Stalin

[lrd]

Nostalgia, or...?

Moscow Plans First Stalin Monument Since 1960s
Reuters
Jan. 19, 2005 - Moscow plans to erect a new statue of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin, returning his once-ubiquitous image to its streets after an absence of four decades, a top city official said Wednesday.

Since President Vladimir Putin was elected in 2000, a number of Soviet symbols -- including the national anthem and an army flag -- have been restored to use, reflecting widespread nostalgia for Russia's communist years.

But rehabilitation of Stalin, who was denounced after his death in 1953 by the Soviet leadership for encouraging a cult of personality and killing millions of real and imagined opponents, has previously been out of bounds. Statues of Stalin were removed from Moscow's public spaces in the 1960s.

"A monument will be erected to those who took part in (leading the war against Adolf Hitler), including Stalin," Oleg Tolkachev, Moscow's senator in the upper house of parliament, told Ekho Moskvy radio.

Interfax news agency reported earlier that a Stalin monument would also be built in the Belgorod region near the Ukrainian border to mark the Soviet victory against Nazi Germany 60 years ago -- seen as the country's greatest military triumph.

In another sign of Stalin's growing appeal, state television channels have shown a number of prime-time television shows in recent months depicting him in a positive light.

Copyright © 2005 ABC News Internet Ventures
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=424834

[aricbcool]

We'll see. They claim to have only put it up as part of a broader effort to memorialize their WWII heroes. But with the subtle change in govt. policy requiring all governers to be approved by Putin, it may be something more sinister. Maybe I should start studying Russian. =0)

[The Reaper]

Stalin killed more of his own people than the Nazis did.

If they will memorialize him, they have completely lost track of history and what Stalin really did.

Why not one to Beria as well?

TR

[Roguish Lawyer]

Very disturbing.

[DanUCSB]

I would posit that this is much less a generalized attempt to memorialize those who fought in the Great Patriotic War and much more an attempt to encourage a faux-nostalgic veneration of strong, authoritarian rulers, neatly coinciding with Putin's attempts to pull more power to himself. It seems to be a long trend in Russian history to default to autocratic rulers in times of chaos/unhappiness.

[lrd]

I would posit that this is much less a generalized attempt to memorialize those who fought in the Great Patriotic War and much more an attempt to encourage a faux-nostalgic veneration of strong, authoritarian rulers, neatly coinciding with Putin's attempts to pull more power to himself. It seems to be a long trend in Russian history to default to autocratic rulers in times of chaos/unhappiness.
This is similar to where my thoughts were running.

I wonder what the Russian mafia thinks of this.

[aricbcool]

http://au.news.yahoo.com/050120/19/sodl.html

Moscow scraps Stalin statue plan amid protests

MOSCOW (AFP) - Moscow has scrapped plans to erect a statue honoring Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin and fellow wartime leaders Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill in a Moscow monument marking the end of World War II, an official said.

A Moscow city government spokesman told Moscow Echo radio that a statue of Stalin would upset too many people, and the monument would depict just Roosevelt and Churchill.

Praise of Stalin all but vanished after he was denounced by former Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in a 1956 secret speech to the 20th Communist Party Congress.

Stalin's image disappeared following the Soviet Union's collapse in 1991, but he remains popular with wide sections of the Russian population. Boris Gryzlov, speaker of the lower house in Moscow, recently described him as a man of "uncommon qualities" who had "done much for the victory of the Soviet Union."

A Stalin bust remains at the Kremlin wall along with those of other Soviet leaders and heroes.

The monument had been expected to appear on a hill known as the Mount of Worship before Russia's May 9 celebrations marking the 60th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany, Tolkachyov said.

The Yalta conference, held in the Crimean port town in February 1945, marked the Allies' approaching victory over Nazi Germany, with Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill agreeing to divide Germany into US, Soviet, British and French zones.

Germany was divided into two post-war states which were reunited in 1990 with the end of communism in eastern Europe.

[Roguish Lawyer]

They should memorialize Stalin, but not in a positive way. Like Auschwitz, I think.