Tag: Soviet History

JRL NEWSWATCH: “Regime Change in Russia Won’t Lead to Chaos or Collapse” – Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Headlines, JRL NewsBlog, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Russia Regions Map

“History shows that a change of leader in Russia has almost always been accompanied not by civil strife, but by liberalization.” “… [R]ecent years have seen regional leaders transformed into technocrats whose every move is closely controlled by the federal center. They depend on Moscow for everything, and are accountable to the Kremlin — not the local people. All such […]

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Kissinger on Russia: Insights and Recommendations

China, Cybersecurity, Economy, Business, Investment, Trade, Europe, EU, Headlines, History, Soviet Union, Iran, Middle East, North Africa, Military, Nuclear, Missile Defense, Oil, Gas, Energy, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections, Syria, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Henry Kissinger File Photo, with Military Officer and Others in Background; adapted from image at defense.gov,; original image was DoD photo by Air Force Senior Master Sgt. Adrian Cadiz

(Russia Matters – russiamatters.org – Henry Kissinger and RM Staff – May 26, 2023) This evolving compilation of observations and policy ideas about Russia by Henry Kissinger, an eminent U.S. statesman who turns 100 on May 27, 2023, was the first in Russia Matters’ “Competing Views” series, where we share prominent American thinkers’ alternative takes on U.S.-Russian relations, Russia itself […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH: “Latvia battles to curb Russian media influence” – DW

Baltics, Headlines, History, Soviet Union, JRL NewsBlog, Latvia, Media, Internet, Social Media, Television
Map of Baltics and Environs, Including Kaliningrad

“Latvia is fighting to counter the spread of Moscow’s disinformation. Given its large Russian-speaking community, this is a tough task.” “… Latvia gained its long-awaited independence in the 1990s … then became a member of the [EU] and NATO. But … the country’s Soviet past still has a potent impact …. Even before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine … Latvian […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH: “It’s High Time to Decolonize Western Russia Studies” – Foreign Policy/ Artem Shaipov, Yuliia Shaipova

Academia, Education, Academia, Europe, EU, Headlines, Human Rights, JRL NewsBlog, Ukraine, Russo-Ukrainian War, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Bookcase file photo, adapted from image at nlm.nih.gov

“Why has it taken a war of conquest for experts to recognize Russia’s nature as a vast imperial enterprise?” “… Russia’s nature as an imperial power is [historically and geopolitically] incontrovertible. After World War I, the Russian Empire avoided the permanent dismemberment that befell other multi-ethnic land empires …. The Soviet Union … reconquered most of the non-Russian lands … […]

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Back in the USSR: Are Residents of Former Republics Better Off 30 Years Later?

Economy, Business, Investment, Trade, History, Soviet Union
Soviet ICBM in Parade With Soviet Flag Bearing Image of Lenin in Background

(Russia Matters – russiamatters.org – RM Staff – Dec. 16, 2021) Thirty years ago this month, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics officially ceased to exist. The 15 republics which had made up the Soviet Union were confronted with uncertain paths as they endeavored to establish political structures and reform economic systems. They faced unresolved territorial questions, socio-economic crises and […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH: “Russia clamps down on historical memory and justice” – Financial Times

History, Soviet Union, Human Rights, JRL NewsBlog, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Gulag file photo featuring barbed wire across open ceiling, adapted from image at nps.gov

“The threat to liquidate the research group Memorial is an assault on a brave outpost of post-Soviet civil society.” “… Putin’s crackdown on dissent is inextricable from a desire to control Russia’s past. … Memorial has [painstakingly] compiled a database of more than 3m victims of Soviet political repression, mostly … executed, imprisoned, sent to labour camps or exiled during […]

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RUSSIALINK: “Archie Brown Is Awarded the Pushkin House Book Prize: ‘The Human Factor: Gorbachev, Reagan and Thatcher and the End of the Cold War'” – Moscow Times

Britain, UK, United Kingdom, History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Bookcase file photo, adapted from image at nlm.nih.gov

The 9th Pushkin House Book Prize was awarded to Archie Brown, Emeritus Professor of Politics at the University of Oxford, for “The Human Factor: Gorbachev, Reagan and Thatcher and the End of the Cold War,” published by Oxford University Press.

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RUSSIALINK: “Evgeny Dobrenko’s ‘Late Stalinism: The Aesthetics of Politics’ Recasts 20th Century History” – Moscow Times

History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
File Phot of Attlee, Truman, Stalin at Potsdam, adapted from image at osti.gov

Dobrenko, a professor at the U.K.’s Sheffield University … argues [that] Stalin’s twilight years — which see the rise of cultural puritanism, state-sanctioned anti-Semitism and the nascent Cold War — set the cultural frames of reference on which the Soviet Union, and eventually Russia, continue to operate […]

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RUSSIALINK: “Catherine Belton’s “Putin’s People” is Essential Reading: ‘How the KGB Took Back Russia and then Took on the West.'” – Moscow Times

History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Vladimir Putin file photo with VOA logo; screen shot from video still

(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Emily Couch – Oct. 17, 2021) The path taken by Catherine Belton’s “Putin’s People: How the KGB Took Back Russia and then Took on the West” is a well-trodden one. For those who have read Masha Gessen’s “The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin,” Ben Judah’s “Fragile Empire: How Russia Fell […]

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RUSSIALINK: “‘The Human Factor’ Shines New Light on Recent History; Author Archie Brown’s book expands our understanding of one of history’s key periods” – Moscow Times

Britain, UK, United Kingdom, History, Soviet Union, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
File Photo of Mikhail Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan at Table Signing Documents

How important was the true-believing communist son of Stavropol peasants, the actor son of a Midwestern traveling salesman, or the staid, provincial daughter of a Lincolnshire shopkeeper? […]

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Russian Political Elite Seeks to Retain Post-Stalin Consensus while ‘Correcting Mistakes’ of Soviet Regime, Luzin Says

History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Kremlin and River

(Paul Goble – Window On Eurasia – Staunton, Sept. 24, 2021) The Russian elite does not have an explicit ideology but it does have a shared set of beliefs that guide its actions, an ideology that has “grown out of political practice rather than from any philosophy,” Pavel Luzin says. But that does not make it any less influential. Indeed, […]

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Russia’s Foreign Military Basing Strategy

Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
File Photo of Deck of Russian Aircraft Carrier Admiral Kuznetsov

(PONARS Eurasia Policy Memo – DMITRY GORENBURG, Senior Research Scientist, CNA – Sept. 20, 2021) In December 2020, news broke that Russia had signed an agreement with Sudan to build a naval base on the Red Sea. Given the refurbishment of its existing base in Syria and rumors of other potential bases abroad being negotiated, on the surface, Russia appears […]

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Putin’s Perestroika, One Driven Like Gorbachev’s by a Desire to Revive a Stagnating System, Path to Its Destruction, Inozemtsev Says

Economy, Business, Investment, Trade, History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
File Photo of Vladimir Putin at Podium with United Russia Logo, Gesturing

(Paul Goble – Window On Eurasia – Staunton, Sept. 8, 2021) Vladislav Inozemtsev, who has long argued that the Putin system is likely to remain stable for at least another decade, now says that the Kremlin is acting in ways that point to an attempt to fundamentally restructure the Russian political system before the 2024 presidential vote. And such a […]

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30 Years After End of Soviet Union, Its Main Lesson for Russia Remains ‘Reform or Else’

Economy, Business, Investment, Trade, History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Tower and Building Inside Kremlin

Thirty years after the failed August 1991 coup in the Soviet Union and the dissolution of the country four months later, it is hard to avoid asking: What led to the demise of that superpower and are the same factors relevant for its successor, today’s Russia?

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RUSSIALINK: “‘It Was All for Nothing’: Russia Marks August Coup With Regret, Indifference” – Moscow Times

History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
CIA Map of USSR Administrative Divisions, adapted from image at loc.gov

Thirty years on, The Moscow Times spoke to surviving participants in the events that led to the collapse of the Soviet Union and the birth of a new Russia. (Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Felix Light – Aug. 18, 2021) In the center of Moscow, hidden behind two lanes of heaving traffic on the New Arbat commercial thoroughfare, stands a […]

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RUSSIALINK: “Russia’s democratic development is the only correct path – Gorbachev” – Interfax

History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
CIA Map of USSR Administrative Divisions, adapted from image at loc.gov

MOSCOW. Aug 18 (Interfax) – Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev blames the organizers of the coup attempt of August 1991 and the signatories to the Belavezha agreements for the collapse of the Soviet Union, calls for defending the principles of democracy, and believes that Russia can develop and solve any problems only on a democratic path. “I believe that the […]

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RUSSIALINK: “As Chaos Engulfs Kabul, Russia Says It’s Ready to Work With the Taliban” – Moscow Times

Afghanistan, Central Asia, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Afghanistan houses aerial view, adapted from image at state.gov

Moscow has a history of pragmatism toward the Islamist militia and appears well placed for a transition in Afghanistan. (Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Felix Light, Pjotr Sauer – Aug. 16, 2021) In the day since a Taliban offensive swept away the U.S.-backed Afghan government, Russian officials are taking satisfaction from their principle global adversary’s humiliation as they prepare to […]

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Image of Sakharov, Once the Conscience of the Nation, an Increasingly Blurred Figure for Russians, Lev Gudkov Says

History, Soviet Union, Human Rights, In Memoriam, Nuclear, Missile Defense
Map of Russia and Russian Flag adapted from images at state.gov

The month marks the 100th anniversary of the birth of Academician Andrey Sakharov who developed the hydrogen bomb … then became the leading spokesman for humanism and democracy against the Soviet regime […]

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The Inconvenient Sakharov: His legacy is a moral challenge to the Kremlin, to Western elites and to many of Russia’s oppositionists

History, Soviet Union, Human Rights, Nonprofits, Activists, NGO's, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Andrei Sakharov file photo, adapted from image at Russian-speaking Community Council facebook event page

Subject: THE INCONVENIENT SAKHAROV Date: Thu, 20 May 2021 From: DDGlinski <DDGlinski@alumni.harvard.edu> THE INCONVENIENT SAKHAROV His legacy is a moral challenge to the Kremlin, to Western elites and to many of Russia’s oppositionists by Dmitri Glinski Dmitri Daniel Glinski, Ph.D., a member of the council of the Democratic Russia Movement in the early 1990s and of Russia’s Constitutional Consultative Assembly […]

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RUSSIALINK: “‘Memories of Moscow’ Brings the Late Soviet Era to Life; Author Harald Lipman was the British Embassy doctor in the 1980s.” – Moscow Times

Britain, UK, United Kingdom, History, Soviet Union
Bookcase file photo, adapted from image at nlm.nih.gov

… Lipman kept a diary … enough to trigger … memories, often aided by his wife, Nahid. He has compiled them into … “Moscow Memories: Memoirs of a Medical Diplomat,” … describ[ing] the day-to-day life not only of diplomats, but of Soviet citizens […]

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The Dzerzhinsky Discord: Who Will Fill the Vacancy in Lubyanka Square?

History, Soviet Union, Human Rights, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections, Spies, Spy Allegations
FSB Headquarters file photo

(PONARS Eurasia Policy Memo – Maria Lipman – March 19, 2021) Maria Lipman is an affiliate of the Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies (IERES) and the Program on New Approaches to Research and Security in Eurasia (PONARS Eurasia) at George Washington University. For about a decade, negative, anti-Western, and anti-liberal ideological trends have been on the rise in […]

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JRL RUSSIALINK: “Katherine Zubovich’s Magnificent ‘Moscow Monumental’; The story of Moscow’s skyscrapers and the lives they changed” – Moscow Times

History, Soviet Union, Life in Russia, Culture, Arts, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections, Regions, Cities, Municipalities
Moscow State University file photo

“In its 874-year history, Moscow has grown from an obscure twelfth-century military outpost into a world-class capital city of over 20 million inhabitants. Along the way, the city has been reinvented over and over to suit the needs of its rulers. Ivan the Great made Moscow “The Third Rome” after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, raising stone cathedrals inside […]

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Calls by U.S. for Economic Transition in Russia From Reagan Through Trump

Economy, Business, Investment, Trade, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Cash, Calculator, Pen

… Russia’s transition to a market economy is at least partially completed, though estimates point to the state holding between 33 and 46 percent of the economy … concentrated in “strategic” sectors such as energy and banking […]

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Most Russians Can’t or Won’t Rate Lenin but Overwhelmingly Oppose Taking Down Monuments to Him

History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Lenin Mausoleum on Red Square, Kremlin Walls

(Paul Goble – Window On Eurasia – Staunton – Feb. 17, 2021) In most other former Soviet republics, people favor taking down statues of Lenin or renaming any place or street bearing his name – Ukraine, for example, has completed these tasks (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2021/01/last-lenin-statue-in-ukraine-falls.html). But a new Public Opinion Poll suggests Russians have a very different view. It found that while […]

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AUDIO: Katrina vanden Heuvel: “Steve Cohen’s Anecdote Lecture — December 6, 1983/ via John/ JohnBatchelorShow.com podcast”

Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Bookcase file photo, adapted from image at nlm.nih.gov

Subject: Steve Cohen’s Anecdote Lecture — December 6, 1983/ via John/ JohnBatchelorShow.com podcast Date: Mon, 23 Nov 2020 From: Katrina vanden Heuvel <kat@thenation.com> Steve Cohen gave an annual anecdote lecture in his Soviet Politics class, first at Princeton starting in 1980, and running through his ten years at NYU — until about 2012 — Here is the 12/6/83 Lecture broken […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH: “Along Russia’s ‘Road of Bones,’ Relics of Suffering and Despair” – New York Times/ Andrew Higgins

Far East, Siberia, APEC, History, Soviet Union, Human Rights, JRL NewsBlog, Regions, Cities, Municipalities

“The Kolyma Highway in the Russian Far East once delivered tens of thousands of prisoners to the work camps of Stalin’s gulag. The ruins of that cruel era are still visible today.” “… [P]risoners, hacking … through insect-infested summer swamps and winter ice fields, brought the road … [which] then brought yet more prisoners … a torrent of slave labor […]

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RUSSIALINK: “Film About Gorbachev and Reagan in Pre-Production; From the team that made ‘The Death of Stalin'” – Moscow Times

History, Soviet Union, Life in Russia, Culture, Arts, Media, Internet, Social Media, Television, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
File Photo of Reel of Film

The historic 1986 Reykjavik summit between Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and U.S. President Ronald Reagan will be the backdrop for a new satirical film […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH VIDEO: “Russia Declassifies Video From 1961 of Largest Hydrogen Bomb Ever Detonated” – Smithsonian Magazine/ Theresa Machemer

History, Soviet Union, JRL NewsBlog, Nuclear, Missile Defense, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
File Photo of Tsar Bomba Nuclear Detonation, adapted from image at osd.mil

“The blast was over 3,000 times bigger than the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima.” “… [D]eclassified Russian footage [features] the 1961 Tsar Bomba hydrogen bomb test …  [of] the largest bomb … detonated on Earth …. a 50-million-ton hydrogen bomb, officially named RDS-220[,] … [set off] late October 1961 … during the height of the Cold War[,] …. 26 feet long […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH: “Nine photos; Russia put a historian on trial twice for supposedly abusing his foster daughter sexually. Here’s how Yuri Dmitriev became a ‘political prisoner.'” – Meduza

Corruption, Law, Police, Courts, Crime, History, Soviet Union, JRL NewsBlog, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
File Photos of Law Books and Gavel, adapted from image at fjc.gov

“On July 22, the Petrozavodsk City Court convicted historian Yuri Dmitriev of committing violent sexual acts against his underage foster daughter and sentenced him to three and a half years in prison. Because of time already served in pretrial detention, Dmitriev should go free in November 2020. This was his second trial. In April 2018, the same court acquitted him […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH: “Still standing; How Vladimir Putin maintains his support” – Times Literary Supplement (UK)/ Stephen Kotkin

Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
File Photo of Vladimir Putin at Podium with United Russia Logo, Gesturing

“… Putin forced through a plebiscite to zero out … constitutional limits on his rule. … [H]e can run again, in 2024, for two more six-year terms, until 2036, when he will turn eighty-four. …. Putin could have … move[d] Russia onto a stable path of institutional pluralism. Russia’s would-be democrats … Gorbachev and … Yeltsin, started out … popular […]

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“New book: SOVIET JUDGMENT AT NUREMBERG – A New History of the International Military Tribunal // Pub. July 2020” – Sarah Payne, Oxford University Press

Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Nuremberg Trials Courtroom Scene, adapted from image at archives.gov

Subject: New book: SOVIET JUDGMENT AT NUREMBERG – A New History of the International Military Tribunal // Pub. July 2020 Date: Tue, 7 Jul 2020 15:05:20 +0000 From: PAYNE, Sarah <Sarah.Payne@oup.com> Amazon: https://amzn.to/3ffJmId Standard Western accounts of The Nuremberg Trials fixate on key figures like Justice Robert H. Jackson, the U.S. chief prosecutor and Supreme Court judge, as well as […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH: “Return to Kabul? Russian Policy in Afghanistan” – David G. Lewis/ George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies

Afghanistan, Central Asia, History, Soviet Union, JRL NewsBlog, Military, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Soviet Era Afghan Soldiers with Flag

“… Moscow has publicly supported the current U.S.-Taliban peace talks … [yet] has a very different perspective from the U.S. … influenced by geography and history. Russia’s current strategic posture is informed by a long history of relations with Afghanistan and above all … the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan in 1979, a strategic and military failure … still fresh in […]

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Putin Driving Russia to Where the USSR was in 1991, Zyuganov Says

Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Kremlin and River

(Paul Goble – Window on Eurasia – Staunton, June 22, 2020) Gennady Zyuganov, the leader of the KPRF which is the only parliamentary party that has come out against approving the constitutional amendments by referendum, says that Vladimir Putin’s recent actions have been “not simply disappointing but depressing.” In the course of a wide-ranging 3,000-word interview with Anastaya Melnikova of […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH: “Sergei Khrushchev, Son of Former Soviet Premier, Dies at 84” – New York Times/ Katharine Q. Seelye

History, Soviet Union, JRL NewsBlog, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Brown University Gate, adapted from image at senate.gov

“A rocket scientist in the Soviet Union, he became a U.S. citizen long after the Cold War ended. ‘I’m not a defector,’ he said. ‘I like this country.’” “Sergei N. Khrushchev … former Soviet rocket scientist … son of Nikita S. Khrushchev … died … June 18 at his home …. He was 84. The Rhode Island medical examiner’s office […]

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Kremlin Denies Eyeing Territorial Claims After Putin’s Comments In Documentary

Foreign Policy, Security, Visas, History, Soviet Union, Military, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Map of Commonwealth of Independent States, European Portion

The Kremlin has denied it has any territorial claims on former Soviet republics after … Putin appeared to question the redrawn borders of Russia after the breakup of the Soviet Union […]

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VIDEO: JRL NEWSWATCH: “The Death Of Stalin: Unique Propaganda Footage Shows Dictator’s Funeral” – RFE/RL

History, Soviet Union, Videos
Joseph Stalin file photo

“Largely unseen footage of the funeral and official mourning following the death of Soviet leader Josef Stalin is featured in a new documentary, State Funeral, by Ukrainian director Sergei Loznitsa. It’s being shown on Current Time, the Russian-language network led by RFE/RL in cooperation with VOA. The mourning events were held at factories, on collective farms, town squares, and in […]

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RUSSIALINK: “Pushkin House Announces 2020 Book Prize Short List; Six titles that are all required reading for Russia watchers” – Moscow Times

History, Soviet Union, Life in Russia, Culture, Arts
Bookcase file photo, adapted from image at nlm.nih.gov

(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Michele A. Berdy – April 29, 2020) Michele A. Berdy is the Arts Editor and author of “The Russian Word’s Worth,” a collection of her columns. On Tuesday Pushkin House in London announced its short list of nominations for the 2020 Pushkin House Russian Book Prize. The prize has been awarded annually since 2013 to […]

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RUSSIALINK: “On This Day Victims of Political Repressions Are Honored; The day was declared by political prisoners in 1974” – Moscow Times

History, Soviet Union, Human Rights, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
File Photo of Soviet Gulag at Belbaltlag, adapted from image at nps.gov

(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – October 30, 2019) On Oct. 30, 1974 a group of dissidents imprisoned in Soviet labor camps in Mordovia and Perm declared the date the Day of the Political Prisoners in the U.S.S.R. Led by Kronid Lyubarsky, the prisoners put forward a list of demands, which included recognition of political prisoner status; separation of political prisoners […]

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European identity and the paradox of anti-communism

Europe, EU, History, Soviet Union
EU Map

The European Parliament’s conflation of Soviet Communism and Nazi-Fascism, says more about the present paranoia surrounding populism than it does about the past. This distortion of history should be of grave concern for democrats across the political spectrum. (Opendemocracy.net – Jamie Mackay – October 3, 2019) Jamie Mackay (@JacMackay) is a writer and journalist based in the UK and Italy. […]

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Fearing and Ignoring Russia: A Recipe for Trouble

Books, New Books, Book Releases, United States, U.S.-Russian Relations
Stylized Russian and U.S. Flags, 200, 1807-2007

(Russia Matters – russiamatters.org – Paul Saunders – Oct. 1, 2019) Paul Saunders is the chairman and president of the Energy Innovation Reform Project and a senior fellow in U.S. foreign policy at the Center for the National Interest. Book Review “The Russia Anxiety and How History Can Resolve It” By Mark B. Smith Oxford University Press, October 2019 [Amazon: […]

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JRL NEWSWATCH: “Russia Will Likely Collapse from the Inside” – Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies (Israel)/ Emil Avdaliani (Tbilisi State University, Ilia State University)

Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
File Photo of Revolutionaries Marching in Moscow in 1917, adapted from image at state.gov

“Russia is historically prone to internal collapse … shown by numerous examples from both the imperial and Soviet periods. … usually tak[ing] place as Russia rests on the laurels of recent military victories while internal economic and social troubles grow. … the best way to deal with Russia is to keep intervention to a minimum and wait for its internal […]

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Awakening a new generation of activists in Eurasia; An emerging young, urban population has begun to challenge the lasting legacies of the Soviet era

Georgia, Kazakhstan, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Map of Commonwealth of Independent States, European Portion

(Opendemocracy.net – Erica Marat – September 5, 2019) Erica Marat, PhD, is an Associate Professor at the College of International Security Affairs, National Defense University. She is the author of The Politics of Police Reform: Society against the State in Post-Soviet Countries (Oxford University Press, 2018). A new wave of anti-government mobilization has swept across the Eurasian countries that once […]

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‘Russians Fully Reconciled to Capitalism’ and Don’t Want Socialism Back, Shelin Says

Economy, Business, Investment, Trade, History, Soviet Union, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Cash, Calculator, Pen

(Paul Goble – Window on Eurasia – Staunton, August 21, 2019) Despite all the talk about a revival of socialism in the face of stagnation, Sergey Shelin says, “Russians are fully reconciled to capitalism, consider it completely practicable, and do not want even to think about the socialist past,” a fundamental transformation of Russian values over the last 30 years. […]

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Molotov-Ribbentrop What? Do Russians Know Of Key World War II Pact?

History, Soviet Union, Military, Poland, Politics, Government, Protests, Elections
Map of Poland and Environs

(Article text ©2019 RFE/RL, Inc., Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty – rferl.org – Tony Wesolowsky, Matthew Luxmoore – August 22, 2019 – article text also appeared at rferl.org/a/molotov-ribbentrop-what-do-russians-know-of-key-wwii-pact/30123950.html) It’s an anniversary few in the Kremlin, or elsewhere in Russia for that matter, are keen to talk about — let alone remember in some way. Eighty years ago, on August 23, 1939, […]

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