The main forms of falsification of national history of the twentieth century. The lessons of the Second World War and the main directions of its falsification

PROBLEMS OF INTERPRETATION OF HISTORY AND OPPOSITION

ATTEMPT TO FALSE RUSSIAN HISTORY

– cand. philosophy Sci., Assoc.. - Associate Professor of the Department of State Duma SKIRO PC and PRO

The resolution of the First All-Russian Congress of Teachers of History and Social Studies (Moscow, Presidium of the Russian Academy of Sciences, March 31 - April 1, 2011) emphasizes that "historical education is: - the most important and necessary component of personality development, which is not only a way of communication and interaction with others, but also the basis for preparing for a future profession, intellectual and creative development, understanding the laws of the universe; – a strategic resource for the innovative development of Russia, which forms the foundations of citizenship and patriotism”. At the same time, concern was expressed about “a significant decrease in the level of general humanitarian, including historical training of secondary school graduates, which jeopardizes Russia’s ability to reproduce highly qualified personnel who know the history of their country, are able to navigate in modern conditions and have a common identity” (see .: http://*****/blog/articles/articles2011/1374) .

Modern researchers of the problem of falsification of Russian history reasonably note: “our history, our cultural and spiritual heritage is a huge national resource. This is the resource that, unlike mineral wealth, is not wasted. He can only multiply. But attempts to falsify history can lead to the devaluation of this resource.”

It should be noted that the modern concept of falsification of history differs from its interpretation by the historiography of the Soviet period, where the emphasis was on ideological assessments of this or that historical research from the standpoint of the dominant party-state ideology based on a class approach to the analysis of the historical process. Fairness requires that it be noted, however, that with all its inherent shortcomings and unacceptability from the point of view of modern evaluative positions, this approach, according to the recognition of the current high-ranking leaders of modern Russian education, provided t. "allied" relations between the then mass media and the educational community of teachers of history and social science. So, according to a fair remark, “Before, television helped the school, supplemented it. Today, unfortunately, it is rare. Most often, these vectors turn out to be literally perpendicular. And physics says that work is the product of the force vector by the displacement vector and by the cosine of the angle between them. And if the angle is 90%, then the cosine is zero, and the work is zero. Unfortunately, often the results of historical education with perpendicularity between what the teacher is trying to do in the lesson on her own, and what some popular person on the screen does, become equal to zero.

Metaphorically using this phrase “man from the screen” to refer to the social phenomenon of a large-scale presentation of information that does not quite coincide, and sometimes is directly opposite to the settings for the formation of an “ideal portrait of a graduate” of a general school, we can approach a modern understanding of distortions, devoid of ideologized layers. , deformations or falsification of historical knowledge as a factor that can have a significant negative impact on the modern process of school history education.

Falsification of history - a false description of historical events for the sake of a preconceived idea. The goals and motives of historical falsifications can be very diverse: to secure the historical right to a certain territory for this or that people, to justify the legitimacy of the ruling dynasty, to justify the succession of the state in relation to one or another historical predecessor, to “ennoble” the process of ethnogenesis, etc.

According to "Under falsification history is usually understood as the deliberate distortion of historical events for certain, often political purposes. Falsification of history in a narrow pragmatic sense can be defined as a deliberate distortion of historical facts, their biased interpretation, selective quoting and manipulation of sources in order to create a distorted image of historical reality.

The methods of falsifying history are diverse, but in general they can be summarized as follows:

a) direct fabrication of facts and forgery of documents;

b) one-sided selection and arbitrary interpretation of facts, as a result of which links are built between facts that are absent in reality, and conclusions are drawn that are impossible to draw on the basis of a complete picture.

In the second case, all the facts used may correspond to reality, but the conclusions are made with a gross and purposeful violation of the methodological foundations: for example, in order to justify a certain historical character, all sources reporting negative information about him are dismissed as hostile, therefore tendentious, therefore false. (although the hostile source need not, in and of itself, be lying); on the contrary, sources reporting positive facts are accepted without any criticism.

The main directions of falsification of the modern history of Russia in the XX - early XXIcentury

Tendentious interpretation of the events related to the famine in Ukraine in the early 1930s. 20th century (“Holodomor”) under the President.

The problem of "occupation" of the Baltic States in the conditions of the beginning of the Second World War.

Interpretation of the circumstances of the mass execution of Polish officers near Katyn as a key event in Russian-Polish relations.

Substantiation of territorial claims against the Russian Federation based on the falsification of the history of the Second World War, its causes and results (the problem of the Kuril Islands, Kaliningrad, the history of the Soviet-Finnish war - the "unknown war").

Equalization of our country with Nazi Germany in unleashing the Second World War, belittling the role of the USSR in achieving the victory of the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition over the states of the fascist bloc.

Falsification of the history of national relations in our country, aimed at weakening the territorial integrity of the Russian Federation by distorting the history of the entry into Russia of a number of peoples and territories (in particular, the peoples of the Caucasus), at provoking the growth of separatist sentiments in a number of national-state subjects of the Federation (North Caucasus, Tatarstan, etc.).

The introduction into the public consciousness of such "versions" of historical events, which are designed to form a negative image of Russia, provoke the growth of Russophobic sentiments in the world. Example: biased coverage of military events in the summer of 2008 in the Caucasus. There are conflicting versions of the history of the 2008 conflict in the Caucasus (Russia-Georgia) in historiography, which, at the same time, is not a basis for translating these versions into the content of the course of modern Russian history.

The tasks and main directions of the state policy of the Russian Federation to counter attempts to falsify the history of Russia were defined in Decree of the President of the Russian Federation dated 01.01.01 No. 000 “On the Commission under the President of the Russian Federation to counter attempts to falsify history to the detriment of Russia's interests” .

The decree of the President of the Russian Federation formulated the tasks of the Commission as a state body entrusted with coordinating the activities of state and public institutions in the field of countering attempts to falsify history. These tasks include in particular:

a) generalization and analysis of information on the falsification of historical facts and events aimed at belittling the international prestige of the Russian Federation, and preparation of relevant reports to the President of the Russian Federation;

b) development of a strategy to counter attempts to falsify historical facts and events, undertaken in order to harm the interests of Russia;

c) preparation of proposals to the President of the Russian Federation on the implementation of measures aimed at countering attempts to falsify historical facts and events that are detrimental to Russia's interests;

d) consideration of proposals and coordination of the activities of federal state authorities, state authorities of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation and organizations on countering attempts to falsify historical facts and events to the detriment of Russia's interests;

Recently it became known that the commission to counter attempts to falsify history to the detriment of Russia's interests has ceased to exist. According to some historians, because she did her job, according to others - because she was not needed at all.

Member of the Commission, Director of the Institute of World History of the Russian Academy of Sciences Academician Alexander Chubaryan assesses the results of the Commission's activities positively, believing that it "in three years drew the attention of specialists to the pain points of modern history, contributed to facilitating access to archives and initiated the declassification of documents, .. counteracted the distortion of various historical facts. Its creation was a step towards veterans concerned about the distortions of the history of the Great Patriotic War, and in this respect, her work was also useful.

The director of the St. Petersburg Institute of History of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Historical Sciences Viktor Pleshkov, has a different opinion: “The commission was stillborn. Over the years of its existence, it has not done any tangible work aimed at solving the problems facing historical science - facilitating access to archives, financing serious projects related to the publication of documents. Finally, she did not even attempt to raise the question of the need for publishers to conduct an examination of the authenticity of various kinds of “unknown documents” that pop up in “private archives” and “grandmother’s chests”, which are now published in large numbers, as happened, for example, with Beria’s diaries ". On the other hand, the commission evoked sad associations with the Soviet era - suddenly circulars began to be sent to scientific institutions with demands to report on the exposure of falsifiers. True, few people took them seriously, but still they had to come up with replies.

Director of the State Hermitage Museum, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Historical Sciences Mikhail Piotrovsky considers the abolition of this structure quite natural: “The commission was dissolved quite rightly. The term "falsification" is unacceptable for professional scientific discussion and for normal political dialogue. He is from the category of propaganda and journalistic. Without different approaches and interpretations, science stands still, and an attempt to "adjust" views on certain historical events was doomed to failure. In addition, conceived by the initiators of its creation as a response to historical and political attacks from our closest neighbors, the commission, alas, had, it seems to me, a counterproductive effect: its existence, albeit inactively harmless, gave rise to talk about the attempts of the state to influence freedom of science. In his opinion, the abolition of the commission, in fact, is a "correction of a mistake."

On the contrary, Alexander Vladimirovich Fomenko, director of the Center for the Study of Competitive Advantages and Alternative Development Strategies, is convinced that « we need to firmly oppose attempts at malicious intellectual and emotional influence on our historical memory.”

Orlov, director of the MGIMO Institute for International Studies (U) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, emphasizes: “The struggle for historical truth today is not just a dispute over the interpretation of certain events or documents. The stakes are immeasurably higher. For Russians, this is a struggle for national identity.”

To understand the phenomenon of falsification of history, it is necessary to take into account that in modern Russia there is no single official (“state”) version of the historical process. The scientific community, on the basis of consensus, determines the dominant version of the historical process in science within the framework of the methodological direction, which becomes the basis for building the author's line of history textbooks. At the same time, it is quite legitimate to form several author lines of history textbooks, which can be built on the basis of different methodological directions.

Thus, the construction of educational literature on the basis of author's versions and interpretations of the historical past is not a sign of falsification of history, conscious myth-making. This feature of the construction of educational literature on history is due to the very nature of historical knowledge and historical education.

The fundamental feature of historical knowledge is due to the fact that the knowledge of history is based on the author's (subjective in nature) versions of historical events and interpretations of historical sources, the information of which makes it possible to reconstruct historical events. At the same time, the reliability of the results of historical research is verified using special procedures that are used by professional historians (critical analysis of sources, etc.).

The content of school history education should address issues related to attempts to falsify the history of Russia. In modern conditions, the role of a history teacher as a citizen and a professional is increasing, who must have a well-formed methodological culture, competence in the field of ability to counteract factors that falsify historical knowledge, and thereby ensure the achievement of substantive results in the implementation of educational programs in history and social science.

See: Podberezkin at the scientific-practical conference of MGIMO (U) of the Russian Foreign Ministry "Counteracting attempts to falsify history to the detriment of Russia's interests)" http://*****/vol6/book62/index. phtml

See: Kalina at the scientific and practical conference of MGIMO (U) of the Russian Foreign Ministry "Counteracting attempts to falsify history to the detriment of Russia's interests)" http://*****/vol6/book62/index. phtml

See: Vyazemsky falsification of history in educational literature http://www. *****/index. php? id=934

See: ibid.

Kirsanov's falsification of history: how it really happened. http://*****/statty/1jjqipjw73172rmhtjr8.html

See: Decree of the President of the Russian Federation No. 000 dated February 14, 2012 On approval of the composition of the commission under the President of the Russian Federation for the formation and training of a reserve of managerial personnel, amendment and invalidation of certain acts of the President of the Russian Federation

See: Kantor Yu. Without falsifications: the "historical" commission under the president was dissolved // MN. – March 20 - No. | http://*****/society_history//.html

See: Fomenko at the scientific and practical conference of MGIMO (U) of the Russian Foreign Ministry "Counteracting attempts to falsify history to the detriment of Russia's interests)" http://*****/vol6/book62/index. phtml

The Soviet Union collapsed almost a quarter of a century ago. Soviet history in the media and in textbooks has long and habitually been painted in the gloomy colors of communist terror, which was supposedly the meaning of the Soviet political system.

It seems that the authorities are waiting for the last witnesses of the Soviet past to die out, and the new generations of Russia to lose all interest in the heroic image of the great country, which for seventy years gave hope to the whole world for the triumph of justice. In the meantime, other values ​​​​are promoted and other heroes are famous.

However, a movement for the revival of the historical dignity of Russia has arisen and is growing in Russian society. This happens after the strengthening of its political positions in the world. So far, these are public organizations of a club format. Their main task is to fight the falsification of history, opportunistic disinformation and forgery of documents aimed at destroying the unity of peoples and social groups of our vast country. In fact, in response to the informational aggression of the falsifiers of the past, a search is being made for a consolidating national Russian idea or ideology, contrary to the vague definition of political diversity in Article 13 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation.

"Forget your kind, and you are nobody"

As you know, history is a policy directed to the past. The writing of history, the factual interpretation, is an exclusively ideological work. There is no future without the past. In the ideological basis of self-identification of the individual and patriotism lies, first of all, historical memory, around which the culture and language of communication in its diversity is formed. Everything together unites people into a society inhabiting a historical territory, and with the development of the economy, a nation is formed from a historical community. If this algorithm for the formation of a nation is destroyed, if its identification historical basis is distorted, then society will begin to disintegrate and the nation will not take place.

The main sign of the distortion of historical facts is manifested in the direction of the description of the fact itself, its interpretation. If the orientation is anti-Russian or anti-Russian, anti-Soviet, then this is probably a propaganda goal and disinformation, informational intervention in the historical consciousness of Russian society with the aim of its decomposition, the formation of an inferiority complex. This is the direct goal of the so-called information war of the West against the Russian Federation and the former Soviet republics.

The goal is neither new nor exclusive. Information sabotage against Russia has been actively used in politics by Western governments for hundreds of years. In this case, parrying the intervention systematically, new historians and journalists who study history need to be able to perceive the factual series of events, tying them to the political situation of the time in which the events took place, abstracting from modern ideological clichés and not mentally introducing them into the social relations of the past. . Only then, based on the analysis and modeling of events, such an interpretation of facts or processes, alternative to Western propaganda, can appear, which will serve to comprehend the past and consolidate society.

Without a worthy comprehension of the past, it is impossible to build the future without destroying oneself. Moreover, the Russian state, losing the historical continuity of generations, condemning its own history and renouncing the choice of previous generations, runs the risk of blindly following the ideological guidelines of Western competitors, losing its sovereignty. We have no reason to be ashamed of our past. It was worthy, historically predetermined within the framework of the laws of evolution.

Below are several examples of distortions in the interpretation of historical events adopted in Western historiography, and a real alternative to them, based on the cause-and-effect relationships of social processes and facts. This is a purely subjective opinion of the author.

1. There is a persistent message that the Red Army and Stalin forcibly imposed communism on Eastern Europe. That is, the fear of the USSR and the Bolsheviks paralyzed the democratic forces in the countries of Eastern Europe, which were allegedly against communism and socialism.

In fact, everything was the opposite. By the beginning of World War II, almost all European countries were affected by fascism to varying degrees. The fascisization of Europe was due to the response of the bourgeoisie, primarily financial, to the growing popularity in Europe of left-wing movements and parties, the authority of the Comintern after the First World War.

Fascist bourgeois political regimes in European countries were the norm. Moreover, many of them covered themselves with ultra-left slogans of nationalist socialism. So it was in Italy - the birthplace of fascism - led by Mussolini. Hitler's party was called the National Socialist, the national flag of Germany was red with a swastika in a white circle, symbolizing the absolute vitality of the National Socialist idea. It was a prudent propaganda trick of the Nazis in the conditions of the crisis depression of the 30s.

World War II was unleashed as an anti-communist war, in which Germany was the striking force in the intrigue of financial cartels against the USSR and the core of the anti-Soviet European or Western coalition. Fascist Europe concluded peace treaties with fascist Germany. It was the quintessence of political strategy in the next campaign of Europe to the East, as a continuation of the First World War. For this, Germany was armed by the financiers of the United States and Europe.

The allies of the USSR, really the Anglo-Saxons, were hypocritical in this war and were looking for an advantageous middle ground in playing off the two major powers and at the same time their historical competitors - Germany and the USSR.

At the same time, one cannot fail to say that the birthplace of the communist project Marx-Engels was France and England, and the project itself, as conceived by the British Prime Minister Palmerston, a skilled political intriguer who tacitly supported Marx, was intended for rival Germany in order to undermine its economy and state.

Marxov "Communist Manifesto" was developed and freely published in London in 1848 as a program document of the Communist League, and in Germany the manifesto appeared only in 1872. The First International, as an international organization of workers, was founded in 1864, also in London.

At that time, a complete translation of Marx's Capital was first printed in St. Petersburg, and Marxism was a little-known philosophical movement. The CP Manifesto was published in Russia only in 1882, and before that there were attempts to translate it into Russian abroad, in particular in Geneva.

In Germany, in 1918, a communist political party appeared and, if not for the Nazi pogroms of the communists, it would have had a chance to come to power. The communist idea in Eastern Europe also appeared earlier than in Tsarist Russia. In 1919, a Soviet republic was proclaimed in Hungary and a red army was formed to defend it, while a civil war was in full swing in the RSFSR, in which European internationalists also participated. So Europe was ready for communism long before World War II and Stalin.

Rather, Russia followed the European left and allowed a grand experiment to take place. There was no diktat to Europe on its part, just as there has never been a forcible planting of Russian Orthodoxy. It is no coincidence that after the war in the 70s of the last century, Eurocommunism was cultivated in Europe, different from the Soviet version. What does the USSR and Stalin have to do with it?

After the victory in 1945, the authority of the USSR and the ideas of socialism were in themselves very high, and the USSR was perceived in the world by the broad masses of the people as a role model in solving such acute political problems as social justice and the prosperity of peoples, their independence.

Therefore, the influence of the left-wing parties in European countries increased sharply as a result of the war, while the right-wing bourgeois parties, who collaborated with the Germans in governments during the war, collapsed. This is the main reason for the political parties in Europe, as well as Asia, South America, and Africa to the left. The process also affected the United States. This is how the International Socialist System arose, which was represented by socialist countries and countries with a socialist orientation. And then there were the associations of Eastern European countries in CMEA And Warsaw Pact.

No one forced them into these organizations. Albania voluntarily withdrew from these organizations. Socialist Yugoslavia and Austria did not participate in them, on the territory of which Soviet troops were located until 1954, and the hammer and sickle flaunted on the Austrian coat of arms from 1919 to 1934.

In order to prevent left-wing revolutions in their countries, in America and France, for example, in the post-war period, pro-fascist measures were taken and communist parties were banned there. This is anti-communist policy de Gaulle in France, and McCarthyism in the USA. In Spain and Portugal, the fascist dictatorship was established earlier, but was not overthrown immediately after the war, but only decades later ceased due to the death of the dictators. Franco And Salazar. It is noteworthy that in Portugal, the constitution of 1974 (the so-called Carnation Revolution) proclaimed a course towards the construction of socialism. Later this article was removed from the text of the constitution.

One may ask, how can we regard the events in Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968, if we do not consider them dictated by the USSR? Very simple. The Warsaw Pact provided for mutual military assistance in crisis situations. The putsch in Hungary and Czechoslovakia was inspired from outside, as it was much later in Yugoslavia. That's why in Hungary and Czechoslovakia, troops were introduced not only from the USSR, but also from Poland, the GDR, and Bulgaria. The operation was collective, not exclusively Soviet. At the same time, modern Russia bears no historical responsibility for these events.

Moreover, the Warsaw Pact provided for a self-dissolution procedure if a pan-European system of collective security was created. The treaty was open to accession by other countries, regardless of their political system of power, on the basis of equal sovereign rights.

2. Western propaganda and opposition in Russia fan the myth of the notorious Iron Curtain between the USSR and the West, allegedly lowered by the Soviet dictatorship. This is a complete perversion of the essence of the isolation of the USSR. The Iron Curtain was lowered by the West, that is, the economic and political isolation of the USSR was declared, the blockade of its entry into the world market immediately after the establishment of Soviet power after the revolution.

World War II did not change the position of Western governments. Churchill's Fulton speech in 1946 Truman Doctrine and other policy statements by American presidents confirm this fact. The strategy of the "Iron Curtain", i.e. isolation in the post-war period, was implemented in the form of the Cold War. All this continues now in the form of sanctions and trade restrictions, but already against Russia.

Nevertheless, the Soviet Union managed to conduct successful foreign trade. In addition to raw materials, timber and oil, products of mechanical engineering, energy and chemical industries, aircraft industry, etc. were exported. gold ruble, which protected the domestic market and the CMEA from the influence of the US dollar and ensured market stability. However, this created a shortage of foreign currency in the state treasury, which was necessary for industrial development and foreign policy activities.

There was a widespread opinion among the intelligentsia that the state was deliberately forbidding travel abroad for ideological reasons. In fact, the reason for the restrictions was the shortage of foreign currency, since the government had to provide foreign currency for citizens traveling abroad in rubles according to international standards. For the same reason of the currency shortage, trade in foreign consumer goods was organized through the Vneshtorg store system for checks of the VPT, which were paid instead of currency to Soviet citizens for work on foreign business trips, and the earned currency itself went to the state treasury.

As for ideological obstacles, then for this reason the dissident emigration of the 60s and 70s would hardly have taken place. Compared to the emigrants of the first wave, Soviet dissidents did not play any significant role in the ideological confrontation between the West and the USSR, they were dangerous at home, and not abroad, where they sent dissidents out of harm's way. The very ideological background of the travel restrictions has become a kind of cover story for the real cause of the problem - saving foreign exchange reserves.

The exchange of tourists and students was also normalized due to the foreign exchange deficit, but it existed on the basis of quotas for the exchange of tourists and students. There were also visa restrictions on both sides. In the USSR, by law, citizens who had access to secret documents were also limited in traveling abroad.

In addition, bilateral agreements on the free crossing of borders were then concluded between the states. The USSR did not have such agreements with foreign countries. But this was determined not by ideology, but by the migration policy of each country. It was possible to leave for a socialist country at the invitation of an organization or relatives. The procedure for obtaining an exit visa to a capitalist country for the same reasons was more complicated. But it depended on the rules of the other side. In our time, when almost all restrictions on leaving the Russian Federation have been lifted, restrictive conditions for entry into some countries remain.

What was the currency spent on in the USSR? First of all, for foreign policy goals to ensure the balance of power and world influence of the two systems in the conditions of the blockade and the Cold War, to put it briefly. Peaceful coexistence cost money. Therefore, the USSR supported materially friendly states in their development and ensuring sovereignty. The maintenance of foreign state institutions, the provision of maritime navigation, international communications also required foreign exchange costs.

The task of world revolution, for which the USSR is reproached, was never set by the Soviet leadership after Trotsky's departure and the collapse of the Comintern. But the myth of the "world revolution of the Soviets" remained, thanks to the slogan of the Comintern era "Proletarians of all countries, unite!". This tradition did not reflect real Soviet foreign policy, but was used tendentiously in Western anti-Soviet propaganda, now the soviet threat is replaced by the russian one.

3. Russophobes and opposition shout about the technological backwardness of the USSR and Russia. But the USSR was not technologically backward. On the contrary, most of the advanced technologies in the world were developed by Soviet scientists, but they were implemented in other countries. For example, laser, television, mobile phone, space exploration and nuclear power.

In military technologies, we were ahead of the developed capitalist countries, and we are ahead of them now, however, in the production of consumer goods, the state did not allow excess consumer qualities, focusing on domestic demand in the absence of competition. Many high dual-use technologies were unnecessarily classified.

Soviet goods were simple, cheap, and in terms of quality they were quite satisfied with the demand of the bulk of the population, and the state saved on this. Although the industry could also produce more sophisticated household appliances, if they did not save on costs in the light and food industries in order to carry out grandiose space programs - the basis of the country's security. At a time when the West was switching to plastic and food surrogates at the whim of speculators, the USSR preferred natural products and fabrics, building materials. Today it is proved that the shortage of goods in the USSR was deliberate, a form of political pressure in the struggle for power.

In reality, according to the results of participation in international exhibitions, our goods, including cars, enjoyed a fairly wide potential demand abroad among the population because of their cheapness and utility. This was one of the reasons for the market isolation of the USSR in favor of Western concerns that produced products, for example, the same cars, with inflated consumer properties at a higher price and a relatively short service life even with a well-organized technical service.

Overproduction, an excess of goods in relation to demand, leads to overexpenditure of resources and their depletion, an increase in industrial waste and garbage. But a competitive market cannot exist without this commodity glut and intensive financial turnover. Today we see it firsthand.

After the collapse of the USSR, Russia entered the world market, but limited in the implementation of its capabilities by the obligations of membership in the WTO. The ruble has become freely convertible and unprotected from the influence of stock market conditions. As a result, the economy of the Russian Federation, like other former Soviet republics, turned out to be controlled by Western financial cartels. Russia imports consumer goods that it could produce itself with better quality. Gradually, consumption develops into pathological consumerism, which ensures the growth of capital of financial speculators-usurers, morally corrupting society.

What is the benefit to the population of Russia from participation in the WTO and is there any? The benefits of speculators do not improve the standard of living of the population and the quality of goods.

4. The West constantly accused the USSR and accuses Russia of aggressiveness, naming far-fetched aggressiveness in the first place among other threats. However, in world history there is no other state with many peace-loving initiatives, such as the USSR and the Russian Federation.

Even at the Genoa Conference in 1922, the Soviet delegation, on behalf of the head of state, proposed general disarmament. The USSR offered peace and the fulfillment of the obligations of the former government (tsarist and bourgeois-republican) for debts and compensation for the losses of foreign companies from the revolution in exchange for the official recognition of the Soviet government as legitimate and full in international relations. The West rejected both proposals. The Soviet state remained in a trade blockade and political isolation. The West is now pursuing the same policy towards Russia.

5. The outright lie is circulating in the media and the Internet that the West was forced to create NATO and expand it because of the threat of a communist invasion from the East. Few people know that initially, at the end of the war, the UN was planned like the pre-war League of Nations, from which the USSR was expelled in 1940. The League of Nations itself collapsed due to insurmountable political differences between its members on the eve of the World War and was formally dissolved in 1946, but after the establishment of the UN in 1945.

The membership of the USSR in the UN was also not supposed, and the new international organization was conceived by the Western powers as a consolidated tool in the fight against communism, by analogy with the League of Nations.

However, this could not be done, thanks to the authority of the then leadership of the Soviet Union, which became one of the founders of the modern UN. Obviously, in opposition to the anti-communist UN, the Comintern could be revived with the Soviet Union at the head, which before the war caused a lot of anxiety to world capital. This was a weighty argument in favor of the USSR's membership in the UN, which did not seek confrontation. The inclusion in the UN of the USSR and two union republics - the Ukrainian SSR and the BSSR - as independent members of the organization was a victory for Soviet diplomacy.

Soviet lawyers, experts in international law, actively participated in the development of the UN Charter. At their suggestion, the UN Security Council was formed with the right of veto for each of the five countries members of the Security Council: the winners of WWII and China. The inclusion of China in the UN Security Council was proposed by the Soviet leadership. Thus, the plans of the leading Western powers to aggravate the confrontation in the Cold War were frustrated, which was fraught with the Third World War with the use of nuclear weapons.

As a result, the UN was established in 1945 in the status of a universal subject of international law to develop international cooperation, ensure security and maintain peace on Earth with the authority to form and use peacekeeping armed forces.

Having failed in the UN project, the Western states united with the same anti-Soviet and anti-communist goal, creating the NATO North Atlantic Alliance in 1949. This organization was originally not only commercial and political, but also military, which included the combined armed forces of NATO member countries. In response, in Eastern Europe, six years later, in 1955, the military organization of the Warsaw Pact appeared., and before that there was already an intergovernmental consultative economic body of the socialist countries of the CMEA (1949). Both organizations were dissolved in 1991.

This is the reason and sequence for the emergence of these international organizations. To this must be added the perfidious eastward expansion of NATO after the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact. So who is the real aggressor here?

6. A special place in Western propaganda is given to the shortage of goods in the USSR and low wages, the infringement of agricultural workers' rights. This issue is very difficult to discuss, since there are no unambiguous methods and comparable statistical data to compare two different systems of government and distribution of national income related to the solution of specific domestic economic and social problems.

Of course, the USSR was "catching up with America." But by what criteria? The Soviet economy was built on the basis of its own resources and labor, and America, which did not fight on its own territory, dominated the world market through dollar speculation and military force.

Nevertheless, today we can quite compare life in the USSR under socialism with life in the Russian Federation under capitalism in many ways: in terms of income, self-realization of the individual and spiritual life.

In Soviet times, the real incomes of the population were much higher than wages. They consisted of earnings and government subsidies. The state subsidized expenses for the maintenance of housing and communal services, kindergartens and nurseries, provided free education at all levels from primary to higher specialized, maintained at the expense of the budget an extensive network of institutions for out-of-school education and rehabilitation of children and youth, sports clubs and sections, sports schools and houses of pioneers. Today in Russia this is practically non-existent. You have to pay for everything. For many families, comprehensive childrearing is out of reach due to low incomes. Thus, from generation to generation, the marginal part of society is growing as a social base for extremism and criminality.

Speculation on historical events

In addition to the ideological falsification of historical facts, the distortion of the essence of the events of the Soviet past, Western political technologists look for episodes in our past that could become an ideological ground for dividing peoples and regions. That is, they are looking for ideological cracks along which Russia could be split.

Among such events, for example, the episode of the capture of Kazan in 1552 by the tsar was chosen. Ivan IV the Terrible, the main city of the former Kazan ulus of the Golden Horde. This was the fifth campaign against Kazan, the previous ones were unsuccessful, which speaks of the power of the Kazan Khanate, comparable to Moscow.

This event is presented by Western and many Soviet historians as the conquest, the conquest by the Russians of the Kazan sovereign Khanate of the Volga Tatars in order to expand Moscow's possessions. Thus, an aggressive image of the Russian Moscow state is sticking out, which should encourage modern Tatars to historical revenge, stimulate separatist sentiments in Tatarstan.

In fact, Kazan was taken by the troops of the Russian Tsar, which included squads of Kazan Tatars, Mari, Chuvash, Mordovians with their khans and princes. Free Don Cossacks came to the rescue.

Together, a protege of the Crimean Khan and the Ottoman Empire was expelled from Kazan, blocking the Volga trade route and raiding Russian lands to rob and capture slaves. The slave trade was one of the industries of the Crimean Khanate. After the capture of Kazan, the tsar, according to the custom of that time, himself became the khan of the Volga Tatars, the Volga trade route became free, and the peoples of the Volga region joined the Russian state, with which they repeatedly turned to the tsar. Neither the way of life, nor the faith, nor the customs of the annexed peoples, including the Tatars, were changed or violated by force. Nevertheless, the capture of Kazan is presented as a war of conquest.

Turkey for several years tried to restore its influence in the Kazan Khanate and put its khan on the throne, organizing rebellion after rebellion against Russia with the help of the Nogais, but was never able to do this. This period is taught as the national liberation war of the Kazan Tatars against the Russians.

In the same manner, the settlement of the provinces of the North Caucasus in the 18th century and later is played up. The fact is that most of the settlers were from the regions of Little Russia, the Kuban and Terek Cossacks were mainly formed from Zaporozhye Cossacks, and therefore, up to our time, an original Ukrainian dialect was spread in the Stavropol and Krasnodar Territories, and Ukrainian culture was also introduced. Modern Ukrainian Nazis took this episode of Russian history as the basis for territorial claims against the Russian Federation, threatening to spread their ideology to the Kuban and even annex the Kuban lands to Ukraine. They talk about this openly, blurting out in the context of Western scenarios of stimulating the collapse of Russia.

It is no coincidence that scholars — historians, ethnographers, sociologists and political scientists from European and American universities are quite actively conducting research work in the North Caucasus, reports on which become the property of specialists of a different kind. Probably, as a result of such scientific contacts with representatives of the local intelligentsia in Stavropol, the opinion suddenly began to spread that "Russians have lost their culture." What will follow?

It is also no coincidence that publications about the peasant war under the leadership of Emeliana Pugacheva or about the Pugachev uprising of 1773-1775. This topic has always aroused great interest in Russia. Too many mysteries remain for posterity about that distant event. But what is the intrigue of the current popularity? It is covered in just a few lines. The peasant war is interpreted as a war between two states - tsarist Russia and the Cossack Yaik (Urals). Pugachev allegedly had a full-fledged government with its own orders and ministers, and the army was regular.

If we compare these curious statements with the activity of the American embassy in the Urals, then we can judge the possible preparation of some kind of ideological basis for an anti-Russian American project in this region. It is quite possible that the authors of historical studies are unaware of such intentions of the customer. But this does not mean that there are no such intentions at all.

In the same series of historical speculations is the problem of the revival of the monarchy in Russia, candidates for the royal throne have already been prepared from imaginary Bagrationi-Romanovs.

The society was shocked by the news of a certain scientific dissertation justifying the betrayal of the commander of the 2nd shock army, General Vlasov. They say that in modern anti-communist Russia, Vlasov cannot be considered a traitor, since he did what higher leaders repeated in the Cold War in the 80-90s of the last century. In addition, the remains of a white general Denikin and his wife were reburied at the Donskoy Monastery in Moscow as a sign of reconciliation of the past. But everyone knows that Anton Ivanovich Denikin refused to cooperate with the Germans against Soviet Russia, although he was an implacable enemy of the Soviet government and the Bolsheviks.

As the old Russian proverb says, you can’t throw a scarf over every mouth. Bans on provocative topics will not improve things here. It is necessary to adequately respond to such challenges with counterinformation, new historiography with a clear ideology of statehood.

Shambarov Valeriy Evgenievich, candidate of technical sciences, member of the Writers' Union of Russia

At the Monino Cadet School, at a meeting with veterans of the Great Patriotic War, one of the cadets volunteered to tell what he knew about these events. His story may come as a shock: “The war began on September 1, 1939, when Stalin attacked Poland. The Germans intervened, they moved so that ours scrambled to Moscow. Then the Americans landed troops in Belarus and rectified the situation ... "

Historical falsifications are by no means a new phenomenon and by no means accidental. Political (and spiritual) rivalry has always been accompanied by information wars, and our country has been involved in such rivalry for centuries.

Since the 14th century, Russia has been fighting for its existence with Lithuania and Poland. In the 17th century, it won, won leadership in Eastern Europe, but at the same time, the leader of Western Europe, France, stood out. At first, she fought Russia with proxy, set the Swedes, Turks, lost in a direct clash of the Napoleonic Wars - but right there, without any respite, rivalry with England unfolded, Russia became her main competitor. Then England was replaced by the USA.

Since the 13th century, in addition to political, economic, and commercial rivalry, Russia has assumed the mission of the bulwark and salvation of world Orthodoxy. Thus, it turned out to be an opponent for militant Catholicism, and for Protestant movements, and for dark occult, satanic sects, and for atheistic parties and groups.

This hostility is not surprising. After all, the Lord Himself warned: “If the world hates you, know that it hated Me before you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hates you” (Inn 15:18-19).
In line with the information wars, historical falsifications were born. They wandered from era to era, they were adopted from their predecessors, and peculiar stereotypes were formed, stable, with claims to objectivity. Although their essence was entirely determined by the rivalry described above. All opponents had to present Russia only in the image of an enemy - an aggressive conqueror, enslaver, a prison of peoples. And the Russians needed to be portrayed as unsightly and caricatured as possible. From here myths about Russian savagery, cruelty, slavery, drunkenness, ignorance, and backwardness were produced. Everything of value was declared borrowed from the West. Russia for world civilization was exposed not only as useless, but as a brake, an obstacle to progress.

A typical concentrate of these tendencies is given in the works of the German ideologist W. Hehn on the eve of the First World War: “The souls of Russians have been imbued with age-old despotism”, they “have neither honor nor conscience, they are ungrateful and love only those whom they fear ... Not a single Russian can to become a locomotive driver ... The inability of this people is amazing, their mental development does not exceed the level of a student in a German high school. They have no traditions, roots, culture on which they could rely. Everything they have is imported from abroad.”
Therefore, "without any loss to humanity, they can be excluded from the list of civilized peoples."

Naturally, the falsifications were aimed at the citizens of the states opposing Russia in order to excite and mobilize them for the struggle. But ideological sabotage, the introduction of lies among the Russians themselves, also proved to be effective. I saw this danger in the 17th century. Croatian thinker Yuri Krizhanich is a Catholic spy who also wrote negative things about Russia, but was in exile in Siberia, got to know our country better, and began to look at many things differently. He called such a threat "foreignness." “Nothing can be more disastrous for the country and the people than the neglect of one’s good order, laws, language and the appropriation of other people’s orders and a foreign language and the desire to become another people.”
Nevertheless, "foreignness" in Russia has established itself - under the brand name of "Westernism". It was also reflected in historical science, which adopted foreign views and assessments, absurd theories like Normanism. Unsubstantiated and quite easily refuted, but, in spite of everything, extremely stable, living both abroad and in our country so far.

Let us also note such an important fact. In all states, historians carefully embellished and varnished their past. And only in Russia in the XIX century. a fashion for self-spitting on one's history has taken root! Moreover, the methods used for this were far from clean. So, dozens of foreign authors wrote about Medieval Rus'. They wrote differently. But the testimonies of those who admired our country were hushed up. And the testimonies of those who found fault (even if within the framework of obvious information wars) were replicated, promoted as "generally recognized."

A vivid example of dishonest manipulations with primary sources can be the famous "Domostroy". According to various works, historical and journalistic, the same quote roams: “And the husband will see that his wife is in trouble ... and for disobedience ... taking off his shirt and whip, politely beat him, holding his hands, looking at fault.” Seemingly undeniable barbarism? Stop! Notice the dots. They are missing not individual words, but several paragraphs! Let us take the original text of Domostroy: “If a husband sees that his wife and servants are in disorder, he would be able to instruct and teach his wife with useful advice.” Same meaning or a little different? Or is he completely different? And the words about spanking do not refer to the wife at all, but to negligent servants. I am not arguing here whether it is right or not to flog a servant if, for example, he steals (perhaps it would be more correct to send him to the gallows immediately, as they did in England until the 19th century?) But Russian historians, like Kostomarov, who put into circulation a quote with an ellipsis, read the full text of Domostroy. Therefore, the forgery was deliberately committed. By the way, facts of forgery can also be found in the translations of some texts from Church Slavonic into modern Russian. The question is why? To spit at one's own ancestors, but to earn a reputation as "progressive", praise abroad...

The result is known. The educated elite of society, the nobility and intelligentsia, broke away from national roots. From the language, culture, and then from the Faith. And the same educated elite, infected with the falsifications of Westernism, influenced the common people. Everyone knows Bulgakov's story "The Heart of a Dog", but few thought that it was close to the truth. The noble and seemingly decent Professors Preobrazhensky and Dr. Bormentali actually created the Sharikovs! But not from dogs, but from simple and honest Russian people. Zemstvo teacher, engineer, agronomist, doctor came to peasants, workers, children, sowed the seeds of atheism and other "progressive" teachings. Should we be surprised at the tragedy that broke out among the same nobility and intelligentsia? Everything happened according to the Gospel. “And whoever offends one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for him if they hung a millstone around his neck and drowned him in the depths of the sea” (Matt, 18, 6).

In the storms of the 20th century several varieties of ideological falsifications have been added to historical science. On the one hand, communist, denigrating and distorting pre-revolutionary reality. But anti-Soviet ones also appeared - distorting and denigrating Soviet reality. And for the Western powers, the Soviet Union remained the same rival as the Russian Empire, ideology played a purely applied role. Therefore, old fakes were extracted and turned over from the archives of past centuries, new ones were composed - for example, during the Cold War, forgeries of the history of the Second World War were urgently needed. The political order demanded that the USSR be turned from an ally and savior of the world back into a monster, equivalent to defeated fascism.

As for our era, not only ideological barriers have disappeared in studies and descriptions of the past. Disappeared - more precisely, were rudely broken into, moral barriers. Barriers of conscience, responsibility, elementary decency. Any restraining mechanisms have collapsed, and flows of disinformation are pouring down on people, like from a broken sewer pipe. The main directions of these flows can be identified as follows:

1) "Classic" falsifications that migrated from past centuries. That the Russians are aggressors, a constant threat to civilized humanity, by nature they are dark barbarians, savages, drunkards, etc.

2) The same Russophobic falsifications, picked up by the domestic intelligentsia and transplanted onto domestic soil, gave rise to another direction - a complex of national inferiority and self-deprecation - with us, Russians, everything is not like people, we do not know how to live well and culturally. And for the past it remains only to repent. By the way - before whom? No, not before the Lord! Foreigners are invited to be judges of our repentance! Ideological enemies who carried out the described sabotage.

3) Ideological falsifications, both Soviet and anti-Soviet, have been further developed. They seem to be opposite, irreconcilable. But an interesting feature can be noted. Both fit perfectly into one mainstream, anti-Russian and anti-Russian. The detractors of our history make excellent use of both at the same time. Relying on communist arguments, they cheat tsarist Russia, and to cheat Soviet Russia they use the arguments of rabid critics of communism.

4) Preferred targets for falsifiers are key figures in the history of Russia. St. Vladimir the Baptist, St. Andrei Bogolyubsky, St. Alexander Nevsky and others. One can even identify a pattern, the more this or that figure has done for the country, the thicker and more persistently they try to denigrate him.

5) In the same way, key events in national history are attacked. Priority in this respect belongs to the Great Patriotic War. And this is also quite understandable. In order to water Russia with slander, it is necessary first of all to obscure and cross out her brightest, most grandiose feat, which saved the entire civilized world. If you do not cross it out, then in other respects slander will not “stick” well, sympathy will remain.

6) Nationalist falsifications about the enslavement of the Baltic states, Ukraine, the Caucasus, and Central Asia by the Russians received a new life. And also pseudo-nationalistic - attempts to further dismember our people. For example, the recognition of the Cossacks as a separate nation, and a nation also enslaved by the Russians. The development of these theories was carried out by Kaiser Germany, then Nazi Germany picked them up, then they were considered useful and suitable by American ideologists, and now the fruits of their joint creativity are walking around Russia with might and main.

7) Theories opposed to Westernism also appeared. An example is Eurasianism. The Mongol-Tatar yoke is denied, the Horde khans are recognized as almost Russian tsars, a symbiosis of Rus' and Asian peoples is announced. Theories, at first glance, friendly to our country, calling for joint resistance to common enemies and common slanderers. Although if you figure it out, you get an analogue of the same Westernism with a sign change. The independent role of the Russian people is belittled, they are offered a model of subordination, but not to the West, but to the East.

8) The direction of falsifications, seemingly patriotic, pro-Russian - neo-pagan, has become new in our era. Sensational works emerge about some primordial wisdom, ancient Slavic traditions and civilizations. But in reality, such theories also turn out to be extremely dangerous and destructive. Generating false traditions, they aim at undermining the true traditions of Russia, the Orthodox.

9) Finally, directions of "historical terrorism" appeared, aimed at blowing up the very foundation of historical science. The most striking example is the so-called "New Chronology".

The processes of introducing historical fakes at the present stage have certain features:
- The impact is massive and clearly targeted. The most dangerous fakes are supported by very solid sources of funding and splash out in huge circulations, flooding the shelves, as was the case with the works of the notorious traitor Rezun (who dared to take the pseudonym "Suvorov"), with the works of Fomenko - Nosovsky.

Even greater opportunities for the spread of fakes are opened up by the Internet - here everything is poured out. The swamp of the Internet attracts and drowns, first of all, young people.

Fundamental historical science does not provide real resistance to falsifications. Its possibilities are limited, its funding leaves much to be desired, and the circulation of academic publications is scanty. However, Russian historians themselves are often in captivity of falsifications: all the same Soviet or anti-Soviet, or Westernizing. Suffice it to recall a school history textbook, which stated that the turning point of World War II was not the Battle of Stalingrad at all, but the battle of the Americans with the Japanese at Midway Atoll.

However, scientific methods of struggle, familiar and traditional for past eras, now, as a rule, do not give results. Falsification can be refuted, exposed, but it continues to spread, as if nothing had happened. The determining factor is not logic at all, not evidence of rightness, but the influence of the masses.

If we generalize all the directions of falsification, we can see what they lead to. Russian people are taught to think that they did not have a great and glorious past. That one can only be ashamed of the achievements of the ancestors and the name of the Russian. The younger generation is turned away from their native history. Say, there is nothing good there! Stink, dirt and shame, why go there?

A hodgepodge of all kinds of sensations and pseudo-sensations, at first glance, plays the opposite role. Attracts to itself, causes an increased interest in history. But in reality, she also turns away. Carried away and played enough delusional sensations, people get tired of them. And it cools down to history as such - if everything in it is incomprehensible, it is redrawn in this way, then is it worth getting into this confusion?

The results are depressing. The overwhelming majority of today's youth do not know their history at all and are not interested in it. At the All-Russian training camp of military-patriotic clubs, I had the opportunity to examine 16-17 year old finalists of the historical competition. The answers could terrify: “Which prince won the battle on the ice of Lake Peipus? - Yuri Dolgoruky”, “Who fought against Dmitry Donskoy on the Kulikovo field? - Batu Khan", "Which tsar built the Russian navy? - Nicholas II.

If any of the young people are still interested in history, they pick up completely insane fiction in the dumps of the Internet, television and yellow literature. For example, at a meeting with veterans of the Great Patriotic War at the Monino Cadet School, one of the cadets himself volunteered to tell what he knew about these events. His story drove the veterans into complete shock: “The war began on September 1, 1939, when Stalin attacked Poland. The Germans intervened, they moved so that ours scrambled to Moscow. Then the Americans landed troops in Belarus and rectified the situation ... "

What happens? And it turns out that Russia is trying to destroy its past. They are destroying Russia itself, but more than that, they are trying to erase the former power from memory! Erase from the memory of descendants, and therefore of all mankind. In general, uproot our country from the face of the earth, as if it never existed. However, the past is inseparable from the present. If a nation breaks away from its historical, spiritual and cultural roots, it collapses and perishes. Tear grass from the roots - it will wither and be blown away by the wind. Tear off the people - it will be the same. People will remain, but nothing else binds them together. They are no longer a historical community. Dissolve in other nations, change language, faith. Or, let's say, they become an inveterate drunkard, die out. Alas, history knows such cases.

It's no secret that the destruction of the Soviet Union and the subsequent disintegration of the post-Soviet space was based on a large-scale falsification of Russian history. Under the pretext of familiarizing ourselves with the benefits and values ​​of Western civilization, all kinds of anti-historical concepts were imposed on our peoples with the sole purpose of discrediting our national history and changing the mentality of our people, depriving them of national identity, respect for their history, for their great compatriots and ancestors. For a people deprived of its historical memory, its historical self-consciousness, ceases its historical existence, disappears as a people. Of course, the falsifiers directed their main blow against Soviet history as the closest and most tangible for our people and, consequently, the most dangerous for the disintegrative, anti-historical designs of the falsifiers.

Let's single out the most typical forms and give the most used examples of falsification of Russian history of the 20th century.

1. It is important to understand that the very process of choosing and substantiating a historical theme can already be a certain form of falsification of history. This is when an insignificant, insignificant topic is portrayed as a large and complex problem, studied long ago - supposedly not studied by historians, but unpromising, local in terms of reaching theoretical knowledge, seems relevant and fundamental for historical science. Far-fetched themes are often formulated. For example, what kind of war was the USSR preparing for - defensive or offensive? Who led the country during the Great Patriotic War - Stalin or Zhukov? It is obvious that the very posing of such questions already orients towards the falsification of historical events.

2. The inclusion in the object of study of elements that exist outside the subject of historical science, its cognitive tasks. For example, "devilry" according to Dostoevsky is presented as a real history of 1861-1917 and subsequent years. The political and religious-philosophical views of the white emigration about the fate of Russia are interpreted as elements of historical science. The opinions of writers and journalists are announced as scientific facts in the process of learning the history of our country.

So on June 4, 1991, Komsomolskaya Pravda published an interview with A.I. Solzhenitsyn, which he gave to Spanish television back in 1976. In this interview, referring to the "data" of Professor I. Kurganov, A.I. Solzhenitsin claims that, they say, from the internal war of the Soviet regime against its people from 1917 to 1959, the country lost 110 million people: 66 million as a result Civil War and the subsequent policy of the Soviet government, and 44 million - during the Second World War from its neglectful, sloppy conduct. The interview was published under the title Reflections on Two Civil Wars. The meaning of these reflections was to whitewash the crime of the fascists and Francoists in the war they unleashed against the republican government of Spain in 1936-1939, under the guise of bringing grotesque falsified statistics of the allegedly criminal policy of Soviet socialism against its people. And thus to introduce into the minds of the Spaniards in 1976 and into the minds of our citizens in 1991 that socialism, so to speak, is more terrible than fascism. The logic here was the same as that of Goebbels: the more monstrous the lie, the more willingly they would believe in it. And when the modern falsifier Yu.L. Dyakov in the book “The Ideology of Bolshevism and Real Socialism” (M., Tula, 2009) reproduces the so-called “calculations” of Professor I. Kurganov, which A.I. Solzhenitsyn repeated in 1976, then, as the Russian historian V.N. Zemskov correctly noted, all these conclusions and generalizations “cannot be called otherwise than as a pathological deviation from the mainstream in this area of ​​historical science” .

3. The fabrication of falsified documents, attributing ideas and meanings to documents that they did not have, and abstracting from the functions that these documents were intended for.

At present, it is well known that specifically in order to discredit Stalin, back in the Khrushchev era, a false “report” by the Soviet intelligence officer Richard Sorge was fabricated, allegedly dated June 15, 1941 and reporting the date of the German invasion - June 22, 1941. “In fact, Sorge did not send such a report, because he did not know the exact date of the German attack on the USSR.”

Or take the so-called Stalin's speech on May 5, 1941, which is used by falsifiers as evidence of the USSR's preparations for an attack on Germany. But what happened in reality? The exact title of this document is as follows: "Brief recording of the speech at the graduation of students of the Academy of the Red Army on May 5, 1941." This document was reconstructed according to the memoirs of the meeting participants in two versions - Russian and German. The Russian version contains several fragments: the main text - speech - speeches in the form of toasts. In particular, Stalin said: “While carrying out the defense of our country, we are obliged to act in an offensive manner. From defense to move to a military policy of offensive actions. “You don’t have to be a military specialist,” G.D. Alekseeva quite correctly points out, “to understand that we are talking about strategy in time of war - from defense to “offensive actions”, and not about two types of wars, as some modern historians, including Nevezhin and Sakharov, who, it should be noted, never studied the documents of 1940-1941. By the way, modern falsifiers are deeply ignorant in their understanding of the moral spirit of Soviet society on the eve and during the Great Patriotic War. They are trying to transfer their corrupt soul and servile admiration for the West to the soldiers of the Red Army, portraying the latter as some kind of underdeveloped subjects, criminals and fines who are afraid and hate Stalin and the Soviet government, and fight the Germans only because of their stupidity and because under sticks. Thus, the writer Vladimir Voinovich in his libelous novel The Life and Extraordinary Adventures of a Soldier Ivan Chonkin portrayed a Soviet soldier small, bow-legged, with red ears, stupid and downtrodden. And the resonant theatergoer Eldar Ryazanov called him "a normal folk type, a truly Russian character." The difference between these "workers of art" and the truly outstanding Russian writer Alexei Tolstoy with his "Russian character" is precisely the difference between a real patriotic writer and literary and theatrical dirty tricks and falsifiers. The latter, due to their pro-Western servility, will never understand that there can be warriors who are capable of the highest heroism and self-sacrifice in the name of the freedom of their Motherland. The famous Belarusian sculptor Valentin Zankovich, the author of the main monument of the memorial complex "Khatyn" in the casemates of the Brest Fortress found a stunning inscription made by the defenders of the fortress, which is not yet known to the general public. These are laconic, but soul-searing words: “There were five of us. We will die for Stalin." That's the whole truth about the moral and psychological atmosphere of Soviet society during the war. These words contain the whole meaning, the spirit of the Great Patriotic War, our national history: morality, patriotism and heroism of our people.

4. Substitution of scientific knowledge about historical facts with the information contained in the sources. Such an approach leads to gross errors. And the most significant of them is the unlawful identification of information, information recorded in documents, with scientific knowledge about historical facts. The second mistake is the inclusion of information in a scientific text without its analysis and critical evaluation, i.e. without scientific understanding, in the form of a retelling of the source. It is with this approach that the falsification of history is carried out, even apart from the consciousness of the researcher himself. To prevent this from happening, it is necessary to conduct a comprehensive analysis of the source. Only after a comprehensive analysis, the information contained in the source turns into scientific knowledge, which is already used by the historian in the process of knowing certain historical events. Scientific knowledge acquired as a result of a comprehensive analysis of the information contained in the source often plays a verification role in determining the reliability of previously obtained scientific knowledge.

5. In particular, this also applies to the so-called concept of totalitarianism, which today's falsifiers and simply narrow-minded historians have put as the basis for studying the national history of the twentieth century. The American historian Steven Cohen, in his book Rethinking the Soviet Experience: Politics and History since 1917, published in Russian in 1986, stated: full embodiment in the "totalitarian model" of 1953-1956." . Stephen Cohen points out that these studies were funded not only by private foundations (Rockefeller, Carnegie), but also by the Department of Defense, the US CIA. By the way, the Soviet Ministry of Defense and the KGB never engaged in such activities, and in this regard, American studies, English studies in the USSR acquired a different type of development in the system of scientific knowledge, where the history of foreign countries was covered more correctly than was the case in Western Sovietology, in which, according to S. Cohen, anti-communism and anti-Sovietism became the source and basis for the emergence of the "totalitarian school", a model of totalitarianism. Analyzing the positions of the authors of the "totalitarian school", Cohen came to the conclusion that "they began to identify Stalin's Russia with Hitler's Germany, Soviet communism with Nazism, etc." . This is where, it turns out, today's home-grown falsifiers borrowed their miserable ideas about identifying Stalin with Hitler and the USSR with Nazi Germany. From Fascist and Western Reactionary Historiography of the 1940s-1950s.

It is important to note that many Western Sovietologists have completely rejected the concept of totalitarianism, concluding that its inconsistencies and ideological overtones are all too obvious and that its only function is to label the Soviet system of government with derogatory labels. As the American historian M. Karpovich noted, scientific works in the United States "were too often created in an atmosphere of fierce hatred for the current Russian (Soviet - L.K.) regime."

Thus, concludes the Russian historian G.D. Alekseeva, “borrowed from the American Sovietology of 1940-1960. totalitarianism and its verbose replication in the academic literature of 1990-2010. became evidence not only of the theoretical helplessness of the opponents of Soviet power and science that appeared. Due to scientific impotence, moral degradation, betrayal, historians have turned into preachers of Western canons, who, having lost scientific content in the United States already in the 1960s, in Russia in the 1990s. began to play an ideological and political role without any significant scientific perspective.

In 2015, a great event in our historical calendar is the 70th anniversary of the victory of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War over the Nazi invaders. In this regard, there is reason to dwell on some more falsifications related to the events of the Great Patriotic War.

It is known that falsifiers, trying to discredit the great feat of our peoples during the Great Patriotic War, introduced into the mass consciousness the installation that the leadership of the USSR allegedly recorded all the captured soldiers of the Red Army as traitors. It was a deliberate blasphemous falsification, when the expression “we have no prisoners, we have traitors” was attributed to Stalin. In fact, this falsification was composed in 1956 in the literary and journalistic environment in the wake of criticism of Stalin's personality cult. This falsification is still widely used in journalism, films, fiction.

It should be noted that such a "crime" as "surrender" did not appear in the criminal legislation of the USSR. In article 193 of the then Criminal Code of the RSFSR, in the list of military crimes, it was recorded: "Surrender, not caused by a combat situation." It goes without saying that the concepts of "surrender" and "surrender not caused by a combat situation" are not identical concepts. Therefore, there was no identification of the concepts of "prisoners" and "traitors". Traitors included those who actually were such (policemen, punishers, graduates of reconnaissance and sabotage schools, officials of the occupation administration, etc.), and such a definition was not applied to prisoners of war in principle.

The falsifiers of the Great Patriotic War also invented a myth about certain “hit lists”, “executions” of part of the repatriates, i.e. people returning to the USSR (prisoners of war, Ostarbeiters, displaced persons, collaborators) supposedly immediately upon arrival at Soviet assembly points. It was also a monstrous lie. The truth is that the vast majority of repatriates were not subjected not only to no executions, but even to any repressions. The paradox here was that many of the direct accomplices of the Nazis were surprised that in the USSR they were not treated as harshly as they expected.

Let's take an illustrative example. In the summer of 1944, during the offensive of the Anglo-American troops in France, a large number of German soldiers and officers were captured by them, who were usually sent to camps in England. It soon became clear that some of these prisoners did not understand German and that it turned out that they were former Red Army soldiers who were captured by the Germans and then entered the service in the German army. According to Article 193 of the then Criminal Code of the RSFSR, only one punishment was provided for the transfer of military personnel to the side of the enemy in wartime - the death penalty with confiscation of property. The British knew about this, but, nevertheless, informed Moscow about these persons and asked to take them to the USSR. On October 31, 1944, 9,907 repatriates on two British ships were sent to Murmansk, where they arrived on November 6, 1944. Among these repatriates, who went over to serve in the German army, there were suggestions that they would be shot immediately on the Murmansk pier. However, official Soviet representatives explained that the Soviet government had forgiven them and that not only would they not be shot, but that they would generally be exempted from criminal liability for treason. For more than a year, these people were tested in the NKVD special camp, and then they were sent to a 6-year-old special settlement. In 1952, most of them were released, and their profiles did not show any criminal record, and the time spent working in the special settlement was included in the length of service.

The anti-Soviet falsifiers who criticize the Anglo-Americans for extraditing these people to the Soviet Union do not grasp one subtlety in the psychology of the British and American politicians and officials at that time. And this subtlety lies in the fact that the British and Americans could well assume that the former Red Army soldiers who were captured by them in German military uniforms are in fact Stalin's people and play some role in his political game. Hence, naturally, a desire was born to quickly clear Western Europe of them, and, consequently, to return them all to the USSR. “Later,” as the Russian historian V.N. Zemskov notes, “the Anglo-Americans to some extent abandoned these suspicions, but before that they managed to betray to the Soviet authorities many active opponents of Bolshevism and Soviet power.”

Here we must bear in mind the fact that the approaching victory of the USSR over fascist Germany largely contributed to the humanization of the policy towards prisoners of war and interned civilians, up to the promise not to bring to justice those of them who entered military service with the enemy and committed actions in damage to the interests of the USSR as a result of fascist violence and terror over Soviet prisoners of war. This also applied to the aforementioned repatriates who arrived in Murmansk on November 6, 1944, since it was known that for the most part they entered the military service of the enemy, unable to withstand the torture of hunger and ill-treatment in German camps. Therefore, one cannot agree with the widespread falsification in the literature and journalism of the repatriation of Soviet citizens solely as an alleged violation of human rights or even a humanitarian crime. V.N. Zemskov is absolutely right that “in spite of all the costs and negative phenomena that took place, this process was based on a natural and exciting epic finding the motherland large masses of people forcibly deprived of it by foreign conquerors.

And the last thing to note, speaking of the falsification of the national history of the twentieth century. This is about the so-called Stalinist repressions. The public conscience of the post-Soviet countries is being intensively forced into a perverted idea that in the USSR the majority of the population suffered from repressions and was allegedly intimidated by them. It is important to note that the exposure of this fake was done not only by objective domestic historians, but also by Western ones. In this regard, the conclusions of the American historian Robert Thurston, who published the monograph Life and Terror in Stalinist Russia in 1996, are of interest. 1934-1941".

These are the conclusions that an American historian came to on the basis of documentary facts and statistics. “The system of Stalinist terror in the form in which it was described by previous generations of Western researchers never existed. The influence of terror on Soviet society in the Stalin years was not significant, and there was no mass fear of reprisals in the 1930s in the Soviet Union. The repressions were limited and did not affect the majority of the Soviet people. Soviet society supported the Stalinist regime rather than feared it. For most people, the Stalinist system provided the opportunity to move up and participate in public life.

One does not have to be an expert not to recognize the absolute correctness of the conclusions of Robert Thurston. Even more. The socio-political system that took shape in the pre-war years in the minds of the many millions of people was strongly associated with the ideals of justice, friendship and progress. And the Soviet civilization was unequivocally regarded by the overwhelming majority of our citizens as the most humane and fair on our entire planet. And it was so in reality.

1. Zemskov, V.N. On the scale of political repressions in the USSR // Political education. - M., 2012. - No. 1.
2. Alekseeva, G.D., Manykin, A.V. Historical science in Russia of the XXI century / G.D. Alekseeva, A.V. Manykin. - M., 2011.
3. Zemskov, V.N. People and war: pages of the history of the Soviet people on the eve and during the Great Patriotic War. 1938-1945 / V.N. Zemskov. - M., 2014.
4. Thurston, R. Life and Terror in Stalin's Russia 1934-1941 / R. Thurston. - New Haven, 1996.

ABSTRACT

on the course "History of Russia"

on the topic: "The lessons of the Second World War and the main directions of its falsification"

1 Key Lessons of World War II

The events of the Second World War are increasingly receding in time. However, millions of people do not stop thinking about the reasons that gave rise to this war, its results and lessons. Many of these lessons are still relevant today.

The Great Patriotic War is one of the most tragic pages in the history of our country. The Soviet people and their Armed Forces had to experience many hardships and hardships. But the four-year fierce struggle against the fascist invaders was crowned with our complete victory over the forces of the Wehrmacht. The experience and lessons of this war are of great importance for the living generation.

One of the main lessons is that the war danger must be fought before the war has begun. Moreover, it should be carried out by the collective efforts of peace-loving states, peoples, all those who value peace and freedom.

World War II was not fatally inevitable. It could have been prevented if the Western countries had not made fatal political mistakes and strategic miscalculations.

Of course, the direct culprit of the war is German fascism. It is on him that the entire responsibility for its unleashing is on him. However, the Western countries, with their short-sighted policy of appeasement, their desire to isolate the Soviet Union and direct expansion to the East, created the conditions under which war became a reality.

The Soviet Union, for its part, in the troubled pre-war years, made a lot of efforts to consolidate the forces opposing aggression. However, the proposals put forward by the USSR constantly ran into obstacles from the Western powers, their stubborn unwillingness to cooperate. In addition, Western countries sought to stay away from the military confrontation between Nazi Germany and the USSR.

Only after the aggressor seized almost all of Western Europe did Soviet diplomacy manage to prevent the formation of a single bloc of states hostile to the USSR and to avoid a war on two fronts. This was one of the prerequisites for the emergence of the anti-Hitler coalition and, ultimately, the defeat of the aggressor.

Another important lesson of the Great Patriotic War is that military cooperation should be carried out not only taking into account the economic capabilities of the country, but also a real assessment of the existing military threats. The solution of the question of what kind of war the Armed Forces should be prepared for and what defense tasks they will have to solve depends on this.

When planning military construction, it is important to take into account all the factors that ensure the country's security: political and diplomatic, economic, ideological, informational and defense.

In the prewar years, many military theoretical developments remained unrealized. But our country is the birthplace of operational military art, and it was in those years that the development of the theory of deep operation was completed. The same can be said about weapons: there were a lot of new developments, but the troops did not have them in the required quantity.

This shortcoming is partly manifested at the present time in the Russian army. So, if seven previously unknown types of weapons were used in World War II, twenty-five in the Korean War (1950-1953), thirty in four Arab-Israeli military conflicts, and about a hundred in the Persian Gulf War. Therefore, the need to improve the products of the military-industrial complex of the state is obvious.

The next lesson has not lost its relevance - the Armed Forces can count on success if they skillfully master all forms of military operations. It must be admitted that in the prewar period mistakes were made in the theoretical development of a number of important problems, which had a negative impact on the practice of combat training of troops. Thus, in the military theory of that period, the main mode of action of the Armed Forces in a future war was considered a strategic offensive, while the role of defense remained downplayed. As a result, the unreasonable desire of the Soviet military command to conduct military operations mainly by an offensive and on foreign territory was manifested, and our troops were trained accordingly.

After the war, in the conditions of global confrontation, there was no other alternative than to prepare for a world war using all available forces and means. Now, with the end of the Cold War, the primary task is to prepare for local wars and armed conflicts, to master the methods of conducting combat operations, taking into account their specifics, based on the experience of Afghanistan, Chechnya, the war in the Persian Gulf, etc., as well as the fight against terrorism.

At the same time, according to some military leaders, it would be a big mistake to exclude the possibility of a large-scale war in Russia, which could erupt as a result of the escalation of small conflicts and a regional war. With this in mind, it is necessary not to relax attention to the mobilization, operational and combat training of troops, to comprehensively train the personnel of the army and navy. Events in various regions of the world confirm that the main emphasis in combat training should be placed on training in combat operations under the conditions of the use of conventional, long-range, high-precision weapons, but with the continuing threat of the use of nuclear weapons. The latter is becoming the property of an increasing number of states, including countries with extremist-minded political regimes.

The most important lesson of the beginning of the war is a thorough analysis of various options for the actions of a potential enemy and flexible planning of the use of forces and means, and most importantly, the adoption of all necessary measures to maintain the Armed Forces in a sufficient degree of combat readiness.

As is known, during the last war, measures to transfer troops to martial law were carried out with a great delay. As a result, our troops found themselves in a state of “relative combat readiness” with a shortage of up to 40-60 percent in terms of personnel, which did not allow us to complete not only the strategic, but also the operational deployment of groups in the composition provided for by the mobplan.

Despite the availability of information about the threat of war on the part of fascist Germany, the Soviet leadership did not take appropriate measures to bring the troops of the western districts to combat readiness.

The strategic deployment of Germany's shock groupings was significantly ahead of the deployment of the Red Army troops in the border districts. The balance of forces and means, as well as the number of formations of the first echelons of the opposing sides, gave more than a twofold advantage in favor of Germany, which allowed her to deliver the first powerful blow.

The lesson of the last war is that it is not the side that strikes first and achieves decisive successes at the very beginning of hostilities that wins, but the one that has more moral and material strength, which skillfully uses them and is able to turn the potential for victory into real reality. Our victory was not historically preordained, as has been emphasized in the past. It was conquered in a stubborn struggle, at the cost of enormous exertion of all the forces of the state, its people and army.

Not a single state of the anti-Hitler coalition carried out such a mobilization of human and material resources as the Soviet Union during the war years, no one endured such trials as befell the Soviet people and their Armed Forces.

Only in the first 8 months of the war, about 11 million people were mobilized, of which more than 9 million were sent to staff both newly created and existing combat units. The war absorbed so many reserves that in a year and a half the rifle troops in the army in the field renewed their composition three times.

During the four years of the war, 29575 thousand people were mobilized (minus the re-conscripted 2237.3 thousand people), and in total, together with the personnel who were in the Red Army and the Navy on June 22, 1941, they joined the army system ( during the war years) 34476 thousand people, which amounted to 17.5% of the total population of the country.

The hardest trials that befell the peoples of the Soviet Union during the war years make it possible to draw another extremely important lesson: when the people and the army are united, the army is invincible. In these harsh years, the Armed Forces of the country were connected by thousands of invisible threads

with the people who helped them both with the necessary material means and spiritual forces, maintaining in the soldiers a high morale, confidence in victory. This is confirmed by mass heroism, courage, unbending will to defeat the enemy.

The heroic traditions of the great historical past of our people have become an example of high patriotism and national self-consciousness of our citizens. In the first three days of the war in Moscow alone, they received more than 70,000 applications with a request to be sent to the front. In the summer and autumn of 1941, about 60 divisions and 200 separate regiments of the people's militia were created. Their number was about 2 million people. The whole country, in a single patriotic impulse, stood up to defend its independence.

The defense of the Brest Fortress in the first days of the war is a symbol of steadfastness, inflexibility, courage and heroism of soldiers. Entire formations and units, companies and battalions covered themselves with unfading glory.

The courage and heroism of the Soviet soldiers were recognized even by our opponents. So, the former Hitlerite General Blumentritt, who fought against Russia in the rank of lieutenant in the First World War, said in an interview with the English military historian Hart: “Already the battles of June 1941 showed us what the new Soviet army is like. We lost up to 50% of our personnel in battles. The Fuhrer and most of our command had no idea about this. It caused a lot of trouble." On the eighth day of the war, another German general, Chief of the General Staff of the Wehrmacht Ground Forces Gelder, wrote in his diary: “Information from the front confirms that the Russians are fighting everywhere to the last man ...”

Love for the Motherland and hatred for its enemies cemented the front and rear, made the country a powerful fortress, and became the most important factor in achieving victory.

2. Exposing the falsification of the history of the war

During the Second World War, a fierce struggle was waged not only on the battlefields, but also in the spiritual sphere, for the minds and hearts of millions of people all over the planet. The ideological struggle was waged on the most diverse issues of politics, international relations, the course and outcome of the war, while pursuing fundamentally different goals.

If the fascist leadership openly called on its people to enslave other peoples, to world domination, then the Soviet leadership always advocated a just liberation struggle and the defense of the Fatherland.

Already in the course of the war, politicians and historians appeared who propagated myths about the “preventive nature” of the war of fascist Germany against the USSR, about the “accidental defeat” of the fascist German troops in major battles on the Soviet-German front, etc.

The victory in the war promoted the Soviet Union to the ranks of the world's leading powers and contributed to the growth of its authority and prestige in the international arena. This was in no way part of the plans of the reactionary international forces, it aroused in them frank anger and hatred, which led to the Cold War, to fierce ideological attacks against the USSR.

Throughout the entire post-war period, the events of the Great Patriotic War were one of the main areas of acute ideological confrontation between Western ideological centers and the Soviet Union.

The most important issues of the war became the main object of attack - the history of the pre-war period, the military art of the Red Army command, the role and significance of various fronts, Soviet losses in the war, the cost of victory, etc.

Falsified concepts, views on these and other issues were distributed in millions of copies of books, articles, were reflected in television and radio programs, in works of cinema. The purpose of all this is to hide the real reasons why the Second World War was generated by the capitalist system itself; make the Soviet Union, along with Germany, responsible for starting the war; belittle the contribution of the USSR and its Armed Forces to the defeat of the fascist bloc and at the same time exalt the role of the Western allies in the anti-Hitler coalition in achieving victory.

Here are some of the methods used by falsifiers of the history of the Great Patriotic War.

Throughout the entire post-war period, including the last decade, some Western historians (F. Fabry, D. Irving) spread versions that the USSR in 1941 wanted to be the first to start a war against Germany. The myth about Moscow's readiness to unleash a preventive war against Germany is also present in the books of Russian-speaking historians V. Suvorov (Rezun), B. Sokolov and others. They even refer to the resolution allegedly imposed by the then First Deputy Chief of the General Staff N.F. Vatutin to the plan for strategic deployment in the West, adopted in March 1941: "The offensive will begin on 12.6". However, it is known that a decision of this kind is made by the political leadership of the state, and not by the General Staff.

Convincing documents and facts about the preparation by the Soviet Union of an attack on Germany are not given by these authors, because they do not exist in reality. As a result, speculative schemes are being concocted and there are talks about the readiness of the USSR to deliver a "preemptive strike" and other fabrications in the same spirit.

Another method by which Western falsifiers also try to justify the preparation of the USSR for an "offensive preventive war" against Germany is the arbitrary interpretation of Stalin's speech to the graduates of the military academies of the Red Army on May 5, 1941, which is called "aggressive", "calling for war with Germany". ". This version is actively promoted by a number of Russian historians.

The categorical and far-fetched nature of these conclusions is obvious. The facts show that in 1941 neither Hitler nor the command of the Wehrmacht had reason to think that the USSR could attack Germany. Berlin received no information about the aggressive plans of the Soviet Union. On the contrary, German diplomats and German intelligence constantly reported on the desire of the USSR to maintain peace with Germany, to prevent serious conflict situations in relations with this country, and about the readiness of our state to make certain economic concessions for this. The USSR sent industrial and agricultural goods to Germany until the very last moment.

The falsifiers are making great efforts to underestimate the losses of the German side and exaggerate the losses of the Red Army in some major battles, thereby trying to belittle the significance of the latter. Thus, the German historian K. G. Frieser, referring to the data of the German archives, claims that during the tank battle near Prokhorovka on July 12, 1943, the losses of the German side were reduced to only 5 tanks. Another 38 tanks and 12 assault guns were damaged.

However, according to the Russian military archives, it follows that the German side lost from 300 to 400 tanks and assault guns irretrievably. At the same time, the Soviet 5th Guards TA, which took the main part in the battle of Prokhorov, suffered heavy losses - about 350 tanks and self-propelled guns. It turned out that the German historian cited data on the losses of only the 2nd SS Panzer Corps, keeping silent about the losses of the 48th and 3rd German Panzer Corps, which also took part in the battle.

Not only individual researchers, but also serious state organizations act in a similar way. For example, in 1991, the United States created the National Committee to Celebrate the 50th Anniversary of the Victory in World War II. Soon this organization published a colorful anniversary booklet prepared with the participation of historians in a huge edition. It opens with a "Chronicle of the most important events of the Second World War". And in this very detailed list, not one of the major battles, not one of the operations won or carried out by the Soviet troops against the Nazi invaders, is named. As if there were no Moscow, Stalingrad, Kursk and other battles, after which the Nazi army suffered irreparable losses and finally lost its strategic initiative.

In the post-war years, in the conditions of the Cold War, a huge amount of historical literature was published in the West, in which the true events of the Second World War were distorted and the role of the USSR in defeating the fascist aggressors was in every possible way belittled. This method of falsification is used to this day, although during the war our Western allies more objectively assessed the leading role of the USSR in the fight against a common enemy.

The Patriotic War was Great both in its scope and in terms of the forces and means involved in the Soviet-German front. The total number of personnel on both sides in the active army alone reached 12 million people.

At the same time, in different periods, from 800 to 900 settlement divisions operated on a front from 3 to 6.2 thousand km, which chained the overwhelming majority of the armed forces of Germany, its allies and the Soviet Union, thereby exerting a decisive influence on the situation on other fronts of World War II .

US President F. Roosevelt noted that "... the Russians kill more enemy soldiers and destroy more of his weapons than all the other 25 states of the United Nations combined."

From the rostrum of the House of Commons, W. Churchill declared on August 2, 1944, that "it was the Russian army that let the guts out of the German military machine."

In those years there were many such assessments. And there is nothing surprising in this. It was very difficult not to see the obvious truth: the decisive contribution of the Soviet Union to the Victory, its outstanding role in saving world civilization from the Nazi plague seemed indisputable. But soon after the defeat of fascism, the recent allies of the USSR began to speak differently, high assessments of the role of our country in the war were forgotten, and judgments of a completely different kind appeared.

With particular persistence in post-war historiography, the idea was pursued that the most important battles of the Second World War did not take place on the Soviet-German front and the outcome of the armed confrontation between the two coalitions was decided not on land, but mainly at sea and in the airspace, where the armed forces of the United States and Britain carried out intense fighting. The authors of these publications argue that the United States was the leading force in the anti-Hitler coalition, since it had the most powerful armed forces among the capitalist countries.

Similar views on the role of the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition in achieving victory over fascism can be traced, for example, in the 85-volume "History of the Second World War", prepared by the historical section of the British Cabinet, the 25-volume American "Illustrated Encyclopedia of the Second World War" and many other publications.

Our people appreciate the great contribution to the victory over fascism of the peoples of the USA, Great Britain, France, China and other countries of the anti-Hitler coalition. But it was on the Soviet-German front that the main battles of World War II took place, and the main forces of the Nazi Wehrmacht were concentrated here. So, from June 1941 until the opening of the second front on June 6, 1944, 92-95% of the ground forces of Nazi Germany and its satellites fought on the Soviet-German front, and then - from 74 to 65%.

The Soviet Armed Forces defeated 507 Nazi divisions and 100 divisions of its allies, almost 3.5 times more than on all other fronts of World War II.

On the Soviet-German front, the enemy suffered three-quarters of its casualties. The damage to the personnel of the fascist army inflicted by the Red Army was 4 times greater than in the Western European and Mediterranean theaters of operations taken together, and in terms of the number of killed and wounded - 6 times. The main part of the Wehrmacht military equipment was also destroyed here: over 70 thousand (more than 75%) aircraft, about 50 thousand (up to 75%) tanks and assault guns, 167 thousand (74%) artillery pieces, more than 2.5 thousand warships, transports and auxiliary vessels.

The opening of the second front also did not change the significance of the Soviet-German front as the main one in the war. So, in June 1944, 181.5 German and 58 divisions of Germany's allies acted against the Red Army. The American and British troops were opposed by 81.5 German divisions. So all objective facts testify that the Soviet Union made a decisive contribution to the defeat of Nazi Germany and its allies.

When evaluating the results of the Great Patriotic War, Western historians pay especially close attention to the question of the cost of victory, of our sacrifices during the war. Because of our heavy losses, the significance of the victory achieved is called into question.

It is known that the total losses of the USSR in the war amount to 26.5 million people, of which 18 million are civilians who died as a result of fascist atrocities in the occupied territory. The total irretrievable losses (killed, missing, taken prisoner and never returned from it, died from wounds, diseases and as a result of accidents) of the Soviet Armed Forces, together with the border and internal troops, amounted to 8 million 668 thousand 400 people.

The losses of the fascist bloc amounted to 9.3 million people. (7.4 million people were lost by fascist Germany, 1.2 million by its satellites in Europe, 0.7 million by Japan in the Manchurian operation), not counting the losses of auxiliary units from among the foreign formations that fought on the side of the fascists (according to some data - up to 500 - 600 thousand people).

In total, the irretrievable losses of the Soviet Armed Forces by 1 - 1.5 million people. exceed the corresponding German losses. But this is due to the fact that 4.5 million Soviet prisoners of war were in Nazi captivity, and only 2 million people returned to the USSR after the war. The rest died as a result of fascist atrocities. In Soviet captivity, out of 3.8 million German prisoners of war, 450 thousand people died.

Attempts to present the losses of the aggressor as less than they actually were, distort the historical truth, testify to the bias of those who seek to deliberately belittle the feat of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War.

Literature

1. History of the Second World War 1939 - 1945. In 12 volumes. T. 12. M., - 1982. p. 13 - 21, 33 - 37.

2. G. Kumanev. Our contribution to the victory over fascism: truth and fiction. //Reference point. - 2006. - No. 7.

3. G. Kumanev. Feat and forgery: pages of the Great Patriotic War 1941 - 1945. M., - 2007 - p. 336 - 351.

4. 60 years since the beginning of the Great Patriotic War. Military-historical conference. // Appendix to the "Military History Journal". M., 2001.