We have previously discussed the disturbing fondness of some Russians for the memory of Josef Stalin — one of history’s greatest tyrants. Villagers in Georgia have taken that hero worship a step further by storing a statue commemorating Josef Stalin in his (appropriately named) birth town of Gori and are planning a monument to the dictator. Activities celebrating the “happier times” under Stalin ignore the hundreds of thousands of Russians, particularly intelligentsia, killed under this orders and the millions lost due to this policies. Gori however appears happy to have its favorite son in the tyrant’s chair. The story this month truly filled me with disgust and it was particularly poignant that these Georgians would use the Christmas season to honor one of history’s mass murderers.
To his credit, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili had denounced statues of Stalin and worked for their removal. However, the party of billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili has risen in popularity and Ivanishvili has called for closer ties to Russia. Even the Russian Duma recently admitted Stalin’s responsibility for the infamous Katyn Massacre.
Reports quote locals as praising the prosperity under Stalin for the town, ignoring that such prosperity came as a result of bloody crackdown and repression. We have previously discussed the effort of some to rehabilitate the reputation of Stalin, including a ridiculous defamation action.
It is more than just historical ignorance that motivates these efforts. It is a willful blindness to the blood soaked legacy of this truly evil man.
Source: Bloomberg
“If given a choice between anarchy and a dictator, the people will always choose the dictator.” Hell, there are many Americans nostalgic for Nixon.
Merry Pogrom everybody!
(The rest of this post was redacted and sent to a Gulag.)
Signed,
G. Santayana
Stalin was not only brutal he was savvy when it came to public behavior.
“One death is a tragedy, one million is a statistic.” – J. Stalin
While I condemn the Katyn mass murder, I have to say that I cannot get too misty eyed about it since the Polish regime at the time was nearly as bloody as Stalin and dictatorial. Poles like to forget that part of their history and the invasion that Poland did at its very creation into Russia. All that the Soviets did when they invaded Poland after the Germans had defeated the Poles was to restore the boundary that was established by the Treaty of Versailles. In fact the line was named the Curzon line after the BRITISH man who drew the post war boundaries for the new Polish state. Gen Pulsiduski did not think Poland got enough, so he simply attacked to get more. At the time of WII, the former leader of Poland, Paderweski, was living in exile from that horrid Polish regime. Then I hear from Polish folks that Stalin invaded Poland along with their good buddy Adolph HItler, but they forget that POLAND invaded Czechoslovakia ALONG WITH THEIR GOOD BUDDY the very same Adolph.
So let’s remember accurately the kinds of folks involved on BOTH sides. The very people Stalin murdered would have been VERY happy to have done the SAME thing to Russians if they had the chance.
Happy Days are here again. Oh, Happy Days are here again.
Having lived and worked in Georgia, I am certain this story is mostly sensationalism. In and around Gori (and Gori only) there have been statues and busts of Stalin for decades (I never saw any of them removed under Saakashvilli). There is even a moderately interesting museum there. Elsewhere in Georgia (and I have been everywhere in the country) you don’t find any such remembrance and no one ever gets nostalgic for the Stalin years. Georgia has enough issues with current internal divisions to even be remotely thought of as a center of unified neo-Stalinsim.
Nearly all Georgians think little of Stalin because not only was he obviously evil, but he was an ethnic Georgian who rose to become the most powerful person in the Soviet Union and seemed to have nothing but contempt for Georgia and Georgians; sending many of them to the gulags (keep in mind Stalin killed far more people within the Soviet Union than he did at Katyn and anywhere else combined).
As Prime Minister and President, Putin sent a great deal of aid to his hometown of St. Petersburg, but I am not certain that Stalin ever even visited Georgia again after he achieved notoriety; even though Georgia was a preferred republic for the elite to get away for a little r&r.
The entrance of Ivanishvilli into Georgian politics is however a very significant development and one to be watched closely for anyone interested in geopolitics.
The Premier had his ups and downs but people forget that he was a good dancer. He could really cut a rug!
Balanced:
Thank you for the front line view. But any serious measure of returning to the good old days of Stalin and his minions is enough to make any person a bit worried.
HumpinDog has it right.
Where is the statue of hitler….. How bout…. Th guy from Egypt…. The dude from Iraq……
Georgians – Grusinians – Sakartvelians – are not Russians. To them Stalin is a national hero for causing the deaths of millions of their ancient enemies, the Russians and others.
I am from Moscow. Stalin was not russian, he was georgian, same as Saakashvili and Berya (most bloody NKVD(KGB) chief who blamed in thousands deaths and who invented gulags where million of russians died. Stalin started his career from robbery and killings and this is their mentality. Georgians behave and live this way. They never work, they steal…. Concerning the fact that Russia is enemy is not true. Russia saved Georgia from Ottoman empire in 18th century, turkish were taking yang georgian women, killing thousands of georgians and this was georgians who asked russian Queen to protect them from turkish and include in russian empire. Behaviour in south osetia was also predictable, only georgians can invent operation @clean field and start from destruction of all osetian population, same behaviour was in Abhazia in 90th. Women, children all gonna be killed. Despite this georgians and chief criminals in Russia itself even now. They use soft and kind people of russia for many centures. Please dont think that I am against georgians or I am racist. But this it the truth and I know what I am talking about, I worked in International court and examine history for long time. Russians made more good things to georgians than bad.
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