youre absolutly right, rob. Thats clearly the top and entrance of the bunker inside the reichskanzlei.
2 Likes
That definitely is! I was mistakenly looking at the bunker at 4:36 referenced by gracchus, and didn’t notice the scene immediately after. You’re right.
I just finished this oral history by Nobel winner Svetlana Alexievich and if you want some peripheral insight into the experiences these people have gone through, especially on the Soviet side:
Yeah the experiences are almost relentless horrors, surprise.
1 Like
That certainly was a chilling book and stresses that Khrushchev rather than the noble reformist that he is often presented as was an active participant in a lot of Stalin’s atrocities and only criticized him when he was safely dead.
1 Like
I’d be careful with certain claims from that book. SSM did a lot of research for that book, of that there can be no doubt, but some of his sources are kinda dodgy. IIRC, he has no Soviet source for this, and people were in and out of his office and living quarters constantly, who wouldn’t have been critical of Stalin doing that, and likely would have mentioned it.
3 Likes
Came to post this. Can’t recommend this movie enough, though it’s not easy to stomach. But I think it’s important to see, because I think USians tend to gloss over straight from from 1945 to the 50s; “we defeated world evil, yay!” to the good times of the post war boom and look at what great places Japan and Germany became. We forget that for a few years people in these countries were living shattered lives, barely surviving among rubble in completely, utterly destroyed places.
There’s an old joke about Khrushchev speaking at a Party congress soon after his denouncing of Stalin. As he finishes up, an attendant brings him a note, saying it’s a question from the audience.
“Comrade Khrushchev, if all the awful things you’ve told about Stalin are true, then what were you doing while they were happening?”
Khrushchev’s face contorts with anger, and he leans on the podium, glaring at the audience. “Who sent that note?” he bellows. “Confess up right now!”
The entire auditorium is dead quiet; people are stone still, holding their breath and not looking at the enraged Premier at the dais.
Khrushchev relaxes, and speaks in a calm tone. “Now you know what I was doing.”
5 Likes
This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.
