http://www.jurnaltv.ro/video/The_Soviet_St...elor_incredibil

http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=23507

Many interesting jurnals from 1914 to the 60's.

Wow, talk about a propaganda movie! Although generally it is based on real historical events the anti-Russian spin is there between the lines, especially towards its end. "Turning human tragedies into a farce has become normal in Russia. Ridiculing the Ukrainian famine, the Holocaust is the norm."

It would be interesting to see a similar Russian propaganda movie that would propably try to show how the rotten West colluded with Hitler, turned him towards the East through appeasement, failed to open a second front in time etc.

The propaganda slug-fest would at least offer us a stereo picture on the events.

I also have some doubts about some punctual parts of the movie:

1. They claim the US treated the SU as an Axis power. I doubt that. From what I remember the US continued to trade with the SU. I'll have to check later.

2. What Molotov speech in the 1940 are they talking about? They could have mentioned at least the month if not the exact date.

Anyway, thanks for posting. It was interesting.

cheers

This post has been edited by Imperialist on February 26, 2010 10:58 pm

Dunno about a movie, but there's a very "interesting" book, written by the former Soviet ambassador in England at the beginning of WW2, Ivan Maiski: "Who helped Hitler?" (of course, the answer is "Western powers" and it doesn't mention the Molotov-Ribentropp pact!); I read the book (Romanian version appeared in 1963) when I was in high-school, way before graduating History and it still struck me as very partisan and presenting only certain facts which were against UK/France. In the last years, something quite anti-occidental (not directly accusing, but more on the line of derision) is the German / Russian version of the interrogatories taken by NKVD from the personal help of Hitler: Otto Gunsche, Heinz Linge - The Hitler Dossier.
http://books.google.ro/books?id=Bl4DGrEzP6...ved=0CCcQ6AEwAg
Got it, read it, laughed (slightly bitter, though) a little, but it still has good things in it! I'm talking about the Romanian version,of course...
http://www.librariabucuresti.com/Carti-Dos...-0-2868-15-.htm
PS: no commercial in here, of course...

Hallo,
I recently saw on Discovey World in the series Greatest Tank Battles a documentary (can't find a better name) about the Battle of Kursk, basically a documentary with scenes edited out of the tank battles of 2nd WW and Cold War... What was shocking for me was the story of an old Russian ex -ww2 tankman, who told repeatedly that he had fought for Stalin and secondly for Motherland (can you believe that??) and he called all german soldiers (no matter if SS or Wehrmacht) "fascist devils". The point is -can you take this program as a propaganda (antifascist), since a story of a ex-soviet tanker, but a communist fanatic (at least his speech), may be the subject of a program about famous battle tank? I mean the same could apply for righteousness for a ex Waffen SS soldier, to talk about his victories against the Americans in Normandy and France? And to say that he fought for Hitler and secondly for Germany... Obviously such an issue can never be seen on television, as long as the demons were just the fascists, not also the communists...

You are taking it too passionate. Just look at it from a different perspective: the man interviewed is living history. This is how the mentality was back then. You can say this about most of the aired veteran interviews, be it about WW2 or Iraq War, as long as they were on the "correct" side.

I received this book as a gift a while ago, but didn't give it too much attention. Maybe I should check it out sooner than later if you recommended it.

Well, it's certainly worth losing the time to read it - but in order to understand it, some things must be taken with the proverbial "grain of salt", as an innocent reader might get a wrong impression...

@dragos
Ok, I admit I overreacted a bit,
An old veteran lives in the past and maybe his war experience wasn't a pleasant one, on the contrary. But as a romanian (fact valid for all nations of Eastern Europe), is no need to remind somebody that evoking Stalin is monstrous for many of us... actually for all of us! Without mentioning a special reason, I say however that I recommend to all the movie "Portretul luptatorului in tinerete" (to those who didn't see it on HBO)... Don't forget, but try to forgive...

Well, no matter how hurtful that may be for any enemy that the Russians fought, there is no denial that they fought "for Stalin", "for Motherland" and wished "death to Fascists". There is ample proof that that was indeed what the Russians were told to fight for and believed that they fought for. They were told this on the radio, in the newspapers, posters on walls and instructions from their officers.
Look at the thousands of slogans written on aircraft and tanks saying "Za Stalina" (For Stalin), "Za Rodinu" (For the Motherland) and "Smiert Fashistam" (Death to Fascists). That was what they fought for!
These are historical facts. Denying this in the name of some kind of "political correctness" is plainly wrong.
Yes, Stalin was not the nicest man in history, but at that time, he won the war and pushed the Germans all way back to the Reichstag. To his people (and many other nations), that was all that mattered and "the rest" was irrelevant. To millions of people, it was an end that justified the means. Remorse, anger and recrimination came later...

We live in a free world. If a man wishes to worship Stalin and hate fascists, he is perfectly within his rights to do so. Many people still worship Hitler. Many people still worship Mao. Many Romanians worship Ceausescu, Vlad Tepes (and a few other sociopath/sadistic tyrants) but hate Basescu (yet he may be worshipped in the years to come... ). It is called "freedom of opinion" and it is a human right enshrined in the UN Charter of Human Rights. You may not like that, but that "freedom of dissent" is also a right that you are free to enjoy.

Radu

Hitler was worse than Stalin, and that was all that Red Army knew - and all that mattered, for that fact!

@radu
As I said I can understand the personal reasons of a former combatant, and even that his known univers is (was) that of the USSR risen as a great power on The Big Victory brought by Stalin in WW2. What I don't understand is that a person, even without education, who after maybe 70 years lived in so different times, with so many changes, is still thinking in the same terms like then. I have no respect and not a single normal person should have for somebody (even a veteran) who said he has fought for Stalin, a criminal leader (he had the chance to find out about this later) who has killed, at a large scale, his own people, many minorities and lots of opponents, real or imagined. And a lot of his comrades... sent to a sure death or killed by Stalin's political commissars. And as a romanian... I wonder how somebody can be so relaxed about this issue... after all what we found out from our recent history.

@MMM
I hope you quoted from the possible point of view of an ordinary Soviet citizen. Because for someone who knows history, I think you don't have this opinion.

The man was talking about the reasons why he went to war THEN not what he thinks NOW.

Let me give you an example: a child in the 80s used to watch Tom and Jerry cartoons and played "Nu te supara frate" and "Fazan". Now such a person does not do so anymore. Such a person changed, grew up, evolved. If one asked this former child, now an adult, "what did you do when you were a child in the 80s?" and this person answered "I used to watch Huidu&Gainusa on my computer and I listened to Subcarpati on my mobile phone" it would obviously look fake.

We do not know what this man thinks NOW about Stalin, and to be honest, I could not care any less. He only told us how he experienced history as it happened THEN and I want him to tell me as accurately as possible how he did it.

The biggest mistake is to look at the yesterday with today's eyes and apply todays' standards and thinking on yesterday's events/people.

Today I know the winning "6 din 49" lotto numbers. Why did I not use them yesterday, knowing what I know today?

Radu

@Andreas: of course that's what I meant! Look again and see "that was all that Red Army knew"! Obviously, I know that Stalin has made more victims than Hitler, but also his "reign" was substantially longer than Hitler's (1924-1953 vs. 1933-1945). But let's forget statistics and see the point of view of the common soldier: they killed the invaders!!!!!
@Radub: what can one do if no other standards are available (than those of today?)

There is a saying..."history is written by the winner". For me, Stalin and Hitler are the same, but you can't say the same about the russians. After all, Stalin did save the Soviet Union and also "liberated" Eastern Europe, from the nazi invaders, who used to buy eggs from my grandmother. Anyway, my point is, that everybody sees things in their way and it's hard to understand someone's point of view, until being in that someone's shoes.