AP Photo Posted on 03/31/2005 12:51:58 PM PST by jb6
MOSCOW - The city formerly known as Stalingrad will erect a monument to Josef Stalin, Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill to honor their historic Yalta conference in 1945, the city's mayor said Thursday.
AP Photo
Volgograd Mayor Yevgeny Ishchenko also said his city is considering changing some street names in honor of the Battle of Stalingrad, which is widely considered a turning point in World War II.
"We are talking about eternalizing the leaders of world powers, the powers that won in that war, about eternalizing a historic event," Ishchenko said.
Zurab Tsereteli — a sculptor known for grandiose statues that many consider more kitsch than art — is donating the massive bronze statue to the city, located about 550 miles southeast of Moscow. Ishchenko said they hope to erect the monument in time for the 60th anniversary of the end of the war, on May 9.
Erecting monuments to Stalin remains a controversial issue for many Russians, who say the dictator was responsible for the deaths of millions of his own people. Other Russians revere him for the Soviet Union's rapid industrialization and his leadership during the fight against Nazi Germany in what is known here as the Great Patriotic War.
Ishchenko stressed the Yalta monument was not to honor Stalin, but to honor the Nazi defeat and the Yalta conference that charted the postwar world.
It is important "not to blacken our past too much," he said, and to love Russian history "the way it is."
Volgograd residents are also considering renaming some streets in honor of the Battle of Stalingrad, he said. The city's public council may rename the city's main street, Lenin Avenue, to Stalingrad Avenue. Other streets may be named after heroes of the battle.
Ishchenko said there is also talk of returning the city to its previous name of Stalingrad. The city was renamed Volgograd in 1961 after Soviet leaders denounced Stalin for promoting a cult of personality.
Ishchenko, however, said the city will not back the proposal unless it is endorsed by the majority of city residents. A recent opinion poll found only 15 percent of Volgograd residents in favor of renaming the city, he said.
Actually, if we go there, then it is the British and the French who are the guilty ones. Stalin asked them for an alliance, to contain Germany, they turned him down. Then they aided Hitler's rearmement of the Rhineland, annexation of Austria, Sudatenland and then all of Czech. They aided him by doing nothing and allowing no one else to do anything.
The "Peanut". :)
Oh please, Stalin wanted Poland just as much as Hitler did.
That would be Moscow and Leningrad. There was no question of German defeat from the outset of Stalingrad, it was only a question at what cost to both sides. With the launching of Uranus, it took all of Meinstine's genius and pure luck and insane resolve to save the Army Group B from 6th Army's fate, since Stalin gambled and almost won a total encirclement and destruction of all southern (and thus almost all mechanized) German forces.
Further, by Stalingrad, the average Russian soldier was more heavily armed then the average German. The days of every third man with a rifle were 1941 and the very beginning of 1942. By mid 1942, Russian industry (which had spent 1941 in transit) was producing something like a million rifles a month. The Germans also prefereed the Russian PPD submachinguns since they were more rugged. The Germans also maintained several battalions of T-34/76s.
Plenty of Nazis went to work for the West German government. Almost the entire Intelligence network of W.Germany were former SS men. The same for all those scientists (mostly war criminals) who went to work for both sides.
The lands that Stalin took, look a little closer: are Ukrainian and Belarussian lands, that Poland took in 1919. In exchange, in the long run, Poland was given German Silesia and East Prussia.
jb6,
I take it you disagree with this Fox article?
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,95872,00.htm
"Hitler’s Nazis killed about 21million people between 1933 and 1945, (a figure that includes Roma gypsies, homosexuals, the handicapped, Poles, Russians, Jehova Witnesses and Germans, as well as six million Jews.) Stalin killed twice that many, and Mao killed just under 38 million. When you add in the murders attributable to Lenin (search), Pol Pot (search), Tito (search) and the remaining communist dictators of Asia, Africa, Eastern Europe and Latin America, communism claimed more than 100 million lives."
Look again.
I was merely pointing out that many have been propagandized to think that Communism and Naziism are diametrically opposed in regards to being at different ends of the political spectrum..but it simply is not true.
Link is broken and yes, if that's the number given I do disagree. 12 million in concentration camps, 2 million more Poles in whole sale massacres, 20 million Soviet civilians, 1 million Yugoslavs, 1 million Greeks, 1 million Italians (in revenge after Italy switched sides in 1944), half a million French after Overlord and about 10 thousand Britans. Yes, revionism of Nazi atrocities seems to be in these days, they keep parring the numbers down and many even claim that it was all Goebells fault. Pure BS.
oh, yeah, I agree. I've even had some debates with Nazi defenders, here on FR, who were blaiming socialism and communism for all the evils and excusing Nazis. Well had to point out to them that Nazi stands for National Socialists. You are very correct on that point. Nazis are Trotskites with racism.
I would disagree; I think the Soviets were on the ropes at Stalingrad. Morale was very bad; "deserters and cowards" being shot out of hand. Stalin needed a victory for his troops; something more than the "Not a Step Back" order. The Germans on the Volga were a long way toward accomplishing what they needed to do economically. Everyone thinks they were after the Soviet oil in the Caucasus, which they were, and that they needed it, which they did not. Germany had a sufficient amount in Rumania. The problem was getting it to the front. By blocking Volga barge traffic and north-south rail lines through Stalingrad, the Germans were in a position to DENY the Soviets their own oil. Eventually, they would have strangled the USSR if they could have kept their positions.
That almost happened, too. The Germans slated a number of strong panzer formations to back up the Rumanian armies on the flanks at Stalingrad, but gave priority to feeding the meatgrinder in the City. The operations you refer to by Manstein were done with panzer divisions that got there too late to stop Operation Uranus. If the Germans had pulled back to siege positions around Stalingrad after October 15, and made strengthening the flanks a priority, Uranus would be in the toilet, so to speak. Open tank fighting on the steppe in late 1942; advantage, Germany, by a big margin.
I'd love to visit Volgograd, but not while Putin's in charge. I don't trust that guy.
Stalin's strong point was he pretty much stayed out of Zukov's and Stavka's way. He made the noises of decision maker but other then that let them plan and carry out. Hitler after the 1941-42 Soviet counter offensive, declared himself the Furher of the Wehermacht too.
What's he going to do to you? Arrest you?
Lots of Germans, and Nazis, went to work for the Soviets. One master for another.
And a lot of former SS men fought in the French Foreign Legion, too. Many at Dien Bien Phu.
The ones who had no hope were the non-German SS units. Many of them fought in Berlin. They were all dead men and they knew it.
"Stalin was just as guilty as Hitler for starting WWII when they both invaded Poland in 1939"
Let's raise the ante - Hitler rose to power only because of the backlash to Stalin's genocide of 10 million in 1933. Many of these were Mennonites living in Ukraine that were able to get word back to their relatives in Germany.
No Stalin means no rise of the Nazi party.
I don't like him. I wouldn't want to be an American in his Russia. It's an anti-Western atmosphere.
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