Russia: Is The USSR Back In Vogue?

rferl.org ^ | May 5, 2008 | Claire Bigg

[Tailgunner Joe]

For the first time in 17 years, Russia will celebrate the victory over Nazi Germany with a display of the country's big military hardware.

Red Square will host a monumental procession of tanks and missiles on May 9, including the country's new Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missile and the S-300 missile-defense system that Russia now sells to Iran. More than 30 military airplanes and helicopters will roar overhead.

"This is not saber-rattling," Vladimir Putin told the last cabinet meeting he will preside over as Russian president before stepping down in two days.

"We are not threatening anybody and we are not imposing anything on anybody," Putin said on May 5. "We have enough of everything. But this is a demonstration of our growing defense capability. We are capable of defending our people, our citizens, our state, our abundant riches."

Still, the parade is a deliberate throwback to the country's communist past, when millions of people watched live on television as the Soviet Union celebrated its vast military might.

It also comes on the heels of a historic political transition, when Putin -- the still-powerful, still-popular leader -- moves into the premiership to make way for his protege, President-elect Dmitry Medvedev.

Dmitry Oreshkin, a Russian political analyst, says beefing up the Victory Day parade is just one of many steps that Putin has taken toward resurrecting the hallmarks of the Soviet empire and the country's former glory.

"He gives free rein to the Soviet dream," Oreshkin says. "The huge number of people who were brought up in a military tradition, and who conceive the world in terms of the West wanting to enslave them, have the painful feeling that Russia lacks tanks. So why not show them these tanks? Why not roll them across Red Square? Let them watch, shed a few tears, and calm down."

To that end, the army has erected a full-scale replica of Moscow's most famous square outside the capital to train for the event. State-run television has been flooding the screens with images of tanks and missile carriers trundling through the city's main thoroughfares as part of the rehearsal.

The show should feature more than 8,000 soldiers wearing spiffy new uniforms, designed by a top Russian couturier and personally approved by Putin, which highlight design motifs from both the Soviet and imperial past.

The outgoing president, who famously described the collapse of the Soviet Union as the 20th century's "greatest geopolitical catastrophe," has made no secret of his fondness for the Soviet era.

A former KGB officer, Putin as president restored the Soviet anthem and the red banner as Russia's official military flag. In 2005, he allowed Moscow authorities to put up a statue of Feliks Dzerzhinsky, the founder of the dreaded Cheka secret police that preceded the KGB.

Visual Memory

Like Putin, large swaths of the population never quite shook off their nostalgia for all things Soviet. Websites ending in the Soviet ".su" domain, for example, are back in vogue, with registrations increasing by 45 percent since the beginning of the year.

There's also talk of reinstating Misha the Bear, the emblem of the 1980 Moscow Olympics and one of the best-selling toys in the Soviet Union, as the mascot for the 2014 Winter Games in the Russian resort of Sochi.

And in December, a sequel to the cult Soviet film "Ironia Sudby" (Irony of Fate), pulverized Russian box-office records.

Russians and the Russian government have flirted with Soviet nostalgia virtually since the collapse of the USSR, when economic and political chaos dealt a heavy blow to national self-worth. But Boris Dubin, a sociologist at the Levada polling center, says the current Soviet revival is unprecedented.

"This tendency has consolidated under Putin's two presidential terms," Dubin says. "All these symbols suggest that both the country's leadership and the overall population are re-embracing Soviet times. This was not characteristic of the first Yeltsin period or even, to a large extent, of Gorbachev's perestroika."

Putin and his disciples, who have overseen a massive economic and consumer boom, are not bent on resurrecting all aspects of the USSR.

But analysts say the Kremlin has sought to fill the ideological vacuum left by the Soviet demise by tapping into what it believes to be the most memorable pages of the country's history.

The Soviet Union, including its most brutal episodes, certainly has many admirers in today's Russia.

One of them is Azirkhan Pashayev, a pensioner who opened a museum commemorating Josef Stalin three years ago at his home in Makhachkala, the capital of the Russian republic of Daghestan.

Pashayev, who prides himself on his resemblance to the Soviet dictator, says his museum draws a steady stream of visitors.

"It's our history, whatever mistakes were made. We shouldn't forget our history, we should teach it to the younger generations," says Pashayev. "Teachers come here with schoolchildren. We celebrate birthdays. On Stalin's remembrance day, I invite 40 or 50 veterans and stage a commemorative ceremony for them."

'Just 70 Years'

Back in Moscow, Soviet memorabilia is all the rage in the dozens of souvenir shops that line the Old Arbat, the capital's famous pedestrian street.

One Arbat shopkeeper says it is mainly tourists who visit her shop, piled high with brightly colored matryoshka dolls, Putin refrigerator magnets, and bottles of vodka shaped like Kalashnikov assault rifles.

But it is Russians, she says, who are quick to snatch other wares, like the secondhand Soviet cameras, binoculars, posters, and old watches displayed in a dusty cabinet at the back of the shop.

Vadim, a 42-year-old collector, recently purchased three podstakaniki, the metal glass holders, once ubiquitous on every Soviet train, from which passengers would sip hot tea.

"This period didn't last very long, just 70 years," Vadim says. "And much was achieved in these 70 years in the Soviet Union. But unfortunately this epoch is gone. A few of its items have remained, and that's why it's so interesting. Besides, I spent my youth, my childhood in this era."

While this year's May 9 parade will have most Soviet nostalgists whooping with excitement, many blame Putin for turning the country into a pastiche of the Soviet Union.

Putin, however, has also restored a number of potent prerevolutionary symbols.

Russia's last tsar, Nicholas II, and his family were reburied with great pomp in St. Petersburg's Peter and Paul Cathedral in 1998, after painstaking efforts to identify their remains. The whole family was canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church two years later.

Putin has also backed the ceremonial reburials of Russian empress Maria Fyodorovna and tsarist General Anton Denikin, both of whom died in exile after fleeing the Bolshevik Revolution.

The sky-high popularity rating enjoyed by Putin and his successor Medvedev underscores widespread nostalgia for what many Russians see as their country's heydays.

But the forced marriage between Tsarist and Soviet symbols, critics like Dubin argue, is not only absurd, it is also harmful.

"These things are far from being innocuous. There is no doubt that all these symbols, this rhetoric, act counter to modernization. The potential for modernization in Russia, the desire for reforms, is already extremely small," Dubin says. "The bulk of the population is now becoming convinced that nothing is changing, and nothing should change."

[kingattax]

seeing the “soviet army in afghanistan” float in the parade should be fun

[Proud_USA_Republican]

And as with all Russian military parades, most of the hardware is not functional and simply for show.

[goldstategop]

Russia is combining the most potent motifs of Russian and Soviet history. The Soviet Union is never going to come back. But its a reminder that Russia is the legal successor to the U.S.S.R and remains the world's largest country and nuclear superpower.

"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." - Manuel II Palelologus

[Proud_USA_Republican]

Its bad enough being losers, but to be losers who dwell on the past makes it even more cronic.

[tips up]

Absolutely...

Flew in from Miami Beach BOAC
Didn’t get to bed last night
Oh, the way the paper bag was on my knee
Man, I had a dreadful flight
I’m back in the USSR
You don’t know how lucky you are, boy
Back in the USSR, yeah

Been away so long I hardly knew the place
Gee, it’s good to be back home
Leave it till tomorrow to unpack my case
Honey disconnect the phone
I’m back in the USSR
You don’t know how lucky you are, boy
Back in the US
Back in the US
Back in the USSR

Well the Ukraine girls really knock me out
They leave the west behind
And Moscow girls make me sing and shout
They Georgia’s always on my my my my my my my my my mind
Oh, come on
Hu Hey Hu, hey, ah, yeah
yeah, yeah, yeah
I’m back in the USSR
You don’t know how lucky you are, boys
Back in the USSR

Well the Ukraine girls really knock me out
They leave the west behind
And Moscow girls make me sing and shout
They Georgia’s always on my my my my my my my my my mind

Oh, show me round your snow peaked
mountain way down south
Take me to you daddy’s farm
Let me hear you balalaika’s ringing out
Come and keep your comrade warm
I’m back in the USSR
Hey, You don’t know how lucky you are, boy
Back in the USSR
Oh, let me tell you honey

[Tailgunner Joe]

Socialism combined with nationalism equals National Socialism.

[lesser_satan]

...and the S-300 missile-defense system that Russia now sells to Iran.

Would that be the same system the Israelis pwn3d on their way to hit the Syrian whatever-it-was?

[RachelFaith]

Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him,

And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I [am] against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal:

And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws, and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts [of armour, even] a great company [with] bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords:

Persia, Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet:

Gomer, and all his bands; the house of Togarmah of the north quarters, and all his bands: [and] many people with thee.

Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.

After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land [that is] brought back from the sword, [and is] gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.

Thou shalt ascend and come like a storm, thou shalt be like a cloud to cover the land, thou, and all thy bands, and many people with thee.

Thus saith the Lord GOD; It shall also come to pass, [that] at the same time shall things come into thy mind, and thou shalt think an evil thought:

And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates,

To take a spoil, and to take a prey; to turn thine hand upon the desolate places [that are now] inhabited, and upon the people [that are] gathered out of the nations, which have gotten cattle and goods, that dwell in the midst of the land.

Sheba, and Dedan, and the merchants of Tarshish, with all the young lions thereof, shall say unto thee, Art thou come to take a spoil? hast thou gathered thy company to take a prey? to carry away silver and gold, to take away cattle and goods, to take a great spoil?

Therefore, son of man, prophesy and say unto Gog, Thus saith the Lord GOD; In that day when my people of Israel dwelleth safely, shalt thou not know [it]?

And thou shalt come from thy place out of the north parts, thou, and many people with thee, all of them riding upon horses, a great company, and a mighty army:

And thou shalt come up against my people of Israel, as a cloud to cover the land; it shall be in the latter days, and I will bring thee against my land, that the heathen may know me, when I shall be sanctified in thee, O Gog, before their eyes.

Thus saith the Lord GOD; [Art] thou he of whom I have spoken in old time by my servants the prophets of Israel, which prophesied in those days [many] years that I would bring thee against them?

And it shall come to pass at the same time when Gog shall come against the land of Israel, saith the Lord GOD, [that] my fury shall come up in my face.

For in my jealousy [and] in the fire of my wrath have I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel;

So that the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the heaven, and the beasts of the field, and all creeping things that creep upon the earth, and all the men that [are] upon the face of the earth, shall shake at my presence, and the mountains shall be thrown down, and the steep places shall fall, and every wall shall fall to the ground.

And I will call for a sword against him throughout all my mountains, saith the Lord GOD: every man’s sword shall be against his brother.

And I will plead against him with pestilence and with blood; and I will rain upon him, and upon his bands, and upon the many people that [are] with him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire, and brimstone.

Thus will I magnify myself, and sanctify myself; and I will be known in the eyes of many nations, and they shall know that I [am] the LORD.

[wolfcreek]

DON’T MAKE US HAVE A PARADE....RuSSSSIA!!!

[Blood of Tyrants]

It was never out of style with the liberals in this country, who were in mourning for years after the USSR fell.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Liberals were socialists when socialists weren’t cool.

[x]

There's also talk of reinstating Misha the Bear, the emblem of the 1980 Moscow Olympics and one of the best-selling toys in the Soviet Union, as the mascot for the 2014 Winter Games in the Russian resort of Sochi.

Oooh! I'm scared of that little bear!

What they're doing is like saying that Happy Days meant the return of McCarthyism.

Really, there is such a thing as nostalgia that doesn't have anything to do with politics.

And in December, a sequel to the cult Soviet film "Ironia Sudby" (Irony of Fate), pulverized Russian box-office records.

D'uh! It's a comedy about a guy who gets on the wrong plane for the holidays and goes to the wrong appartment. It has as much to do with Brezhnev as That Seventies Show.

When they said the USSR is coming back in vogue I thought they were talking about Western kids and their disgusting taste in bars:

[cherokee1]

I’m trying to figure out how the Gog parade works into the prophesy?

[uglybiker]

...S-300 missile-defense system that Russia now sells to Iran.

Would this be the same system the Syrians bought, perchance?