Russians are bastards.
For sinking a ship in Nazi controlled waters?
Turkey was supplying Germany with war materiel straight until spring, 1944.
If you understand 1942 dynamics and put yourself in a Russian skipper’s shoes you’d sink any vessel you’d find North of Turkish coast assuming it is a traffic between Turkey and (Nazi-held) Romania.
Read about it. European Jews fleeing the nazis made it to Istanbul, enroute to British Palestine. The Brits caused the Turks to refuse it passage through the Bosphorus. They were stranded there for about 2 weeks and the Brits finally decided to honor a handful of visas but to refuse the rest.
The Turks assaulted the ship as it sat with no power. The Turks cut the anchor chain and towed them 10 miles out into the Black Sea and set them adrift.
Soviet subs were attacking all non-allied shipping coming out of the straights. The Battle of Sevastopol was raging and they Soviets had just conducted an amphibious landing in Crimea.
Sinking any non-allied shipping coming out of that chokepoint was smart.
So Jews, fleeing nazis, were screwed by Brits, abandoned in a torpedo alley by Turks, where they were sunk by Soviets, thinking they were interdicting nazi supplying shipping. In this one I’d rate bastardhood with nazis at top, Brits an Turks tied for second and third, and some soviet sub captain a close 4th.
War sucks.
Maybe so. But the Russians were targeting all neutral ships, not refugee liners.
The real bastards with respect to Jewish war refugees are the British who threw up every obstacle in the path of Jews who sought refuge in the Levant.
Why? As the article says, the British didn't want to stir up the "Arab street", that pesky tantrum throwing "Arab street". God forbid anyone do anything to stir up the "Arab street".
That sentiment combined with the barely concealed antisemitism of the British diplomatic corp sealed the fate of not only those refugees but hundreds of thousands others.
They were our allies in WWII?
I don’t blame all Russian people. I do blame the Commies in Charge. Then and now.
The USSR is no more, but Commies still exist. Totalitarianism in all forms is evil.
Progressive
Socialist
Marxist
Fascist
Communist
Dictator
Islamist
Bureaucrap
All Evil.