ethnic Ukrainians . But, of course, representatives of other peoples of the USSR also took part in the partisan struggle in Ukraine. So, one of the most respected Ukrainian partisan commanders was the Georgian David Ilyich Bakradze (1912 - 1977).

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Partisan unit commanders
David Ilyich Bakradze and Peter Petrovich Vershigora

The youngest (at the time of the feat) Hero of the Soviet Union was the Ukrainian partisan Valentin Aleksandrovich Kotik (1930 - 1944). He found the cable connecting the headquarters of Field Marshal von Manstein with Hitler’s headquarters and blew it up, leaving the German command in Kiev without communication. Valya Kotik died in battle at the age of 14 years and six days.

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Monument to pioneer hero Val Kotik in Shepetivka

The hero of the Great Patriotic War especially revered in Kazakhstan is Abdolla Zhumagaliev (1915 - 1942). He had a rare profession: he was a poet. From his works, the poems “The Eastern Girl” and “The Legend of Asan” are known, as well as translations into the Kazakh language of his favorite John Gordon Byron (1788 - 1824) and Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov (1814 - 1841). Abdollah Zhumagaliev was a very optimistic and cheerful person.

“ I was born with a smile,
With her only the earthly way,
Life, my beloved,
became very dear,” the poet wrote.

Sowing on the roof of the village house A. Zhumagaliev fired machine-gun fire at the enemy, covering the retreat of his company. The Germans surrounded the house and offered the machine gunner to surrender. But Abdollah, using popular unprintable expressions in Russia, sent them far, far. Then the Nazis set fire to the house. Zhumagaliev continued to fire until he suffocated in smoke.

In 1944, the Kazakh poet Kasym Rakhimdzhanovich Amenzholov (1911 - 1955) wrote a beautiful poem, "The Legend of the Poet's Death," dedicated to A. Zhumagaliev . The fact that this poem was not included in the school curriculum in literature throughout the Soviet Union should be considered an unconditional omission.

A similar feat was made by the machine gunner Kazashka Manshuk Zhiyengalievna Mametova (1922 - 1943). Left one of the machine gun crew, she continued to fire and died the death of the brave.

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Manshuk Zhiengalievna Mametova
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Kazakh poet Abdolla Zhumagaliev

The Nazi invaders planned to create units from representatives of non-Russian peoples of the USSR , who would begin to fight on the side of Germany . It was planned, in particular, to create the Idel-Ural legion of Bashkirs and Tatars. To this end, the Nazis decided to use the secretary of the Tatar branch of the Union of Soviet Writers Musa Mustafayevich Zalilov who was captured in German captivity.(Musu Jalil) (1906 - 1944). Musa Jalil “agreed” and began to work with the Germans. The formation of the Tatar-Bashkir military units proceeded quite intensively, but, having fallen to the front, these units in full force passed to the side of the Red Army or Soviet partisans. In the end, the Germans realized that they were being fooled. Musa Jalil and his comrades were arrested and imprisoned by Moabit . On August 25 1944 the year of Musa Jalil and his comrades Abdullah Alish (Abdullah Barievich Alishev) (1908 1944), Gabdulla Azyhovich Battalov (1916 - 1944), Gyallyanur Mustafovich Bukharaev (1915 - 1944), Gaynar Nurievich Kurmashev (1919 - 1944) Ahmed Sadretdinovich Simaev(1907 - 1944), Zinnat Khusnulovich Khasanov (1910 1944), Garif Hafizovich Shabaev (1907 1944) were executed.

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Monument to Musa Jalil in Kazan

Many details of the biography of one of the most respected national heroes of our country Alexander Matveevich Matrosov (1924 - 1943) remain unclear . It is known that he was a street child and, according to some reports, wore the nickname Sanka Sailor, which then became a surname. According to some researchers, Alexander Matrosov was an ethnic Bashkir and his real name is Shakiryan Yunusovich Mukhamedyanov .
During the Great Patriotic War, about 400 people performed a similar feat. Among them, a Chechen Dasha Ibrahimovic Akayev (1910 - 1944), the Armenians Uren Sumbatovich Arakelian (1911 - 1943), apoB V. Rostomyan (1905 - 1945), Azerbaijani Garay Latif oglu Asadov (1923 - 1944), Kazakhs Sultan Birzhanovich Baimagambetov (1920 - 1943), Sundutkali Iskaliev (1924 - 1944), Dzhuman Karakulov (1921 - 1944), Zhangas Moldogaliev (1917 - 1943), Sabalak Orozalinov (1925 - 1988), Agadil Sukhambaev (1920 - 1944), Belarusians Mikhail Andreevich Belush (1927 - 1944)Sergey Vasilyevich Virko (1926 - 1945), Petr Vasilyevich Kostyuchek (1923 - 1945), Leonid Ivanovich Musteykis (1911 - 1943) and Rimma Ivanovna Shershneva (1925 - 1942), Ukrainians Mikhail Kuzmich Bovkun (1921 - 1942), Alexey Egorovich Vashchenko ( 1921 - 1942), Ivan Savvich Gerasimenko (1913 - 1942), Petr Lavrentievich Gutchenko (1921 - 1942), Konstantin Viktorovich Emelianenko (1922 - 1943), Alexander Kondratievich Korobchuk (1918 - 1944), Nikolai Vladimirovich Miroshnik (1925 - 1944), Petr Afanasevich Miroshnichenko (1922 - 1944),Nikolai Vasilievich Nosulya (1926 - 1945), Alexander Antonovich Pokalchuk (1923 - 1942), Ivan Stepanovich Pristupa (1919 - 1942), Semen Andreevich Harchenko (1915 - 1944), Jews Iosif Romanovich Bumagin (1907 - 1945), Abram Isaakovich Levin ( 1918 - 1942), Tovye Khaimovich Rise (1920 - 1982) and Meer Yeremeyevich Spivakov (1909 - 1944), Tatars Salakhutdin Khaliulovich Valiullov (1903 - 1943), Gazinur Gafiatulovich Gafiattulin (1913 - 1944), Nukh Idrisovich Idrisov (1918 - 1944) , Abdullah Salimov (1917 - 1943), Bashkirs Minnigali Khabibullovich Gubaidullin(1921 - 1944), the Nogay Halmurza Sahatgareevich Kumuk (1913 - 1943), Estonians Jacob Martynovich Kunder (1921 - 1945), Joseph I. Laar (1905 - 1943), Avar Saadul Isaevich Musayev (1919 - 1943), Abkhazian Vladimir Digovich Pachulia ( 1922 - 1944), Uzbeks Tashtemir Rustemov (1906 - 1943) and Turchi Eydzhigitov (1921 - 1943), Kyrgyz Cholponbai Tuleberdiev (1922 - 1942).
Residents of the Armenian village of Chardakhly , located in the west of Azerbaijan, made a great contribution to the Victory . This village gave our country two marshals (Marshal of the Soviet UnionИван (Ованес) Христофорович Баграмян (1897 — 1982) и Главный маршал бронетанковых войск Амазасп Хачатурович Бабаджанян (1906 — 1973)), 12 генералов Красной армии, 7 Героев Советского Союза. После начала армяно-азербайджанских конфликтов на рубеже 1990-х годов армянское население села было выселено и армянское село Чардахлы превратилось в азербайджанское село Чанчибель.

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Natives of the village of Chardakhly: Chief Marshal of the Armored Forces A.Kh. Babajanyan and Marshal of the Soviet Union I.Kh. Baghramyan

In the ranks of the People's Liberation Army of Yugoslavia, Azerbaijanis Mehti Ganifa oglu Huseyn Zade (1918 - 1944) and Javad Atahalil-oglu Hakimli (1914 - 2006) fled from captivity . In a battle with superior enemy forces, Mehti Huseyn-zade fired back to the last, after which he committed suicide.

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Soviet citizens - Yugoslav partisans
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Jahangir (Vladimir) World Jafar-oglu Bagirov

June 5, 1943 in the sky near Kursk made an air ram and killed the Azerbaijani pilot Jahangir (Vladimir) Mir Jafar-oglu Bagirov (1919 - 1943). Jahangir Bagirov’s father, dictator of Soviet Azerbaijan Mir Jafar Abbas-oglu Bagirov (1896 - 1956) was a very bad person and was sentenced to death in 1956 for his crimes. Before his death, Bagirov turned to the Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR Kliment Efremovich Voroshilov(1881 - 1969) with a request to fulfill his last wish and allow him to visit the grave of his son. Kliment Efremovich instructed to satisfy the request. The state criminal was escorted to the cemetery under escort. The former dictator said goodbye to his son and took a handful of earth from his grave. This handful of land remained with him until the very end.

During the Great Patriotic War, many soldier's tales went to the front. One of them talked about a fighter who caught enemy grenades like balls and threw them back at enemies.
This is not a bike. Such a fighter was Kyrgyz Akun Sadyrbaev (1914 - 1942). It is said that in the last battle he caught 16 grenades, but the 17th turned out to be fatal. It is not very clear who considered these grenades: maybe there were 15. Or maybe all 20. But the essence of the matter does not change.

Turkmen Aydogdy Takhirov (1907 - 1943), who fought as part of the Turkmen Separate Rifle Brigade, was captured. The Nazis offered to speak to him on the radio with an appeal to his compatriots and urge them to lay down their arms and surrender. Takhirov agreed and spoke. “Turkmen brothers, listen to me! I, Aydogdy Takhirov ... Hit the fascists, mercilessly beat. Let our great motherland lives forever ... " . After brutal torture, Aydogdy Takhirov was killed.

In July 1941, the Germans launched an unexpected attack on a strategically important highway. And the Soviet battalion ran. Then the political instructor Estonian Arnold Konstantinovich Meri (1919 - 2009) stopped the flight by personal example and assumed command of the battalion. In battle, he was wounded four times, but continued to command the battalion. The enemy was unable to cut the highway. Arnold Mary became the first Estonian to receive the title Hero of the Soviet Union. Subsequently, he became a major party and Soviet worker. After 1991, he was prosecuted by the authorities of independent Estonia .

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After 1991, Hero of the Soviet Union Arnold Konstantinovich Mary was persecuted by the Estonian authorities

Lithuanian partisan Marite Iozovna Melnikaitė (1923 - 1943) was captured. The Nazis demanded that the girl give out the whereabouts of the partisan detachment. But Marite refused to do this. After severe torture, she was executed. Under similar circumstances, Estonian reconnaissance agent Lean Kuhlman (1920 - 1943) also died .

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Kuhlman Lean
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Melite Marite

In June 1943 , one of the leaders of the Lithuanian underground, Juozas Tomović Vitas (1899 - 1943), was executed by the Nazi invaders , and in May 1944, one of the leaders of the Latvian underground Imant Janovich Sudmalis (1916 - 1944).

Representatives of the Jewish people also fought bravely. One of the most prominent submarine commanders was the Hero of the Soviet Union, Captain 3rd rank Israel Ilyich Fisanovich (1914 - 1944). The submarine M-172, commanded by I.I. Fisanovich, was one of the four guards submarines of the Soviet fleet.

I.I. Fisanovich was also a talented poet. He wrote the hymn of Soviet submariners (“And there is no firmer soil under our feet than the decks of submarines ...”).

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I.I. Fisanovich (left) with comrades

On October 26, 1941 , the young underground activist Maria Borisovna Bruskina (1924 - 1941) was hanged in Minsk .

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Kirill Trusov, Masha Bruskin and Vladimir Shcherbatsevich are being executed

The boy Musya (Abram Vladimirovich) Pinkenson (1930 - 1942) never held weapons in his hands. But he played the violin perfectly. He was told the future of a great musician. When the Nazis came to the city, they decided to shoot several Jews on the central square as a warning to the locals, including Musya and his parents. Musya never parted with his violin. He did not part with her and going to be shot. “Mr. officer,” Musya politely asked, “can I play the violin before death?” The German officer, who was no stranger to sentimentality and love of art, allowed. And then the boy began to play the violin ... International. And the people driven to the square began to sing. At first, the Germans did not understand what was happening. But, realizing, they opened fire. The violinist was the first to be killed. Musya Pinkenzon, who never held arms in his hands, is rightfully considered in our country one of the most respected pioneer heroes.

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The Feat of the Pioneer Musi Pinkenzon

The cultural revolution that took place in the early 1930s opened the way for the development of the most modern technology to the representatives of the small peoples of the USSR (some of which until 1917 did not even have their own written language). During the Great Patriotic War, these peoples nominated talented tankmen, pilots, artillerymen, submariners.

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Tanker Matash Mazaev

Очень яркой фигурой был молодой чеченец танкист Маташ Хамзатханович Мазаев (1908 — 1942). По комсомольской путевке чеченский юноша был направлен на учебу в Московское высшее техническое училище. После его окончания он поступил в Киевское училище бронетанковых войск, которое с успехом окончил. Отличился во время советско-финской войны 1939 -1940 годов, был представлен к званию Героя Советского Союза, но звания не получил.
Маташ Мазаев был не только отважным воином, но и ярким военным мыслителем. Он придумал ряд оригинальных тактических приемов, позволяющих более эффективно использовать танки. В годы Великой отечественной войны, будучи всего лишь капитаном, М. Мазаев командовал танковым полком. Вполне возможно, что в дальнейшем он мог бы сравняться с самим Mikhail Efimovich Katukov (1900 - 1976). But captain Mazaev died in 1942 near Stalingrad.

The legendary submarine commander was the captain of the 2nd rank Hero of the Soviet Union Avatar Magomet Imautdinovich Gadzhiev (1907 - 1942). He has the famous phrase: “Nowhere is there such an equality as in a submarine. In a submarine, either everyone wins or everyone dies. ”

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The legendary submariner Magomet Imautdinovich Gadzhiev

Twice Hero of the Soviet Union was the pilot Sultan Amet Khan (1920 - 1971), the son of a Lak and Crimean Tatar. After the war, he abandoned his military career and became a test pilot. S. Amet Khan died in testing a new aircraft on February 1, 1971.

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Twice Hero of the Soviet Union Sultan Amet Khan

Among the other striking pilots Caucasians should remember Ingush Rashid Chahovicha Ahrieva (1893 - 1942), Murad Akhmedovich Ozdoev (1922 - 1999), Karachai Soltan Hamid Lokmaevicha Bidzhieva (1919 - 1996), Ossetians Ibrahim Magometovich Dzusova (1905 - 1980), George Ivanovich Tvauri (1920 - 1999), Adyge Akhmet Khan Talovich Kankoshev (1914 - 1943), Kabardians Kubati Lokmanovich Kardanov (1917 - 2011), Nazir Tituyevich Konukoev (1918 - 1975).

Representatives of the peoples of the North and Siberia fought very well. They knew how to shoot accurately, move silently, merge with nature. This made them great snipers and scouts. In this capacity, representatives of the northern and Siberian peoples tried to use it at the front.
Among the most successful snipers of World War II were Russian Mikhail Ilyich Surkov (1921 - 1953) (702 killed), Ossetian Vladimir Gavrilovich Salbiev (1916 - 1996) (601 killed), Yakut Ivan Nikolaevich Kulbertinov (1917 - 1993) (587 killed) ( nicknamed the enemy “Siberian Midnight”), Georgians Vasily Shalvovich Kvanchatiradze (1907 - 1950) (534 killed), Bashkirs Akhat Abdulhaovich Akhmetyanov (1918 - 1976) (502 killed), Ukrainian Ivan Mikhailovich Sidorenko (1919 - 1994) (500 killed), Russian Ilyin Nikolay Yakovlevich (1922 - 1943) (494 killed), Russian Vladimir Nikolaevich Pchelintsev(1919 - 1997) (456 killed), Russian Mikhail Ivanovich Budenkov (437 killed), Yakut Fedor Matveyevich Okhlopkov (1908 1968) (429 killed), Ukrainian Dyachenko Fedor Trofimovich (1917 1995) (425 killed), Russian Kuzma Danilovich Smolensky ( 1906 - 1971) (414 killed), Kazakh Tuleugali Nasyrhanovich Abdybekov (1916 - 1944) (397 killed), Russian Goncharov Pyotr Alekseevich (1903 - 1944) (380 killed), Evenk Semyon Danilovich Nomokonov (1900 - 1973) (380 killed) , drill Arseny Mikhailovich Etobaev (1903 - 1987) (356 killed), Chechen Abukhadzhi Idrisov (349 killed), Ukrainian Lyudmila Mikhailovna Pavlichenko(1916 - 1974) (307 killed) (nicknamed the enemy "Lady Death" and "Miss Colt"), drilled by Tsyrendashi Rinchinovich Dorzhiev (1912 - 1943) (297 killed), Russian Antonov Ivan Petrovich (1920 - 1989) (302 killed) , Kazakh Ibraim Suleimenov (1908 - 1943) (289 killed), drilling Zhambyl Yeseyevich Tulaev (1905 - 1961) (282 killed), Russian Vasily Gavrilovich Zaitsev (1915 - 1991) (257 killed), Nanai Maxim Alexandrovich Passar (1923 - 1943 ) (236 killed).
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World War II snipers

Among the Heroes of the Soviet Union there was even one gypsy Timofey Ilyich Prokofiev (1913 - 1944). True, he seems to have never lived in a camp. T.I. Prokofiev was a marine, fought on Malaya Zemlya, and in March 1944 he became one of 68 participants in the legendary landing of senior lieutenant Konstantin Fedorovich Olshansky (1915 - 1944), who seized the port of Nikolaev and held it until the arrival of Soviet troops. Almost all the participants in the landing, including Prokofiev, were killed.

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Memorial to Heroes - Alshans in Nikolaev
There were heroes of the war and among the Crimean Tatars. The scout Alime Abdenanova (1924 - 1944) was abandoned in the Crimea occupied by the Nazis, from where she transmitted valuable information about the German troops via the radio. As a result of the betrayal, she was captured and killed after brutal torture.

Crimean Tatar Died Akmolla Adamanov (1916 - 1943) before the war worked as a driver in Massandra. At the beginning of the war he was captured and sent to a prisoner of war camp in Poland. Together with his comrades, he fled from the camp, created a partisan detachment. And soon became his commander. Among the partisans and not only partisans, he was known as the "Tatar Bear". For the head of the partisan commander, the Germans promised 100 thousand zlotys. Adamanov died in battle in the summer of 1943.

During the Great Patriotic War, national military formations were formed in the USSR. For the most part, these were divisions. And even Latvians and Estonians formed corps. The 41st Estonian Rifle Corps was commanded by Lieutenant General Lembit Abramovich Pern (1903 - 1974), the 130th Latvian Rifle Corps was commanded by Major General Detlaf Karlovich Brantkaln (1898 - 1979).

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Lieutenant General Brantkaln Detlaf Karlovich
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Lieutenant General Pern Lembit Abramovich

A number of national formations (the 41st Estonian Rifle Corps, the 16th Bashkir Cavalry Division, the 17th Tajik Cavalry Division, the 118th and 122nd Estonian Rifle Divisions, the 128th Turkestan Mountain Rifle Division) were named “Guards” .

National units fought bravely on different fronts.
Tuvan cavalrymen who fought fear at enemies fought very well. The Germans called them "der Schwartze Tod" ("Black Death").

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Tuvan cavalrymen

Hitler received wide support from only one people of the USSR - Crimean Tatars. Although, as noted above, among the representatives of this people were heroes who fought against the Nazis. Hitler was also supported by some representatives of the Balkars, Kalmyks, Ingush and Chechens, but among the representatives of these peoples there were Red Army heroes.

The support of fascist Germany on the part of representatives of some small peoples of the USSR forced the Soviet leadership to decide on the expulsion of these peoples from places of permanent residence in Central Asia and Siberia. In 1957, all peoples, except the Crimean Tatars, returned to their homeland.

But nevertheless, support for fascist Germany from representatives of certain peoples of the USSR was purely local in nature and could not significantly affect the general course of the war. There were much more heroes who selflessly fought for the freedom and prosperity of their socialist homeland; this largely determined the outcome of the confrontation.

Unfortunately, more than forty years after the end of World War II, dreams reigned over the Third Reich (and not only the Third Reich) came true: the Soviet Union collapsed. What the aggressor could not do was done by the internal struggle of the elites for a "place at the feeding trough." And today, words such as “friendship of peoples” are not popular. Hopefully this is not for long. All nations that were part of the former USSR have a common destiny and common history. Therefore, they will inevitably have a common Motherland and a common Future.

S.V. Bagotsky

https://www.rotfront.su/druzhba-narodov ... a-fashizm/

Google Translator
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Fri May 15, 2020 1:14 pm

1993 coup: twenty years of criminal power
... Every day, Muscovites walk where the war was twenty years ago.

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Twenty years ago, our neighbors, colleagues, and some of our relatives, died under bullets in the streets of Moscow, protecting the future from impending lawlessness, protecting us ...

In the bloody autumn of 1993, modern Russian statehood was born. Not at ceremonial congresses, but in the doorways. Not with declarations, but with cannon fire. And even the current constitution of the Russian Federation has become a "constitution on the blood", overshadowed the one, the real Russian constitution, which was shot by Yeltsin along with thousands of Russian citizens.

How it was? Why did it happen? Where were those who are now ranting about those events? And what did those who remain silent now do? What moved people who fought for freedom and democracy on rainy Moscow streets twenty years ago? And is a repetition of this war possible?

You will find out about this on our website. It was created so that the memory of those events helped us understand our life today. Photo gallery, memoirs of participants in the events, dossiers at the executioners , interviews with eyewitnesses ... Not the past needs this memory, but the future. Us with you.

But in the memoirs alone, there is no use if they do not lead to active actions to eliminate the lawlessness and arbitrariness into which our country was plunged twenty years ago.

Our goal is not only to commemorate the anniversary of the mourning events, but also to recall the real heroism shown by ordinary citizens of Russia in the fall of 1993. Workers, engineers / scientists , teachers, physicians, students and schoolchildren who bravely defended the Constitution and legal authority in Russia. Out to meet the riot police chains, units of the regular army and special forces.

We must study their experience, know their victories, consider the causes of defeats. In order to win the next time.

Read, ask, think. Take action.

Preconditions for the Yeltsin coup →

http://1993-2013.ru/

This is the intro page to an extensive and detailed description of the events in Russia in 1993. Heartbreak vies with Molotov's anger. Cannot recommend enough. It is in Russian but as can be seen by the above the machine translates well enough.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Tue Jun 09, 2020 2:11 pm

Prime Numbers: MythBusters. Deficit in the USSR
06/09/2020
Member of the Labor Front Oleg Komolov with author's transmission
Where does the shortage of goods come from? Why was he in the USSR and disappeared with the advent of the market? Or maybe it didn’t disappear at all? How does big capital manipulate society, and why are monopolies interested in selling goods less than buyers need? And where does the Stalinist Gosplan? We explain in a nutshell based on basic economic theory and interesting documents on the Soviet economy.
Hello everyone!

I’m not a fan of disassembling other people's videos, but in recent days our mail has simply been bombarded with requests to comment on a video about the planned and market economy by Maxim Katz.



This man shows a rare outlook for today. publishing materials on history, political science, medicine, urban studies, psychology and economics. And something shows me that the width of the spectrum of competencies is inversely proportional to the depth of existing knowledge.

In other words, the opinions of such experts are often very superficial, and the conclusions are erroneous.

So, Maxim undertook to explain to us that the market will solve everything.
Whatever happens around us - crisis, epidemic or natural disaster - the capitalist economy will overcome everything thanks to its superpowers: free prices, the independence of market players and competition.
What follows are reassuring promises that the goods will not go anywhere. Masks, toilet paper, buckwheat - they are enough for everyone. Indeed, the deficit is a relic of the Soviet economy, which forever went down in history with it.

However, two questions arise here.

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Firstly, photographs with bursts of flour designed to shock Moscow hipsters relate primarily to the late 80s. However, why in the 50s, when the country restored the economy destroyed by the war, such phenomena were not observed in it.

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Russia's GDP: 1989-2018

Secondly, where did the deficit go in the new, capitalist Russia, if in terms of GDP it overcame the level of the RSFSR only in 2010.

In terms of agricultural production - in 2019, and in industry still can not overcome the bar 30 years ago.

Stalls in Russia
Where did the collapsed production come from, goods that already in the 90s filled the shelves of domestic stores? You might think that these products were of foreign origin.

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Scale of foreign deliveries to Russia 1990-2018

But no, income from foreign trade at that time was very low, and supplies from abroad were clearly not able to fill this gap.

To answer these questions, you need to start with the concept of deficiency.

The concepts of the relationship of exchange with other market functions
This phenomenon lies in the field of exchange and reflects the mismatch of supply and demand for goods. Of course, production is also more important here: if a product is created in unlimited quantities or vice versa, it is simply not needed, then there will be no shortage. However, despite the fact that the needs of society always exceed its production capabilities, the deficit is only a special case in the market.

Let us turn to a simple chart of market equilibrium, where the prices and quantity of goods are plotted along the axes, and the supply and demand functions express, respectively, a direct and inverse relationship between them.

Market Equilibrium Chart
For example, together with an increase in demand for a product, a producer will increase its price. Firstly, in order to simply get rich in a favorable market environment, and secondly, because to create a product requires more resources, which also increase in price as their reserves are depleted.

Market Equilibrium Chart
Where graphs intersect, equilibrium price and volume are set. But this balance can be achieved in different ways, and the author of the video describes only one of the possible options: the so-called cobweb-like model.

Those. if the price of the product P1 turned out to be higher than the equilibrium, which is good for the seller and bad for the buyer, there is an excess of goods in the market equal to the Q1-Q2 segment.

Market Equilibrium Chart
To sell it, the store reduces the price to P2.

Market Equilibrium Chart
This is already too cheap. At this price, many want to buy a product, but there are few sellers willing to agree to it - there is a shortage of goods equal to the Q3-Q4 segment.

Market Equilibrium Chart
A scarce commodity begins to rise in price again and so on until the system comes to a state of compromise between the parties.

Market Equilibrium Chart
However, such a model only works if there is sufficiently high competition in the market. And the realities of our time are the high monopolization of the economy, which is growing steadily in all countries of the world, including Russia.

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Monopolization in the medical products industry

And pharmaceuticals, the demand for whose products skyrocketed, is one of the most monopolized industries in the world. The phrase Big Pharma? I have no doubt everyone knows.

For example, in the vaccine market, yes the very ones that we most likely will need very soon, are hosted by only 4 companies.

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Monopolization in the vaccine market

A major producer or group of leaders, even without entering into a cartel conspiracy, will strive to keep product prices at a high level even with falling demand.

For example, if initially the price was higher than the equilibrium, then the seller will not yield, but will reduce sales.

Market Equilibrium Chart
Since this price rises above value, for the sake of its preservation, the owner can even knowingly destroy the goods, if only not to sell it cheaper. We examined this topic in a video dedicated to overproduction crises.


In fact, a seller with market power by such actions creates an artificial shortage of goods. For example, large banks and exporter companies regularly act in the conditions of the next economic crisis in Russia. In conditions of excessive demand for dollars, they prefer to hold the currency in order to reduce supply and achieve even greater growth in the exchange rate.

The situation is aggravated if the demand for the goods is low elastic.

The volume of purchased goods, as a rule, is inversely proportional to its price.

Market Equilibrium Chart

The strength of the influence of price on demand is called elasticity and is expressed by the angle of the graph of the demand function for certain groups of goods. Thus, the demand for essential goods - food, clothing, medicines, utilities and transport services - has low elasticity. This means that even a significant increase in the prices of these goods will not be accompanied by a significant drop in demand.

Market Equilibrium Chart
This circumstance allows monopolists or large producers who have entered into a cartel conspiracy to maximize profits, reducing sales.

For example, earlier on the market 5 units of goods were sold at 6 rubles, at a cost of 4 rubles per unit.

Market Equilibrium Chart
A 20% reduction in sales will allow the company to increase profits by almost 2.5 times. And this new state will also be called equilibrium.

Profit:

A: 6 rub. * 5 pcs. - 4 rubles. * 5 pieces. = 10 rubles

B: 10 rub. * 4 pcs. - 4 rubles. * 4 things. = 24 rub.

Market Equilibrium Chart
And if the demand for goods increased, God himself ordered to increase the price for it, not at all increasing production volumes or doing so in insignificant volumes.
Actually, we are seeing that, together with a sharp increase in the need for medical masks, sanitizers, gloves and other goods, firstly, they are still in short supply on the market . secondly, the prices of this product have risen. People lack goods even when they are willing to pay more for it. It is like negotiating with a blackmailer who will raise the bar as the victim fulfills his requirements.
But tailoring a mask is not the construction of a spaceship. It's about a piece of gauze on an elastic band. And all this colossus of the capitalist economy is not capable of providing society with this primitive commodity. However, as you might imagine, there is nothing stopping technically from solving this problem: given the growth of unemployment in the economy, there is no shortage of workers. Solving this pressing social problem does not allow the desire of the monopolists to maximize profits. And in order for the market to provide society with masks in the role of a customer and a buyer of products at an inflated price, the state is forced to act, which is actually following capital, allocating tens of billions of dollars worldwide for the production of medical equipment and related products.
Yes, everything is exactly as you understand: the state subsidizes super-profitable production, because production growth is not profitable for business .
And now we see how statements about the increase in the production of masks are made not by business, but by the state, which agrees to purchase products at an inflated price.

Yes, the balance has developed: those who demand medical masks at 40 rubles apiece were able to satisfy it. And the rest - just did not fit into the market.

Back to the deficit problem. In the market system, it occurs when the price is set below the equilibrium, and the desire to buy a product begins to greatly exceed the ability to release it.
As for the planned economy, here the nature of the deficit lies in the excess of demand over the application. The planned economy of the USSR was based on the principle of price stability, which was knocked out on the product itself during production. For a simple person, this meant that very confidence in tomorrow, the understanding that oil that had collapsed somewhere on the American exchanges would not leave him hungry and barefoot. More than three-quarters of the goods were sold at state and cooperative stores at solid prices, the rest on collective farm markets with free prices.
In addition to price controls, the state subsidized many goods. The price of bread was 20% lower than its value, beef - 74%, milk - 61%, poultry - 36% (Source: Gaidar E. The death of the Empire. Lessons for modern Russia. M., 2006. P. 212) .

In order to maintain such conditions of trade, the planning authorities needed to carry out complex calculations and strictly monitor compliance with the proportions, in particular, to prevent the rapid growth of the money supply relative to the commodity.

However, this was not easy to do, and such imbalances arose frequently. But not always.
For example, in the Stalin period, state economic policy was characterized by a rather high monetary discipline. Of course, like any state in the conditions of war, the Soviet Union carried out unsecured emission of the national currency in order to support the costs of warfare: the State Bank credited the Government, carrying out an additional issue of the ruble. It was a kind of joint contribution of Soviet society to the cause of victory, when the value created by all workers was partially redistributed to the state through the channel of unsecured currency. At the same time, the purchasing power of the Soviet ruble fell, and the consumption of the common man became more scarce.
Further source .

However, already in 1944, as soon as the strategic initiative on the fronts had finally passed to the Red Army, the Soviet government began to pay off the debt to the State Bank at the expense of the budget surplus. Those. as they say now, excess money has been sterilized. This process was completed by 1947.

Image

Attentive attitude to the issue of control over the money supply continued even later. Here, for example, the chairman of the State Bank of the USSR Council of Ministers sends a letter "On measures to prevent the issue of money in 1955" .

In the document, he expresses concern that in 1954 the amount of money in circulation increased by 19.5%, while retail turnover was only 11.5%.

Letter
The reason for this was the too rapid growth of wage funds, volume purchases of grain by the state, as well as unexpectedly large payments on sick leave. As a result, industry did not supply enough goods to stores, the demand of the population was not completely satisfied, and on collective farm markets the average price level rose by 15%.
In the 60s, the Soviet leadership gradually began to take supporters of the introduction of market elements in the planned economy, which resulted in the famous Kosygins reform. The contradiction between central planning and increased independence of enterprises only intensified the described effects.
And in 1967, the State Bank in one of its analytical reports writes the following. If, until 1964, enterprises received loans to replenish working capital only in exceptional cases and with the permission of the Council of Ministers, then by 1966 the volume of financial assistance to industries for various purposes had grown one and a half times in 5 years.

Analytical report
Borrowers were not required to form accumulations guaranteeing a return on the debt, and maintaining the system afloat constantly required additional cash emissions.

This moment can be called a turning point in the history of the Soviet economy. If in 1965 inventories exceeded the cash balances of the population by 23%, then in 1966 already by 8.7%. And at the beginning of 1969, money in the hands of citizens was already a quarter higher than the volume of the commodity mass.

Analytical report
Analysts of the Council of Ministers noted that movement along such a path would not end in good. The disproportionate growth of the money supply creates favorable conditions for speculators, undermines the structure of consumption of workers, leads to the appearance of queues, and encourages citizens to buy goods in reserve.

Analytical report
The conclusion was incredibly accurate: "All these negative phenomena in the field of commodity circulation and money circulation are beginning to increasingly affect the purchasing power of the ruble and the material interest of workers in increasing labor productivity."
But instead of improving planning tools, the Soviet bureaucracy chose an easier way: to give an ever larger chunk of the economy to the forefront of the invisible hand of the market. The final and, as it turned out, fatal blow to the system was dealt by the reforms of 1987, which established the widespread transfer of enterprises to self-financing
Enterprises were given the opportunity to halve the volume of their “compulsory” products, which were sold in state stores at solid prices, and all goods produced in excess of state orders were sold on a market where prices were set at contractually higher than state prices. This dramatically increased the profitability of production and enriched enterprising businessmen. It has become profitable to reduce product quality, to discontinue products with less profitability in order to increase personal income. Soap, children's clothes, stationery, cereals, pasta, flour and the same toilet paper disappeared from the shelves. At the same time, the state continued to lend to enterprises for the replenishment of working capital and the payment of salaries. Naturally, in an emission manner.

Further source .

In 1991, in a letter to the State Bank, Gorbachev reported that the issue of cash for 10 months of the year more than four times exceeded last year.

Letter of the State Bank of the USSR
The last vestiges of the planned system kept prices at a stable level, thereby fulfilling the conditions of the social contract of Soviet society with the bureaucratic elite over the years. Those. in fact, evidence of a shortage of goods at the end of the 80s only says that cheap goods in state stores became inaccessible. In the conditions of rapid growth of salaries and reorientation of enterprises to wounded relations, they were instantly sold out, and a significantly expanded market hung up completely different price tags on goods.

From here, the answer to the question that Gaidar’s reformers tormented is: “Where will the goods come from?”

Quote by Yegor Gaidar

And they didn’t go anywhere. Just liberalization lifted the price bar to such a level that for most of the country's population, goods became completely inaccessible. Production was crumbling at space speed, and store shelves were bursting with products that no one could buy.

So this was where we had to start. The deficit was instantly defeated, but it was not easier for an ordinary person to live on it.

What is characteristic, this problem cannot be done anywhere today, it just became less pronounced. Of course, thanks to the cheap labor of the Chinese, in exchange for petrodollars, all sorts of imported trinkets at reasonable prices began to arrive in our country. However, in conditions of a weak and constantly falling ruble exchange rate, import is not able to compensate for the degradation of industry and agriculture. The return to the market did not make domestic production more efficient, but was able to distribute national income in favor of the super-rich minority.

As a result, in half of our compatriots over 25 years real disposable income fell by 20%, and the diet of at least 30% of the population does not reach the minimum standards for energy values (Source: Voeikov M, Anisimova G., The social context of economic inequality in Russia / / Society and Economics, 10, 2017, pp. 95-117) . We analyzed this problem in one of the previous videos.


What is the conclusion from this? Deficit is a phenomenon that lies in the sphere of circulation. It can appear and disappear both with large volumes of production, and with insufficient ones. The deficit in the economy of the USSR, of course, is rooted in the inability of industry to meet the growing needs of Soviet society and the imperfection of planning tools. However, an attempt to solve the problems of a planned economy through the introduction of market elements only exacerbated the problem. The final transition to capitalism, it would seem, solved this problem once and for all, but there is no valor in this. It crawled out on the other side and took on the form of inflation, multiplied by social inequality.

Now there is no State Planning Commission, but the market anarchy that succeeded him did not last long. The economy was quickly divided between the largest players, and monopolists are now building production plans. Only this time, this plan is subordinated to the task of saturating the private pocket, for which social problems are but a good way to get rich.

https://www.rotfront.su/prostye-chisla- ... it-v-sssr/

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Other charts, videos and images at link.

The Chinese took the lesson. It is perhaps impossible to directly transit from a market economy to an economy of human need in a society of such scale and technology. The market has been with us for perhaps 7000 years, to invent something from whole cloth to replace it as the means of regulating production and distributing goods was perhaps a bridge too far.As they say, the devil is in the details: we know where we want to go, but there was no map. But someone had to do it, to find out. China stands on the shoulders of Soviet giants.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Tue Jul 14, 2020 4:12 pm

Statement by the Communist and Workers Parties on the 75th Anniversary of the Victory over Fascism
05/05/2020
In the name of freedom, peace and truth - against fascism and war

The victory over fascism in World War II is the greatest event in history, the memory of which must be preserved and protected from the ongoing attempts of historical falsification, the purpose of which is to forget the leading role of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, communists and anti-fascists around the world in defeating Nazism.

Image
Victory Banner was red

Nazi fascism generated by capitalism was the most terrorist manifestation of monopoly capital. It was he who was responsible for the outbreak of that aggressive war, which led to the deaths of about 75 million people, of whom about 27 million were Soviet citizens who died on the battlefields and as a result of unlimited suffering in Nazi concentration camps. Peoples also cannot forget about black pages, such as the US atomic bombings of the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, without any military justification, but only to demonstrate their power and hegemonic goals at the global level.

The Second World War (1939-1945) was the result of aggravation of inter-imperialist contradictions, and also aimed at the destruction of the first socialist state, the USSR, which was expressed, in particular, in aiding the Great Britain, France and the United States, the expansionist ambitions of the rearmed Nazi Germany .

Celebrating the 75th anniversary of the Victory on May 9, 1945, the undersigned communist and workers parties are convinced that they express the feelings and desires of workers and peoples of the whole world, calling on:

pay tribute to all those who gave their lives on the battlefields against the fascist hordes, to honor the memory of the heroically opposed anti-fascist fighters, the heroic Soviet people and the Red Army led by the Communist Party, whose contribution is inscribed on the heroic pages of military history, such as the battles of Moscow , Leningrad and Stalingrad, which became decisive for the Victory over fascist barbarism.
recognize that the victory over Nazi Germany and its allies under the Anti-Comintern Pact was achieved thanks to the decisive contribution of the USSR, the class nature of Soviet power based on the participation of the masses and the leading role of the Communist Party, the superiority of the socialist system. This victory represents the great historical legacy of the revolutionary movement;
to appreciate the outstanding successes in the process of social and national liberation of peoples and workers, which were made possible thanks to the victory and advancement of the forces of social peace and progress, the expansion of the socialist camp to Europe, Asia and Latin America, the conquests of the labor movement in capitalist countries, the rapid development of the national liberation movement and the subsequent liquidation of colonial empires;
expose and condemn campaigns aimed at downplaying, distorting or even refuting the decisive role of the USSR and the Communists in defeating Nazi fascism, moreover, falsely and unfairly blame the Soviet Union at the beginning of World War II, erase the guilt of big capital and the governments that served it in assistance to fascism and the outbreak of war, in the justification and rehabilitation of fascism, the destruction of monuments and the memory of the liberating role of the Soviet Army, the promotion of anti-communism and the criminalization of communists and anti-fascists;
expose and condemn the anti-communist resolutions of the EU and the attempt of historical and slanderous falsification, equating socialism with a fascist monster;
to warn that imperialism increasingly relies on fascism and war as a “way out” of the deepening crisis of the capitalist system, whose inhuman character is especially evident when, even in the conditions of a serious epidemic outbreak, Covid-19, imperialism of the USA, NATO, the EU and its allied capitalist powers pursue a criminal policy of blockade and aggression against countries and peoples;
recognize that the struggle for peace, social progress and socialism are inseparable; to commit themselves to help strengthen the common cause of the working class, working people and peoples of the whole world, political forces interested in preventing the spread of fascism and participating in the struggle against imperialism, imperialist aggression and unleashing a new tragic war.

Image

The situation in which the working people and the peoples of the world are underscores the importance of intensifying the anti-imperialist struggle for the sovereignty of peoples and the independence of states, for the rights of workers and peoples on the path to revolutionary overcoming the capitalist system, which creates fascism, war, injustice and other dangerous contradictions of the current moment. Like 75 years ago, it is precisely the struggle of the Communists and all those who are faced with capitalist exploitation and oppression that will open the way for the future of mankind.

Communist Party of Argentina
Communist Party of Armenia
Communist Party of Australia
Party of labor of austria
Communist Party of Azerbaidjan
Communist Party of Bangladesh
Communist Party of Belarus
Communist Party of Belgium
Communist Party of Brazil
Communist Party of Britain
New communist party of britain
Communist Party of Canada
Communist Party of Chile
Colombian communist party
Socialist Worker's Party of Croatia
Communist Party of Cuba
The Progressive Party of the Working People - AKEL
Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia
Communist Party in Denmark
Egyptian Communist Party
Communist Party of Finland
French communist party
Pole of communist revival in france
Communist Revolutionary Party of France
Unified Communist Party of Georgia
German communist party
Communist Party of Greece
Hungarian worker's party
Communist Party of India (Marxist)
Communist party of india
Tudeh Party of Iran
Iraqi Communist Party
Kurdistan Communist Party - Iraq
Communist party of ireland
Workers Party of Ireland
Communist Party of Israel
Italian Communist Party
Party of the Communist Refoundation - European Left (Italy)
Socialist Movement of Kazakhstan
Workers' Party of Korea
Socialist Party (Lithuania)
Communist Party of Luxembourg
Communist Party of Malta
Popular Socialist Party - National Political Association (México)
Communist Party of Mexico
New Communist Party of the Netherlands
New Communist Party of Aotearoa (New Zealand)
Communist Party of Macedonia (North Macedonia)
Communist Party of Norway
Communist Party of Pakistan
Palestinian Communist Party
Paraguayan Communist Party
Peruan communist party
Philippine Communist Party (PKP - 1930)
Portuguese Communist Party
Communist Party of the Russian Federation
Union of Communist Parties-CPSU
Russian Communist Workers Party
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
New Communist Party of Yugoslavia
Communist of serbia
Communist Party of Slovakia
South African Communist Party
Communist Party of Spain
Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain
Communist Party of the Workers of Spain
Communists of catalonia
Galizan people's union
Communist Party of Sri Lanka
Sudanese Communist Party
Communist Party of Swaziland
Communist Party (Switzerland)
Syrian communist party
Syrian Communist Party (Unified)
Communist Party of Turkey
Communist Party of Ukraine
Union of Communists of Ukraine
Communist Party USA
Communist Party of Venezuela
(The list continues to replenish)

https://www.rotfront.su/zayavlenie-komm ... rabochi-2/

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"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Sat Jul 18, 2020 5:21 pm

Member of the European Parliament declares Lenin guilty of the deaths of six million people
07/18/2020
A lie repeated a thousand times ...
The question of the demolition of the monument to Vladimir Lenin in Gelsenkirchen and the prohibition of communist symbols throughout the European Union was raised at a session of the European Parliament. This was stated by the Polish deputy Elzbieta Kruk in her question to the European Commission.
Image
Waffen SS Veterans March Held in Riga

A two-meter monument to Lenin appeared in Gelsenkirchen on June 20 at the initiative of the Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany, which cooperates with the RKRP - the core of the ROT FRONT.

“It is outrageous that Lenin, the first leader of Soviet Russia and a criminal who, according to historians, is responsible for the death of up to 6 million people, is honored in a seemingly democratic Germany, with the assistance of which he came to Russia, and after him the revolution” , - the deputy summarizes.

The document containing a question for the European Commission refers to the EP resolution of 2019, which refers to the policy of a pan-European condemnation of Nazism, Stalinism and other “totalitarian regimes”.

“It should be recalled that the communist regimes have a total responsibility for the death of about 100 million people, which is why communism is one of the bloodiest systems in the history of mankind,” the document says.

The Polish deputy asks colleagues from the European Commission if they do not believe that communist symbols in the EU should be banned and steps should be taken to demolish the monument. In addition, the chosen one wonders, "whether there are any fears in this connection that Germany is returning to its totalitarian traditions."
The state political line of Poland has long followed the far right path. Denying the Soviet past, the state stands on a par with the main enemy of socialism - fascism. In November 2019, thousands of ultra-right activists took part in a torchlight procession in Poland . The fight against communism has already generated fascism in Latvia : annually, a march of veterans of the Waffen SS legion, a fascist formation that fought against the Soviet army during the Great Patriotic War , is openly held in the country .
Right-wing moods in European state policy continue to gain momentum. In Hungary, nationalists from the dominant Fides party, led by Viktor Orban, already dominate. In Germany, the authority of the right Alternative for Germany is growing and expanding. In Italy, the League of the North.
In any anti-communist message from those in power, we should see no feelings about the millions killed (after all, is it true that liberalization of the economy, during which nearly 13 million people died from hardships , is negatively assessed by market apologists?) Stubborn ignoring of millions of victims who did not fit , - a direct consequence of the double standards preached by the new right-wing states.
https://www.rotfront.su/chlen-evroparla ... o-vinovno/

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Fuck these people, we'll write the history books.
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Sun Sep 06, 2020 11:18 pm

The path to a brighter future begins in childhood
09/06/2020
In memory of Vladislav Petrovich Krapivin

On September 1, 2020 , the most outstanding Soviet children's writer Vladislav Petrovich Krapivin (1938 - 2020) died after Arkady Petrovich Gaidar (1904 - 1941 ).

Image
Vladislav Krapivin with the guys from the "Caravel" squadron

Local authorities have repeatedly tried to close the "Caravel", which interferes with life, however, thanks to the support of the editorial board of the "Pioneer" magazine and some workers of the Central Committee of the Komsomol, the detachment continued to exist. It still exists today. Currently, the club is run by the wife of the writer's son, Larisa Aleksandrovna.

The work of "Caravel" is based on self-government. The role of the older companions is to provide the children with sound advice and resolve conflicts. All this strongly resembles the colony led by Anton Semyonovich Makarenko (1888 - 1939), and the team led by Timur.

Thousands of children and adolescents have passed through the "Caravel" detachment.

Image
V.P. Krapivin with the guys from the "Caravel" squadron

Children's club created by V.P. Krapivin, was not the only organization of this kind. At the turn of the 1950s and 1960s, the Children's Communards Movement appeared in the USSR, informal children's associations were created, working on the principles of self-government and engaged in various interesting things. The main ideologist of this movement was Igor Petrovich Ivanov , Doctor of Pedagogy (1923 - 1992), who worked at the Leningrad Pedagogical Institute named after A.I. Herzen.

Image
I.P. Ivanov, 1960s

“Let our children now live the life that will come for everyone after the Victory of Communism ,” said I.P. Ivanov .

Working with the "Caravel" detachment inspired V.P. Krapivin for the creation of his program works written in 1965 - 1982. Among them are "Squire Kashka" (1965), "Shadow of the Caravel" (1970), "Boy with a Sword" (1974), "Bolt" (1976), "Lullaby for Brother" (1978), "Three from Carronade Square" ( 1979), Crane and Lightning (1981). At the center of these works is the clash of a boy brought up in the concept of honor and nobility, with the world of ordinary people, where these ideas are very blurred.

Many features of creativity are related to V.P. Krapivin with the outstanding American writer Jerome David Salinger (1919 - 2010), whose novel "The Catcher in the Rye", which tells about the collision of a growing teenager with the adult world, received worldwide recognition. However, there is a fundamental difference between the heroes of Salinger and Krapivin. Salinger's heroes are passive and, when faced with the outside world, withdraw into themselves. And the heroes of Krapivin are actively fighting what is unacceptable for them. As, incidentally, befits real Soviet people.

Image
Shot from the lost TV movie "Boy with a Sword", V. Solomin as Oleg Moskovkin

The creativity of V.P. Krapivina actively opposed the growing influence of the philistine worldview and bourgeois ideology on Soviet people in the 1960s-1980s. And this circumstance made the writer, who had little interest in politics, a continuation of the best traditions of socialist realism.

In the second half of the 1980s, V.P. Krapivin writes a cycle of fantastic stories "In the depths of the Great Crystal", which tells about the problems faced by the inhabitants of different Universes. These problems differ little from the problems facing the inhabitants of our planet. Among the works of this cycle, the story "Geese, geese, ha-ha-ha ..." should be especially noted, which tells about a world where all information about all people is stored in the form of a universal biological index.

Krapivin also wrote fairy tales. For example, "Tales of the Singing Cat".

The creative heritage of V.P. Krapivina is huge. The writer once even admitted that he did not remember how many books he wrote. In 2013-2017 , the Meshcheryakov Publishing House published the complete works of V.P. Krapivin in 50 (!!!) volumes.

The death of Vladislav Petrovich Krapivin is an irreparable loss for domestic literature and domestic pedagogy.

S.V. Bagotsky

https://www.rotfront.su/put-k-svetlomu- ... naetsya-v/

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“Let our children now live the life that will come for everyone after the Victory of Communism ,” said I.P. Ivanov

Swear to gawd, this made me weep. Just an old man...
"There is great chaos under heaven; the situation is excellent."

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Tue Sep 29, 2020 2:25 pm

Prime numbers. Central Asia: from the Middle Ages to socialism and back
09/27/2020
Member of the Labor Front Oleg Komolov with the author's transmission
The attitude to the speech of a member of our party Oleg Komolov on the Internet turned out to be ambiguous: some listeners considered it "Great Russian chauvinism"some understatement on the national question. We assure our readers that the position of the party in this regard remains Leninist: for us, of course, mutually beneficial cultural cooperation of nationalities is important, and therefore we consider ourselves obliged to talk about the Soviet era, in which there was no place for either "lumps" or skinheads - the development of our the country was spurred on by the true friendship of peoples. However, the most important question is the class one. After all, migrants from the countries of Central Asia in Russia today await with trepidation not only the Russian "national" bourgeoisie, but also the bourgeoisie of the "southern republics". A careful and thorough study of cultural and social policies in our countries will help to see the class interest. ROT FRONT encourages readers to independently analyze the texture given by Oleg in order to understand

Hello!

“They began to press on patriotism. Apparently they got caught. "

This immortal quote by Saltykov-Shchedrin from the 19th century remains a very reliable tool of political science analysis today.

Image
Russian writer Mikhail Evgrafovich Saltykov-Shchedrin

Wanting to divert the attention of citizens from acute socio-economic problems, to justify their own managerial worthlessness and hide the parasitic essence of the elites from the eyes of citizens, state propaganda begins to appeal to a sense of unity and cohesion, common roots and a cultural code. And when things go really badly, overt nationalism becomes a national idea, fostering hatred of other peoples in society and explaining all the failures to the intrigues of external aggressors.

Recently, Andriy Rudoy on the Vestnik Buri channel released an amusing video about the content of Ukrainian history textbooks. The main culprit of all the troubles of the local population there is called the eastern neighbor, who for many hundreds of years kept the country in subjection, and in the 20th century committed a real genocide of the Ukrainian people. It may seem that all this is the fruit of the Maidan and the coming to power of Stepan Bandera's heirs. However, in other post-Soviet republics the situation is developing in a similar way.

Take, for example, the countries of Central Asia - Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan.

Image
Central Asian region on the map

They formed the Central Asian economic region of the USSR and in the pre-revolutionary era were part of Turkestan, annexed to the Russian Empire in the middle of the 19th century.

Local textbooks serve up historical science to the younger generation from a purely nationalistic standpoint, and are full of Russophobia and anti-Sovietism. So, the events of 1917-1920. school textbooks in Kyrgyzstan are presented as if the Bolsheviks were the successors of the tsarist cause and pursued a colonial policy towards the Kyrgyz people.

Quote from a Kyrgyz textbook for grade 9:

“Among the local Bolshevik leaders of Russian nationality, a chauvinistic worldview prevailed. This attitude of the Bolshevik leaders towards the indigenous population was not very different from the position of the officials of the colonial times. Thus, in the first years of Soviet power, the great-power colonial policy continued to exist. " Imankulov M.K. History of Kyrgyzstan XX-XXI centuries. A textbook for the 9th grade of secondary school. - B .: Publishing House "Kitep Company", 2006. P. 31 .

Or here:

"Throughout its three-thousand-year history, the Kyrgyz people have not been in such a miserable state as under the successors of the tsarist imperialism - the red militarists." Imankulov M.K. History of Kyrgyzstan XX-XXI centuries. A textbook for the 9th grade of secondary school. - B .: Publishing House "Kitep Company", 2006. P. 96 .

The author of the textbook finds another apt definition for the Bolsheviks, calling them "colonizers with a party membership card in their pocket" (MK Imankulov, History of Kyrgyzstan XX-XXI centuries. Textbook for the 9th grade of secondary school. 2006. p. 62) .

What are the colonialists doing? Of course, they rob the local population:

"Kyrgyzstan, like other republics of Central Asia, was turned into a raw material base, the level of its social development and social security was much lower than that of most European Union republics." Imankulov M.K. History of Kyrgyzstan XX-XXI centuries. A textbook for the 9th grade of secondary school. - B .: Publishing house "Kitep Company", 2006. P. 181 .

Uzbek textbooks are not lagging behind.

“The Soviet system subordinated the economy of Uzbekistan to the interests of the Center, turned it into its raw material base. From here such valuable raw materials as cotton, raw silk, karakul, the wealth of our bowels were exported. " Usmanov K., Sadikov History of Uzbekistan (1917-1991)., T. 2007, p . 4 .

Industrialization is being exhibited as yet another manifestation of colonial oppression:

“The implementation of the plan for the industrialization of Uzbekistan should have created opportunities for its complete subordination to the Center ... Industrial enterprises erected in Uzbekistan were engaged in the processing of raw materials or semi-finished products. Their products were exported to other regions of the USSR, where finished products were produced. This provided a large stream of profits to the treasury of the Soviet state. The merciless exploitation of natural resources carried out on the instructions of the Center did not take into account the economic interests of the republic. " Usmanov K., Sadikov M. History of Uzbekistan (1917-1991), T. 2007. S. 88-89 .

At the same time, despite all the intrigues of the aggressor, the Uzbek people built and irrigated, sowed and collected, erected, invented, developed. In general, not thanks to, but in spite of, - the classics:

“Despite the pressure of the Soviet system, positive changes have been achieved in our country. Through the efforts of our hardworking people, many new cities were erected, factories and factories were built, millions of hectares of new lands were developed. Schools, higher and secondary specialized educational institutions were opened, significant successes were achieved in the field of science, literature and art ”. Usmanov K., Sadikov M. History of Uzbekistan (1917-1991). T., 2007.S. 4 .

But, apparently, these positive changes were insufficient:

"And if we call a spade a spade, if we draw parallels with world history and practice, then Uzbekistan, in fact, was a semi-colonial country with a one-sided deformed economy completely dependent on the Center." Karimov I.A. Uzbekistan, aspiring to the XXI century. - T.: Uzbekistan, 1999. - P. 344 .

The reason for all the troubles is clear. What kind of development is there, we would heal the wounds of colonial oppression:

“The former Soviet Union inherited a fragile, weak economy with a raw material orientation, that is, the republic was a supplier of cheap raw materials and strategic mineral resources. We inherited the low standard of living of the population. According to this indicator, the republic occupied one of the last places in the Union ”. Usmanov K., Sadikov M. History of Uzbekistan (1917-1991). T., 2007., pp . 247-248 .

Finally, the destruction of the Soviet Union, the restoration of the power of local bais is presented as a great happiness for the inhabitants of Central Asia:

“… The age-old dream of our people has come true. The country, our people have freed themselves from political dependence. " Usmanov K. History of Uzbekistan. The period of national independence. T., p. 16 .

But in reality, of course, everything is different. The Soviet period in the history of Asian peoples cannot be compared with colonial exploitation. On the contrary, being a part of the USSR gave the local population unprecedented opportunities until then and became a unique example of the rapid modernization of Islamic countries. Its foundation was the transition of the economy from the agrarian to the industrial stage of development.

Before joining the Russian Empire, there were almost no industrial enterprises on the territory of Turkestan. The exceptions were ginneries and a small number of mines, mines and oil fields. The region specialized in animal husbandry and agriculture. The majority of the urban and a large part of the rural population of the region were engaged in handicraft production and side trades. Over the next 50 years, the industry, although it developed, but at a very sluggish pace. In 1911, on the territory of Turkestan, there were only a few hundred large enterprises, which employed only 15 thousand people (Russia. A complete geographical description of our fatherland. Volume 19. Turkestan Territory. SPb., 1913. S. 536) .

After the revolution, significant investments began to be directed to the industry of Central Asia.

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Source: Kudelya-Odabashyan M.L. Turkestan within Soviet Russia: problems of socio-economic and political development (October 1917 - October 1924). M., 2001., pp. 210-211

At the height of the civil war, from September 1919 to February 1920, the Center provided her with cast iron, steel, building materials and machinery.

From 1922-24, the RSFSR opened a loan for irrigation to the Turkestan Republic for almost 17 million rubles in gold terms (Kudelya-Odabashyan M.L. Turkestan as part of Soviet Russia: problems of socio-economic and political development (October 1917 - October 1924 G.). M., 2001., S. 293)

A powerful impetus to the development of industry in the region was the evacuation there from the European part of the USSR of a number of developed industries in 1941-1942. The availability of a large amount of local raw materials and massive urbanization ensured sustainable growth in light industry.

But it would be a mistake to believe that only labor-consuming production and extraction of minerals remained the lot of Central Asia. By 1990, machines and equipment, machine tools, and building materials were produced on the territory of the republics.

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Source: National Economy of the USSR in 1990: Statistical Yearbook. M., 1991.S. 358-359

In general, by the end of the 80s, the volume of industrial production in Central Asia increased hundreds of times.

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Source: National Economy of the USSR for 70 Years: Jubilee Statistical Yearbook. M., 1987.S. 17

Thanks to the massive mechanization of agriculture, most of which was natural in nature before the revolution, Central Asia was able to significantly increase both gross production rates and labor productivity. For example, milk production per employee from 1940 to 1990 increased 50 times.

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Source: V.G. Rastyannikov Uzbekistan. Economic growth in the agricultural sector: anomalies of the XX century. M., 1996.S. 151

The power industry deserves special attention. In Soviet Central Asia, this industry was created virtually from scratch: 28 power plants were built, and electricity production increased hundreds of times.

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Source: National Economy of the USSR for 70 Years: Jubilee Statistical Yearbook. M., 1987.S. 162

Built in the 1970s. Nurek HPP in Tajikistan is a unique engineering facility.

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Nurek HPP in Tajikistan

But its value lies not only in the highest earth-stone dam in the world at the time of construction, withstanding any earthquakes. The entire country was building the power plant. 300 enterprises from 200 cities of the USSR supplied design and estimate documentation, equipment, components and raw materials for the construction of this facility, and sent specialists.

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Construction of the Nurek HPP in Tajikistan

By 1968, an eight-thousand-strong team of experienced builders and installers worked on the construction, having passed the school for the construction of the Bratsk, Zeiskaya and Sayano-Shushenskaya hydroelectric power plants, as well as the country's largest thermal power plants. Timber was shipped from Eastern Siberia, Magnitka sent reinforcing steel, Kommunarsk and Nizhny Tagil - rolled metal and glass, Kharkov - turbines and unique 600-ton ball valves, which were used for the first time in world practice at the Nurek HPP.

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Construction of the Nurek HPP in Tajikistan

Sverdlovsk became a supplier of hydrogenerators. Powerful 360-ton cranes and transformers came from Zaporozhye. Dnepropetrovsk Mechanical Plant manufactured caterpillar gates for construction tunnels, Khmelnitsky Plant - transformers and automatic switching devices, Moscow plant "Electroshield" - complex switchgears. Belarusian automakers provided the construction site with mining dump trucks, the Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant - with self-propelled drilling rigs.

In addition, enterprises in Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary, and the German Democratic Republic were connected to the construction of the Nurek hydroelectric power station through the CMEA system.

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Construction of the Nurek HPP in Tajikistan

The development of industry in Central Asia, of course, created a demand for a healthy and educated worker. The Soviet government paid great attention to the creation in the region of a generally accessible system of mass education and health care (Source: Logofet DN Bukhara Khanate under the Russian protectorate. In two volumes. T. 2. SPb., 1911. S. 142).

Before the annexation of Turkestan to the Russian Empire, there was no medical support for the region's population. And the point is not only that doctor's services were very expensive and were inaccessible to the majority of the population. There were no doctors themselves. They were replaced by numerous "traditional healers". To this should be added the terrible unsanitary conditions and non-observance of the simplest rules of personal hygiene by residents. Periodic epidemics of infectious diseases were the real scourge of the local population at that time. Thus, the largest plague epidemic in the 19th century, which broke out in the Bukhara Emirate in 1898, was eliminated with great difficulty by teams of Russian doctors. At the end of the last century, certified doctors began to gradually appear in Turkestan. True, there were very few of them. For example, in 1908 in the Bukhara Emirate there was only one doctor per 100 thousand inhabitants, but 2,000 mullahs.

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Dynamics of development of medical care in the countries of Central Asia

Under Soviet rule, the region managed not only to create an effective and accessible health care system, but also to overcome many infectious diseases (for example, malaria and cholera). The provision of doctors of all specialties has grown by orders of magnitude. For example, in Kyrgyzstan - more than 170 times. The number of hospitals and beds has also increased manifold.

Education. Before Turkestan became part of the Russian Empire, there were no secular educational institutions. Later they began to appear, albeit in small numbers, and there were no universities at all. In 1917, the number of literate people among the indigenous population of Central Asia ranged from 1 to 2% (Uzbek SSR. One-volume encyclopedia. Tashkent, 1981, p. 281) .

After the October Revolution, as well as throughout the country, higher educational institutions began to open in Central Asia. Already in April 1918, Turkestan People's University was established with branches in several cities.

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Dynamics of education development in the countries of Central Asia

Even as part of the Soviet Union, before the availability of higher and secondary education, the republics of Central Asia were even ahead of some European countries. So, in the Uzbek SSR in 1981 there were 173 students per 10 thousand people, more than in many countries of the Western world (Uzbek SSR. One-volume encyclopedia. Tashkent, 1981, p. 264) .

In parallel with the development of the education system, the cultural level also grew. Thousands of museums, libraries and theaters were opened in the republics.

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Source: National Economy of the USSR for 70 Years: Anniversary Statistical Yearbook. M., 1987.S. 18

However, to all of the above, some Kyrgyz nationalist can answer: why the hell did these soviet libraries surrender to us, if such a high price was paid for them. The USSR turned Central Asia into its fodder base, an internal colony. And the bones that he threw to our people cannot compensate for the damage suffered.

Data on the internal and external trade of the Central Asian economic region will help to refute this statement. In all four republics, the import of goods significantly exceeded their export.

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Source: National Economy 1990: Statistical Yearbook. M., 1991.S. 640

In fact, this meant that the Central Asian republics were selling significantly less goods than they were consuming. The consequences of the negative trade balance were compensated by Moscow. The union state went to subsidized relations that were disadvantageous for the center, since this made it possible to move along the path to an important goal: to smooth out social inequality, raising the standard of living of the lagging republics to the average for the union due to the importance of the Central Asian republics in economic, political and military terms.

The budgetary and tax system of the USSR provided another type of subsidies: different amounts of deductions from all-union taxes and revenues to the budgets of the union republics. So, if the RSFSR in 1975 could keep 42% of the turnover tax collected on its territory, Ukraine - 43, and Estonia - 60. For Uzbekistan, this figure was 92%, for Kyrgyzstan - 93; for Tajikistan 99% and for Turkmenistan - 100%.

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Source: USSR Law on the State Budget // Session of the USSR Supreme Soviet: Transcript. M., 1974

And one more important observation. In the postwar years in Central Asia, the share of workers employed in agriculture has been steadily declining. The labor force spilled over into industry, science, education, and health care. The historical experience of the development of the Central Asian economic region shows that its industrialization, ensuring the employment of the population in collective labor processes that required qualified personnel, already in the 1930s. was a significant prerequisite for the almost complete elimination of Islamist radicalism in the form of the so-called. Basmachism.

In fact, while remaining the largest agro-industrial region in terms of territory and population in the industrial-agrarian economy of the USSR, the Central Asian economic region until the beginning of the 1990s experienced an era of industrialization that stretched out over several decades. And when its development was interrupted with the collapse of the Soviet Union, in Central Asia, especially in the urban industrial regions, a large number of "superfluous people" formed, who became a nutritious layer for the advancement of radical Islamist movements and drug trafficking into the region, as well as the main source of illegal migration to Russia and through Russia.

Independence did not bring new sources of growth to Central Asia. Three of the four republics in the region - Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan - are among the ten poorest countries in the world, neighboring Haiti , Mozambique and Uganda. At first glance, Turkmenistan stands out from this row. Thanks to the rise in gas prices, the country's main export commodity, real GDP per capita has doubled here compared to 1990. However, these revenues were not used to develop the country and improve the living standards of citizens, but turned into the construction of luxurious palaces for the local elite.

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The poorest countries in the world according to FocusEconomics (2019, 2020)

Several months ago, we published a video about the socio-economic structure of the Baltic republics. It would seem that they may have in common with Central Asia: different culture, different parts of the world, different standard of living. But almost all post-Soviet regimes have a common generic trait - aggressive anti-Sovietism. And the more the country affects the periphery of the world economy, the more in demand are the attempts of the ruling class to shift the blame to the old days.

https://www.rotfront.su/prostye-chisla- ... z-srednev/

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Re: The Soviet Union

Post by blindpig » Thu Oct 08, 2020 1:22 pm

Socialism betrayed: the causes of the fall of the USSR *
2020-03-04_15h07_18

by Alberto Ferretti

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The debate on the causes of the fall of the USSR is wide and varied. The correct understanding of an event of this magnitude certainly helps the development of today's workers movement, left orphaned by an ideal and material reference as important as the first workers' state in history.

Leaving aside the liquidationism of those who see in the USSR "the empire of evil" and "a totalitarian regime" (meaningless words, a reflection of the bourgeois criminalization of the Soviet experience, which a large part of the reformist and radical left is propagating with both hands ), and the constructive analyzes of bourgeois economists who limit themselves to repeating the tautology of "communism collapsed because the communist economy cannot work" (thus passing off their class prejudices as science) - it is appropriate to advance precise criticisms on the events that they have helped to disrupt the world.

Let's focus on the economic problems of Soviet socialism in the 1980s. We often hear, without proof and almost as a cliché, that the Soviet economy was on the verge of collapse; but this is false, and even the most careful anti-communist scholars are ready to admit it. GDP grew at much higher levels than Western economies, and much more than it is growing today in Europe and the USA; basic needs - food, rent, energy - were fully satisfied; disappeared unemployment; free and good quality public services for all; industrial and technological sectors often more advanced than capitalist ones; an infinitely superior cultural production and education in quality and popular diffusion compared to capitalist countries. Overall the economy of the USSR - and of the Socialist Republics of Eastern Europe,

Yet there was a need for reform which led to the fall of the system. What happened? A more pertinent aspect of criticism with respect to what happens is instead encountered when discussing the USSR's refusal to innovate by introducing market mechanisms (or continuing the NEP, or following the Chinese model), or the very impossibility of reforming the socialist model. whole wheat. In this regard, some aspects that we hope will contribute to the debate should be specified, these aspects are of an economic nature and we will limit ourselves here to outlining the broad lines, referring for details and statistics to the bibliography in the note.

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In 1956, with Khrushchev , not only and not so much the ideological rigor of the party was relaxed, but above all the competent control over the socialist economy, to the extent that the new course envisaged a "right" turn understood as less planning centralization and more liberalism cheap. A good example was the calamitous agricultural reforms, with the dismantling of the large tractor power plants in favor of an increased autonomy of the kolkhozes (agricultural cooperatives), which caused a substantial loss of productivity in agriculture and an increase in prices such as to generate discontent in the population. In practice, the application of this line was nothing short of catastrophic.

The least one can say is that this trend - in itself not open to criticism in advance (leaving aside here the role of the opposition nefarious right that took power with Khrushchev in the falsification of Soviet history in the Stalin era) - did not take the form of an orderly transition of a part of the economy towards market mechanisms included in the five-year plans, with private investments as a corollary of the macro public investments which in any case would have determined the sense of development.

Nothing serious was put in the pipeline to reform the economy in the sense of opening up to mercantilistic processes, if this was the authentic desire of the CPSU tendencies more conciliatory with the petty bourgeoisie and the partially capitalist economy represented by the peasants at the Stalinist era middle-rich of which Khrushchev and the ruling class close to him were the political references.

In the non-performing interstices of the planned economy that the new reformist course was not concerned with perfecting - and which therefore began to manifest cracks and malfunctions where attention was less iron - pockets of informal or submerged economy fell increasingly into the hands of private individuals, not recognized as such, but in fact in possession of means of exchange and production. These nascent private trading relationships were virtually invisible to official statistics. Therefore, on the basis of a confused and voluntarist line, a gradual disengagement of the state took shape which was transformed into hoarding by the administrators and staff related to them (and by citizens with more availability than others) of a part of the economy,

This second shadow economy - smuggled, or submerged - which developed within the socialist economy, if on the one hand it took advantage of the operational defects of planning, on the other it contributed to disintegrate the productive forces, in a dialectical relationship. In other words, it fed illegal parallel channels, the material basis of a corruption in the party and government levels, and in about twenty years - towards the end of the 1970s - it had necessarily created, like every growing economic sector ago, a social base, although small in number, quite influential, because it is linked to a part (we would say the sick part) of the state and government bureaucracy.

Furthermore , Gosplan (the state body responsible for drafting the five-year plans) found itself in the surreal situation of not being able to integrate - because it did not know them, or because it was convenient to ignore their existence in the absence of clear political directives - the data coming from these more or less informal sectors, and not really controlling the activity of certain cooperatives which formally registered in the planned system but which in reality proceeded to slow movement of goods from a legal sector to the paralegal one of the black market, based a macroeconomic objectives on incomplete or incorrect data.

As a result, there could be completely unrealistic forecasts on certain production targets, which the plant managers did their best to "reach", in turn falsifying the result accounting, with a potential permanent vicious circle rooted in the administration of the Soviet economy . The allocation of resources was then necessarily inaccurate and misled on the basis of a photograph of the economic situation that did not respond 100% to the real composition of the economy. In the absence of substantial corrections, this situation could only worsen and the problems worsened from year to year.

In practice, this uncontrolled de facto liberalization of some economic strata - we repeat of a small but growing part of the economy that stretched like a bubo because out of the control of the party and the state, which culpably refused to pay due attention to it (i.e. legalizing it to control its flows or prohibiting it) - created the objective conditions for the emergence of proto-capitalist interests in certain social groups that drew not only sustenance, but enrichment (something unprecedented in the Soviet system) from an economic activity similar to capitalism , but constrained and restricted by the collectivist and socialist framework of almost the entire Soviet economy.

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That said, by the early 1980s this second economy had become quite invasive and prosperous. Partly because of the Soviet planning inexperience, partly because of the Khrushchevite "right" course, partly because of the need to focus all attention on heavy industry (which on the contrary was equal in quantity and quality if not superior to the capitalist one, which demonstrates that in themselves social ownership and integral plan logic produce stunning results, if planning is carried out carefully and on the basis of correct information), this second economy on the one hand amplified some problems such as the shortages of certain products, on the other hand, benefited from them thanks to the black market.

The leadership of the CPSU became aware of this series of problems towards the last years of the Brezhnev presidency , and after his death the new Secretary General Yuri Andropov began to put into practice the necessary measures to eradicate these tendencies harmful to socialism. The priorities identified at the time were clear and unambiguous: to fight the laxity and absenteeism of the urban white-collar class, to fight corruption (the victim of the anti-corruption raids of the KGB in the Andropov era was Brezhnev's nephew himself), controlled mechanisms and market reasons if necessary to improve the light industry and consumer sectors, strengthening and refinement of state planning.

Well, this reform enterprise, Andropov died prematurely , after Chenrnenko's useless parenthesis , passed into the hands of Gorbatchev . From the beginning he aroused a wave of enthusiasm among the Soviets who awaited a reformist process in their country, and Gorbatchev initially did not betray the expectations of the population by retracing and wanting to deepen, at least in theory, the legacy of Andropov's work, seeking to put this, we would say, modernizing line into practice.

However, what happened was that the process was quickly taken over and dominated by the representatives of this second capitalist economy accustomed to enrich themselves in the shadows on the malfunctions of socialism, representatives who often occupied important posts within the party and the state, enamored by the high-ranking luxuries of the Western model (which they frequented through embassies and political-cultural circles), and who saw in the emergence of a reformist current a historic opportunity for the realization of interests common to a minority but rising social stratum, up to that moment partially frustrated: that of dismantling the planned economy that prevented the achievement of private enrichment, which they had foretold in their semi-legal activities.

The reform process that was objectively imposed was seized by the liberalists within the CPSU (how then the CPSU may have tolerated such degeneration internally is a topic that we refer to further analysis), as an opportunity to take power. In this sense it can be said that certain party cadres influenced the choices of the Gorbatchev leadership , carrying out a counter-revolution from above, all the easier since the application of the Gorbatchev era of market reformist mechanisms was done in a chaotic way and beyond. out of any rational planning.

Shock therapy was performed- such as the government's decision to reduce by 50%, overnight, the purchases of goods produced by state-owned companies, to leave the "free market" to allocate goods according to the mechanism, unknown to the Soviet economy , of "supply / demand" - which in a planned economy can only mean introducing chaos by decree, if an infrastructure and a series of mechanisms capable of absorbing goods and capital have not been built first. Measures like these can only make sense if explained in this way: they were imposed on the thrust of liberal extremists, in the illusion that the "market" was the answer to all problems, and put into practice only to ensure that the mafias that developed under the 'umbrella of the second economy could get their hands on the goods removed from the state monopoly, ensuring the immeasurable enrichment of the profiteers. The development of these productive forces generated by this unrecognized capitalist economy finally and suddenly entered into direct conflict with the predominantly socialist relations of production, in a completely antagonistic way and without mediation of the party and of the governing bodies without clear objectives.

And in fact it happened just like that. The conflict took the form of degenerate elements of the Party who, under the influence of corruption, informal paramafia networks of enrichment, ultraliberal cultural hegemony from the West (fashionable in the new think tankseconomic liberals of Moscow), derailed the "reforms" towards the never expected dismantling of socialism. Otherwise said, the proto-capitalist elements that for decades had been hidden and guilty managed suddenly emerged and took a counter-revolutionary and anti-party form on the wave of ill-conceived, rash and badly managed reforms, applied under imperialist blackmail, which destroyed in 5 years the prosperous socialist economy built in 70 years of enormous efforts. If the goal was to improve the economic performance of light industry, and to reorient some sectors as much as possible by raising quality standards, the path taken surpassed this economist intent to take on clear political connotations: the pure and simple restoration of capitalism.

The lack of basic necessities in fact, it should be remembered to those who still chatter about "communism that had reduced citizens to starvation", date of this period - 1985-1991 - that is the period in which socialism was put under the test of "Reforms" which in reality had taken the form of nascent capitalism and were unconsciously disrupting the entire Soviet production chain. It was not socialism that did not work - in the sense that economic problems existed, but had relatively controllable proportions and, moreover, were identified by the more conscious part of the party trying to remedy them - but rather its reform in a liberal sense got out of hand. all,

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Paradoxically, counterintuitively compared to today's vulgate, it was not too much control of the economy that sank the USSR, but on the contrary the lack of control of "illegal" activities that thrived on the slums of Soviet economic life, the inability to manage them in the higher interests of the development of the socialist republics: activities that necessarily came to attack the vital ganglia of the system in order to gain the upper hand. When they came to light it was too late to stop these "animal spirits". If in fact in a capitalist system laissez-fairegranted to private economic agents is healthy, and the underground economy is consubstantial with capitalism and feeds some channels of private profit and enrichment, in a socialist system, if not controlled, it can lead to the death and paralysis of the system, which is oriented towards other objectives, namely the social distribution of wealth on the basis of equality and social justice against private accumulation and hoarding. And control, in this sense, does not mean so much ownership as the hegemonic capacity of direction on the part of the political power of capital or private activity.

Economic problems culpably swept under the carpet for decades by an at least lazy leadership, under imperialist attack, ossified in some ways; reforms in the capitalist sense made under the hegemony of the bourgeois-like class that had formed from the Kruscivian era could only lead to what happened: the catastrophe of the dismantling of the USSR, and the plundering of the resources of the countries by a class of oligarchs, that is mafia escaped from the circuits of the second economy linked to some cadres of the party who took advantage of the opportunity to enrich themselves with the support of Western capitalist circles and the IMF.

It was a counter-revolution, internal, led by the elites in close relationship with the capitalist West, imposed from above on the popular masses opposed to the new course and on the healthy part of the Party, the army and the state that failed to stop the counter-revolution (the because it did not succeed, it deserves a longer study that goes beyond this synthetic account of the economic reasons for the fall and the USSR and which we intend to develop later). The reformers, in a nutshell, weakened the USSR and then said that the only solution was to privatize everything, a tactic that we know and experience even today in Europe.

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Looking at the present, with respect to the issue of reforms within socialism, we can say that the Chinese experience - a veritable laboratory of practical innovations and reforms within the socialist system - proves that the conscious inclusion of capitalist elements in the wider framework of the planned economy not only can positively contribute to improving the economic mechanisms of the public part of the economy, but the preponderance of the public part helps the private one not to go to extremes towards financial predation and be more efficient in turn, in a positive dialectical relationship if controlled by a party firm in principles and technocratically competent.

In this context, capital tends to confidently follow state investments and is rooted in productive industrial activities, instead of getting lost in the streams of illegal trade and speculation. For this reason, the CCP and the new leadership united around Secretary Xi Jinping have identified corruption as the potential disruptor of the system. This corruption had developed in the years of "disorderly and anarchic" development, the laissez-faire represented by Hu Jintao's rule. The CCP studied and treasured the mistakes of the USSR, just described, committed at the historical turn of the adaptation of socialism to the changed historical conditions of the 1980s and the challenge represented by the triumphant neo-liberal capitalism at the time.

Current Chinese socialism welcomes these economic tendencies, but unlike the USSR, the capitalist elements that have gradually emerged and made official can only adapt to the hegemony of the proletariat that holds the reins of political power, and take the form not already of a disintegrating and destructive, but gregarious and loyal. Certainly not because the Chinese capitalists are good, but because they have no choice: to get rich, yes, but with the written rules and within the limits granted by the Party, not against the Party and the State.

As we have had the opportunity to say (see the three links in the footnote) this is the challenge specific to contemporary China in this historical phase, and it is on this aspect - that of reforms within the socialist framework, whether in the sense of the market or in the sense of a more pushed socialization - which undoubtedly the USSR and its leadership have failed. However, their work has provided valuable elements for reflection for the political practice of today's socialist states - which can count on that experience, which unfortunately ended badly (also because the USSR was the first workers' state to find itself facing economic problems of this magnitude. ,


* Roger Keeran, Thomas Kenny , Le Socialisme trahi. Les causes de la chute de l'Union soviétique (The Socialism Betrayed. Behind the Collapse of the Soviet Union), Paris, Delga, 2012

Henri Alleg , Le grand bond en arrière, Paris, Delga, 2011

Grover Furr , Khrushchev lied, City of the Sun, 2016

Michael Parenti , Black Shirts and Reds, Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism, 1997

https://ottobre.info/2016/11/01/il-soci ... -dellurss/

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