Topic: Former USSR

[patentlymn]

I am watching more of Bald and Bankrupt videos.
I do not pretend to understand the ethnic history of everywhere on earth but know it is complex.
I wanted to create an intro before I write about Georgia and a heart breaking video.

In the USSR, from what I know:
1.  There were lots of Russians in the Russian Empire. No surprise. There were lots of other ethnic groups in the Russian empire as well. It varied by region.
2. Lenin drew oblast/vassal country borders to include various ethnic groups to prevent any ethnostates from forming that could challenge commie rule.
3. Stalin transported some ethnic groups to other regions to reduce rebellious minorities. E.g. Tartars from Crimea to Siberia. YT person Eli from Russia is Tartar, from Perm Siberia. Dunno her family history.
4. Stalin shipped Russians into some areas.
5. When USSR fell apart Russians left some regions and their economy fell apart. Maybe like when the Romans left Britain?

There were Poles centered around Lvov, Ukrainians around Kiev, Russians around Kharkov, and Russians and Tartars in Crimea.
When the tzar fell each of the 4 regions declared themselves independent countries but the commies ended that. Stalin later deported lots of Tartars.

Lenin drew borders to include Poles, Ukrainians, and Russians and called it Ukraine. Russians in eastern Ukraine declined some as percentage since 1900 as Ukrainians moved in for economic advantage. This was from census data I found a while back.
Ukraine western border changed with WWII.

[patentlymn]

This is sad. Scott Ritter is married to a Georgian woman as I recall. He told this story of the civil war. He said that the Georgians kicked off the war by attacking the Abkhaz people living in the Abkhazia region. From memory, some Georgian politician wanted to score points. Then the Abkhaz counter attacked and drove out the Georgians living there. A woman describes what Ritter said. Fleeing over the mountains in the cold for days.

I believe the Abkhaz are Turkic, not Russian or Slavs.

Later the US Marines trained the Georgian troops who attacked people living in South Ossetia, along the northern Georgia border with Russia. Russia counter attacked. Russia may have peace keeping troops there still. Dunno.The Georgian president who did this was forced out of office as I recall. Works in DC. The US likes to cause trouble on Russia's border.

I learn some history from Bald. The USSR both oppressed and protected people. Here they live in an abandoned sanitarium in Georgia.

https://youtu.be/yjF4jiOOdPY
She Has Lived In This Hotel For 25 Years!

bald and bankrupt
3.85M subscribers

1,939,712 views  Jul 7, 2019
🇬🇪 After the fall of the USSR ancient resentments and rivalries that had been kept in check for 70 years suddenly rose up leading to outbreaks of civil wars in various former Soviet Republics. Once such war broke out in the small sub-tropical region of Abkhazia on Georgia's north west coast. The Georgian people were forced to flee over the mountains leaving everything behind. I found some of those refugees still living in the empty shells of Soviet hotels some 25 years on and went to ask them about their story.

@user-kq2he4fd2q
1 year ago
Thanks to the authors, u ' re very friendly. I was 12 and my sister 8 during the war.it was September, so we wore shorts and t-shirts when we left Sokhumi, and whatever we had, worse years were awaited us. Now i 'm 41, we have not got our home for so many years. The war left a psychological mark. It's sad that war destroys the lives of innocent people. ?

[patentlymn]

As I recall, the US recently pumped money into Georgia, to pay for protests against a proposed law that would expose the foreign sources of NGOs inside Georgia. US senators  and EU officials complained about the law. Even though both have such laws themselves.

[patentlymn]

Here is the original Ritter post I made.

Ritter mentions demonstrators in Rustaveli Plaza in Tbilisi Georgia shouting "Sokhumi" that is in an apparently autonomous region that used to be part of Georgia?, meaning they want to take it back? At first Ritter tells the story of his Georgian father in law who fought against the Abkhazians apparently. Ritter rants and tells a story about his father in law who held a bridge at Sohkumi so  civilians could flee then over the mountains E through the Kodori Gorge where they were robbed and shot at by Abkha snipers. He could not carry all the still live babies in the snow. Left some.

18 min https://youtu.be/rJdDyp0RAEc?t=1087
39 min Then Ritter goes into how and why the US is trying to destabilize Georgia like they did in Ukraine. That is the good part. The US is trying to start a civil war? Another coup?  Ritter gets real upset at what the US is trying to do.
https://youtu.be/rJdDyp0RAEc?t=2316

Georgian Civil War 1992 involving the Abkhazians.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_in_Abkhazia_(1992%E2%80%931993)

The War in Abkhazia was fought between Georgian government forces for the most part and Abkhaz separatist forces, Russian government armed forces and North Caucasian militants between 1992 and 1993. Ethnic Georgians who lived in Abkhazia fought largely on the side of Georgian government forces. Ethnic Armenians and Russians[9] within Abkhazia's population largely supported the Abkhazians[10][11][12] and many fought on their side. The separatists received support from thousands of North Caucasus and Cossack militants and from the Russian Federation forces stationed in and near Abkhazia.[13][14]

The handling of this conflict was aggravated by the civil strife in Georgia proper (between the supporters of the ousted Georgian president, Zviad Gamsakhurdia – in office 1991–1992 – and the post-coup government headed by Eduard Shevardnadze) as well as by the Georgian–Ossetian conflict of 1989 onwards.

Significant human rights violations and atrocities were reported on all sides, peaking in the aftermath of the Abkhaz capture of Sukhumi on 27 September 1993, which (according to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe) was followed by a large-scale campaign of ethnic cleansing against the ethnic Georgian population.[15] A fact-finding mission dispatched by the UN Secretary General in October 1993 reported numerous and serious human rights violations committed both by Abkhazians and by Georgians.[16] Approximately 5,000 ethnic Georgians and 4,000 Abkhaz were reported killed or missing, and 250,000 Georgians became internally displaced or refugees.[3][4]

The war heavily affected post-Soviet Georgia, which suffered considerable financial, human and psychological damage. The fighting and subsequent continued sporadic conflict have devastated Abkhazia. In Abkhazia the conflict is officially named Patriotic War of the People of Abkhazia.[17
...
After taking Sukhumi, Georgian forces (including Mkhedrioni paramilitaries) engaged in "vicious, ethnically based pillage, looting, assault and murder."[20]

Map of Abkhazi.

At 40 min Ritter goes into what the US is trying to do in Georgia $40 min from USAID alone to Georgia.

[patentlymn]

I had watched some docs on the USSR.
I found them interesting.
I trust videos like those from Bald and Bankrupt and similar people the most.
I have noticed that sometimes people say they miss the USSR. I was shocked.  I thought their memories were faulty but then again what do I know? I have heard some modern young people in former USSR ask how their parents were able to afford to raise them.

I am well aware of the death toll from communism in USSR and even worse in China.
I was surprised to believe that not everything was bad.

I think sometimes the fall of the USSR meant an opportunity for people to loot the countries. Some guy in Moldova ranted to Bald about how much worse things were now than under USSR. Life got much worse under Yeltsin as those inside and  outside of USSR looted the place.

Here are some docs i watched.
https://youtu.be/Hlb-HwxUxSU
The Human Face of Russia (1984) - society and everyday life in 1980s USSR

https://youtu.be/GAVqM4geAAk
USSR Memories - Daily life of a Russian family in the Soviet Union | Part 1

https://youtu.be/YkWEDJXtsA0
Memories of USSR - Daily life of Russians in the Soviet Union | Part 2

[patentlymn]

More docs. This narrator Setarko is pretty good. Dry sense of humor.
BTW people still live in the communal apartments, mostly young single people.
https://youtu.be/zZhGrjPavII
 What’s Inside a Typical Soviet Apartment?
Setarko

https://youtu.be/ZN-419d7vt4
 Khrushchyovka - UGLIEST Old Soviet Apartment Building?
Setarko
55.3K subscribers
1,076,058 views  Oct 20, 2020
You always wanted to live in an old soviet apartment in the most soviet building of all time? You dream can come true - just visit Russia and rent an apartment in Khrushchyovka (or Khruschhevka). Believe me, little USSR fan, you won't regret living in this amazing russian commieblock! (you probably will). Let's talk about this diamond of soviet arthitecture and find out why khrushchyyovkas are not as bad as they seem on the first sight.

https://youtu.be/yxmfyJ0xwWo
 How do Russians live? Communal apartments
Natasha's Russia

https://youtu.be/X3QEzdDoDSQ
 Communal Apartments In Soviet Union - History of "Kommunalka"
Setarko
Communal apartments or kommunalkas appeared in the Soviet Union following the Russian revolution in 1917. It was seen as a product of the "new collective vision of the future" and as a good solution to the housing crisis in the urban areas of USSR. Let's see how the life in communal apartments was arranged and why some people still live in them in the 21st century.


https://youtu.be/NC8mME1-GR4
 Brezhnevka - Soviet Panel Building That Defined Russia's Modern Identity
Setarko
55.3K subscribers
335,543 views  May 18, 2021
You always liked gray colors? You love panels? Khrushchyovka is your favourite building of all time? Fear not, I present to you the ADVANCED version of Khrushchyovka,  still gray and ugly, but now it can be up to 25 stories and up to a kilometer long. When Leonid Brezhnev came to power, he decided to build on the work of his predecessor and continue to erect identical panel houses on the whole territory of the Soviet Union. Nowadays a panel Brezhnevka is the most common type of building you can find in Russia. Let's talk about them and about how they were about to build a whole culture of doomers around themselves.

[patentlymn]

These trains are run by students. Toward the end of the second video they say that in some European countries they eliminated these trains and programs in anti USSR moves as they are considered relics of the evil empire. The first one was actually in Gorky Park Moscow? BUT Stalin wanted to give pride of place to his native Georgia so he erased most mentions of the Moscow RR and credits Georgia with the first such RR.

https://youtu.be/q6Cc_vmlzwQ
 Far East Children's Railway in Khabarovsk Russia.
C57128
931 subscribers
2,072 views  Jul 28, 2018
A children's railway is an extracurricular educational institution, where teenagers learn railway professions. This phenomenon originated in the USSR and was greatly developed in Soviet times.
Many children's railways are still functioning in post-Soviet states and Eastern European countries.
 ...

This is beyond cute. They start in 5th grade?

https://youtu.be/kDlsXUMqMxw
 
 Full-Fledged Railways Ran By Kids: Children's Railways Of Eastern Europe
Railways of the World
15.8K subscribers
154,708 views  Mar 24, 2021  #train #railway #education
Who of us, as a kid, did not want to become a train driver? Not everyone manages to carry their love of the railway by the time they make a career choice, but what if I told you that there is a place on Earth, where being just a teenager you can already drive a real train?


https://youtu.be/x-yGtFsAYAQ
 RUSSIA: THE "LITTLE BEE" CHILDREN'S RAILWAY LINE
AP Archive
4.92M subscribers
6,141 views  Jul 21, 2015
(21 Jul 1996) Russian/Nat

Children have always played with train sets, dreaming of becoming train drivers when  they grow up.   But Russian youngsters have gone one better - they run their own  railway line.

The "Little Bee" railway was dreamed-up under former dictator Josef Stalin to instruct  children in the work ethic of communist society.

Now it's just for fun.  But financial problems in the wake of communism's collapse are  threatening to derail one of the Soviet Union's strangest - and most endearing -  legacies.

This must be the biggest toy train in the world.
Most children only dream of becoming train drivers. These Russian youngsters are  doing it for real.

Every summer vacation, over a thousand boys and girls get the chance to play with a  train set their Western contemporaries could scarcely even imagine.
The "Little Bee" children's railway is one of more than 20 similar lines across Russia.

But despite the holiday atmosphere, the children's railways have a sinister past.
Stalin's transport minister set them up in the 1930s to train youngsters to keep the  Soviet Union rolling if war took their fathers to the frontline.

Other children found themselves working the points and collecting tickets when both  parents were locked away in prison camps.
But unlike other relics of Soviet childhood, the "Little Bee" still attracts scores of eager  Russian kids.

Take Dima, who has been working this line for three summers now.
As the driver's assistant, he is fiercely proud of his work.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children%27s_railway
http://www.dzd-ussr.ru/english/
http://www.dzd-ussr.ru/towns/index-eng.html

[patentlymn]

Fast paced questions of older Russians on whether they miss the USSR (yes, many things).
Do you want it back (no or not possible).
https://youtu.be/PiAHtm9yEu4
 Elderly People Describe How Was The USSR |The Soviet Union NOSTALGIA |
StreetTalk
46.5K subscribers
122,721 views  Sep 15, 2020  MOSCOW
In This Series Of Russia Public Interview We Make Street Interview With People In Moscow And In This Video We Asked Russian Elders About the USSR and How Life Was During the Soviet Union, How was it in the USSR?, Is there anything you miss and nostalgic about during the Soviet Union?, Would you like to return the USSR?

https://youtu.be/YcBKRMJI7Ck
 Soviet Television and Radio - COLD WAR DOCUMENTARY
The Cold War

[patentlymn]

Some the propaganda I knew about and laughable. Some others may not have been accurate then but more so now!
https://youtu.be/lKfD9rI4a9E
Soviet Anti-American Propaganda - Cold War DOCUMENTARY

The answer below is no, then yes, then less so but parents preferred Russian for kids for career reasons. Initially there was even affirmative action by ethnic/nationality. USSR developed scripts for languages that did not have them. 48 new scripts. Some Latin rather than Cyrillic especially for Arabic scripts.  66 languages new or converted to Latin script.

https://youtu.be/ynA-8oW3b3g
Did the Soviet Union Russify Other Nationalities? - Cold War DOCUMENTARY
 

[patentlymn]

1932, education in 104 different languages. Russian used for inter ethnic communications.
Later in 1939 Russian was required as a language in USSR. To reduce translation and allow conscripts to communicate.
1959 law change allowed parents three choices. RU as language of instruction and no local language taught. 2. RU instruction plus local language as a subject. 3. Local as instruction lang plus RU as a subject. Sometimes parents not notified of choices. Parents often chose RU for career reasons.

Some former Arabic script changed to Latin changed to Cyrillic at some point.
Some education languages dropped in late 50s. In RSFSR dropped from 47 in 60s, 1982 only 17. Lack of interest and lack of teachers.

RSFSR = Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic as well as being unofficially known as the Russian Federation, Soviet Russia, or simply Russia.

[patentlymn]

I saw Bald and Bankrupt where he went to Moldova.People said things were better under USSR. This explains post USSR history. Oligarchs and politicians looted the place.  Did Transnistria avoid this?

18 min. In 2014 banks were taken over, loans not paid bank, money ended up in Latvia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Moldovan_bank_fraud_scandal
https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-33166383
It's a mystery that's thrown Europe's poorest nation into deep crisis - $1bn has vanished from three of Moldova's leading banks, much of it passing through UK companies. A confidential report has blamed 28-year-old businessman, Ilan Shor, but in an exclusive BBC interview he proclaims his innocence.


https://youtu.be/bf0j26bCbkA?t=639
 How the Rich Ate Moldova
Asianometry

[Libertas]

https://y.yarn.co/f85f10c5-638c-4a40-9d3d-fc7d91d9a0f1.mp4

[patentlymn]

https://y.yarn.co/f85f10c5-638c-4a40-9d3d-fc7d91d9a0f1.mp4

What is he saying? What am I seeing?

[Libertas]

https://y.yarn.co/f85f10c5-638c-4a40-9d3d-fc7d91d9a0f1.mp4

What is he saying? What am I seeing?

From the movie "RED" - Moldova Sucks!   

[patentlymn]

Another video interviewing 3 people from former USSR. In short, things were OK. Hard to compare with now. One said health care was better then. 1990s were terrible. People are meaner now said all 3 in different ways.

The last person, an older man, in Moscow but from Ukraine as a boy remembers the retreating Germans, retreating ahead of the Red Army. He ran away as fast as he could. The Germans set fire to his house and he stills sees this in his mind.

Reminded me of the telegram civilian testimonies when I watched too many. People in Mariupol said they were invaded by Ukr troops who used their apts as firing positions. After return fire from DPR/RU they often set fire to the apts.

In another small town a woman said the damage to the stores on main street were from retreating Kiev forces.

Some church caretaker said the holes in the tower were from retreating Kiev forces tank who said they used the wrong words. Liturgy?

From Ukr social media posts I kept hearing the Kiev troops say they wanted to drive subhuman Russians from their land, even though the regions were ethnic Russian, not ethnic Ukrainian. So it all fits together.

https://youtu.be/ui11x8vLQFI?t=225
 Does Socialism Work? Soviet Citizens Speak About Their Lives in the USSR (Moscow)
TheRevolutionReport

[patentlymn]

I like these low level docs that interview real people and make me rethink things. bald and Bankrupt started me down this road.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGUAIwlVR9A
@dawnsshine
@dawnsshine
1 year ago
Well, socialism was nice for low-middle classes. I remember my grandma from moldova said she was able to feed 2 children, have an 3-rooms apartment for a little money (she cooked for a restaurant and was a sigle mom). Her children ALWAYS had nice clothes, went every summer to the sea (odessa, crimea).
Those days a cooker for a canteen can give so much to her children? Of course not.
Lets day under socialism things were more equal, super rich were only a small group of people.
In some sense it was better that way. All people cooperated.
Nowadays people are not so kind anymore, and we have HUGE differences between super rich and super poor.
There were bad things in socialism too, of course, but capitalism have them as well (but with socialism you dont die of staveness, they would find you a job even if you dont want to).
What destroyed the soviet were the american propaganda and the infiltration of nazi in poland baltics etc... where they made them think soviet is bad.
....but. look at Lituania of example... 20 years in EU but there are more poors on streets that in 1980 🙄 i saw so many old people begging for you to buy their hand-made stuff, that in any other country. It was hearbreaking.

[patentlymn]

24 min lecture on Ukraine. Sachs was there around the time of the 2014 coup, a little after.
He had enough clout to get WH access in Dec 2021. Backs my idea that the US govt wanted war.
I wonder if he was a cause of the horrible economy of Russia in the 1990s. He was an advisor to Russia.

https://youtu.be/YUifh-Wud4g
Jeffrey Sachs Interview - The US and Ukraine - A Deeper Look

[Libertas]

The USSR was morally and literally bankrupt...you're going to have to define "horrible economy" because the mob-led free for all (and eventual emergence and legitimization of the oligarchy) was still economically better than the dying USSR era of empty shelves and endemic alcoholism...the former which can hardly be a result of yankee imperialist influence since it is a genetic predisposition in the Rus gene...

 

[patentlymn]

I recall that avg age of male deaths dropped by around 10 years after USSR fell. People who lived through it describe that period as hell. Yeltsin is despised today. Not sure about Brezhnev and Gorbachev.  All property in USSR 'belonged' to the people, but under control of party. After the collapse, somehow, most became property of some oligarchs. That happened differently in different regions. Somehow,  in Russia, much control was taken back from the oligarchs, maybe gangster style.

Ukraine was predicted to be the best performing part of former USSR thanks to resources and educated workforce, industry. In Ukr the oligarchs retained most ownership so it did not do well. Also the corruption was real bad. In the news and in movies there were stories of military equipment like helicopters being sold for pennies on the dollar. Most of that was in Ukraine.

I posted links to docs on life in USSR with lots of videos of work places, shops, apartments. They gave  a detailed view of all this. Prices, waiting lists. I just watched a doc on Soviet furniture. Mostly made in Soviet eastern Russia. Decent quality.

I like man on the street interviews of older people. I was surprised at some positive opinions of the old USSR. Bald and Bankrupt, Eli from Russia and others ask questions of old people.  They say that they never went hungry. They likely refer to 1960s forward. People did go hungry, I think, after the collapse. Not now.

Here is 2 minute video of Putin with factory owners.
https://youtu.be/3GsDLrUieJg
Putin Calls Billionaire Oligarchs "Cockroaches" For Closing Factory Live On Camera

[Libertas]

They must have been high up in the party ranks to not be hungry...or peasant farmers stashing aside some state-owned produce...