The State of Affairs in Russia

[Valmy]

Is it a competition to see who can say the most nonsensical thing?

[Syt]

It looks like they go full retard in many respects. It would be one thing if media were to quote them out of context, but this being official state media ... 

[Valmy]

I think all European countries should follow suit and create state media agencies that release a steady stream of completely nonsensical nationalist articles.  'Luxembourg only wants a unified space from Lyon to Dusseldorf as forseen by Eva Peron.  Those who doubt this new force on the world stage only show its grand importance and we call on the state of Thuringia to build the missing bridges.'

[Josquius]

Yet they throw a hissy fit when ukraine moves towarda the eu

[Valmy]

Yet they throw a hissy fit when ukraine moves towarda the eu

Yeah they call for a merger with the EU and in the same article attack Ukraine for wanting to be part of the EU

It is just amazing.

[Syt]

Yet they throw a hissy fit when ukraine moves towarda the eu

Yeah they call for a merger with the EU and in the same article attack Ukraine for wanting to be part of the EU

It is just amazing.

I think their problem is that Ukraine wants to ONLY be with the EU.

Reminds me of the old joke:
- Sorry, we're only open Tuesdays and Thursdays.
- But today is Tuesday!
- But not Thursday.


What's baffling is that Russia seems genuinely surprised that they're not universally beloved in Eastern Europe after liberating them from Fascism. And that countries there, after 40 years of being under Communist rule jump at the chance of joining NATO and/or the EU. It's not that NATO/EU expand eastwards, it's that the countries there rush westwards. Yet Russian politicians seem unable to understand how they might have alienated those nations.

It's kind of like if Germany after WW2 wanted to keep Poland, Austria and Czechoslovakia in their sphere of influence and follow her lead, because of "common shared history."

[MadImmortalMan]

Vienna hasn't torn down the Soviet monument in Belvedere Park.

[Valmy]

Vienna hasn't torn down the Soviet monument in Belvedere Park.

Vienna was not under 40 years of Communist rule.  Besides that is there to remind everybody the Austrians were not Nazis and something totally different from Germans.

[CountDeMoney]

You know, I've just about had it with those filthy ass cossacks.  I gave Obama the benefit with the doubt with the whole "reset" thingy, but it's obvious the Russians are not interested in being anything more than Douchebagistan.

They're still more of a regional nuisance than a true international geopolitical threat--at least at this time; just wait until the Arctic Circle ice recedes even more and they have unfettered access to rare mineral deposits in the next few decades--but we should just go all 1980s on their asses, and bankrupt them all over again. 
Even with their new wealth in oil and gas they're still a fucked up country, and just like any other syndicate run by the Mob they can collapse under their own weight, they just need a good enough push.

[Syt]

German RT doesn't seem to take off much yet. They mostly hired young, inexperienced folks and their website updates with maybe 3 to 5 articles per day. And they use professional headlines like "Yawn: NATO again claims Russian troops in Ukraine."

Even TAZ, a very left-wing/liberal paper mocks them.

[Syt]

Ukraine re-evaluating WW2 = embracing nazism.

http://en.itar-tass.com/russia/763661

United Russia condemns Kiev's plans to remove Great Patriotic War mentions from textbooks

The arguments of the Ukrainian government are becoming more and more reckless, a deputy chairman of the International Committee of the Russian State Duma Ivan Kvitka said

MOSCOW, November 25. /TASS/. Russia's ruling United Russia party has condemned Ukraine's plans to remove any mention of the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945 from history textbooks.

These plans were announced on Tuesday by Volodymyr Vyatovich, director of the Ukrainian National Memory Institute. All after-effects of "the Soviet-era propaganda and primarily a myth about the Great Patriotic War" should be dropped from educational materials and textbooks, he said. "For us, the Second World War started on September 1, 1939, and we have no right to narrow it to the Great Patriotic War, as it was much more horrible and tragic."

The arguments of the Ukrainian government are becoming more and more reckless, Ivan Kvitka, a deputy chairman of the International Committee of the Russian State Duma lower parliament house, said on Tuesday. "They have already denied their Soviet past. Now they are denying the feat of their fathers and grandfathers. I don't think attempts to deny their own roots could bring Ukraine closer to Europe," he said.

He said this initiative of the Kiev authorities was a manifestation of disrespect to the people who had given their lives to defend Ukraine. "As of the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, Ukraine had a population of about 41 million, whereas by the end of the war there were only 27 million people living in Ukraine," Kvitka said. "More than ten million Ukrainians died defending their families, their homeland from fascism. And Kiev wants its citizens to forget about this irreplaceable loss. No wonder the Nazi ideology is flourishing in the present-day Ukraine on such background."

[KRonn]

This seems to make sense, what the Ukrainian minister defined. And I'm sure it'll ruffle Russian feathers but given that Russia has basically invaded parts of eastern Ukraine, shades of WW2, perhaps Ukrainian officials see this as justified change in the way history of WW2 should be taught.

[celedhring]

This seems to make sense, what the Ukrainian minister defined. And I'm sure it'll ruffle Russian feathers but given that Russia has basically invaded parts of eastern Ukraine, shades of WW2, perhaps Ukrainian officials see this as justified change in the way history of WW2 should be taught.

Given all that over-acted anti-Nazi rhetoric, I have always wondered how the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact is spun in Russia.

[Valmy]

Stalin was buying time to build up his forces to fight Hitler, hoping to weaken Hitler and strengthen his position before the inevitable confrontation. 

Which was why he was so prepared to fight off the invasion in 1941, was eager to cooperate with the UK in its war against Nazi Germany, encouraged the Comintern to assist the French Government anyway it could before June 1940, and stopped sending trainloads of raw materials to fuel Germany's war machine.  Or, you know, the opposite of those things.

[Syt]

I loved a section in Tony Judt's Post War Europe where he talks about the Marshall Plan. Czechoslovakia (at the time not yet under Communist government) was happy to accept the offer and attended the meetings.

Then Soviet Union told them that if they accepted the aid, it would have serious repercussions for the relationship of the two countries, and that this was all just a plan to isolate the Soviet Union and establish an American hegemony in Europe and the world.

The more things change ...