Forgotten Histories

This is a VERY interesting book, dealing with a subject that few in this world even know about.

The American mass emigration to the Soviet Union during the Great Depression.

The Forsaken: An American Tragedy in Stalin's Russia by Tim Tzouliadis.

I accidentally found this book while searching for the NKVD units which were at Brest Litovsk in 1941, as I marveled how the movie is some of the best propaganda I've seen, and part of that search was the German-Soviet cooperation in occupied Poland 1939-1941... not that interesting...

...

Still here?

Go read the book, it is posted (almost?) in full on google books, it is fascinating.

Now off to how my febrile, insane brain works.

This will go on a hella of a tangent, so strap in.

Regarding my little search, it all started with me watching the Belorussian movie Brest, about the fighting in the fortress of Brest Litovsk in 1941.

The movie, if you are interested, is here, but you must read the subtitles (which are, amazingly, in English) to understand it, and I know how lazy you fucking bastards are - you best stick to your Private Ryan and Band of Brothers.

Anyhoo.....

*MOVIE SPOILERS*

The movie shows little children crushed by a German tank rolling over massacred civilians, and a little crying girl holding her toy is right in the path of the Nazi tank...

Of course, innocent Russian girl is captured, rape is implied, and then she is shot by a grinning German soldier...

Soviet troops, attacking with chairs (not, am not kidding), handily beat the Germans armed with MP-40's (submachine gun)... and the Germans, instead of mowing the idiots down, succumb to the brave Ivans.

The movie commits the usual sin of WW2 movies showing the German infantry as complete idiots, advancing while fully standing up, shooting from the hip, and continuing to stand up while under fire, while (of course) bunching up together to be easier targets.

I realize that you, the reader, is in all probability a civilian, but here's a pop quiz:

Somebody is shooting at you! Quick, what do you do?!

Right, you don't win anything, because if you are a non retarded human being your answer is to drop down to the ground immediately and then either try to crawl away into some cover or (if you are armed) to shoot back (or both).

If you did not answer the question correctly, please leave this blog and do not come back.

You are either an idiot or a black "gangsta" who shoots his/her gun sideways.

One of the things the movie does right is showing the NKVD troops who were present in the fortress, and their commander, one Vanshtein... You get one guess what ethnic minority this officer was. If you have trouble, know that many high (and low) ranking officers in the Soviet Union's terror units (or, if you would rather, political police, the Cheka then renamed to NKVD) were Jews, who had no qualms ordering mass executions of Russians, Ukrainians, Latvians, Poles, Estonians...

The presence of these NKVD troops fascinated me - exactly why were they on the Soviet-German border in June 1941?

Reading up on the subject, I happened upon Absolute War: Soviet Russia in the Second World War, by Chris Bellamy.

There were NKVD border guards and the 132 Independent NKVD Battalion.

NKVD Border Guards located on the border I can understand, but what exactly was the 132 Independent NKVD Battalion?

To the Google!

The heroic 132 Independent NKVD Battalion was a Convoy unit.

On other web sites, they are listed as an "Escort" unit by the more English speaking writers who never had the pleasure of living behind the "Iron Curtain".

What kind of troops are these?

The Convoy/Escort Battalion?

What or who did they escort?

What or who made up a convoy?

To the Google!

The lesser terror: Soviet state security, 1939-1953, by Michael Parrish.

Ta da!

They were NKVD "troops" whose job was to "convoy", or "escort" prisoners of the Soviet system. And we are not necessarily talking Polish or German or Romanian military prisoners - the Soviet gulags were made to kill off unwanted people en masse while providing the state with slave labour.

A primer on the Gulag System on Wikipedia is here. If you've never heard of this, give it a quick read.

The NKVD Convoy Battalions main job was to transport the prisoners to these gulags (note that I did not say "from", as the foreign sounding word "gulag" can and should not be used, but instead "concentration camp" or "death camp" put in its place).

Now, as you watch (or have watched) the war movie Brest, you realize exactly WHY the Soviet troops trapped in the fortress fought so heroically against the Germans in 1941 and did not surrender.

Simply put, "Vanshtein" and his co-leaders and their underlings realized what the Germans would do when they discovered exactly who these "Convoy" troopers were.

Which ties in neatly once again, proving Viktor Suvorov's thesis of Stalin's planned attack on Nazi Germany in 1941, as detailed in his books and my limited contribution to the topic in this article.

Why else would a whole battalion of NKVD Convoy troops be based RIGHT ON THE German border?

Another thing is - Why exactly Monsieur Chris Bellamy did not list the FULL name of the unit and left it at "132 Independent NKVD Battalion" and did not add the (quite official, in the unit's name) "Convoy" or "Escort" designation?

Perhaps he did not think it important.

Perhaps he did not want to explain what was special about these "troops".

Perhaps he did not do enough research on this.

In any of these (not mutually exclusive) cases, that makes him an idiot, and not an historian.

Which reminds me - Goy, never, never, NEVER EVER EVER read a book by an modern American historian. The politically correct, ahistorical, skewed facts and lack of fact checking is sure to piss you off!

A few more things.

Regardless, the NKVD battalion and the other Soviet units DID perform heroically and did fight a tremendous fight, without resupply of food, ammo and, most importantly, water, which was not present in the fortress (as you know from the movie; wikipedia is lacking in its article here on this subject).

While I recognized the movie for a pretty effective propaganda (for idiots), there are some GREAT Russian war movies which I would encourage you to watch.

For action, and glorification of the Soviet Union, as well as a "movie monument" to the Soviet troops who fought in Afghanistan, you simply MUST watch "9 Rota" or, in English, "The 9th Company".

One of the most powerful scenes in the movie is here, as a Russian officer teaches newly arrived soldiers the reality of the situation in the country and of their moslem enemy:

Youtube.

Now you know what Harram means - aren't you glad?

You can buy this movie in America now - it's worth it. After watching it you will laugh at R. Lee, the lovable Marine drill instructor in that silly Kubrick's movie, Full Metal Something or other...

Another, perhaps the greatest war movie, is Afghan Breakdown (1990) or Afganskiy izlom (original title).

This is NOT your American Hollywood or a typical Soviet or Russian silly war movie with silly enemies and heroic allies killing hundreds of suicidal, retarded Germans (or Mujahedin, in this case).

The movie starts with real life circumcision, which, if you are a normal human being, will make you queasy and possibly throw up, or, if you are moslem, Jewish or American will not affect you at all (note to non- American readers - in Yoo Ess of Ey, Jewish doctors and Goyim doctors perform routine circumcisions due to "health reasons". Yes, Americans are THAT stupid and the country is THAT far gone).

After that, it gets worse...

If that is too much for you, may I recommend "Zvezda" or "The Star". It is the radio code for a group of Soviet razvedchiki (Spetsnaz) infiltrating behind German lines in 1944.

Highly recommended, a link to IMDB is here.

You CAN watch it all, however, Russian speakers will have an advantage over others here (Full movie).

The movie is very realistic; as an example, before starting on their long range patrol, the leader of the group asks the group to "jump around".

Now, I realize that some of you are probably laughing at this, and the scene in the movie at first glance looks comical, as the soldiers jump up and down for a moment.

Once you start thinking about it, you should realize that it was done to see if anything in their uniforms and on their persons made any amount of noise or was shaking excessively or stuck too much from their persons or was not packed in/secured properly, which could result in either making noise while moving or losing a piece of equipment while on patrol which could be disastrous to such a commando group.

Small details, people.

The Germans for once are not complete morons, which leads to a very tense movie. The group seeks "tongues", who are prisoners, the higher ranking the better, in order to interrogate them. The information is then sent back to HQ.

The German soldier captured by the group is a very clean, nice looking, ordinary boy, totally innocent on his face and in his eyes. A very human moment - the German, afraid, shaking in fear, and from the cold, his eyes pleading...

Once captured, what happens to the "tongue"?

If you are an American, you probably said that either he was let go (OK... nobody is that stupid) or that the group kept the prisoner with them...

Think on it a bit - a small commando group behind enemy lines - can they bother with a prisoner, who WILL slow them down, who will try to escape, who will try to shout and alert the enemy to the group's whereabouts.

Of course the prisoner is to be killed, after interrogation.

The interrogation by the Soviet Special Forces is NOT shown in the movie, as the German was scared enough that it wasn't necessary - but if a "tongue" proved obtuse, a myriad of interesting ways could and was found to make him talk, starting with inserting knives under fingernails (a relatively humane form of interrogation).

Stop, stop!

Are you, dear reader, offended?

Are you muttering about the Geneva convention and the inhumanity of it all?

Would you rather go back to the bloodless Hollywood movies with American hero effortlessly mowing down German Wehrmacht troops who all have the Down Syndrome?

My dear reader, please research the British SAS, who act in the same way the Soviet troops realistically portrayed in this movie do (i.e. they do NOT take prisoners behind enemy lines).

Of course, there are exceptions to every rule, and Americans ARE the exception.

This incident occurred during "Desert Storm" in 1991.



My blood boils as I watch this idiot explain his actions and his "compassionate thinking".

First, he picked a badly exposed position for his team, which led to...

Himself and his soldiers being discovered by Iraqi children because...

They were badly camouflaged which led to...

Over a hundred Iraqi troops attacking his position.


He was stupid, he endangered his men, he compromised the mission, did I say he was stupid?

The children should have been pinned to the ground, restrained and immediate evac called in before the commotion was investigated by other Iraqis.

Failing that, they should have been killed (as quietly as possible) and immediate evac called in.

My dear reader, are you calling me a monster now?

Would you rather watch your friends, the soldiers around you, die as they are picked off one by one by the Iraqis?

Note that Americans (the idiots) are blessed with overwhelming air firepower from the sky - other nations are not so lucky.

What do you think other soldiers from other nations would do in such a situation?

Knowing that there was a risk of no fire support?


Wait a fucking minute, did this man just say "My gosh" out loud during his interview?

Remind me again NOT to enlist in the American army, and not just because I do not feel the need to die for Israel, either.

Youtube comment:

A wonderful clip. Thank you for posting. Chad Balwanz is a true hero and a wonderful man.

Indeed.

He is so and I am a monster.


PS
The Soviet-German border run through close to the town of Brest Litovsk because of the 1939 dual aggression of the Soviet Union and Germany against Poland.

The first siege of the fortress in World War 2 occurred during 1939, with Polish troops defending themselves against the Wehrmacht.

You can read about this battle on a wiki article here.

Incidentally, the town is very famous in history due to a certain parade which took place after Poland was defeated, in which the Soviet and German troops marched proudly together.

Again, wiki does a so so decent job, its article here.

Just setting the historical record straight.