Commemorative Exhibition – 80 Years of The Battle of Stalingrad

Today is the 80th anniversary since the end of the Battle of Stalingrad, when on the 2nd of February 1943 the world saw the turning point in the course of The Great Patriotic War – the Second World War.

This blog marks the occasion with a series of historic flashbacks, found on the pages that can be accessed either through the top menu or by diving into the link below!

Battle of Stalingrad 1943-2023

Named Родина-мать зовёт! — Rodina-Mat’ zovyot! — The Motherland Calls!
The statue on Mamayev Kurgan in Volgograd, Russia, commemorating the Battle of Stalingrad with Nazi Germany.
Photo: Kim Lau

A letter from grandfather “Tiger” to his grandson “Leopard”, sent to Ukraine

This humorous continuity, or historical parallel that there’s been so many of lately caught my eye on the TopWar site. So, without further ado, here is a translation that tries to preserve the wit of the original.


A letter from grandfather “Tiger” to his grandson “Leopard”, sent to Ukraine

24.01.2023

Grandfather and grandson

Guten morgen, mein lieber grandson! I am infinitely glad that you decided to continue “Drang nah Osten”. The Russians have a lot of good fertile land. But for some reason they cling to, and do not want to give it to us, the Aryans. After all, only we are able to administrate this wild land and the barbarians that inhabit it.

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Rostislav Ischenko on the Anti-Russian Racism: Operation “Derusification” or a global attempt to abolish the Russians

It has been a while since I last translated an article by Rostislav Ischenko. In the past I translated such articles as The Great Patriotic War in Ukraine. A historical retrospective by Rostislav Ischenko and Ukraine celebrated its independence – from what?. His political and historical analysis largely centres around Ukraine and the parallels of the present-day historical process to those of the past. Recently he published a number of articles that were mostly of interest to the domestic reader. The one you are about to read now, however, touches upon the wider theme of the anti-Russian racism that has engulfed and consumed the Western world.


Cemetery near Paris: Operation “Derusification” or a global attempt to abolish the Russians

Rostislav Ishchenko, Columnist of MIA “Russia Today”
January 16, 2023

The French authorities are hypocritically sad to announce that they will be forced to close the Russian cemetery in Saint-Genevieve-de-Bois, since Russia has stopped paying for its maintenance. However, Russia stopped paying because the French authorities stopped accepting payments as part of the imposed sanctions.

Saint-Genevieve-de-Bois is a monument to Russian emigration. Emigrants of the Civil War era of the early twentieth century, and then the emigrants of all the subsequent waves are buried there. In addition to Drozdovsky and Drozdov’s followers, Alekseev and Alekseev’s followers, Rodzianko, Yusupov, Grand Duke Gabriel Konstantinovich, Bunin and Gippius, Galich and Nuriev, Taffy and Tarkovsky, Lifar and Merezhkovsky lie there.

This cemetery is a monument to the Russian history of the twentieth century, with all its problems and contradictions. But at the same time it is a monument to the Russians who did not get along in Russia. Some being the losers of the Civil War, some – of the political struggle, whether they left Russia in search of a better life or professional self-realization. But it is also a monument to the Russian culture in its highest manifestations, in which sense it constitutes the integral part of the world culture.

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A short history of Russian America – the gain and loss of California and Alaska

With all the talks of various reparations, territorial claims and such, I is both interesting and educational to remember the history the the Russian America, and remind certain actors that if the legality of other past documents can be brought into question, so can the sale of Alaska and California.

Below are several articles from “Argumenty i Fakty” that take a look at that history and mull over what could have been done differently. The last article in the series is illustrative of the battle with the monuments in the “Woke-Woke West” as a manifestation of a brainless demolition of history.

Table of contents:


Kindness, “kushka” and “luzhka”. What kind of memory did the Russians leave in California

11.09.2022

An Orthodox chapel in Fort Ross.Orthodox chapel in Fort Ross. / Frank Schulenburg / Commons.wikimedia.org

200 years ago, on the 11th of September 1812, the official opening of the Russian colony in California, founded back in March, was marked with cannon and rifle salute. It remained nameless all the preceding months and received the name only six months later. The Russian fortress “by drawing of a lot before the icon of the Saviour” was named Fort Ross.

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Happy New Year from the USSR! Postcards of the Bygone Era

With the New Year coming up, it is time to look hopefully into the coming year and to send someone you love a post card with the best wishes. For me, few modern cards come close to the personality and warmth eminating from the vintage cards. In my family’s archive there are a number of such cards, that were collected by my grandparents from the time even before my mother was born.

Inspired by the article 15 nostalgic Soviet New Year postcards in Russia Beyond the Headlines and by a Telegram post showing how “In the city of Sovetsky, bus stops were decorated with drawings from old Soviet postcards.”, I started scanning this festive part of the collection.

Each postcard is represented with both the face and reverse sides, in the original, aged, paper colour and with the white balance restored (see the links under each picture for the additional versions). The cards are indexed by the year they were approved from printing, meaning that they were used to congratulate people with the next, coming, year.


1952-1953


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Bahmut or Artyomovsk? A historical look at the name of the city

The battles for Bahmut/Artyomovsk have been raging for some time, the city becoming the focal point of defence the the Ukrainians were building up over the last 8 years, while hiding under the fig leaf of the Minsk peace accord. The Western/Ukrainian publications stick to the name Bahmut as a true “Ukrainian” one. (Incidentally, the name Bahmut has a Turkic sound to it.) The Russian side sticks with Artyomovsk. The article that I am going to translate below looks at the history of the name, and may be an eye-opened for both parties.

And so, the article in question, published in Deita.ru on the 26th of December 2022. Note that the names may alternatively be transliterated as Bakhmut and Artyomovsk.


Bahmut or Artyomovsk? What is wrong with the city’s name?

The conflict in Ukraine is being fought not only on the battlefield – with artillery and missiles, but also in the information space, where symbolism becomes the main weapon. The city of Bahmut, where fierce battles continue, has become a mini-field of a global information and semantic struggle. The Ukrainian modern name of the city is Bahmut, while Russian media and bloggers persistently use the Soviet toponym Artyomovsk.

This material of IA DEITA.RU is about where both names of the city came from, why the heated argument, and what is the problem with the position of our information attack.

Bahmut vs Artyomovsk

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An Honest Deal. How Peter I Bought the Baltic Territories from Sweden. With a bonus about an earlier purchase of Kiev.

Seeing how the Baltic states (and Ukraine) jumped on the anti-Russian bandwagon, it is worth taking a historical detour into the not so distant past and take a look at a certain fact that those states are trying to erase…

First is a translation of an article from a St.Petersburg edition of “Argumenty i Fakty”, followed by fragment of a related historical article, and concluding with an even deeper dive to the time of the purchase of Kiev from Poland. What is common for these two cases is the fact, that Russia chose to buy the territories at a fair price, despite it having a position of a war winner, enabling it to “just take” those lands. Another aspect of that history is, well, a historical parallel that no one among the Western leadership wants to learn from, maybe because they have not studied history at school.

A fair deal. How Peter I bought the Baltic States from Sweden

Weekly magazine “Arguments and Facts” No. 35. Arguments and facts – Petersburg 31/08/2022


Peter the Great announces the Peace of Nystad (Nishtadt) on Trinity Square in St. Petersburg

The destruction of the monuments to the Soviet soldiers in the Baltic states drew the attention of the Russian society, and at the same time reminded of how these territories came to be a part of the Russian state.

The Northern Russian-Swedish War was concluded on September 10, 1721 with the signing of the Peace of Nystad (Nishtadt), as a result of which Peter the Great actually bought Livonia and Estlandia (modern Latvia and Estonia) from the Swedish Kingdom. Why did the tsar still decide to pay for the territories that were by that time already under the control of the Russian army?

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“Fainting Piglet”, aka. “Unconscious Piggy” Satirical Cartoons Explain the Core of Ukraine and Why SMO Was Unavoidable (with future updates)

In the August of 2022 the CGI animator Evgenia from Krasnodar Krai started creating something that grew into an in-depth satirical reviews of all what was failing Ukraine, and explaining the Special Military Operation’s goals.

The character personifying Ukraine became a little wayward, Nazi-tainted piglet. The Russian title of the series is “Свинка в обмороке” (Svinka v obmoroke), which is a play on the shortened name of the Special Military Operation (SMO) – SVO in Russian. In English the series have got several varying names, trying to convey the essence: “Unconscious Piggy”, “Fainting Piglet”, “Piglet in a Swoon”, “Swooning Pig”.

All episodes are released at the official Telegram channel of the Fainting Piglet. Evgenia writes in the description: “The Piglet is not the whole of Ukraine, but only her demented part!” I have additionally uploaded them to Yandex Disk for easy download.

While the later episodes were released bilingually, earlier episodes require translation (and most of them also require some context for the Western audience, who have been subjected to the heavy Mains Stream Media censorship). This honourable task was undertaken by the admin of The Putinger’s Cat Telegram channel.

As more and more episodes get release and translated, they are becoming increasingly more difficult to trace. And, additionally, not everyone has Telegram. That is why I decided to upload them to Odysee and create this collated post that will get updates as new episodes see the light of day.

But first, a very short clip that cuts to the chase, and shows the very essence of the conflict and the role Ukraine plays in it!


The very first Unconscious Pig episode – “What is Russia Punishing Ukraine For?” or “Why do Russians support the SMO?” – is finally translated! (Translation at Putinger’s Cat)

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The West Seeing Russia’s Strength as Weakness. A Testimonial on Telegram

Today I observed a conversation in Putinger’s Cat Telegram channel chat that revolved about Russia and USSR and the Westerner’s view of Russia being weak, countered by a very good string of arguments by Milana Attison. The topic resonated strongly with what I’ve written earlier in this blog in the following articles about the Wild ’90s:

There were several lines of conversation going at once, but in reality they all boiled down to one thing: countering the centuries-old Western stereotype of bad USSR/Russia.

At first Milana replied to a member Jason, who postulated that everything was miserable in the USSR, based on some second-hand information, yet he did not make a distinction between the pre-War USSR or Russia after the 90’s.

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Some accounts of the Ukrainian continued war on their own – Russian – history, language and heritage

One of the signs of the blossoming Nazism is a war of an ultra-nationalistic minority, waged on the culture and values of the majority in their own country. Ukraine has now outpaced Nazi Germany in this regard. In this post I will first translate an article from “Argumenty i Fakty” regarding the ongoing war on the historic monuments and Russian language in Ukraine, and after that I will reference several Telegram posts from several channels that underscore what this article talks about..


The Fall of Pushkin. The preschoolers of Kiev were forbidden to speak Russian


11.11.2022

“Completely excluded from the curricula of municipal institutions of preschool and general secondary education”

The total Ukrainization of the language sphere, legalized under Petro Poroshenko, is now reaching the smallest ones. Now children living in the Nezalezhnaya (translator note: “independent country”, aka. “404” or “Ukraine”) will not be allowed to speak Russian even in preschool institutions.

These are not fabrications, but an official statement published on the website of the Kiev City Council.

“Russian language is completely excluded from the curricula of municipal institutions of preschool and general secondary education in the capital,” it says, “According to the deputy of the Kiev City Council, chairman of the Standing Committee on education and science, family, youth and sports Vadim Vasilchuk, in the conditions of war with the Russian Federation, it is inappropriate and incorrect to conduct the educational process and to study Russian in preschool and general education institutions belonging to the municipal property of the territorial community of Kiev.

Related article:
The monument to Pushkin in Uzhgorod is already the third monument to the poet, dismantled recently in Ukraine. What will sober up Kiev? The construction of peace in Ukraine is not yet in sight.

“The deputy corps of the Kiev City Council has made a decision that will make it possible to avoid escalation of tension in society and strengthen the protection of the educational space of Kiev from the hybrid influences of the aggressor state. Language matters, and during the war it is a matter of national security,” Vasilchuk said.

“Organizational and legal actions”

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Reparations to Poland from Russia? And how much does Poland itself in fact owe Russia?

A few weeks ago Poland made an official demand of Germany for the reparations for damages incurred during WWII. That, despite the fact that all reparations had already been settled after the War.
At the same time Poland had the audaciousness to say that they are considering a similar claim for reparations from Russia. That, despite Poland being one of the main benefactors from the USSR in the Soviet block.

In her highly-current report URGENT INTEL & SHOCKING RUMORS! Something Major is About to Change in Russia & Ukraine!! (BIG REPORT 6) Lada Ray wrote something that I thought resonated with this topic:

So I do hope Russians won’t try to whitewash the truth, when and if it comes out! Russians in the past whitewashed the crimes of others to keep peace in the family, so to speak, including the Poles, as well as Latvian, Finnish and German Nazis, and Bandera ukro-nazis after WWII. This led to the current situation! Better painful truth right away than a major problem years from now.

And indeed, Poland enjoyed Russian leniency and whitewashing of the “brotherly nation” after the war to a great extent. Just how great, and who should pay reparations to whom is explored in the article that I want to translate today. It was published on the 29th of September in “Argumenty i Fakty”:


The Hamburg Bill for Pan Duda. How much does Poland owe Russia?

The word “reparations” in Poland is gradually acquiring the character of a national sacrament. This time, President Andrzej Duda decided to talk about the reparations from the rostrum of the UN General Assembly. The object of the claim this time was Russia.

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Daily Shincho: DPR and Mariupol through the eyes of a Japanese journalist

I came across this summary of an article in a Japanese newspaper Daily Shincho, written by a journalist who actually went to DPR and Mariupol and saw everything with her own eyes. Thus, the article is an outlier in the overall landscape of the Japanese pro-Ukrainian publications, and rather highlights the rule by becoming an exception. Still, every trickle of truth in the “Western” press is very much welcome!


Daily Shincho: DPR and Mariupol through the eyes of a Japanese journalist
14.09.2022

Japanese journalist Asuka Tokuyama visited Donetsk and Mariupol, after which she wrote an article published in the Daily Shincho. This article differs in many ways from those published in the Japanese media, since Tokyo officially supports Kiev.

“The Japanese Embassy in Moscow has a new “neighbour”. The Embassy of the Donetsk People’s Republic has officially opened across the street from our diplomatic mission. The fighting in the DPR was fierce then, the embassy was busy supporting evacuees and refugees, so the ceremony was not held”,

– writes Daily Shincho.

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The Legacy of Gorbachev. Germany is denying Russia what it got from Russia 30 years ago.

After Gorbachev’s passing, a lot can be said about his deeds and legacy. Little of it will be positive.
At best, he’s remembered as a bumbling fool, who started reforms that he was in no position to bring to a positive fruition.
At worst he – along with Yeltsin – is remembered as a malicious traitor to the Russian world, responsible for the deaths of tens of millions of people as the result of the demolition of the USSR, which started several years before the fateful events of 1991.
As a middle-ground, I would recommend Scott Ritter’s article in Consortium News SCOTT RITTER: Mikhail Gorbachev, a Vector of Change

My today’s translation takes a look at Gorbachev’s legacy from a different angle – from the perspective of the reunification of Germany. It was in 2014 that first read a short comment about the German counter-historical stance on the reunification of Crimea in light of the prior reunification of Germany. Back then it was just that – a comment in some other discussion. Yesterday I came across an article at the Federal News Agency site that makes a much deeper , and more passionate dive into the matter. And article, a translation of which I am presenting below.


Germany refuses the Russians what Russians gave her thirty years ago
03 September 2022 12:47


Pravda Komsomolskaya/Russian Look

In Germany, Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev is very much loved. Much more than in Russia and many former Soviet republics. Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev was even called “the best German” because he did a huge historical thing for the German people. He united a divided Germany.

But he demolished his own country.

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Finnish blogger: That’s why half the world owes Russia to the grave

I am reposting an article under the same name from the English edition of NewsFront. This is probably the best – in its brevity – description of Russia’s role in state-building in the recent history! This is the kind of material that cannot be re-posted or re-told too few times.

In the list the author mentions the Napoleonic time, and in this regard I want to especially draw attention to Holland that exists as a state today solely thanks to the Russian effort in 1813: “Russians Are Coming!”: Restoration of the Dutch Kingdom. Year 1813.

The list also mentions Kazakhstan, and the statement there is best understood in light of purveying of a certain map of the USSR from exactly 100 years ago – from 1922, something that I did a short time ago in A short look at the short history of Kazakhstan through the lens of a 1922 map.


Finnish blogger: That’s why half the world owes Russia to the grave

A blogger from the Finnish city of Oulu Veikko Korhonen, as most modern Finns periodically fell under the corrupting influence of pro-Western history textbooks.

Everything related to Russia there was usually poured with total mud, the joint Russian-Finnish history was presented as a nightmare, and the pernicious influence of the present was constantly supported by stories about the aggressiveness and hostility of the nearest neighbour.

Fortunately, Veikko Korhonen had a very wise and well-educated grandmother, and so he knew very well about the true course of our joint history.

And once, tired of constant disputes with anti-Russian compatriots, he wrote a small article on his Facebook page, and whenever he met another Russophobe, just gave him direct link.

Are you asking about the results of Russia’s “aggression”? They are as follows: half of Europe and part of Asia got their statehood from the hands of this particular state.

Let’s remember who:

Finland in 1802 and 1918. (Until 1802, never had its own state).

Latvia in 1918 (before 1918 it never had its own state).

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