Real USSR » AK47

The Victory Aftermath. Russia in Second World War.

eugenia — Sun, 16 May 2010 09:12:35 +0000

The V-Day. Copyright unknown

On May, 25th 1945 Joseph Stalin made a celebratory speech devoted to the end of the Russian Great Patriotic War. The Second World War was coming to an end, but the Soviet Union was done fighting. The Russian troops had exited Germany and ahead lied a long road of rebuilding and rehabilitation. So in Kremlin, at the V-day Meeting, Stalin had said the following:

Do not expect me to say anything extraordinary today. I have a very simple, very ordinary toast to make. I would like to raise a glass to health of those people who are low in rank and invisible in the hierarchy. Of those who we consider to be the “small screws” of our huge state mechanism — they might be small but without them us generals, marshals and other top army leaders wouldn’t have made it. They are plentiful, they are a legion, it is tens of millions of people who have not been heard of — yet they hold us together, as the base holds the top. To their health!

Today we have brought to your attention a fragment of the interview with Yelena Bonner, a human rights activist, a dissident, a writer, and a widow of the late Andrei Sakharov — during the war she was a teen and now, courtesy to the Internet-magazine Snob.ru, she tells us about her experience during the war.

So — We did not fight for Stalin or the Soviet Union. We fought because we had no other choice.

Elena Bonner, b.1923. Image couretsy of snob.ru

Do you remember the war motto: “To Stalin! To Soviet Union!”

I was 18 when I was summoned — at the beginning of war, and till very late 1945 I spent with the troops — yet I never heard that motto. Every time there was a fire on the frontline we never shouted “To Stalin””, it was more like “You sons of fucking bitches!”.

So at the beginning of the war we have been told that many — lots! — of young people volunteered to be sent to the front line..

That was another huge lie about that war. Only a tiny percent of people who ended up in the front line volunteered to be there. The rest were mobilised, hands down. Every single man of the appropriate age, be him a farmer or a factory worker — all of them were summoned and sent to the war.

I was also mobilised, as thousands of other girls. I was a student at Hertsen Institute, and they had a huge banner on the wall: “Girls of our country, get your second, military profession now”. So we had to take a compulsory course in military education. The choices we had were about becoming a nurse, a communications technician or a sniper. I chose to be a nurse, and by the end of it I was listed as “suitable for summon”.

So on June 22nd, 1941 you heard about the German invasion –you know you are listed as “suitable”, so did you know you’d be part of the war very shortly? Did you have a feeling of upcoming radical change?

You know, it was a very odd feeling. I am eighty seven years old now, and now I am trying to comprehend what was happening and I am failing at it, how my generation lived anticipating the war. Not just the people of Leningrad — at least we experienced the war with Finland of 1939 — 1940 (the so-called Winter War), and it was a real war, with food shortages and no heating. So starting from 1937 I just couldn’t help but anticipate a war coming — and it was a solid, gut feeling. My Moscow friends felt the same.

So in 1942 you were summoned as a nurse — what did it feel like?

I was a nurse on the train, which was travelling in the Leningrad district, picking up the wounded and delivering them to Vologda or other safe destinations. There they were dropped off, cared for, nurtured a bit and then either returned back to the front line, or sent somewhere else, I am unsure… The train was constantly bombed, or derailed, or lost in the snow. And then I was wounded myself — I had a broken clavicle, a damaged left shoulder, injured nerve and a blood eye — I was bad and I was sent by the same train to Vologda and later to the Urals.

I guess I was very lucky throughout the war. There was no reason for me to be on the train — I could have been right on the front line. It was 1942, the toughest year by some account — nobody summoned during that year came back.

Yelena Bonner in her Moscow apartment. Image courtesy of Snob magazine.

How long did you spend on that train?

Till 1945 — till the very end. We were sent to Germany to evacuate the wounded from their territories in 1945. So on May 8, the VE Day, we were somewhere around Innsbruck, Austria, and this was our last journey bound for Leningrad. We arrived home, the train crew was restructured, I was made the Head of some medical department to care for the wounded bomb disposal soldiers. The war was technically over, yet these guys — working with the explosives — kept coming our way.I was one of the last ones to be demobilised, too — in August 1945.

Can you tell us some more myths about the war?

As I have said, nobody volunteered. Another one was that the Jewish did not fight — it is not true, they did. And probably the biggest one is post war — the exploitation of that war. And all these military parades show offs — they are no longer carried out to remember those who did not come back — now they have a mission of public relations, and TV ratings, and flexing the military muscle — both on the domestic and international levels.

Did you feel that right after the war things would change to the better?

We did — we felt that our country had just survived the incredible! We felt powerful, we felt like we were able to change things around, we hoped for the better.

So why do these war veterans who came back from the war never argue these myths about the war?

Why do you think when we came back and thought ah, we are so powerful — why do you think we all shut up?

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Cold Clone War

Stas Kulesh — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 07:54:31 +0000

Buran VS Shuttle

According to the Soviet propaganda, everything which wasn’t invented by the ancient Chinese, was invented by the Soviet engineers in the USSR. Ah, they were said to invent the best weaponry, the best tanks and the best cars.

In reality, of course, the path of inventions had a very moderate development but in order to keep the morale up, Soviet government had the engineers copying things off their American, Canadian or Japanese counterparts. Certainly, nothing is wrong with it per se– such strategies usually allow to save time and money by buying and recreating a licensed version. However, the root of all evils is the mentioned Soviet brainwash on the topic of Soviet superiority in all fields of engineering research and development.

Let’s have a closer look at who really invented what.

One of the most controversial inventions was the gunfire rifle AK-47 invented by a Soviet engineer Mikhail Kalashnikov in, well, 1947. The holy war over this rifle and its true origins has been going on for more than half a century. The story goes that after the second World War, Germany was not allowed to produce weapons, which the USSR authorities used to their advantage: the prominent weaponmaker Hugo Schmeisser was invited to visit the arms plants in the Ural mountains, where later on the Soviets allegedly stole some of his ideas. As per usual, the truth is hard to find, however, we won’t be surpised if his family would file a lawsuit over the intellectual property of this particual invention.

AK 47 vs Stturmgewehr 44 by Hugo Schmeisser

Another piece of weaponry story: it is hard to tell whether it was copied off the Finnish or the Soviets just happened to invent a similar-looking rifle just a year later. The resemblance is striking, and yet again, no mention of the rights reseved.

Shpagin Rifle, 1941 vs Suomi Rifle (Finland), 1931

Next, the popular Makarov pistol of 1951– another acclaimed example of Soviet weaponry, this pistol had been copied by many as a popular military side arm.The question is still raised whether it is a scaled up version of a German pistol (minus decorative elements), but the resemblance is quite uncanny.

Makarov 9mm Pistol, 1951 vs German Walther 9 mm Ultra, 1935

Next, heavy military machinery. Every kid knows that tanks were the USSR’s frst and foremost object of pride, yet there is an opinion that the famous T-34 and its later versions were just copycats of the American Christie line.

T-34, 1940 vs Tank Christie, USA, circa 1930

The next one is probably one of the fewer honest examples of Soviet cooperation. During the WWII, seventy of American electric locomotives were shipped to the USSR as part of the Allied Forces war effort. The USSR authories kept them after the war, adopting the design to form the basis of their own line of diesel locomotives.

Diesel-Electric Loco (DA), of 1946 vs American ALCO RSD-1, of 1941

As for the planes, here even the wikipedia supports the story of the Tupolev plane Tu-4 being shamelessly copied off the American Boeing B-29 Superfortress.In 1945 the Tupolev avia construction company had meticulously reengineered the American plane to the point of ashtray locations! Certainly the whole concept of reverse engineering (ie, discoverig the technological principles of something through analysing its workings in detail) is praiseworthy.

The Tupolev TU-4 (1947) vs Boeing B-29 of 1942

Even the rockets — the endless well of Soviet pride — are rumoured to be the copies of the German development. Needless to say, it is still a remarkable act of engineering. Academic Sergey Korolev — the same scientist who sent the first human Gagarin in the outer space — was in charge of this project, so it just as successful.

The rocket R1, 1948 vs the German V-2, 1942

The following projects do not look identical, however, both the hydro electrical power station on the river Dnipro and the American Hoover Dam, NV have something in common: their chief engineer, C J Thompson, who oversaw the development of both projects.

DneproGes (1927–1939) vs Hoover Dam (1922–1933)

Another finest example of dubious engineering success — when Khrushchev started his building binge, his architect team did not invent the hideous looking apartment blocks — they just borrowed the idea of the German civil engineers. Pity both parties, in this case.

Soviet vs German Plattenbau Apartment Blocks

The automobile industry was the one with the most copied items. In some cases, even parts are said to be compatible!

Moskvich-400 (1947) vs German Opel Cadette of 1936.

Gaz Mini Truck, 1932 vs Ford AA, 1929

Volga of 1970 vs Ford Falcon, 1966

Volga of 1970 vs Ford Mainline of 1954.

Also, remember our post about Vyatka mopeds, the exact and true copies of Vespa? That one is just classic.

The bottom line here is about honesty, really. Nobody is expected to invent things from scratch — you can borrow other people’s ideas as long as they are properly copyrighted. It is also more efficient to modify the original version to suit the domestic realities better. However, it is good manners to acknowledge the work of others. And it is certainly shameful to claim the intellectual rights to things which never belonged to you. And this is where the USSR had failed dramatically.

Based on: www.worldaffairsboard.com and muacre.livejournal.com

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