This woman and her child aren’t walking by the Yenisei River near Krasnoyarsk… they’re walking ON the frozen surface of the river. That’s how cold it gets in Siberia… you can drive heavy vehicles over the ice. Now, that’s SERIOUS cold…
BMD
Here’s my New Year good wishes for all of you out there. Tilt the jug and smile… remember, that really riles ’em…
BMD
The above image from a parade on 7 November 2012 in Moscow to mark the 71st anniversary of the Parade for Red October in 1941… where the soldiers went from the parade straight to the fighting on the outskirts of the city.
Yet, never forget… soldiers aren’t automatons… they’re human beings with real lives and real emotions. As a friend of mine wrote:
I’ve seen it many times… men would be fighting for their life, but they held their fire so as not to hit a poor animal. Innocence, I suppose, kids and puppies.
If that doesn’t tell you that soldiers aren’t brutes, I don’t know what to tell you. Mark this well… soldiers are usually not warmongers… they know the cost of it all. They’ve buried one too many of their friends…
I once had a comrade,
you won’t find a better one.
The drum was rolling for battle,
he was marching by my side
in the same pace and stride.
A bullet flew towards us
meant for you or for me?
It did tear him away,
he lies at my feet
like he was a part of me.
He wants to reach his hand to me,
while I’m just reloading my gun.
“Can’t give you my hand for now,
you rest in eternal life,
My good comrade!”
I had a comrade…
Я был товарищ…
Ich hatte einen Kameraden…
J’avais un camarade…
Zhuravli… the White Cranes… “Perhaps, it’s there for me?”
It seems to me that sometimes that soldiers
Who didn’t come home from blood-soaked battlefields,
Weren’t laid to rest in the earth,
But turned into white cranes…
That ever since that time long ago
They have been flying, calling,
Maybe that’s why we often, and sadly,
Fall silent, staring into the sky!
The tired flock flies and flies up in the sky,
It flies in the fog, as the day dies,
In this formation, there’s a space;
Maybe, it’s a place for me.
The day will come when I’ll also drift
With the flock of the cranes in the blue-grey haze,
Calling from the sky, in the bird’s language,
The names of you I’ve left on earth.
It seems to me sometimes that soldiers
Who didn’t come home from blood-soaked battlefields,
Weren’t laid to rest in the earth,
But turned into white cranes…
Yo tenía un camarada…
Minulla oli toveri…
Είχα ένα σύντροφο…
Tôi đã có một đồng chí…
No matter what tongue, no matter what uniform… it hurts…
BMD
Voices From Russia, Too 
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