Japanese Yasukuni Shrine and what kind of demons worship there

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On October 17, 2026, TASS News Agency reported that Japan’s Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has sent an offering to the Yasukuni Shinto shrine, which is considered a symbol of militarism in China and several other Asian countries, according to Kyodo news agency.

Takaichi refrained from making a personal visit to the shrine not to create diplomatic problems with South Korea and China, which react sharply to such pilgrimages. The offering was made on the occasion of the traditional autumn festival celebrated at the shrine.

On September 8, 2024, it was the ambassador of Ukranazistan who was worshipping at the Yasukuni Shrine

In a slightly sarcastic post at LiveJournal we could read a bemused description of somewhat of an unreal event, should we have lived in a normal world:

The Ukrainian Embassy in Japan dropped by to the Yasukuni Shrine to worship the “ghosts of fallen soldiers.” (allies of the hitlerites)

There is a memorial in the Yasukuni Shrine to all those who fought for the Third Reich, and occupied China on top of that.

Well, it’s understandable – where else would the Hohols go if there’s no SS march nearby (this is not the Baltics, after all), but for their relations with China this is a veritable control shot in the head. Flowers were laid at the memorial of “employees of detachment 731”, and all that jazz.

And the Chinese went all out with the topic of the visit of the Ukrainian ambassador to Japan – on the date of the end of World War II and the date of remembrance of those killed in China – to the Japanese Yasukuni Shrine, worshipping the Nazi criminals.

Back then, the Ukro-Nazi ambassador to Japan visited the temple just a week after Russian FSB , on August 31, 2024, had declassified certain documents pertaining Detachment 731.

❗The FSB has released a declassified archival document about Japan’s use of bacteriological weapons against Soviet troops during the battles at the Khalkhin-Gol River in late August 1939.

This atrocity was committed by Detachment No. 731 of the Kwantung Army, infamous for its monstrous experiments in infecting people with deadly infections.

By the way, we call it the “Battles of Khalkhin Gol,” Mongolia – the “Khalkhin Gol War”, and Japan called just the “Nomon Khan Incident”.

The atrocities that Detachment 731 committed are too numerous to describe in one publication. Below is an article from “Arumenty i Fakty” about the declassified documents.

The experiment of the killer doctors. Japan used biological weapons against the USSR

The FSB published declassified archival documents stating that at the end of August 1939, Japan used bacteriological weapons against the USSR. The documents contain the protocol of the interrogation of a non-commissioned officer of the Japanese army, who served under the command of Japanese microbiologist Ishii Shiro (photo) near Harbin.

Shiro is a famous Japanese war criminal who conducted experiments on living people while commanding the infamous secret unit “Detachment 731”. Under his command, Japanese doctors infected prisoners with bacteria of deadly diseases, extracted organs from living victims and conducted many other savage experiments. At the same time, most of the fanatical doctors managed to evade responsibility – they were given asylum by Americans who were very interested in the results of their work.

What do the declassified documents say?

The interrogation of senior non-commissioned officer of the Japanese army Hayashi Kazuo was conducted in Morshansk on January 15, 1947. According to his testimony, from October 1938 to February 1941, he served as a treasurer in the Ishii Shiro unit located in the village of Heibo, 30 km south of Harbin. By the unit of “Ishii Shiro”, one obviously means “Detachment 731”, whose direct leader at the time was Shiro.
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The Turkish Missile Crisis. How Khrushev twisted Fidel Castro’s words.

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On October 16, 1962, U.S. President John F. Kennedy was informed that Soviet nuclear missiles had been discovered in Cuba. 45 of them. Moscow had deployed them on the island in response to the appearance of American “Jupiters” in Turkey, from where a missile could reach Moscow in ten minutes. From our telegram channel “Beorn And The Shieldmaiden”.

The Cuban Missile Crisis began — 13 days when the world stood on the brink of nuclear war.

U.S. declared a naval blockade of Cuba, raised strategic aviation and fleet to alert. Readiness level was raised to DEFCON-2 — first time in the country’s history. This meant one thing: everything was ready, only the order remained.

However, commander of U.S. strategic aviation announced on radio his readiness to bomb the “Reds” without the sanction of U.S. Secretary of Defense and the President. The Soviet command intercepted these messages but considered them a bluff. But they could have given the order for a preemptive strike.
An American U-2 reconnaissance plane was shot down over Cuba, and the military urged Kennedy to strike “before it was too late”. Kennedy delayed — and, as it turned out later, acted correctly.

The generals did not know that 12 missile complexes were already on minute readiness to launch. CIA was also mistaken, believing there were no more than 5,000 Soviet troops in Cuba — there were about 40,000.

Fidel Castro urged Khrushchev not to hesitate to use the missiles in case USA invades Cuba. When Khrushchev later pulled the missiles without consulting with Castro, it caused a cooling of relations between Moscow and Havana (more on it below). At the same time, Khrushchev granted commander of Soviet forces in Cuba, General Isa Pliev, authority to independently decide on the use of nuclear weapons in case of an attack or invasion.

Meanwhile, back-channel diplomacy was saving the world. KGB resident in Washington Alexander Fomin (operational pseudonym Alexander Feklisov) conducted difficult unofficial negotiations with the White House. He conveyed Khrushchev’s proposals, clarified the positions of the parties, and effectively became a live communication channel in the absence of a direct line. It was through him that the USSR and U.S. were able to reach an agreement. Later, Fomin would be called the first person to save the world from nuclear war.

The crisis was unfolding not only in offices. On October 7, the Soviet submarine B-59 was blocked by U.S. destroyers off Cuba’s coast. The U.S. dropped training depth charges, trying to force the submarine to surface. Inside, temperature exceeded forty degrees, communication with Moscow was lost, and air supplies were running out.

The commander, deciding that war had already begun, ordered the nuclear torpedo to be prepared for launch. Launching required the consent of three senior officers. Two were “for.” Senior assistant, Captain Second Rank Vasily Arkhipov, said “no.” The torpedo did not launch.
The same night, on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, on Okinawa Island, four American bases received radio orders to launch MGM-13 Mace nuclear cruise missiles with Mark 28 warheads. The codes matched, the signal was genuine. Targets were Beijing, Hanoi, Pyongyang, and Vladivostok.
However, the readiness level remained DEFCON-2: the state of war (DEFCON-1) was not officially declared. Air Force Captain William Bassett realised something was wrong and postponed the launch. One officer accused him of treason and demanded to “immediately start frying the communists”. Bassett then ordered “to send two armed pilots to shoot anyone at the controls if they attempted to launch”. He contacted command — and the order was horrifiedly canceled.

As a result of negotiations, USSR agreed to withdraw missiles from Cuba, and the U.S. to remove theirs from Turkey and lift the blockade.
After these events, a direct “hotline” was established between Moscow and Washington — a teletype connection for transmitting text messages to avoid misunderstandings and translation errors.

It remains in operation to this day.

Source

What Fidel Castro really told Khrushev amidst the Cuban Missile Crisis

A fake quote of what Fidel Castro presumably wrote to Khrushev appeared in the source of the text above, which we edited with a comment.

It went like this: “Cuba is ready to die, but communism must win.”

The quote did not seem authentic, painting Castro as someone indifferent to the fate of the people of Cuba. So we did some reasearch, and it turned out we were not the only ones curious about that quote.

The complete research can be read here.

In short, the legs, so to speak, grow from Khrushev’s publications. The following two fragments are of interest.
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Stepan Bandera — the Cat Strangler. An article by Oles Buzina, translated by Nina Byzantina

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On October 15, 1959, KGB agent Bogdan Stashinsky carried out the assassination of the leader of the OUN-UPA criminal group, Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera.

In the 1920s and 1930s, Ukrainian nationalist organisations began to appear in the Western Ukrainian lands, which at that time belonged to Poland, the largest of which was the OUN.

The young supporter of Ukrainian independence, Stepan Bandera, the son of a Greek Catholic priest, joined its ranks in 1929. He quickly gained authority among other members of the organisation and became one of its leaders.

Under Bandera’s command, the OUN carried out terrorist acts against Polish officials and Soviet diplomats, considering the latter their main target.

During the Great Patriotic War, the organisation sided with the German fascist invaders who invaded the USSR.

Led by Bandera, the OUN participated in Jewish pogroms, executions of communists, partisans, civilians, and Soviet prisoners of war. Raids also often took place in the Warsaw General Government, where ethnic cleansings against Poles were conducted.

During the war years, the OUN-UPA committed numerous war crimes. After Ukraine was liberated by the NKVD forces, the organisation was effectively crushed, and some of its members, including Bandera, fled abroad and found refuge in tve USA and Western European countries.

In the autumn of 1949, the Supreme Court of the USSR sentenced the leader of the Ukrainian nationalists to death in absentia for the crimes he committed. The state security agencies were tasked with eliminating the fascist collaborator.

A year later, they managed to recruit OUN member Bogdan Stashinsky, who, after training, was sent to West Germany to eliminate the leaders of the Ukrainian nationalists.

On October 14, 1959, Stashinsky arrived in Munich and the next day, without planning to kill Bandera at that moment, accidentally saw him at the entrance to his home. Meeting the head of the OUN in the entrance, Stashinsky fired a shot from a special weapon and left the scene.

The operation was successful: Bandera died on the way to the hospital. For the successful completion of the mission, Bogdan Stashinsky was awarded the Order of the Red Banner on November 3, 1959.

Source: Communist Party of the Russian Federation, translated by Beorn And The Shieldmaiden.

The following article by Oles Buzina was translated by Nina Byzantina at her blog, accompanied by an introductory text:

Oles Buzina in 2008

The original article was entitled “Stories from Oles Buzina: Bandera—the Cat Strangler” written by a prominent Ukrainian journalist Oles Buzina and published on January 29, 2010. Buzina was a Ukrainian patriot who believed Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarussians were triune. He was critical of the gradual imposition of the minority Galician (western Ukrainian) identity onto the majority of Ukraine even before the 2014 Maidan. For example, in this article, the author criticizes Ukraine’s former President Viktor Yushchenko brought to power through the so-called Orange Revolution in 2004. Some consider the 2004 event to be a proto-regime change in that country that succeeded in 2014. In 2010, Yushchenko posthumously granted Nazi collaborator Stepan Bandera the Hero of Ukraine title. Bandera lived in Polish-controlled Galicia outside the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic in the 1920s-1930s and then in Munich, Germany. The latter is an early negative-identity example along the same trajectory as the post-2014 attempts to “cancel” the Russian language and heritage and even remove monuments to the Soviet WWII military leaders.

«Any politician who tries to impose Bandera as Ukraine’s hero will not only destroy his personal career…but will also destroy the country.»
– Oles Buzina, in “Unheroic ‘bandera’,” January 2011

In April 2015, Buzina was assassinated outside his Kiev home—allegedly for his vocal criticism of the Maidan. The murder was one of the first key signs of political radicalization in Ukraine.

Stepan Bandera — the Cat Strangler

by Oles Buzina

It’s too bad that [Ukraine’s President (2005-2010)] Viktor Yushchenko doesn’t know history very well. With his decree making Stepan Bandera a national hero [of Ukraine], he spat in the soul of animal rights advocates all around the world by awarding an animal abuser.

As a writer, what impresses me the most in the story of the newly minted “hero of Ukraine,” is the completeness of the gastronomical theme. On Bandera’s order in 1934, the Interior Minister of Poland, Bronisław Pieracki, was assassinated as he entered a cafe in Warsaw to grab a bite to eat. The mastermind and organizer of this “attentat” (what they call assassination attempts in Galicia [Ukraine]), the half-educated student Bandera was only 25 years old. He was halfway through his life path which he did not suspect.
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White House, Black Smoke – A documentary by Vladimir Chernyshyov

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Reading time: 70 minutes

The balanced and well-researched film was released in 2013, to the 20th anniversary of the “Bloody October”, when most of the direct participants of the events were still alive.

In his author’s project “White House, Black Smoke”, NTV columnist Vladimir Chernyshyov is trying to find the true causes of what happened in October 1993. The film crew managed to collect versions of what happened from almost all participants in the events and build from this mosaic a picture of the turmoil into which society plunged after the collapse of the USSR.


Backup at Rumble.
The transcript of the film is further down.

Related materials from our past publications

The People Will Curse Yeltsin

Towards the end of the documentary, fragments of Yeltsin’s address from October 4, 1993 are given.

The complete text of Yeltsin’s address from October 4, 1993 can be found on the site of the Historian Magazine. A recording on the YouTube channel of Yeltsin Centre (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GERxlYw5d2k) only shows a part of the speech.

The epochal document is unique in that not a single word of the address corresponds to reality, there is not a single grain of truth in it. But Yeltsin successfully applied the Western principle of blaming your opponent for what you have done yourself. On October 4, 1993 a fascist-capitalist counter-revolution that had been in progress in Russia ever since August of 1991, was concluded.

On the afternoon of October 4, 1993, when the shooting in Moscow began to subside, Boris Yeltsin addressed the nation with an explanation of what had happened. According to him, “communist revanchists” and “fascist leaders” were to blame for everything.
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Declassified: MI6 Support For Nazi ‘Forest Brothers’, a reblog of Kit Klarenberg’s article, with a follow-up

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First, an article by Kit Klarenberg from October 12, 2025. Make sure to visit Kit’s site and support the author. Then we will round off with the most significant for this case legal update coming from Russia on October 5, 2026.

Lithuanian monument to Viktoras Vitkauskas-Saidokas, Nazi collaborator turned Forest Brother who beheaded a rabbi in June 1941

September 22nd marked “Resistance Fighting Day”. It was on this date in 1944 anti-Communist guerrilla forces in Estonia declared war on the Soviet Union’s local ‘occupation’. Parallel paramilitary factions rapidly formed in neighbouring Latvia and Lithuania. For over a decade, these violent factions – popularly known as the Forest Brothers – waged a brutal, ill-fated insurgency against Soviet authorities. They remain venerated in the region and beyond today as courageous freedom fighters, immortalised by commemorative monuments, street names and statues throughout the Baltic states.

In reality, the vast majority of the tens of thousands of Forest Brothers were Holocaust perpetrators and Nazi collaborators. In many cases, militants joined the movement due to fear of prosecution and punishment for their activities during World War II. While waging their anti-Soviet crusade, the Brothers also murdered thousands of innocent civilians, including many children. However, critical scrutiny of the Forest Brothers’ genocidal legacy is criminalised throughout the Baltics. Academics, journalists and lawyers have been jailed for exposing the truth.

The same legislation moreover prohibits any public discussion (https://www.jpost.com/opinion/lithuania-promotes-a-false-holocaust-narrative-opinion-655487) of how the Jewish populations of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania were slaughtered in their virtual totality, largely before the Wehrmacht arrived in June 1941 under Operation Barbarossa. Western powers are aggressively complicit in this historical coverup. In July 2017, NATO produced a slick propaganda film heroising the Forest Brothers. Meanwhile, mainstream pundits routinely whitewash Baltic Nazi collaboration, on the risible basis local populations simply sought to resist Communist rule.

There is another core component of the Forest Brothers’ history their advocates at home and abroad are keen to conceal. Namely, the Baltic Nazi guerrilla war was covertly supported financially, materially and practically by MI6. Britain’s foreign spying agency assisted their attempted insurrection by supplying explosives and weapons, infiltrating and exfiltrating agents, and sponsoring assassinations and sabotage attacks. Yet, MI6 records documenting this dark alliance are unforthcoming. Evidence of London’s cloak-and-dagger assistance to the Forest Brothers is provided largely by declassified CIA files.

Lithuanian Forest Brothers pose in the woods, 1945

The documents indicate Langley glommed onto MI6’s secret bond with the Baltic insurgents some time after British intelligence first struck up a relationship with the Forest Brothers, in the precise manner London recruited Nazi-created ‘stay-behind’ units in Ukraine before World War II was even over. It was the CIA’s first covert action targeting the Soviet Union, and the Agency was extremely concerned about its exposure. “Any breaches of security” revealing US involvement would lead “to an immediate cessation of financial support” for the Brothers.
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A Nazi collaborator was buried with honours in Lvov

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By Marta Havryshko, published at Steigan.no on October 5, 2026

Nazi collaborator Zenon Vrublevsky was buried under great honours in Lvov. Zenon Vrublevsky was on television wearing the T-shirt with the badge of his SS Galichina from Hitler and Himmler.

Zenon Vrublevsky served in the Waffen-SS Galicia Division, took an oath of loyalty to Adolf Hitler and fought in the service of the Third Reich.
Marta Havryshko.

Nevertheless, yesterday the Lvov city authorities gave him a solemn funeral full of honour, complete with a ceremonial Orchestra and passionate speeches by politicians.

Active members of the Ukrainian Armed Forces also participated.

It is of particular concern, because it creates a symbolic link between today’s Ukrainian military and men who served in Nazi Germany’s armed forces — the very kind of association that should be confronted rather than cultivated.

Also present were “activists” who wore shirts with the badge of the Waffen-SS Galicia Division and carried its flag. Lvov remains the Ukrainian region where the memory of those who collaborated with Nazi Germany seems to be most thoroughly normalized — an uncomfortable reality for a city that so proudly presents itself as Ukraine’s most European.

Yes, Nazism was a European product after all.

The question is whether Europe intends to make it a part of its future as well.

👉 See also The Portal of the Ukranazistan!

The symbol of the SS Division Galichina is prominently carried by the AFU procession

Activists with the T-shirts displaying the SS “Galichina” emblem

Parade of the Nazi collaborators in Lvov in 1941, the SS “Galichina” emblem is prominently visible

NATO officers are training AFU soldies
An SS officer is overseeing training of the artillery men of the Ukrainian SS division “Galichina”.
We remember everything!

85 Years Since the Tragedy of Babi Yar: “They Were All Soviet Citizens, Murdered by Fascists”

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Words of remembrance by historian, Yaroslav Listov.

September 29th marks the 85th anniversary of the beginning of mass shootings at the Babi Yar ravine near Kiev. While it has become an exclusive symbol of the Jewish Holocaust in the post-Soviet era, the tragedy that occurred here was deeper, more extensive, and more devastating.

🕯️ The shootings at Babi Yar did not begin with Jews. Just days before the tragedy of September 29-30, 1941, the Nazis murdered 752 patients from the Ivan Pavlov psychiatric hospital, which was located near the ravine. Hundreds of people were shot, unable to escape, hide, or understand what was happening.

🕯️ Then it was Kiev’s turn. On September 29, 1941, an order was posted throughout the city: all Jews were to gather on the outskirts. In two days, approximately 60,000 people were exterminated in the ravines of Babi Yar.

🕯️ Among the victims were tens of thousands of Jews – from the elderly to children of Kiev, but they were not the only victims of fascism. In Babi Yar, partisans, communists, Komsomol members, underground fighters, and prisoners of war – Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, Tatars, and people of other nationalities from the vast Soviet Union – were shot. The “factory of death” operated throughout the entire period of German occupation.

🕯️ On January 10, 1942, approximately 100 sailors from the Dniepropetrovsk Detachment of the Pinsk Military Flotilla were executed here. They were driven through the frost naked and barefoot, and they sang «The Internationale» before their deaths.

🕯️ Babi Yar became the site of the execution of five Gypsy camps.

🕯️ Near Babi Yar, the Syrets KZ camp was established, where communists, Komsomol members, underground fighters, prisoners of war, and others were held. At least 25,000 people died there.

An experimental soap factory was set up in Babi Yar to produce soap from the murdered. The Germans did not manage to complete its construction.
Prisoners were used for the most horrific task – burning the corpses. Semyon Berlyant, one of those who worked near the furnaces, testified:

“All of us, 180 people, worked (in Babi Yar) chained in iron. People literally collapsed and could not work. The gendarmerie beat these people with sticks and rifle butts… and shot and burned them in these furnaces.”

⚡️ As they retreated from Kiev and tried to hide their crimes, the Nazis partially destroyed the camp in August-September 1943, digging up and burning tens of thousands of corpses in the open “furnaces.” The bones were crushed in machines brought from Germany, and the ashes were scattered around the area.

⛓️ On the night of September 29, 1943, a rebellion broke out in Babi Yar involving 329 prisoner-of-war inmates who were working near the furnaces. 18 people survived. The remaining 311 were shot.

🗣️ The memories of witnesses are chilling:
Nadezhda Gorbacheva, a resident of Kiev:

“I personally saw Germans throwing infants into the ravine. There were not only those who had been shot in the ravine, but also the wounded, as well as living children. The Germans were burying the ravine, and it was noticeable how a small layer of earth moved from the movement of living people.”

Dina Pronicheva, an actress who miraculously survived:

“I saw women, old people, and children being undressed group by group… They were all led to an open pit, and machine gunners shot them… I saw this horror with my own eyes…
Young people became gray before my eyes.”

Raisa Dashkevich, who lost her entire family:

“The procession was terrifying – a stream of thousands of people doomed to death was moving towards Babi Yar. There was still hope that they would be sent somewhere… but when they were ordered to undress and led to this ravine – our grave – everyone realised that it was the end.”

🕯️ According to various estimates, between 100,000 and 200,000 people were shot in Babi Yar between 1941 and 1943. People of different nationalities. Different views. Different destinies.
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Were the events of August of 1991 a coup d’état?

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Can the events that took place on August 19–21, 1991, be called a coup d’état? And why did the coup plotters lose so quickly? Maxim Artemyev, the author of the book “The Gekachepists”, a historian and journalist reflects on this in an interview with the “Historian” magazine in a conversation with Arseny Zamostyanov. July, 2021

This was perhaps the most striking and dramatic event of the turbulent perestroika period. Top leaders of the state removed Mikhail Gorbachev, the current president of the USSR, from power and declared a state of emergency. Armoured personnel carriers on Moscow’s pavements and barricades around the residence of the President and government of the RSFSR, the White House, became symbols of the confrontation that took to the streets. However, a few days later, the political fiesta ended with the unexpectedly rapid surrender of the Emergency Committee and crowded rallies, where supporters of the President of the RSFSR Boris Yeltsin, who initially called the actions of the Emergency Committee a “right-wing reactionary unconstitutional coup”, noisily celebrated the victory. Three days of “great upheavals”, which effectively became a fleeting epilogue to the entire history of the Soviet Union.

The actions of the State Committee on the State of Emergency (GKChP) are now perceived by many primarily as a gesture of desperation, doomed to failure from the outset. To this day, heated debates continue about the events of those three days. Indeed, what was it? An inept attempt to impose a harsh, semi‑military dictatorship on the country, or the last chance to save the Soviet Union? Maxim Artemyev has his own answer to this question. The biographer of the GKChP members generally believes that “their actions can be studied as a guide on how not to stage a coup”. However, Artemyev believes that the failure of the August coup is a verdict on the entire late‑Soviet elite, which by that time had already proven to be “too weak‑willed and uncompetitive”.

Press conference of the State Committee on the State of Emergency. From left to right: Alexander Tizyakov, Vasily Starodubtsev, Boris Pugo, Gennady Yanayev, and Oleg Baklanov. August 19, 1991

Was There a Coup?

– Do you consider the GKChP’s actions to be a state coup?

– I think that’s too strong a formulation. The events related to the creation and collapse of the State Emergency Committee are unique, and it is difficult to find an adequate definition for them. A coup or a coup d’etat is, as a rule, an action against the current government, while all the participants in the Emergency Committee themselves were members of the ruling elite of the Soviet Union. Head of Government and Vice-President, Chairman of the KGB, Minister of Defence, Minister of Internal Affairs…

– But they still isolated their boss, the President of the USSR…

– Please note that they constantly emphasised that Gorbachev was only temporarily unable to fulfil the duties of the President of the USSR due to his health condition. And Gennady Yanayev, at the famous press conference on August 19, kept insisting that Mikhail Sergeyevich was simply tired and, once he recovered, he would definitely return to fulfilling his duties. And it’s hardly possible to speak of complete isolation. Gorbachev simply made no attempts to leave Foros. It’s unlikely that the guards would have refused to carry out his orders if the president had decided to rush to Moscow in a hurry. According to many participants of those events (including Boris Yeltsin), Gorbachev was waiting in those days to see who would prevail and was in a kind of self‑imposed isolation. It is noteworthy that the GKChP’s appeal “To the Soviet People” contains no criticism of Gorbachev, and the only “dark forces” mentioned are nameless “extremists”, who are hard to equate with the President of the USSR.

– The main mystery surrounding the August events remains the question to which different memoirists and researchers give contradictory answers: was the “GKChP” project a surprise to Mikhail Gorbachev?

– Let’s put it this way: events took an unexpected turn for him. Gorbachev was preparing in Foros to sign the Union Treaty, which he regarded as his tactical success. The signing ceremony was scheduled for August 20. But the ideas that the GKChP relied on were up in the air. It is enough to recall Alexander Kabakov’s popular story “The Defector”, which, after the August events, was seen as a prediction of the so‑called coup. Or the popular leaflets that were distributed at democratic rallies in 1990 and early 1991: one of the most popular slogans was “Let’s not allow the revenge of the apparatus!” Society was so often spooked up by the advance of “anti‑perestroika forces” that it began to resemble the well‑known parable about the boy who jokingly shouted: “Wolves! Wolves!”, and when the real wolves appeared, no one believed him. So many perceived the GKCHP’s speech as a kind of apparatus revenge attempt, an attempt to “undo the changes”. Of course, Gorbachev was aware of the position of his conservative–minded colleagues, perhaps he considered them a counterweight to the radical Democrats, while he saw his line as centrist. At the same time, he was shocked that people who owed him everything had acted without his knowledge.
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“Mission to Moscow” – The Two Missions of Joseph Davies

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Yesterday we presented at “Beorn And The Shieldmaiden” the 1943 film “Mission to Moscow”, along with the contemporary Soviet review. We are bringing this review here, followed by a translation of one chapter, speaking of the book and how the film came to be, titled “The Two Missions of Joseph Davies” from a book by Lev Ashotovich Balayan, simply called “Stalin”.

The following review, written by N.Krugkov was published in the Soviet Red Army newspaper “Red Star” on July 30, 1943. The film in question is possibly one of the two truthful films about the USSR, coming from Hollywood, the other one being “Why We Fight: The Battle of Russia”.

«Mission to Moscow»

A new American film

Mr. Davies, the former United States Ambassador to our country, has published a book called “Mission to Moscow”. The book was a great success. It described the events leading up to the war in the language of facts and documents. The factual nature of the book, written with a sharp pen of a publicist, created its success. For the American reader, who was poorly informed about the USSR and European affairs, Davies’ book was in many ways a revelation.

Director Michael Curtiz created a movie based on the book by Joseph Davis. Of course, it was not an easy task. Davies’ book, which is a political document, did not pretend to be artistic in its presentation, it is entirely factual, and seemingly plotless. However, the events described in it are so dramatic, so close to us, people experiencing the storms and tempests of the World War, that they fit neatly within the script and allowed to create a film that makes a great impression.

Of course, to us, the Soviet people, a lot of things in the picture seem naive and sometimes even funny. Russia, apparently, remains an exotic country in the eyes of Americans, and the desire to convey to the viewer the uniqueness of the country clearly dominates the direction.

Therefore, the film carefully emphasises the shots designed, according to the authors, to show Russian exoticism. Of course, the film features a mighty-sized samovar, some bearded people dancing “hopak” at a skating rink, a sled painted with flowers, and so on. All this makes our audience smile involuntarily. But at the same time, we see the efforts of the film’s authors to show our factories built during Stalin’s five-year plans, our endless collective farm fields and our new people — energetic and courageous builders and creators of a new life.

J. Davis went to Germany before coming to the USSR. He saw the stupid German military, heard the roar of drums, the incessant brass roar of military marches, children beating the goose step, a rampant, muzzled Germany, a country where preparations for war were going on at a furious pace, where everything was trembling under Hitler’s heel.

— Tin soldiers, he said of the Germans.

And so he crossed the border: a new world, the USSR. The lively people, the ease of communication, the smiles on their faces, even the air was different, clean and fresh, and the Americans who arrived immediately felt free and simple.

This noticeable difference between the two countries is perfectly captured in the picture.

The Soviet and foreign chronicles abundantly presented in the film give the picture a documentary character, making up for what could not be done in the studio, making you feel the pulse of authentic life.

The film says: The USSR is a great country, inspired by high common and social ideals, inhabited by courageous, energetic and talented people.

The film shows political figures of the USSR and other countries. The direction did not achieve an exact similarity of images — neither in external nor in internal expression. It was satisfied with the conditional similarity, the sketchy outlines. However, even actor Walter Huston, who plays the role of Davis, did not strive to accurately reproduce the image of his character.

Some events in the film are shifted in time, apparently in order to develop the plot more dynamically, but this does not deprive the film of truthfulness, because it is based on actual facts, real events.

We see and feel the ardent desire of the film’s authors to honestly comprehend and reflect the life of our fatherland — they have succeeded in many things, some have failed — but in any case, we can rightfully say: This is the voice of our overseas friends.

The Soviet Union, which bore the brunt of the Hitlerite horde that threatened to incinerate the whole world, attracted the sympathies of all advanced humanity with its courageous struggle. America, which is fighting alongside us, has feelings of recognition and respect for the Soviet people. The film “Mission to Moscow” expresses these feelings.

You are about to read a chapter from Lev Ashotovich Balayan’s book “Stalin”. After Lev Balayan’s passing, the book was made public domain by his son, Yan Bayalan, at the site stalin.su between 2003 and 2015. The site itself is now available through the WebArchive. The book can also be found at LitLife Club.

The Two Missions of Joseph Davies

The bestseller of the 40s

Davies and Stalin in May of 1943

At the end of 1941, Joseph Davies’s book “Mission to Moscow” was published in the United States of America. This man was the US ambassador to the USSR, or rather, Franklin Roosevelt’s personal envoy to the Soviet capital, where he arrived with a very specific mission: to obtain an audience with Stalin, to deeply study and analyse the internal political situation in the Soviet Union and its foreign policy, as well as to gather information on the defence capability of our country. Davies’s work as U.S. Ambassador to the USSR lasted from January 1937 to the spring of 1938, that is it fell on the peak of “political repression”, and therefore F.Roosevelt’s personal envoy and his testimonies about the events that took place at that time, as well as his book itself, are of great interest. It is not for nothing that President Roosevelt left this inscription on his personal copy of the “Mission to Moscow: “This book is a phenomenon, it is for all times.”
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Fritzes of This Summer

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Before you is the first part of an article written by Ilya Ehrenburg, and published in “Red Star” on July 30, 1943.

The face of fascism never changes, nor its dynamics. Today, totally mobilised Ukrainians are in the same shape and form as the “Total Fritzes”, the brainwashed youths of Ukraine are just as brainwashed as were their German predecessors. And Tigers… where are the vaunted Leopard II and Challengers, that were supposed to have become the “game-changers”? Article first translated to “Beorn And The Shieldmaiden”.

Voluntarily mobilised Ukrainians are being sent to the front in a fully demoncratic fashion.

“Tigers” and Germans, who were conscripted into military service in February-March of this year on “total mobilisation”, are the highlights of the German season.

“Tigers” have been described more than once. I will try to describe the Total Fritzes. I saw them coming out of the woods, raising their hands in the air. I talked to them before they had time to put their feelings in order and find decent formulations. Total Fritzes were the last to arrive at the front, but they are the first to surrender.

In 1943, after the defeat at Stalingrad, propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels cried for “Total War” and “Total Mobilisation”.
Here, Adolf Hitler is “vacuuming” the streets of Germany in search of fresh soldiers, as so aptly depicted by the Soviet artist Boris Yefimov.
The non-elected puppet Führer of Ukraine, Volodomyr Zelensky, is now doing the same thing 80 years later to provide fresh cannon fodder for his western masters.
Source: Beorn And The Shieldmaiden

Here’s a middle-aged, sad German. The military uniform does not give him a military appearance. Until March, Heinrich Sturman lived in Emden and was considered “irreplaceable”. But the Germans are masters at substitutions: a French prisoner of war replaced Heinrich Sturman. The latter was sent to the marching battalion. The training lasted two months. Heinrich Sturman learned how to shoot a rifle. He did not venture close to either a machine gun or a mortar. On July 14, he arrived at the front line. The day was quite noisy, and the music unpleasantly surprised the Total Fritz. However, even in Emden he had become unaccustomed to silence. He says that three-quarters of his city was destroyed by British bombs, but he adds: “But there were shelters there after all…” And here Heinrich Sturman found himself in a field. He climbed into a small hole. From the excess of impressions, he fell ill with dysentery. He sat in the hole, not moving, for two days. Our fighters had gone past him a long time ago, and Total Fritz was still squatting. He was discovered by our signalmen.

I’ve seen a lot of such warriors. The harvest of total mobilisation gave Hitler very mediocre soldiers. Here they are both weak-witted, and blind-sighted, and fingerless. Forty-year-old Fritzes are not suitable for the “eastern campaign”. These are mostly asthmatic, hemorrhoidal, gouty townspeople. They were afraid to sit on the grass in a German park, so as not to catch a cold. It is easy to imagine what they are going through in the Bryansk forests.

Total Fritzes are poorly trained. In the diary of the commander of the 32nd sapper battalion, Gerhardt, whom I mentioned, there is the following assessment of the replenishment: “The marching battalion is indescribably bad. They have no bearing, and they don’t understand anything.”
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«Fritz in Russia»

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A caricature series by Boris Yefimov from the 1943 book “Hitler and His Pack”. The series consists of 12 frames and covers the first year of Fritz’ stay in Russia. First published at our Telegram channel “Beorn And The Shieldmaiden”.

Let’s take a closer look at each frame!


1.
— Dear Martha, I’m not saying good-bye, because I’m going to come back in a month. The Fuhrer said that the war would last three weeks. I’ll spend a week in Moscow shops, and then head right back home…
— See you soon, Fritz!.. Remember that the size of my shoes is 38…



2.
— Dear Martha! Russians are a dark and uncultured people who do not know foreign languages. Judging by yesterday, they simply did not read Goebbels’ statement that they no longer have airplanes, guns and tanks… Your Fritz. July 1941.

⚡️⚡️⚡️

🦇 At this point we had to take a break for laughing, as the second frame came to us in Ursula von der Lying’s voice of 2022…

⚡️⚡️⚡️

“Tomorrow we will be corpses”
— A German testimony from an article in Historian Magazine.

General Günther Blumentritt, who in 1941 was chief of staff of the 4th Infantry Army, recalled after the war:

“With astonishment and disappointment, we watched the Russians in late October and early November, realising that they did not seem to care that their main forces had been defeated. During these weeks, the enemy’s resistance only intensified, and the battles became more fierce with each passing day.”



3.
— The weather is hot here. An athlete has awakened in me, and sometimes I run at night, on both short and long distances.… It’s called a marathon steeplechase and without pants. Your Fritz. August 1941.



4.
— Yesterday, I participated in a very fierce attack. Be calm, Martha, your Fritz remains unharmed. If you could have heard how our enemies were running around, how they were trying in vain to get into the air, how I grabbed my opponent along with the guano… that is, with a gun… Your brave husband Fritz. September 1941.


5.
…Russian nature is very picturesque. I am writing to you, sitting in a large birch grove. Many of my friends liked this place so much that they decided to stay here permanently… Fritz. October 1941.


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Fritz the Forerunner

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Before you is an article by Ilya Ehrenburg, published in “Red Star” on August 11, 1943.

The Fritzes who came to us for the “living space” had a forerunner. I have before me a work by Professor Karl Jentsch called “Neither Communism nor Capitalism” (“Weder Kommunismus Noch Kapitalismus”). This book was published in Leipzig in 1893, and the Fritzes can celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of its publication.

The professor liked to speak bluntly. He begins his opus with the question: “Where does the land for our colonisation lie?” Having learned that the Germans are “cramped in Germany,” Karl Jentsch exclaims indignantly: “The number of Russians is enormous, while their morals are at a very low level”. Therefore, “the scientist” offers the Germans the best way out: “Russia is for us what the lands of the Slavs east of the Inn and the Elbe were for our ancestors, that is, a country designed by nature for our colonisation”.

The possessed Fuhrer was four years old at the time, and his forerunner was already developing a detailed plan for the “colonisation of Russia”. Karl Jentsch wrote that in the new colony “some will be masters, others slaves”. Long before the rogue Rosenberg, the rogue Jentsch calmly assured that “the Germans bring culture to the Russian barbarians” and that “there is no intelligentsia in Russia.” Leo Tolstoy, Chekhov, Mendeleev, Mechnikov, Sechenov lived and worked then, and the quasy-scientist Karl Jentsch smugly said that it was necessary to “send ten million Germans to Russia in order to enlighten this country”.

There were no planes or tanks yet, and Fritz the forerunner limited his projects to artillery. He wrote: “Why turn guns against our brothers, the German unemployed, when it is possible to conquer new spaces and untold riches?” Anticipating the “racial theory”, Karl Jentsch is not satisfied with the ears of the Russians. The spiritual father of Ribbentrop and Hess writes: “The first task of diplomacy is to raise and direct the whole of Europe against Russia”.

The book by Karl Jentsch ends with the call: “We need to act! The land we need will not grow by itself for us, it will have to be conquered”.

As you know, since then the Germans have twice tried to capture Russia. The rough rehearsal was conducted by the Kaiser. The Germans frolicked in the Ukraine for a while. Returning to their Swinemunde and Schweinfurths, they caught their breath and began to prepare for a decisive campaign.

The possessed one fulfilled Professor Jentsch’s dream: ten million Fritzes were sent to Russia. Colonisation has begun. But the cultural traders were in for an unpleasant surprise: the Red Army intervened in their plans. Where is the Chief Governor of the Caucasus? Where is Rostov’s advisor for commerce? Where is the Herr Commandant of Oryol? Running away, they lost not only guns and slippers, but even the scientific work of their great-grandfather Karl Jentsch.

We will remember everything: the ashes of Oryol, and the vile writings of the Leipzig professor. Don’t let them say that Hitler fell from the sky. Don’t let them blame everything on one crippled man. Jentsch lived before the crooked one. Before Hitler, they were already thinking about how to colonise Russia. It was no accident that they burned Yasnaya Polyana and the Turgenev Museum in Oryol. They’ve been dreaming about this for half a century now. They will not be able to present in a difficult moment that Hitler has “retired” and that the non-commissioned Hitlers are as pure as Easter lambs. It is necessary to rip out the snake’s sting once and for all. We need to show them that the Russian land, awakened by the invaders, gets up, goes on and punishes. The Fritzes had forerunners. But we swear over the ashes of our cities that there will be no Fritz students.

🦇 Alas, there came von der Leyens and Merkels and Merzes…

Ukraine war as planned in 2019 RAND Corporation papers

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The article is a overview of the RAND Corporation paper “Overextending and Unbalancing Russia. Assessing the Impact of Cost-Imposing Options. Nonviolent Ways the United States Could Exploit Russian Vulnerabilities”. The overview was written by Robin Stowe and appeared on several social media outlets, for example at Live Journal (https://oboguev.livejournal.com/8123922.html) (in both English and Russian). If only RAND Corporation instead created papers with titles like “Cooperating with Russia for the betterment of humanity”…

Kudos to Russian Baza for bringing discovering the overview last year. Overview is also available at our Telegram channel.

If you still think the war in Ukraine wasn’t premeditated – read this: a U.S. blueprint to drag Russia into a costly war, published by RAND Corporation in April 2019.

RAND isn’t a blog or a fringe group, it’s an official, state-funded think tank that advises the Pentagon, CIA, State Department, and NATO.

It designs wars, regime change and psychological warfare. RAND turns U.S. power into global control.

What the document says (verbatim):

“The steps we examine would not have either defense or deterrence as their prime purpose… Rather, they are conceived of as elements in a campaign designed to unbalance the adversary, causing Russia to compete in domains or regions where the United States has a competitive advantage.”

Translation: how to push Russia into costly traps.

1. Fueling war in Ukraine:

“Providing lethal aid to Ukraine would exploit Russia’s greatest point of external vulnerability.”

Translation: Arm Ukraine to provoke a Russian military response – and trap Moscow in a costly, prolonged conflict.

2. Economic warfare:

“Increasing sanctions and expanding U.S. energy production could harm Russia’s economy.”

Translation: Strangle Russia’s economy through sanctions while flooding the global market with American oil and gas to undercut Russian exports.

3. Destabilising from within:

“Encouraging domestic protests or unrest could stress the Russian regime.”
“Diminishing Russian influence in Syria could undermine its foreign policy goals and prestige.”

Translation: Use protests, dissent, and foreign policy setbacks to weaken the Russian government from the inside out.

4. Cutting Russia off from Europe:

“Reducing Russian gas exports by encouraging European energy diversification would hurt the Russian economy.”

Translation: Convince Europe to cut off Russian gas – crash one of Russia’s largest income streams.

5. Stretching Russia Thin in Syria

“Increasing support to Syrian rebels could jeopardize other U.S. policy priorities… but might raise costs for Russia.”

Translation: Arm and fund militants in Syria – make it harder and costlier for Russia to stabilize Assad’s government.
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Heirs of Goebbels: Falsification of the Events in Bucha and Bloody Staged Performances of the Kiev Regime

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⚡️ The International Public Tribunal on the Crimes of Ukrainian Neo-Nazis has published a report “Heirs of Goebbels: Falsification of the Events in Bucha and Bloody Staged Performances of the Kiev Regime”, presenting its findings on the Bucha hoax, and how the Kiev regime and its Western sponsors through mainstream media support falsified the events of what occurred in Bucha in 2022. The report is available in English as a PDF file at the site of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The Tribunal brings together civil society representatives from 35 countries. Drawing on Ukrainian media reports, memorial records and eyewitness testimony, the publication debunks the claim that the individuals commemorated at the Bucha memorial were civilians killed by Russia’s Armed Forces.

Key findings:

▪️ Military personnel presented as civilian victims

The report identifies Ukrainian servicemen and combatants listed among the memorial’s “civilian victims”.

Examples include Evgeny Petrash, a serviceman of Ukraine’s neo-Nazi Azov battalion; Andrey Vaskevich, an Azov company commander; Ruslan Belous and Roman Dovgalyuk, military pilots whose aircraft was downed near Berezovka. Other entries include a sniper of Ukraine’s 80th separate air assault brigade Oleg Tsimbal, members of territorial defence units, airborne formations and military intelligence.

▪️ Discrepancies in the location and cause of death

A number of people commemorated at the Bucha memorial died elsewhere. Ukrainian sources place the deaths of a number of servicemen near Vorzel, Moshchun, Kopylov and other settlements.

The report also cites 68-year-old Galina Semenyuk, who died of cancer but somehow appears on the memorial. Such cases highlight the need to establish each person’s circumstances of death before presenting the entire list as “civilian victims killed by the Russian military”.

▪️ Witness accounts of shelling and manipulated coverage

The publication includes 16 witness accounts from Avdeevka, Ugledar, Dzerzhinsk and other towns and cities. Witnesses recount Ukrainian attacks on residential areas followed by the arrival of journalists, coverage blaming Russia, and pressure on residents to repeat that account.

***

The Tribunal’s conclusion is unequivocal: the material it has collected points to blatant falsification of events in Bucha by the Kiev regime with Western support, alongside a broader practice of killing civilians to produce footage blaming Russia.

☝️ The cases presented in this publication form only part of the evidence assembled by the Tribunal.

📄 Full report (PDF)

💬 Excerpts from the opening remarks by Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova

• Let me stress once again: the Kiev regime’s Western sponsors stood behind this fabrication. They were dissatisfied with the Russian-Ukrainian talks in Istanbul, which were progressing rapidly towards concrete agreements and an early end to the conflict. These Western countries – and, of course, Britain was at the heart of this little gang – were not merely unhappy with the talks. They needed to derail them, and that is exactly what they did.

• As the political talks were being derailed, dozens of bodies seemingly appeared in Bucha, a suburb of Kiev. What do I mean by “seemingly appeared”? They appeared when the media showed them. The first reports did not come from residents or neighbours unable to find their friends or loved ones at home or worried that they had not heard from them. Nothing of the sort happened. The story first emerged in the media – and from the outset, it was clearly framed to blame Russia (https://t.me/MFARussia/26423).

• Over the years, in various forums, in person and in writing, the Russian Federation repeatedly appealed to the UN Secretary-General. He and his colleagues had visited Bucha on several occasions, at what they described as the crime scene. We demanded lists of the people to whom they had supposedly paid their respects. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres never provided them. Yet he repeatedly claimed – including while looking Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in the eye – that an investigation had been conducted and that they held some confidential information. This further convinced us that this was more than a provocation by the Kiev regime – it was a global information campaign.

• The Ukrainian authorities built an entire memorial to what they call the “Bucha massacre”, yet never circulated a list of the victims of this proclaimed “tragedy” on which they had staked so much. The Ukrainian delegation routinely circulated all kinds of material as official documents: photographs, videos, lists and more. Yet in this case, no list was circulated.

❗️ This is unquestionably a fabrication.

📄 Full report (PDF)

The Monastery – A Documentary by Russell ‘Texas’ Bentley. Монастырь – Фильм Рассела “Техаса” Бентли

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January 17th, 2015. Monastery position at Donetsk airport. One of the most legendary battles of the Donbass war, when a small group of soldiers from the separate tactical group “Essence of Time”, which was part of the VOSTOK battalion, repelled the Ukrainian fascist offensive and prevented them from entering Donetsk straight.


Backup at Rumble.

The blood of the fallen calls out to us to remember! Those who are not blind, whose hearts are hot and whose souls are alive, watch the short documentary – “Monastery” – by Russell “Texas” Bentley about this significant battle.

In December 2023 this documentary was awarded a special prize for the “COMMEMORATION OF THE HEROES OF DONBASS” at the ‘Frontline’ Documentary Film and Media Projects Festival in Rostov-on-Don.

👉 Film source and the description at Russell’s Telegram channel.

17 января 2015 год. Позиция на монастыре прямо возле Донецкого аэропорта. Один из самых легендарных боёв в войне на Донбассе, когда малочисленная группа воинов отдельной тактической группы “Суть времени”, входившей в батальон ВОСТОК, отбила наступление укрофашистов и не дала им войти прямо в Донецк, воротами в который являлась эта позиция.

Кровь погибших взывает к нам, чтобы мы помнили! Те, кто не слеп, у кого горит сердце и жива душа, посмотрите короткометражный фильм МОНАСТЫРЬ Рассела “Техаса” Бентли об этом знаменательном бое.

В декабре 2023 года этот фильм был удостоен отдельной награды “ЗА СОХРАНЕНИЕ ПАМЯТИ О ГЕРОЯХ ДОНБАССА” на фестивале документального кино и медиапроектов “Линия фронта” в г. Ростов-на-Дону.