June 22: the Day We Never Forget

It was a nice and quiet Sunday morning of June 22, 1941, when Hitler started the most terrible and devastating war our great country ever experienced.

In just days "The Sacred War" became kind of an unofficial anthem of the fighting Soviet people.

Multilingual titles included.

The meaning of the War for us Russians (including Ukrainians and Belorussians, for the matter) is often underestimated by the Westerners.

According to the state statistics (the accounting lasted for decades, and seems unfinished till now), the Hitlerites, their satellites and collaborators intentionally killed 7,420,379 civilians on the occupied territory uf the USSR. More than 1.7 million of Soviet Ostarbeiters died in the 3rd Reich, and 450+ thousands of those who survived, did not return back; the country lost them all. Approximately 4.1 million of civilians died on the occupied territory due to unbearable conditions of the regime installed (hunger, diseases, lack of medical assistance, etc.). Thus, for the USSR the "New Order" cost was at least 13.7 millions of civilians alone.

The war led to a considerable increase of child mortality; extra 1.3 million children born during the War, did not survive it (calculated on the base of death mortality in 1939-1940).

To save the Motherland, 8,668,400 soldiers gave their lives.

Taking into account demographic losses, we come to the unthinkable figure of 26.6 million people — and it's the lowest possible strictly scientific calculation.

This was in fact a genocidal war. Quite possibly, the very collapse of the USSR in 1991 became a postponed consequence of it.

Even now I tend to stand up when hearing the song above — just like the people do in the video, my fingers make fists, and tears come to eyes. And I am a grandson of those who fought and survived the War.

The war we understandanly call the Great Patriotic. And my feeling is that we will never forget it — as long as Russia exists, as long as there are Russians (of all 190+ ethnicities) in Russia.

Look Who's Talking (About Rules)

The last day of March was undoubtedly done (well, at least for me) by Reuters. That is, by Britain's foreign secretary Philip Hammond, with Reuters being just the media that spreads his words around the globe.

Just enjoy what this British politician said recently in Tbilisi, Georgia.

If Russia wants the sanctions lifted, then its course of actions is very clear. It has to comply completely with its obligations under the Minsk agreements.

Such claims always make me to wonder if the claimer needs an urgent assistant of a decent mental specialist. Is it Russia that is responsible for internal political changes in Ukraine, according to the Minsk agreements? If so, you just confirm and approve the fact that Ukraine IS Russia (and it really is, to a very very large extent, though it's a topic of another discussion).

We must not forget that this was an incursion into the sovereign territory of Ukraine, Russia annexed Crimea illegally in international law. Of course, reforms and steps are needed on the Ukrainian side as well. But we should never equate the two. Russia is the aggressor in this conflict.

Philip Hammond is a liar and provocateur in these words of him. And the reason for my straightforward statement is pretty simple: just because the Crimea was reincorporated to Russia in an absolutely legal and UN-confirmed way, the next day it declared independence of the mainland Ukraine. And the autonomous region was fully entitled to do that according to the international law.

And the one and only aggressor in this conflict, skillfully orchestrated by the US-lead forces and being a severe civil conflict, virtually a full-scale civil war by its nature, is West-supported Kiev government that came to power as a result of the US- and EU-supported coup d'état. It was Kiev regime that unleashed a campaign of state terrorism hypocritically called 'Anti-Terrorist Operation' against those Ukrainian people who opposed the coup based on openly Nazi, Banderite ideology.

Just like it was in the bloody history of the 20th century, Nazism does not bother Europe and the US so far it is directed against Russia. Some stupid people in some high armchairs love playing with fire pretending to be omnipotent political gods. Unfortunately, these games are always paid by lives, lives of common people, and not by those of black-tied high-ranked scum that forgets pride is a deadly sin.

Russia ignores the norms of international conduct and breaks the rules of the international system. That represents a challenge and a threat to all of us.

Today there was the War

74 years ago the War began. The Great Patriotic War.

For my country it was the most cruel and devastating war in history.

In fact, the USSR fought against the European Union v.1.0. Sounds unexpected? Check the list of countries that supported Hitler this or that way, or were his allies, or were conquered and worked for him.

"The Sacred War", performed by our popular singer Elena Vaenga, in just two or three days after the Hitler invasion became an informal anthem of the fighting country.

Arise, vast country,
Arise for a fight to the death
Against the dark fascist forces,
Against the cursed hordes. 

Chorus:

Let noble wrath
Boil over like a wave!
This is the peoples' war,
A sacred war! 

We shall repulse the oppressors
Of all ardent ideas.
The rapists and the plunderers,
The torturers of people. 

Chorus 

The black wings shall not dare
Fly over the Motherland,
On her spacious fields
The enemy shall not dare tread! 

Chorus 

We shall drive a bullet into the forehead
Of the rotten fascist filth,
For the scum of humanity
We shall build a solid coffin! 

Chorus

Hearing this song even I, a grandson of the fighting generation, feel an immense desire to kill Nazis, and my fingers make fists all by themselves.

My eternal gratitude to all those who fought, and suffered, and won.

Woe Is the Land of Gen. Scales

Let me speak from my heart: I have honour to consider ex-US Army Major General Robert H. Scales a dumb fuck, a purulent lues, and a pure great shame of America.

Listen to and watch what this brave, yet retired warmonger shits out of his dirty mouth (go straight to 3:17).


I transcript his words for those who still don't believe their eyes and ears.

... The only way the United States can have any effect in this region [Ukraine/Donbass] and turn the tide is start killing Russians. Killing Russians by… Killing so many Russians that even Putin’s media can’t hide the fact that Russians are returning to their motherland in body bags...

I don't know how he got his stars. I don't know what he was taught at West-Point and if he had a course of world's history there (or anywhere else).

But the truth is that Americans do have already a certain experience of killing Russians.

They Say - 4

Peter Hitchens writes in the Mal on Sunday: "Forget 'evil' Putin - we are the bloodthirsty warmongers".

I seem surrounded by people who think that war might be fun. This seems to happen when wartime generations are pushed aside by their children, who need to learn the truth all over again.

And more for you to remember:

We think we are the heroes, setting out with brave hearts to confront the Dark Lord, and free the saintly Ukrainians from his wicked grasp.

This is all the most utter garbage. Since 1989, Moscow, the supposed aggressor, has – without fighting or losing a war – peacefully ceded control over roughly 180 million people, and roughly 700,000 square miles of valuable territory.

The EU (and its military wing, Nato) have in the same period gained control over more than 120 million of those people, and almost 400,000 of those square miles.

What's the conclusion?

But do we have any idea what we are doing? Ordinary Russians are pretty stoical and have endured horrors unimaginable to most of us, including a currency collapse in 1998 that ruined millions. But until this week they had some hope.

If anyone really is trying to punish the Russian people for being patriotic, by debauching the rouble, I cannot imagine anything more irresponsible. It was the destruction of the German mark in 1922, and the wipeout of the middle class that resulted, which led directly to Hitler.

Stupid, ill-informed people nowadays like to compare Mr Putin with Hitler. I warn them and you that, if we succeed in overthrowing Mr Putin by unleashing hyper-inflation in Russia, we may find out what a Russian Hitler is really like. And that a war in Europe is anything but fun.

I have emphasized Hitchens' idea by bold letters. In fact, the currency collapse of 1998 was by far not the most difficult thing we Russians went through in our recent history; the very period of the USSR collapse and first years of building 'capitalism' in post-socialist Russia were really terrible for many millions of my compatriots; yet we survived then, and we are not going to lose now.

Anyhow, don't let 'them' fool yourself. Read various opinions and try to think different.