Posted on 04/13/2005 1:24:56 PM PDT by Tailgunner Joe
MOSCOW, April 13 (RIA Novosti commentator Tatiana Sinitsyna) - "We shall not revise history of the Great Patriotic War, whomever such revision might please. However, historians have stocked up enough facts to offer an updated argumentation to the events of that time. Mind you, I don't mean their new treatment or evaluation," said Nikolai Nikiforov, Deputy Director of the Institute of Military History under Russia's Defense Ministry. He was addressing a Novosti news conference on the upcoming 60th V-E Day anniversary.
Victory in World War II was "among principal symbolic landmarks of the 20th century", he stressed-no matter that people in other countries, Great Britain and the USA among them, may be saying it was an "unneeded victory".
"The Allies may regard it as unneeded-after all, they did not shed so much blood [as Russians] in that appalling war. We lost 27 million people, and each had five liters of blood. Make a simple calculation, and you will see the amount of our bloodshed.
"It would be thoroughly wrong, however, to refer to the 27 million casualties as 'the price of victory'. That was, in fact, the price of the entire warfare. The Soviet Army and Navy lost 8.6 million fighters. Civilians made all the rest who died in the war. It left 1,710 towns and several thousand villages and townships in ruins or totally wiped off from the face of the earth. This country lost more than a third of its total national wealth," said the prominent Russian military historian.
"Other countries are harping on Soviet soldiers' alleged cruelty," Mr. Nikiforov went on. Thus, two historians, Czechia's J. Siska and Britain's E. Beaver, refer to several million German women each of whom came through repeated rapes by military occupiers. "Those historians have no leg to stand on. First, there is no documentary proof of the facts. Second, the outrages could never take that scope because they implied punishment of extreme severity. No victorious soldier would risk his life for an ignominious pleasure.
"Stalin made very tough orders concerning the treatment of German civilians. The Soviet Army acquired those days a duty totally new to the Armed Forces-to rescue and protect the population [of an occupied country]. Many eyewitnesses of those efforts survive to this day.
"Russia's President ordered my institute and the Russian Academy of Sciences, a year ago, to prepare together a fundamental History of the Great Patriotic War. This big scholarly book is expected to have twelve volumes," added Mr. Nikiforov.
Soviet troops retreating were machine gunned down by NKVD squads.
I'm reminded of the picture original published in a Soviet encyclopedia. It showed five Russian fighters standing on a hill in winter, smiling after victory.
Years later, when one of the men fell out of Soviet favor (and out of sight), the encyclopedia publisher sent out the annual "updates". Recipients were to paste the updated data over the old. One included a picture of the men, still standing on the hill-side. In this "update" there were only four men, the man in the middle having been conveniently "removed" with a marginally clever touch-up.
""Stalin made very tough orders concerning the treatment of German civilians"
The BIG LIE is often more effective than a small one. This sounds like DPRK propaganda.
"We lost 27 million people, and each had five liters of blood."
They still don't get that most of them were (directly or not) killed by the uncle.
Gee maybe if Stalin didn't cozy up to Hitler to invade Poland in the first place, maybe the Soviets wouldn't have lost that many.
The opening scene of "Enemy at the Gates" showed that NKVD practice.
I love the communist line on his deal with Hitler. The crap about how Stalin knew war was coming but he needed time to prepare. Bull!!
Sad that these "historians" dont show the same amount of hostility with Stalin, who killed more Russians under his command than the Nazi's did in battle, than they do with the Nazis.
Remember that only party members got notification.
The ratio is probably 1:2 Stalin.
We may never know exactly how many were killed.
The 27 million died as a result of the war.
"Uncle Joe" had another 20 million or so killed because he perceived them to be political enemies.
Remember the Ukrainian Famine? There's eight million right there. Predated the war by almost ten years.
A lot of Soviet soldiers were killed because of Stalin's idiotic military decisions. Luckily for Uncle Joe the Austrian Corporal wasn't any better.
Stalin's real "tough orders": "Can't he understand it if a soldier who has crossed thousands of kilometres through blood and fire and death has fun with a woman or takes some trifle?"
Yes, uncle Joe.
And how many killed were brave Russian soldiers who fought, and who's only mistake was seeing part of the West, and for that crime, got shipped to Siberia upon their return to the Motherland?
Uncle Joe, beleive is what Churchill and Roosevelt called him.
The best scholarship holds that Stalin killed 40 milion of his own people. That does not include war casualties.
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