Those old Zil's had a Checker cab coolness...
As I recall the Russkies used one well into the ‘70s that looked like a Packard.
Those old Zil's had a Checker cab coolness...
The Soviets were building their own limos from clear back in Stalin’s time. Look up ZIM, ZIS, & ZIL marques. Mostly knockoffs of 1930’s era Packards.
Stalin donated his personal ZIS limo to the Nork dictator Kim Il Sung. It was captured by U.S. forces following the Inchon counterattack & is on display in the U.S. to this day.
There was a fleet of ZIS limos; Stalin rode in them in a simultaneous motorcade like a rolling shell game, such was his paranoia about assassination. Even the Czar had had two identical Imperial trains riding the Trans-Siberian Railway with his exact location unknown.
“In America, you wait for train. In Russia, train lays in wait for you.”