Posted on 01/28/2018 12:32:58 PM PST by GoldenState_Rose
The Red Army's defeat of Nazi German forces on Polish soil in 1944-1945 remains a thorny issue in Russian-Polish relations.
Many Poles viewed the Red Army as an occupation force, not as liberators, as the 1939 Nazi-Soviet pact had carved up Poland between two dictatorships.
Poland updated its "de-communisation" legislation, banning "totalitarian" symbols, which would include Soviet propaganda monuments.
The Russian foreign ministry condemned the new Polish "de-communisation" law as "an outrageous provocation", and warned of unspecified "consequences".
"The USSR paid the highest price to liberate Poland - on that country's soil, in battles with the enemy, more than 600,000 Soviet soldiers and officers died and were buried. Hundreds of thousands of Soviet prisoners of war, who died in Nazi concentration camps, also lie in Polish soil," the ministry said.
The Russian government has warned Poland that it will face sanctions if it removes monuments glorifying the Soviet victory in World War Two.
In 2007, Estonia's removal of a Red Army statue in its capital Tallinn sparked a violent protest by Russian speakers and a massive cyber attack on Estonian official websites. Russian hackers were blamed for that attack.
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
I stayed a few weeks in Narva (the 90% Russian town you speak of) and Tallinn, the capital, during their Independence Day (from Russia) festivities and NATO parade.
It was a bit of a warp for me because not that long before I was across the border in Russia surrounded by red flags and sickle/hammers at Russia’s Victory Day Parade LoL.
All I can say is:
So long as PUTIN is in power, I assure you Estonia is firmly in Europe’s corner and the most passionate, paying, and committed member of NATO.
Yeah there have been scuffles of course, especially after Estonia made it so that you need to pass a language test to become a citizen (Estonian is a notoriously difficult language) - frustrating many Russians.
But now dialogue has evolved and Russians and Estonians collaborate together in I.T. fields. I’ve witnessed this firsthand.
Also: Estonian Russians are NOT the same as Crimea-Russians mentality wise. Estonia offers perks for Russians that Ukraine did not offer Crimea.
How relations shape AFTER Putin is gone is anyone’s guess though, you’re right.
But what do the soviets say?... oh, there is no Soviet Union. But bye
Dig up the six hundred thousand and send them back
*cough* Katyn *cough*
______________________________________________________________
Not to mention Stalin stopping the Red Army at the Vistula for six months so the Nazi’s could wipe out the Polish resistance in Warsaw.
In the half they didn’t invade WITH the Nazi’s....
Witold Pilecki
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witold_Pilecki
I’m going to take an opposition view on this.
After watching many of my Southern heritage being tore down by antifa types and lesser men(Democratic mayors) I say take it case by case.
I actually looked up(horrors) the images of some of these statues and , for the most part, they look like memorials of the common Soviet soldier.
these statues
I would De-Commify(likie De Nazify) these statues by removing the red star and hammer and sycle but leave them standing, especially if they are on former historic battlegrounds.
The sacrifice of these men are noteworthy even if they served an evil empire.
There’s no changing history and ignoring it is stupid.
Just my opinion.
I think that would be appropriate leaving the graves as they are and shipping back the monuments. Really, the monuments ought to be blown up but it doesn’t pay to piss off the Russian bear.
I’ll be first to say that was really funny!
The Soviets murdered over 20,000 at Katyn alone after they invaded a weakened Poland at the beginning of World War II. Despite promises from the French and British, neither did anything substantive in response to the invasion by the Communists.
I recall that the Reds were responsible for at least 1 million Polish deaths.
The Russians liberated, then raped and pillaged, then subjugated Poland.
“The USSR paid the highest price to liberate Poland - on that country’s soil, in battles with the enemy, more than 600,000 Soviet soldiers”
That is a giant half truth. The Soviets kicked out the Germans so THEY, the Soviets, could OCCUPY Poland and insure their puppets would get installed to run things there.
F_ck you, we can do what we want in our own country...
Sincerely, Poland...
Josef Stalin statues go up in Russia as U.S. Civil War statues fall
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/08/16/soviet-union-terror-josef-stalin-popularity/556625001/
Totally. Russia can go to hell over their craptastic Stalin-worshipping WW II monuments. Tear them down and/or redesign them so that they communicate the truth about the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of 1939 where Stalin and Hitler carved up Poland together.
Yeah, I guess the Russians don’t think anyone remembers that whole Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact thingie . . .
The Russians stood by while the Nazis destroyed Warsaw. Russians were conquerors, not liberators.
Poland needs to turn those Soviet memorials into urinals.....I’d buy one.
My neighbor was a Lithuanian-born Pole who was still serving in the Polish Army when then the war started; he ended up being captured by the Germans and imprisoned for the duration. Then when the Russians invaded instead of being liberated he was shipped into Russia and imprisoned there. His wife, a brilliant woman who spoke 7 languages fluently, was imprisoned somewhere else. They each believed the other was dead.
Needless to say he hates communists, especially Russian and American ones. Russians for what they did to Poland, and ti Lithuania, and American ones for what they want to do to his beloved adopted country, America.
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