Posted on 12/26/2017 2:47:10 PM PST by GoldenState_Rose
Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin may have been reticent to celebrate the centenary of the Bolshevik Revolution, but it had no qualms about celebrating a hundred years since the founding of the Cheka, Lenin’s political police, on Dec. 20.
Alexander Bortnikov, head of the Federal Security Service (FSB) and a veteran of the old Soviet KGB, was predictable in his message. His agency was, he claimed, “free from political influence.” It “does not serve any party or group interest” and even its bloody-handed past was nowhere near as reprehensible as assumed.
Yes, he conceded, it was the engine of Stalin’s Great Terror, but “although many associate this period with the mass fabrication of charges, archive materials show a significant number of criminal cases were based on factual evidence.”
Perhaps more important and more interesting was a talking point in Putin’s own speech on the anniversary. He called on the modern-day Chekists, those “true patriots and defenders of the state,” to “erect a safe barrier against foreign meddling in our social and political life,” pointing not just to radical and terrorist elements but also “foreign security agencies.”
(Excerpt) Read more at themoscowtimes.com ...
They’re slime.
archive materials show a significant number of criminal cases were based on factual evidence.” ............................... i.e. calling Stalin and idiot, reading the Saturday evening post, listening to the BBC and radio Berlin, talking to US citizens who volunteered to help the Soviets and find work for themselves. Yeah, there were millions of guilty people sent to work in labor camps for a bowl of potato soup and a piece of bread if the reached their quota. No work, no eat, no live. Left as frozen meat in the frozen tundra. Many died from deceases of the mind which left holes in their skulls. The only difference between the Soviets and the Nazis was they destroyed all their records, leaving many questions unanswered, and NO REPARATIONS for any of the victims or their families. Life was always tough for the everyday Russian. I guess they miss all that?
Felix Dzerzhinsky was one mean SOB, but an interesting study in power and building an effective organization..
“There is no such thing as an innocent man. There are merely men who have not been questioned competently”.
Within the first year of governing the Bolshevik’s executed more people then 300 years of Romanov’s.
Yes. They are.
I will personally never trust the Russians. I grew up with them as the ultimate enemy, and they were worshiped and defended by all the people who thought the US had never done a thing right in its entire history.
I wish people didn’t feel the same way about our own secret police, the FBI. Internal security organs tend to be well regarded no matter how evil.
” the people who thought the US had never done a thing right in its entire history. “
And after Clinton/Bush/Obama years you can add disenchanted conservative Americans to that list! Surprising amount of Putin defenders on these boards...and I realize it’s not so much pro-Putinism that’s the problem, so much as losing faith in this great country and Western civilization.
For the sake of RUSSIA’s future I say America needs to have faith in herself.
Part of it is a liking of Putin’s “patriotism” and priorities:
Take care of your country and your people: Destroy their enemies by any means wherever they are and without mercy, render impotent those who might BECOME your enemies (pretty much everyone), realize that Islam is waiting like pestilence to destroy anything unguarded, let the church guide the morals of the people. Eliminate like vermin those who will not assimilate.
Different details, but a good set of priorities for a leader.
except that Putin has no problems with Muslims...taking care of his buddy Ramazon Kadyrov in Chechnya (whose just been sanctioned by Trump) - and allied with Iran and Turkey to boot.
“Rebuilding churches” in Syria (in exchange for permanent Russian military bases) in the region. Pleasing Assad while undermining Israel. etc...
“Christians suffered unspeakably in the Soviet Union. It is a hard subject to read about.”
At the hands of the secret police...
He uses the Orthodox, from what I have seen.
I think he’s playing the Muslims. Sometimes you can’t take on all your enemies at once. They are a tool that is being used to weaken opposition. We tried doing the same thing, just not as well.
But I could easily be wrong. Compared to our previous administration.....
And after Clinton/Bush/Obama years you can add disenchanted conservative Americans to that list! Surprising amount of Putin defenders on these boards...and I realize it’s not so much pro-Putinism that’s the problem, so much as losing faith in this great country and Western civilization.
For the sake of RUSSIA’s future I say America needs to have faith in herself.
That's no stranger than the new discovery by the very people who were fanatical Russophiles for a century that their former favorite country is now suddenly no longer so heroic.
Plus a lot of the "conservative" Putin fans are Jew-hating "palaeos." These are the same people who used to ignore the fact that the Communist bloc supported the Arabs and continued to insist that Communist Russia was taken over and being run by Jews. There were, however, a few exceptions, like Francis Parker Yockey, who considered Stalinism a step back into traditional European governance and urged his fellow anti-Semites to support the Communists. A lot of "palaeos" are just now catching up to him.
I think all freedom-loving people regardless of faith have a stake in the integrity of Israel as a State at this point. And I’m glad Trump sees that.
All European maps for centuries had JERUSALEM as the *center* of the known world.
http://www.bl.uk/learning/timeline/item99816.html
No need to be oversensitive. Honor part of function of security organisation doesn’t mean “honor the ideology.”
Reinhard Gehlen worked for Hitler in Nazi era. he worked for CIA and became the leader of BND of West Germany in Cold War era. Anything wrong with it?
I don’t think you’ll see German leaders today excusing the “good aspects” about the Gestapo. In public.
Lest history repeat itself we damn well better have our guards up if ever people get lax about condemning such grave atrocities...and start justifying and celebrating them instead.
But today’s Germany does has federal intelligence services, for example, BND. As I mentioned, it was a bunch of formal Nazis and Hitler’s military officers who laid the foundation for BND.
Let’s get it straight, Obama didn’t promote KGB, Gestapo in public, but since he became the president , FBI has been ideologised and been working for left wing agenda.
That is the serious problem the country should deal with.
Living in today’s Russia (as an average Russian - not privileged expat as some are) would give people a different perspective. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the Soviet Union...but enough ghosts remain.
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