Free Republic

No country is as much a prisoner of its past as Russia. And no leader has become as much a victim of his own obsessive lies as Vladimir Putin. But where did this tragedy for the Russian people as well as Ukraine begin? And why did we not see this coming after the unspeakable brutality of Putin's conduct of war in Chechnya and Syria, deliberately using barrel bombs and nerve gas against civilian populations? I certainly cannot claim to be one of the very few who had foreseen Putin's reckless gamble of invading Ukraine. I also underestimated the lingering resentment...

Divers hunting for lost artwork from the legendary Amber Room looted by the Nazis are to begin searching a WWII shipwreck at the bottom of the Baltic Sea after photos revealed unidentified paintings and possible artefacts. The 12-man team from the Baltictech diving group will spend 10 days off the coast of Gdansk, Poland, at the end of May at the site where the German steamer Karlsruhe was sank by a Royal Navy submarine in 1945. Tomasz Stachura from Baltictech told MailOnline that initial observations of the wreck had revealed several 'non-military crates' as well as what appears to be...

The first glimpse of the upcoming limited series shows us Mirren as the legendary monarch, who was Empress of Russia from 1762 until 1796, making her the country's longest-ruling female leader. The series will show us Catherine toward the end of her rule in the 18th century, when she begins a steamy relationship with Grigory Potemkin (Jason Clarke), a military leader. "When I was young I dreamed of freedom, I dreamed of breaking chains," Catherine can be heard saying in the trailer. "But as you get older, your choices narrow. So instead I gave us an empire, but I knew...

All the flap about Mr. Bannon being in the NSC meetings has reminded me about the Zero's making of all the various Tsars so he could have "citizens" participating in the various government agencies. What ever happened to them?

In Wilson's War Message to Congress on 2 April, 1917, Woodrow Wilson said the following: A steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained except by a partnership of democratic nations. No autocratic government could be trusted to keep faith within it or observe its covenants. It must be a league of honour, a partnership of opinion. Intrigue would eat its vitals away; the plottings of inner circles who could plan what they would and render account to no one would be a corruption seated at its very heart. Only free peoples can hold their purpose and their honour steady...

When President Barack Obama's green jobs adviser, Van Jones, submitted his resignation this weekend, he became the first casualty of the Obama administration not to go quietly. Where other departing officials have given explanations about process or used predictable lines about spending more time with their families, Jones released a statement accusing his critics of using "lies and distortions" about him to divert attention from the White House's agenda. "On the eve of historic fights for health care and clean energy , opponents of reform have mounted a vicious smear campaign against me," Jones said. Also breaking with this White...

DNA Tests Confirm IDs of Russian Tsar's ChildrenMike Eckel in Moscow, Russia Associated PressApril 30, 2008 DNA tests carried out by a U.S. laboratory prove that remains exhumed last year belong to two children of Tsar Nicholas II, putting to rest questions about what happened to Russia's last royal family, a regional governor said Wednesday. The bone fragments dug up are those of Crown Prince Alexei and his sister, Maria, whose remains had been missing since the family was murdered in 1918 as Russia descended into civil war, said Eduard Rossel, governor of the Sverdlovsk region (see map of Russia)....

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The leader of Russia's Communist Party accused President Vladimir Putin on Saturday of piling up vast powers and said the Kremlin's main party represented billionaires rather than ordinary people. "He (President Vladimir Putin) has more power today than the Pharaoh of Egypt, the Tsar, and the Soviet Union's General Secretary combined," veteran Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov told a party congress on the outskirts of Moscow. "He has four times more power than the quite powerful president of the United States," said Zyuganov, whose party is the country's number two political force with 162,000 members. Zyuganov said his...

Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya, an outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin, was shot dead on Saturday at her apartment block in central Moscow, police said. "According to initial information she was killed by two shots when leaving the lift. Neighbors found her body," a police source told Reuters. Police found a pistol and four rounds in the lift. Politkovskaya, a 48-year-old mother of two, won international fame and numerous prizes for her dogged pursuit of rights abuses by Putin's government, particularly in the violent southern province of Chechnya. "The first thing that comes to mind is that Anna was killed...

Energy tsars hungry for a new market (Filed: 26/03/2006) The Chinese President, Hu Jintao, has lobbied Vladimir Putin hard for the planned £6.5 billion East Siberian Pacific Pipeline, on which work is due to begin this year, to include a spur to the Chinese border. If opened as planned in 2008, the main pipeline will pump up to 1.6 million barrels of oil a day to the Pacific port of Nakhodka. Last week, China's National Petroleum Corporation offered to pay Transneft, the company building the pipeline, £228 million to cover the costs of a branch. China is a leading buyer...