An army of the people is invincible!

~ Mao Zedong

Mao Zedong Chinese Commie Communism Mao People Prolitariat Red Army Revolution Soviet

Of the 403,272 tank soldiers (including a small number of women) who were trained by the Red Army in the war, 310,000 would die. Even the most optimistic troops knew what would happen when a tank was shelled. The white-hot flash of the explosion would almost certainly ignite the tank crew’s fuel and ammunition. At best, the crew—or those at least who had not been decapitated or dismembered by the shell itself—would have no more than ninety seconds to climb out of their cabin. Much of that time would be swallowed up as they struggled to open the heavy, sometimes red-hot, hatch, which might have jammed after the impact anyway. The battlefield was no haven, but it was safer than the armored coffin that would now begin to blaze, its metal components to melt. This was not simply “boiling up.” The tank would also torch the atmosphere around it. By then, there could be no hope for the men inside. Not unusually, their bodies were so badly burned that the remains were inseparable. “Have you burned yet?” was a question tank men often asked each other when they met for the first time. A dark joke from this stage in the war has a politruk informing a young man that almost every tank man in his group has died that day. “I’m sorry,” the young man replies. “I’ll make sure that I burn tomorrow.

~ Catherine Merridale

Catherine Merridale Death Red Army Soviet Russia Tanks War World War 2

And thus to my final and most melancholy point: a great number of Stalin's enforcers and henchmen in Eastern Europe were Jews. And not just a great number, but a great proportion. The proportion was especially high in the secret police and 'security' departments, where no doubt revenge played its own part, as did the ideological attachment to Communism that was so strong among internationally minded Jews at that period: Jews like David Szmulevski. There were reasonably strong indigenous Communist forces in Czechoslovakia and East Germany, but in Hungary and Poland the Communists were a small minority and knew it, were dependent on the Red Army and aware of the fact, and were disproportionately Jewish and widely detested for that reason. Many of the penal labor camps constructed by the Nazis were later used as holding pens for German deportees by the Communists, and some of those who ran these grim places were Jewish. Nobody from Israel or the diaspora who goes to the East of Europe on a family-history fishing-trip should be unaware of the chance that they will find out both much less and much more than the package-tour had promised them. It's easy to say, with Albert Camus, 'neither victims nor executioners.' But real history is more pitiless even than you had been told it was.

~ Christopher Hitchens

Christopher Hitchens Antisemitism Camus Communism Czechoslovakia David Szmulevski East Germany Eastern Europe Germans History Hungary Ideology Israel Jewish Diaspora Jews Nazis Poland Red Army Revenge Secret Police Stalin

[Letter to his wife, Natalia Sedova]In addition to the happiness of being a fighter for the cause of socialism, fate gave me the happiness of being her husband. During the almost forty years of our life together she remained an inexhaustible source of love, magnanimity, and tenderness. She underwent great sufferings, especially in the last period of our lives. But I find some comfort in the fact that she also knew days of happiness.For forty-three years of my conscious life I have remained a revolutionist; for forty-two of them I have fought under the banner of Marxism. If I had to begin all over again I would of course try to avoid this or that mistake, but the main course of my life would remain unchanged. I shall die a proletarian revolutionist, a Marxist, a dialectical materialist, and, consequently, an irreconcilable atheist. My faith in the communist future of mankind is not less ardent, indeed it is firmer today, than it was in the days of my youth.Natasha has just come up to the window from the courtyard and opened it wider so that the air may enter more freely into my room. I can see the bright green strip of grass beneath the wall, and the clear blue sky above the wall, and sunlight everywhere. Life is beautiful. Let the future generations cleanse it of all evil, oppression and violence, and enjoy it to the full.

~ Leon Trotsky

Leon Trotsky Atheism Atheist Beauty Communism Death Dialectical Materialism Enjoyment Happiness Hope Irreconcilable Atheism Irreconcilable Atheist Life Love Magnanimity Marxism Materialism Materialist Oppression Proletarian Red Army Revolutionist Soviet Suffering Tenderness True Love Violence Wife Youth

Mounting tensions in Eastern Europe send shivers down the spine. Barely a quarter of a century after the end of the Cold War we seem to be sliding inexorably towards another.

~ Alex Morritt

Alex Morritt Aggression Armageddon Armies Army Caucasus Caucasus Region Checkmate Checks And Balances Cold War Conflict Management Conflict Resolution Conflicts Cool Response Crimea Defence Defences Destruction Of Us Diplomacy Eastern Europe Eastern European End Of The World As We Know It Error Errors Escalation Fear Of Unknown Fear Quote Fears Fears And Doubts Force Forces Forces Of Darkness Geopolitical Forces Geopolitical Tension Geopolitics Historical Perspective History Repeating Itself Impasse Inexorably International Community International Relations International Relationships Lack Of Judgement Learning From Mistakes Lessons Learned Lessons Learned In Life Lessons Of Life Live And Learn Mexican Standoff Military Military History Military Quote Military Theory Moscow Moscow Rules Nato Nuclear Power Nuclear Proliferation Nuclear Threat Nuclear Weapons One Upmanship Peace On Earth Peace Quote Peacemaker Political Commentary Political Quandary Political Quotes Politics Observation Poor Judgement Poor Leadership Power Struggle Power Struggles Quandary Red Army Regressing Regression Repeat Mistakes Repeated Mistake Repeating The Past Rules Of Engagement Russia Russian Federation Sabre Rattling Shiver Quote Shivers Sliding Soviet Occupation Soviet Russia Soviet Union Sphere Of Influence Spine Chilling Stalemate Standoff Struggles Quotes Super Powers Tension Treaty Troops Ukraine Warfare Warmonger Wars Weapons Of Mass Destruction