5 January 2013. There’s a MAN Under the Helmet… Parade on Red Square on 7 November 2012

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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…

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Ich hatte einen Kameraden…

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!”

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I had a comrade…

Я был товарищ…

Ich hatte einen Kameraden…

J’avais un camarade…

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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…

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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

21 November 2012. Don’t Mess With the Best… They’re Not Called “the Black Death” for Naught

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The above are the Russian Naval Infantry, in their traditional black uniforms… that led to their traditional nickname, “the Black Death”. They’re often erroneously called “Russian Marines” in Anglophone publications. Actually, they’re more of an élite unit than the Marines are, and they’d wipe up the floor with the US Marines without breaking a sweat. You see, most Americans have never heard of such battles as Novorossisk (“the Little Land”) in the VOV or Sevastopol in the Crimean War… if they did, they wouldn’t be so belligerent towards Russians. Russians mean it when they say, “All those who march on Russia will be put to death”… they’re not jesting or joking. Ask the Germans…

BMD

 

4 December 2011. THESE Are My Heroes… THEY Didn’t Shirk Their Duty…

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You have a choice… you can honour and respect the heroic fighters of the Second World War (which includes all the brave American fighters, too), or, you can follow the money-grubbing cowards of the Far Right. Rush Limbaugh refused to serve… Richard Cheney refused to serve… Bill O’Reilly refused to serve… Sean Hannity refused to serve… Dropout Scott Walker refused to serve… need I go on? Trust me, virtually ALL of the rightwing loudmouths refused to serve. Ponder that… as Richard Cheney frankly said, “I had better things to do”.

Don’t tell me how “moral” and “upright” the rightwing is… in the main, they’re cowards who refused their country’s call so that they could pursue their own selfish personal ambitions. They’re yellow-bellied godless money-grubbers, worthy of nothing but the contempt of decent people. ONE of the VOV heroes pictured above outweighs all of the Far Right loonies put together. I know where I stand… what about you?

BMD

23 July 2011. Patriarch Kirill Paid Homage to the Dead of the VOV at the Memorial of Glory in Saransk

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On 21 July 2011, His Holiness Patriarch Kirill Gundyaev of Moscow and all the Russias laid flowers at the Memorial of Glory in Saransk in memory of the soldiers from the Republic of Mordovia who died in the Great Patriotic War.