1/?
Y'all...I just talked to my genius 70 year old Jewish-Russian-American friend for 4 hours about the 20th century. He left the Soviet Union in 1990 & had thoughts on everything from Kropotkin to an overview of Soviet Union history to the Holodomor to the Allies missed opportunity in WW2, the UN, the current state of China, to the Korean War to current Ukraine-Russia war.
#AMA 😅
#HeirloomFiction #History #Kropotkin #SovietUnion #Communist #TTJ
3/?
He got out in 1990 & told me some stories involving that.
It's clear that his experiences have made him leary of anything authoritarian, fascist or Bolshevik.
That FDR capitulated too much to the Soviets and could've prevented China from become a superpower early on by focusing on the Soviet Union. They had so many spies in defense and government, even as early as the 1930s, that allowed them to advance capabilities way quicker than they should have.
The UN veto should've never transferred to Russia & therfore time to start a new one. Might at well expand NATO into a new version & just not invite Russia. League of Nations > UN because the LoN had no teeth.
UN was able to enforce Korea, but could not occur now. All the proof you need.
He said the Allies missed a big opportunity in landing in Balkans instead of Normandy & put pressure on the Soviet Union. He said that Churchill was on board with that plan.
4/?
Lenin invading Poland in 1920(?) was stupid, but he came back and started actually investing in transforming the country.
Stalin was always going to Stalin & the end of the Soviet Union was guranteed from the moment Lenin consolidated power among the central committee.
5/?
Stalin used his administrative position on the central committee to put the most loyal and brutal people in crucial positions all over the union.
These people helped him carry out the first purge, then most of them were purged in the 2nd or 3rd round.
Karma is a bitch, though, and Stalin laid in a puddle of his own piss for 2 days after having a stroke with people carrying on like he wasn't there. Probably conscious and able to see/hear but not say or do anything.
Karma. Don't be a Stalin.
Vitaly said that in 1989, he had no indoor plumbing or telephone. He DID have a car, that he wasn't supposed to have because there is no way he could officially afford it on his official salary.
He said that he was there for "the best of times" because the purging was over and the state had lost some of it's bite. It was basically just decades of a slow decline and decay.
6/?
Stalin absolutely wanted to rule the world. While Lenin was still in power, Stalin's administrative role on the central committee didn't have real power, except that final sign-off on who went where. That proved key later, as I previously mentioned.
The other members of central committee noticed Stalin's desire for power and started making some noise. Stalin pulled the same move that had worked for Lenin previously. He asked them all if they wanted him to quit and they said no.
(My editorializing: Obviously there must've been some implied threat and/or politics)
When he needed them, Stalin had the most loyal and brutal men in all of the most critical positions.
7/?
Now some more about Vitaly. I don't want to misspeak about his exact position while in Soviet Union, but he was a government scientist with low level security clearance. It would've taken him over 10 years of his official salary to buy the illegal car that he wasn't supposed to own.
I mentioned before, but in 1989 he did not have indoor plumbing or a telephone. The only way that he was allowed to have a car that cost more than 10 years salary, was that he registered it in his mother inlaw's name. She was old enough to potentially accumulate that much money, had certain jobs, etc.
8/?
George Orwell & Peter Kropotkin
The short: Vitaly had only the highest praise for Orwell. Familiar with, but not read Kropotkin. This was because he wasn't a Bolshevik. It wasn't allowed to exist. 😅
He freaking loves Orwell. The books of course, but especially his other writings and essays in the Guardian(?) Says they aren't even teaching Orwell in USA schools and other "controversial" literature near to the extent they did even 20 years ago. (I would actually like to look into this for my own edification. Thoughts?)
He said that he was familiar with Kropotkin, but not read at all or informed to speak on him. This is because he was as much an enemy of the Bolsheviks as the capitalists.
To give you a better idea of Vitaly, I almost always see him listening to audiobooks of classic Russian literatures while repairing or refurbing an electron microscope.
Sir Rochard 'Dock' Bunson