{"id":10375,"date":"2017-07-12T09:01:39","date_gmt":"2017-07-12T16:01:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/?p=10375"},"modified":"2017-07-12T11:44:28","modified_gmt":"2017-07-12T18:44:28","slug":"military-history-in-the-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/military-history-in-the-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Military History In The News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stalin\u2019s Greatness?<\/h2>\n

by Andrew Roberts<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Poster<\/a>
Image credit:Poster Collection, RU\/SU 2156, Hoover Institution Archives.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThe Red Army could have defeated Nazi Germany without Allied help,\u201d records The Times<\/em> of London, \u201caccording to two thirds of Russians, who are adopting an increasingly positive view of Joseph Stalin\u2019s wartime leadership despite the enormous casualties suffered under his command.\u201d This worrying sign of increased ultra-nationalism under Vladimir Putin was based on findings from a poll conducted by the respected Levada Center in Moscow. Whereas 34% of Russians in 1997\u2013the year Putin came to power\u2013believed that the fact that \u201cStalin acted regardless of casualties\u201d and that was the main reason that 27 million Russians died in World War Two, today only 12% believe that, a tribute to the two decades of Putin\u2019s ceaseless propaganda sanitizing Stalin\u2019s role.<\/p>\n

In June Putin claimed that \u201cexcessive demonization\u201d of Stalin had been used to \u201cattack\u201d and slander post-Soviet Russia. History is a political battlefield in modern Russia, where the historical and civil rights society Memorial, which investigates the extent of Stalinist crimes in the Gulags, has been repeatedly disrupted and attacked by the FSB (Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation). This was taken to a new level in June when Yuri Dmitriev, who dedicated his life to finding and identifying the burial sites of Stalin\u2019s victims in his native Karelia, was arrested for child abuse. Dmitriev played a huge role in uncovering the hidden history of the Solovetsky Islands and the White Sea Canal, and the accusations made against him appear to be a pure act of vengeance carried out by the FSB\u2013the institutional descendant of the NKVD and KGB.<\/p>\n

Campaigners such as the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Anne Applebaum, author of Gulag<\/em>, who demand that the accusations against Dmitriev are investigated properly and independently<\/a>, point out how the FSB persecution tactics come straight out of the old Soviet playbook. Alexei Navalny, the charismatic Russian opposition leader, is also being barred from contesting the presidential elections against Putin in March next year because he has a criminal conviction for fraud, also on trumped-up charges.<\/p>\n

TO READ MORE: http:\/\/www.hoover.org\/research\/stalins-greatness<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Stalin\u2019s Greatness? by Andrew Roberts \u201cThe Red Army could have defeated Nazi Germany without Allied help,\u201d records The Times of London, \u201caccording to two thirds of Russians, who are adopting an increasingly positive view of Joseph Stalin\u2019s wartime leadership despite the enormous casualties suffered under his command.\u201d This worrying sign of increased ultra-nationalism under Vladimir […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-2Hl","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":10727,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/remembering-stalingrad-75-years-later\/","url_meta":{"origin":10375,"position":0},"title":"Remembering Stalingrad 75 Years Later","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 9, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review \u00a0 It is now fashionable to demonize Russia, but most Americans have forgotten key aspects of 20th-century history, including the Russians\u2019 fight to stop the march of Nazi Germany. \u00a0 Seventy-five years ago this month, the Soviet Red Army surrounded \u2014 and would soon\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Stalingrad"","block_context":{"text":"Stalingrad","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/stalingrad\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11542,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/putin-attacks-ukraine-again-to-boost-his-popularity-at-home\/","url_meta":{"origin":10375,"position":1},"title":"Putin attacks Ukraine again to boost his popularity at home","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 28, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Please read this piece by my colleague Paul Roderick Gregory in The Hill Over the weekend,\u00a0the Russian navy fired upon and seized three Ukrainian navy vessels, wounding multiple sailors in the process.\u00a0In addition, a Russian ship has been positioned to block entrance from the Black Sea to the Sea of\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Vladimir Putin"","block_context":{"text":"Vladimir Putin","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/vladimir-putin\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9068,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-return-of-appeasement-collaboration-and-isolationism\/","url_meta":{"origin":10375,"position":2},"title":"The Return of Appeasement, Collaboration and Isolationism","author":"victorhanson","date":"February 22, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ Tribune Media Services World War II broke out when Nazi Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. A once preventable war had become inevitable \u2014 and would soon become global \u2014 due to three fatal decisions. Most infamously, the Western European democracies had appeased Hitler during\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7301,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/what-drives-vladimir-putin\/","url_meta":{"origin":10375,"position":3},"title":"What Drives Vladimir Putin?","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 8, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"Aggressors often attack weaker neighbors to restore a sense of pride.\u00a0 by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Online\u00a0 Vladimir Putin\u2019s Russia is a disaster of a declining population, corruption, authoritarianism, a warped economy, and a high rate of alcoholism. Why, then, would Putin want to ruin additional territory in\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Russia"","block_context":{"text":"Russia","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/europe\/russia\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/800px-Vladimir_Putin-6-300x209.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":8716,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/dont-trust-putin-in-the-mideast\/","url_meta":{"origin":10375,"position":4},"title":"Don\u2019t Trust Putin in the Mideast","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 8, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson\u00a0\/\/ National Review Online Contrary to the principles of American foreign policy of the last 70 years, President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry tacitly invited Russia to \u201chelp\u201d monitor things in the Middle East. Now they are learning that there are lots of Middle\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Russia"","block_context":{"text":"Russia","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/europe\/russia\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"(Mikhail Klimentiev\/Pressphotos\/Getty)","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/vladimir-putin-coalition-r-500x500.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":10024,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-russian-farce\/","url_meta":{"origin":10375,"position":5},"title":"The Russian Farce","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 28, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review Remember when Obama and Hillary cozied up to Putin? And recall when the media rejoiced at surveillance leaks about Team Trump? The American Left used to lecture the nation about its supposedly paranoid suspicions of Russia. The World War II alliance with Joseph Stalin\u2019s\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Democrats"","block_context":{"text":"Democrats","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/democrats\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10375"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10375"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10375\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10381,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10375\/revisions\/10381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}