They Endured the Communist Terror

Der Tagesspiegel ^ | February 28, 2013 | Horst Schüler

[annalex]

This is a Google translation. I was only able to correct most egregious lapses. If you speak German feel free to clarify further; my comments are in square brackets. A-x

[annalex]

I don’t know who else to ping. There was a Polish/East European list but I don’t remember who lead it. I came across several Freepers form Germany, but I don’t remember their names.

I believe, this is an important issue also in America, where alliances and enmities of the Second World War still seem to linger, — despite the fact that for over 60 years our enemy has been not Nazism but Communism.

[VR-21]

Utopian movements always build a facade of altruism to help them seize power, but once in power their true totalitarian brutal nature emerges. No sadistic tyrant or bloodthirsty dictator in recent history came to power telling people of the horrors that would ensue, but rather told their people that they were going to put right some terrible wrong. They also find some group to marginalize and direct peoples animosity towards (the Jews, the Kulaks, the rich etc.).

Regarding the Second World War, there's a somewhat recently published book by Timothy Snyder titled Bloodlands - Europe Between Hitler and Stalin which does an excellent job of revealing the vileness of both the Communists and the Nazis. Rather than focusing on the Jewish Holocaust, it tells (comprehensively) the story of the greater number of people who were starved and slaughtered in the "death zone" between their opposing armies. When the war ended, "those bloodlands fell behind the iron curtain, leaving their history in darkness." I recommend it.

[annalex]

Thank you.

[Fiji Hill]

For more on the Vorkuta Gulag camp, read:

• I was a Slave in Russia by John Noble (New York: Devin-Adair, 1958)

• Vorkuta by Joseph Scholmer (New York: Holt, 1955)

[Fiji Hill]

I've read good reviews about Bloodlands. Another recently published book that has received critical acclaim is Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe 1944-1956 by Anne Applebaum (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 2012).

[Fiji Hill]

I've read good reviews about Bloodlands. Another recently published book that has received critical acclaim is Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe 1944-1956 by Anne Applebaum (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 2012).

[VR-21]

You’re quite welcome. I enjoyed (if that’s the right word) your post. So many of the answers we desperately need nowadays can be found in history. I personally have great fear that modern ‘utopians’ will systematically erase, or ‘modify’ the true history of the modern world. They understandably fear the power of truth.

[DuncanWaring]

Ping.

[annalex]

On returning to Dresden, they were arrested, charged with spying, and imprisoned. John Noble was 22 years old at the time. Conditions were abysmal, and starvation and executions were common. It was during his struggle to survive starvation that John developed the deep religious faith that was to sustain him and shape the rest of his life. Charles and John were kept in nearby cells until John was sent to the Soviet Special Prison, formerly the Nazi concentration camp of Buchenwald, and the two were separated. Fortunately, John’s mother and brother had been released by the Soviets after their arrest.

[...]

Vorkuta Camp Inmate

[...]

Gulag Inmates' Graves near Vorkuta

Every Camera Has a Story: KW, the Patent Etui, and John H. Noble

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Thanks for reminding me about “Bloodlands.” I remember reading the review of it in the Wall Street Journal last October and put it on my Amazon Wish List. I just ordered it after your recommendation.

I just finished “The Venona Secrets” and started “The Founder’s Second Amendment: Origins of the Right to Bear Arms” by Stephen Halbrook. The genocides in Europe last century sure do drive home the importance of the Second Amendment.

[annalex]

modern ‘utopians’ will systematically erase, or ‘modify’ the true history of the modern world

It is especially true of the Soviet history, and the premiere victim of this erasure of history, just as of Communism, is the Russian nation.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Thanks for the recommendation of “Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe 1944-1956.” I just added it to my Amazon wish list. The reviews on Amazon are indeed very good.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

I personally have great fear that modern ‘utopians’ will systematically erase, or ‘modify’ the true history of the modern world. They understandably fear the power of truth.

Indeed. You also come to realize what a genius George Orwell was when he wrote "1984." MiniTru and the "memory hole" didn't mean much to me in 11th grade, but they take on far larger meanings as you age and get more exposure to true world history and how tyrants take control of countries.

[Bigg Red]

MARK

[VR-21]

I haven't read the Stephen Halbrook book, and I'd love to know what you think of it when you're finished. I just finished re-reading David Horowitz' The Politics of Bad Faith and I'm about to start Spain Betrayed - The Soviet Union in the Spanish Civil War. by Ronald Radosh, Mary Habeck and Grigory Sevostianov.

Such is my concern for the future of our country, that I think it worthwhile to establish what Glenn Beck called 'Freedom Library's' for the purpose of preserving knowledge that may eventually become censored, if not forbidden (modern American leftists as you probably know, envision an 'enlightened' world where seemingly everything becomes either mandatory or forbidden).

[VR-21]

"It is especially true of the Soviet history, and the premiere victim of this erasure of history, just as of Communism, is the Russian nation.

I agree with you Annalex. I think that the Bolshevik Revolution and the Second World War were among the more awful consequences of the First World War, and the suffering and misery those events alone inflicted on the Russian people beggars the imagination.

[dfwgator]

The fact is that Hitler and Stalin both greatly admired each other, despite being bitter enemies....Hitler would go out of his way to insult Churchill and FDR, but he never personally directed insults towards Stalin personally.

[VR-21]

Thanks for the recommendation of Iron Curtain,. There's a book by Orlando Figes titled The Whisperers which vividly portrays what life was like for ordinary people living under Stalin. It complements what Solzhenitsyn wrote and it vividly describes life in that totalitarian hellhole.

[VR-21]

You are correct. They were both far more similar than they were different. The reason the went to war was to dominate Europe, rather than any ideological difference. Jonah Goldberg aptly described them as “...two dogs fighting over the same bone.”