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Medvedev visits monument commemorating Great Patriotic War
Published: 25 March, 2010, 18:43
Edited: 13 April, 2010, 13:56
TAGS: Anniversary, Medvedev, Russia, History
As part of his trip to the city of Volgograd, President Dmitry Medvedev has visited a monument to pay homage to the victims of the Great Patriotic War [WWII].
The monument commemorating the Battle of Stalingrad, as the city was formerly known, was the first stop during Medvedev’s visit to the heroic city.
After laying a wreath under the famous eighty-five meter monument dedicated to the Motherland, Medvedev decorated veterans with state honors.
This year, which marks the 65th anniversary of victory of the Great Patriotic War, the military parade will take place not only on Red Square in Moscow, but also in other Russian cities.
The country-wide celebration will take place on May 9.
25.03.2010, 18:35
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Marzipan6: "...the heroism of the Red Army brought no freedom to Russia or its neighbours. " Welcome Marzipan6! I expected you to show up with your comments about evilness of the USSR whenever I post something positive about Russia. You know as well as I do that the valiant Red Army was the salvation of Russians and all the slavic peoples of the USSR. Had Hitler defeated the Red Army, the slavic people would have been subjected to a hell from which they would never have recovered. Slava Krasnaya Army!!! I know that Estonians supported the Germans during WW II and cheered for a German victory against the Red Army, in hopes of eating some of the crumbs the Nazis would throw their way. Too bad you dream of a Greater Germany (including Estonia) was thrown into the sewer by the Red Army. Be sure to watch the Den Pobeda Parade in Moscow on May 9, 2010. I will be in Tbilis that day to enjoy the ceremonies in Vake Park.
While Kihnu enthuses over the Red Army (whose bravery I do not doubt), may I remind him of something that he knows perfectly well already, but simply chooses to close his eyes to: the heroism of the Red Army brought no freedom to Russia or its neighbours. How could it? The Red Army was the instrument of an evil dictator and existed to serve his aims. Prime amongst those aims was to defeat the purposes of his Nazi totalitarian counterpart so as to have only his own brand of totalitarian oppression, not freedom, triumph. The victory of the Red Army brought no freedom to Russia or its neighbours. In Russia, it simply confirmed and shored up the rule of one of history’s most horrific mass murderers. Amongst its neighbours, including in Kihnu’s country of residence, Soviet victory simply replaced one murderous foreign occupier with another. And as mass graves, cattle wagons packed full of innocent civilians on their way to Siberian slavery, and decades of grey, impoverished, soulless Soviet oppression testify, that victory was nothing to celebrate. Freedom was nowhere to be found where the Red Army trod. Nevertheless, the Red Army did contribute significantly to the restoration of freedom – but only in Western Europe, where the Nazi yoke fell away not only because of the exertions of the Western Allies, but also because of the huge losses that Germany sustained in the East. And for this, I acknowledge the Red Army. Yet until Medvedev and his successors can bring themselves to also stand, with head bowed, before memorials to the hundreds of thousands of innocent victims of Soviet oppression in Eastern and Central Europe which the Red Army was directly instrumental in helping to establish, they are acknowledging only part of the story of the Red Army’s deeds. The part that they self-servingly omit is a horrible part, and it ensures that Russia cannot have normal relations with its neighbours until that part, too, is both acknowledged and forgiven.
Kihnu: whatever is positive in post-Soviet Russia (and much is), this does not expiate what was evil in Soviet Russia. Until Russia atones for and cleanses itself of that evil, its shadow will continue to fall over it. Unlike in the comparable case of Nazi Germany, Russia has not brought closure to its Soviet history. Therefore, and again unlike with Germany, the threat of that evil again returning is real, and it is something Russia’s neighbours must include in their calculation of possibilities. You have done the same in other posts, where you wrote of the possibility of future aggression being visited on Russia’s neighbours. The valiant Red Army was the salvation of Russians from Hitler’s horrors. But not from Stalin’s horrors, nor those of Stalin’s successors. Estonian people hoped that both Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia would go to ****, Kihnu. If either of those monstrosities survived, Estonia had no future apart from oppression and subjugation. Nazi Germany was well on the way to defeat anyway, thanks largely to the Red Army. But the Soviets were not. Estonians, your father amongst them, hoped to hold back the Soviets’ re-occupation of their country until the war ended. They were not fighting for “Nazi crumbs” – such crumbs were poisonous. They were fighting for their own freedom. Their fight was desperate, and they failed; Nazi Germany disappeared, but the Soviet Union did not. And a renewed, long night of Red terror and oppression descended on them, ending only in 1991. By all means enjoy the May parade, Kihnu. But with a corner of your mind, remember that you are watching a distorted myth on a scale that the organisers of the Roman circus of old could not even dream of. When you return home to Estonia, please also participate in the June 14 day of mourning for the innocent victims of Soviet mass deportation. It is part of the “liberty” that the valiant Red army brought.