In Defense of History and in Memory of June 22nd, 1941                           

This is an article from our series on septic media

By Russell "Texas" Bentley
OpEds

Alyosha of Murmansk is a 116 ft monument in Murmansk, Russia dedicated to Soviet soldiers, sailors, and airmen of World War II (The Great Patriotic War). Besides a mind-numbing level of infrastrural destruction, the country lost more than 27 million people in that conflict, equivalent to the combined population of Texas, New York and California at the time. Westerners, and especially Americans, cannot begin to wrap their minds around tragedies of that magnitude. and their lying media and political culture is not helping.

As the prospect of a full scale military war in Ukraine seems to have receded once again, at least for the time being, the propaganda and counter-propaganda of the Information War again takes center stage. The connivance of Western governments, media and tech giants to suppress, censor and alter information and even history itself continues and has even intensified recently, and there is every indication it will continue to do so. Their tactics include omissions and distortions of widely confirmed facts, misleading  insinuations, abject hypocrisy and outright lies. What is the motive behind this concerted and coordinated campaign of deception?  As Orwell noted with great prescience in his book, 1984, "Who controls the present, controls the past. Who controls the past, controls the future."

This is not a simple difference of opinion, not a small difference of perspective or a misunderstanding of the facts, this is an intentional, multi-faceted attack on history and truth itself, led by those who own and control the United States, aided by their eager lackeys and collaborators among the rulers of the EU. It is not (only) through stupidity that so-called pundits in the West claim "The US won the war" or "liberated Europe". It is not through forgetfulness that Western commemorations of the defeat of German nazism do not even list Russia as an ally, and it is not historical ignorance when they utter the most despicable lie of all, equating the Heroes of the Red Army with the very nazi murders and criminals that were the Soviets' mortal enemies, and that the Red Army had crushed before the West even entered the war in a meaningful way. These are intentional lies, spread to distort the past, in order to distort the future. And these lies are spread by the same oligarch and corporate/political scum who not only helped bring Hitler and the nazis to power, but who after the war gave refuge and positions of wealth and power to tens of thousands of nazi war criminals. Those who equate the USSR with nazi Germany are, in fact, nazis themselves.

"It should also never be forgotten that the US, UK and Canada themselves imported tens of thousands of nazi war criminals after the war (including the mass murderers of OUN and UPA) not to punish or imprison them, but to collaborate with the very nazis who had been their erstwhile enemies, and give them high ranking jobs in the military, political and intelligence fields, to continue working against the Soviet Union..."

The historical facts are well-known and beyond dispute, and have been widely accepted for over half a century.
It was the Soviet Union, not only more so than anyone else, but more so than everyone else combined, that contributed to, and sacrificed for, the defeat of the German nazi war machine. Over 80% of all German military losses in WW2 were on the Eastern Front. Eighty percent! All the other "Allies", combined, accounted for only 20%. And yet today, they call themselves the victors and liberators, and ignore or disparage the lion's share of the fighting, done by the Red Army. Without the courage, dedication and sacrifice of the Red Army and all the citizens of the Soviet Union, D-Day would never have been even remotely possible, and Europe would, in all probability, still be under the boot of nazism to this day.

The Soviet Union lost more than 27 million of its citizens in the war, including a 31% death rate among their military. Most of them before the United States even got to the battlefields of Europe in 1944. The USA lost 419,000 citizens in the war, and the UK lost 451,000, with military fatality percentages of 2.5% and 3.3% respectively. A fraction of what the USSR lost. And yet it is the US and UK who lead the malignant campaign of historical revisionism against these facts, and against Russia today.

I did not even dream. June 22, 1941 (by Valentin Papko, honored Soviet Artist)

Unlike them, I do not in any way discount the true heroism of the soldiers and citizens of all the allied countries who suffered and sacrificed in the fight against the German nazis. My own Grandfather was a tank commander under General George Patton, and he fought the nazis from southern Italy all the way into Germany itself. I have great respect for all who fought against German nazism, but I say that those who discount the role of the Soviet Red Army today disgrace themselves and insult the memories of all who fought, suffered and died in that war.

There are laws in Europe today that imprison people for questioning the Holocaust and the genocide of  6 million Jews under the German nazis, but there is no law there against disputing or disparaging the sacrifice of 27 million Soviet citizens. US and British hypocrites and revisionists make much of the Non-Aggression Pact signed between Molotov and Ribbentrop at the end of August 1939, conveniently forgetting the capitulation to nazi aggression in the Munich Pact peace treaty signed by Britain, France and Germany almost a full year earlier in September 1938. And it should never be forgotten that it was US and UK oligarchs, along with German corporate leaders, who gave the financial and political backing that brought Hitler and the nazis to power in the first place, beginning in the early 1930's.

The German nazis invaded the USSR on June 22nd, 1941, and made huge initial advances with their blitzkrieg.
The USA did not declare war until December 1941, and did not enter Europe (Southern Italy) until September 1943. The main European offensive by the US and UK would not be until June 1944, more than a year after the Red Army had turned the tide at Stalingrad and forced the Germans into full retreat. But to hear it today from US and EU politicians, "scholars" and "historians", it was the US and UK that saved the world from nazism, with "a little help" from the USSR, who they now describe as not much better than the nazis themselves. It should also never be forgotten that the US, UK and Canada themselves imported tens of thousands of nazi war criminals after the war (including the mass murderers of OUN and UPA) not to punish or imprison them, but to collaborate with the very nazis who had been their erstwhile enemies, and give them high ranking jobs in the military, political and intelligence fields, to continue working against the Soviet Union. So, who's really "equal to the nazis" now?

Such mendacity and hypocrisy must not go undisputed. It must be called out, condemned and corrected, vociferously, every single time it is encountered. Because these lies and distortions are not just crimes against the past, they are made precisely to enable crimes of the same magnitude as WW2 to be committed in the future. George Santayana once said that "Those who cannot learn from the past are doomed to repeat it." One cannot learn from that which has been erased or replaced with lies. We have an obligation to defend history and to stand up for the truth. Because by doing so, we defend the future.