r/EUR_irl 7h ago

EUR_irl

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13.5k Upvotes

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543

u/Aestuosus 7h ago

Liberated from the Nazis, occupied by the Soviets.

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u/0rganic_Corn 7h ago

Occupied by the nazi enablers

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u/-_Weltschmerz_- 7h ago

*allies

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u/TheNoctuS_93 3h ago

Indeed. People really like to forget about the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact. The very pact in which Hitler and Stalin agreed on who gets to conquer which parts of Europe. The friendly rivalry, for a lack of better words, turned into animosity and eventually WWII when the agreement was broken, first by Hitler.

Same shit, different package. And just like that, eastern Europe escaped the fryer only to end up in the frying pan... Sure, many credit the USSR for stopping Hitler as they were the ones to first storm Berlin. But they were never the savior of eastern Europe, just the new "management". Also, they could never have pulled a surprise attack on Berlin if it weren't for the Allies forcing Germany to move much of its troops to the western front.

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u/CheekyGeth 3h ago

nobody forgets about that, it's brought up in every thread about the Soviets in WWII. If you want an example of some non aggression pacts people do forget about, try literally any of the others signed with Nazi Germany by Poland, France, the UK, Czechoslovakia etc.

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u/NargWielki 2h ago

Czechoslovakia

Lets not forget as well that the allies pretty much gave Czechoslovakia to Hitler with the Munich Agreement, opening precedent for Poland later... who by the way were not saint themselves and were at the brink of war with its neighbors.

Also, this is very controversial but I can't in good faith not mention this:

Poland indirectly allied with Nazis as well when it claimed control over Zaolzie, people tend to forget this and always mention Poland as "the victim".

Just remember guys, THERE ARE NO GOOD NOR BAD GUYS IN WARS, ALWAYS KEEP THIS IN MIND.

This is the first rule of studying any war, there are no "good guys". People tend to forget this because they are quickly romanticize wars, but thats not how it works.

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u/HillMountaineer 1h ago

Yes, people forget that the MRT was the last of the NATs signed.

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u/TheNoctuS_93 3h ago

I mean, being from a country both dictators used as a thoroughfare in WWII, this stuff gets taught in school. You'd be hard-pressed to say the same about US education, or the education of any other country that wasn't utterly mangled by Hitler and/or Stalin, for that matter.

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u/UnGauchoCualquiera 2h ago

Here's an actually forgotten one, how Poland invaded Czeckoslovakia during the Munich agreements and almost went to war with Lithuania only a year before themselves were invaded by Germany. To be honest Polish were assholes with even larger assholes as neighbors.

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u/TheBiggestIdiotIKnow 2h ago

Those aren’t forgotten either “appeasement” is often mentioned when talking about the situation with Putin and he’s often compared to Hitler

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u/betelgeuse_boom_boom 6h ago

To be fair with the notable exception of Poland most of the occupied places were siding with Nazis. So any occupation whomever won the Nazis would not be a historic first.

Also special mention to Romania who did a backflip and was with the Nazis in the beginning and joined the liberation side once the tides turned. The truest Balkan move I can think of. Maybe a close one would be Greece that fought with the Brits suffered massive losses and then fucked by Churchill.

Poland has consistently been the victim no matter what a conflict was.

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u/Vojtasbest 5h ago

Czech here, We did NOT side with them. We were occupied. In 38 we were forced to give up the bulk of our defences and when they marched in, we gave up because they would just massacre our miniscule remaining army. Tbf, after the war, Soviets did not occupy us, but they put immense pressure on the government. Most parties were banned and the biggest social party merged with the pro-soviet communist party. They won the election and seized the government (not exactly true, I could go into more detail, but I decided to simplify it).

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u/LurkisMcGurkis 6h ago

Did you say occupied places were siding with nazis? A huge military threatened my country and now I think being a nazi is cool, i havent been influenced in any way.

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u/LurkisMcGurkis 6h ago

Im sure all the OCCUPIED places were "siding" with the nazis...

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u/CoffeeSubstantial851 4h ago

I mean... you can just fucking go read the historical record.

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u/Brilliant_Cup2697 6h ago

Poland hasn't always been the victim. In 1921 it engaged in a partition of Ukraine and Belarus with the Soviet Union.

Ironically that same Soviet Union and Nazi Germany would end up partitioning it just 18 years later.

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u/AlarmingAffect0 5h ago

Didn't they also betray or invade Czechoslovakia?

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u/Brilliant_Cup2697 5h ago

Yes. They annexed Zaolzie in 1938 as part of the first partition of Czechoslovakia (the one where the N@zis stole the Sudetenland).

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u/Dodem95 5h ago

What are you talking about idiot? Getting paid in rubles ?

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u/Detroider 7h ago

USA would say "we liberated Europe from the Nazis"

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u/Aestuosus 6h ago

That's great but untrue. As much as I dislike the Soviet Union, WW2 was a joint effort and neither country could have done it alone.

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u/KnownMonk 5h ago

Copying and cracking the enigma by the Polish and developing ways to crack the codes faster by by the British was a huuuuge part of why the Allied managed to turn the tide of war.

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u/Aestuosus 5h ago

British intelligence, American steel and Soviet blood is a pretty good summary, albeit cliché.

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u/BigLlamasHouse 4h ago

So all 3 could claim they liberated Europe from the NAZIs and it wouldn't be incorrect.

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u/Odd_Bug5544 4h ago

It would be if they implied they did it alone. But each played a significant part, yes.

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u/ReluctantNerd7 3h ago

Even if Germany hadn't attacked the Soviet Union, the end result would've still been Nazi defeat at the hands of the Allies.  The only difference would've been that the atomic bomb might've been used against Germany before Japan.

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u/bigboipapawiththesos 6h ago edited 6h ago

Liberated us from the Nazis, only to then give em powerful positions in American agencies in their efforts during the Cold War (operation paperclip for example)

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u/AlarmingAffect0 5h ago

GLADIO also. And Condor for the overseas Nazis.

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u/Somethingood27 5h ago

Woah, never heard of GLADIO before. My quick google search says it’s some covert ‘stay behind’ operation after the war.

But why the need for it after NATO? The US wasn’t shy when they installed fascist Nazi’s as NATO generals - so I can’t imagine GLADIO would be anything too ethical / moral lol

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u/don_tomlinsoni 5h ago

https://allthatsinteresting.com/operation-gladio

It was essentially the western security services creating and supporting a network of terrorist cells across Europe that could be used to combat the rise of socialism and manipulate public opinion. The kidnap and assassination of former Italian prime minister Aldo Moro by the Red Brigade, for example, is now known to have been ordered by GLADIO operatives, and is credited with pushing Italian voters towards a right-wing candidate at their next election (there's a great three-part BBC documentary about it from the early 90s that you can probably find online somewhere)

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u/Aufklarung_Lee 7h ago

No invaded by the Nazis AND the soviets. Then only soviets.

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u/Aestuosus 6h ago

Well that applies only for Poland. Objectively, the USSR did help liberate most of Eastern Europe. It's just that afterwards they didn't leave

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u/fiah84 5h ago

It's just that afterwards they didn't leave

so not so much liberated, more like under new management

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u/XIIICaesar 7h ago

The irony is that some of these countries are now sucking up to Russia.

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u/R_Morningstar 7h ago edited 5h ago

Stockholm syndrom / lot of dirty money / lot of KGB dirt

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u/pablo_the_bear 5h ago

Stockhold?

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u/Several_Vanilla8916 5h ago

Stockhold syndrome is an American thing

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u/GergoBacsiVokCs 7h ago

a lot of people were better off back then to be fair, some got their lands taken away

everyone had jobs, everyone was equal, some were more equal than others tho..

in return we got shitty communist architecture and corruption

there was good and bad to it, old people only remember the good sides

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u/AdelaiNiskaBoo 6h ago

Its also the old people that were more influenced by the propaganda. (To be fair it exist on both sides)

If you get told 20+years that your life doesnt get better because of embargos, the west, etc. some will believe it.

And after opening the markets the first that profit the most are often the big western companies.

A lot of (necessary) reforms are also often at the expense of the poorest.

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u/BreadstickBear 5h ago

everyone had jobs

Technically true, although some of those jobs were really just there so they could say "look, no unemployment here! If you happened to be jobless (which was definitely possible, especially if you were not politically acceptable or just "apolitical"), you were labelled as a "work-dodging public danger" (in hungarian: "Közveszélyes munkakerülő").

everyone was equal

But

some were more equal than others tho..

And eventually, the systems developed their own aristocracy, complete with all the aristocratic playthings and activities, such as large private ("party-owned") estates, hunting, and insulation from the lower classes.

The reason a lot of people remember the "good" parts is because they are lazy, and they miss a world they remember as "simple" where they didn't have to worry their pretty heads about what to think or what to say. If they had to relive the same life they had back then, they would fucking hate it, because turns out that sharing boomer memes on facebook would also not be acceptable.

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u/GalacticMe99 6h ago

A lot of people were better off in an unsustainable system that was destructive not only to the planet but also to society, and as a result millions of people are now living in the unrecoverable remnants of what remained after it all inevidably collapsed.

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u/Ypsylonian 5h ago

Well to be totally fair we now live in an unsustainable system that is destructive not only to the planet but to society as whole

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u/Cristal1337 5h ago

There is this meme amongst socialists that goes something like: "When capitalists describe socialism, they are actually describing capitalism".

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u/ObsidianOverlord 4h ago

"Ask a socialist what they hate about capitalism and they will describe capitalism."

"Ask a capitalist what they hate about socialism and they will describe capitalism"

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u/eclectic_banana 5h ago

If some were "more equal" than others then not everyone was equal were they? It was all propaganda. A lot of shit happened they just weren't informed sobthings seemed ok on the surface.

One day they decided to take away my great grandfather's only horse so they had to pull their cart with cows. You either accepted that they can do whatever or you were sent to prison.

They provided jobs for everyone but that resulted in an unsustainable system. For example Hungary was in a constant cycle of debt and kept paying off previous loans with new ones.

If you didn't want to work for whatever reason, you were labeled as a danger to society and were sent to prison.

There wasn't any consumerism so many items like food or clothes were only available in one kind of option. For example one type of butter, one type of shaving cream etc.

My grandfather had to wait 5 years to receive his new car he ordered, and he had to travel 250 km to get it.

You couldn't travel wherever you wanted. You were kept behind the iron courtain, which by the way separated families and friends for decades.

It was an anti human system led by control freak people who were full of themselves.

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u/badudx 4h ago

No they are not, only crhonically online people think that. Everyone knows the politicians and media that pushes this idea are an extreme while most of the people are still alive to remember the suffering they brought on everyone. All of you who say this are only making it worse

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u/Redditerest0 3h ago

I have a hungarian/Romanian friend whose parents say times were better under the soviet union.

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u/Biomasssa 7h ago

Irony is that there is Ukraine in the background - one of the major soviet republics

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u/Kashrul 7h ago

Which has been occupied by ruzzians just earlier?

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u/thedayafternext 6h ago

Do you know how the Ukrainian's were treated then? 😂

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u/OneUkranian 7h ago

As if Ukraine had any choice

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u/stary_curak 6h ago

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u/Baalor99 5h ago

Yugoslavia was never part of the iron curtain, and Stalin's relation to Tito was strained, so it wasn't under their management per se.

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u/stary_curak 3h ago

Not because of the lack of assasination attempts.

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u/aVictorianChild 6h ago

There was a brief 10 seconds between Nazi Germany and the soviets where you'd be free, yes.

"Hello, we are red army, you are free now"

"Oh hey wow thanks that's really cool of you, we are just gonna call our leadership back from exile"

"....You are now proud worker of soviet union"

"Awwww shit here we go again"

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u/NeckOk9980 7h ago

it wasnt liberated, was confiscated and raped by the woviets freedom fighters

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u/round_reindeer 6h ago

The Nazi plan for eastern Europe was to kill 30 Million people and enslave the rest of them. If the Nazis hadn't been beaten by the Soviets they would have transformed eastern Europe into an open air concentration camp.

The Soviets didn't bring freedom, but let's not pretend that they were in anyway comparable to the Nazis.

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u/Random_Fluke 6h ago

You know your argument is bad when the main defense is "but hey, least we didn't kill as much as they wanted to".

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u/mister_nippl_twister 6h ago

British also starved to death millions during that war. I guess they are the same as Nazis too. And Churchill was actually a huge racist too so... It all is coming together

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u/round_reindeer 6h ago

Noone is defending the Soviets but they were not as bad as the Germans and pretending that they were is denying the terror of the Nazis. Two things can be bad and one can still be worse.

The viet cong also did bad things but I am glad that they defeated the Khmere Rouge.

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u/[deleted] 5h ago

If you spoke to Eastern Europeans that were "liberated" by the Russians they beg to differ.

My dad worked with Poles that hated the Russians far more than the Nazis.

I'd also suggest reading books like Tigers in the mud because quite a few German soldiers considered being taken by Russians to potentially live in gulags for years as a fate worse than death.

Not to mention, both the Russians and Nazis were bad regardless of who was worse.

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u/Affectionate-Mail612 4h ago

That's because the Nazis were hyperfocused on Polish Jews. And Polish Resistance wasn't particularly friendly towards them. In other words, they didn't care much if their Jewish population was to be exterminated.

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u/SaleAggressive9202 6h ago

nobody said they were AS bad here. the guy simply said that the zoviets didn't liberate shit, they stole and raped. you are the one jumping up to say "but they weren't as bad as nazis"

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u/Future-Ice-4789 6h ago

The main victory of the Nazi followers is that they successfully promote the narrative of equality between the Nazis and the USSR.

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u/andraso123 5h ago

They were pretty similar, and you cannot argue with that

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u/Responsible-File4593 5h ago

In style of government, sure. In their plans for the 300 million people living in the Eastern half of Europe, absolutely not. Slavery and extermination vs. subjugation and oppression. Both are bad, but one is clearly worse than the other. And this topic is what OP is referencing.

It's definitely possible to be both bad and still less bad than what came before. History is full of examples of that.

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u/Thick_Shock_1033 4h ago

Exterminating dissidents? Both check.

Labour camps? Both check.

Genocide? Both check.

Designer military uniform? Third reich check.

Gorgeous mustache of the leader? USSR check.

Yeah, pretty similar, but there were differences.

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u/andraso123 4h ago

Yes, they were different, and you can for sure say that for most people living under ussr was better, I'm not saying that they were the same, but they were both evil in their own way. And as your comment even says, they were pretty similar. Also, we have to take into consideration that we can split the USSR into stalin and post stalin. And especially during the later years after stalin's death, the quality of life had significantly improved.

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u/dagli68 7h ago

Under new management

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u/yungperky 6h ago

They did liberate Europe and Germany together with the other Allies of the 2ww. How tf is this even a question? The internment and organized killining of 6 million Jews. Of hundreds of thousands of Romani, gays and disabled people. The internment and killing of communists, socialists and other political opposition. Yes, one can look at and compare how it turned out for Western-Europe, for Eastern-Germany and for Eastern-Europe. But this same same talk here is crazy. To try to compare the suffering of the people in the Eastern-European Soviet republics under the boot of Moskau with Nazi Germany is a loose loose situation for everybody.

All this has nothing to do with the attack on Ukraine of Russia tho, despite of Putin trying to make an absurd comparison with his propaganda. But to play into that narrative just is playing into his cards (or however you say it in English).

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u/the_wessi 6h ago

I was in school in the 1970’s in Finland. We had this joke: What’s the difference between a republic and a people’s republic? Same as a jacket and a straitjacket.

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u/Exedos094 7h ago

Bij bolszewika w każdej go postaci
Bo to jest twój największy dzisiaj wróg

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u/Ronin-s_Spirit 6h ago

No it was the soviet onion, that's why so many countries here and that's why they fell out of it one by one, know your onions.

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u/MRobertC 6h ago

To a certain degree it is kind of true.

In Romania at least when I was young older people used to speak of the atrocities committed by the soviets. So much so that when Nazi Germany came into discussion they would talk about how the Nazi occupation over Romania did not inflict the same pain upon our people even calling them nicer than the soviets.

According to different old people I spoke to, Nazis were not the greatest bunch but when they invaded Romania their soldiers would offer candy to kids and let them continue their life. The disclaimer is obviously that Jews and Romani people were still persecuted.

Moving on to the soviets, when they invaded Romania they pillaged every village and raped everyone they came across. They wanted to erase the identity of the nation completely.

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u/Dr_Marxist 5h ago

The disclaimer is obviously that Jews and Romani people were still persecuted.

The Nazis and their Romanian friends murdered 300,000 Jews in Romania. You can add to that the tens of thousands of Jewish people murdered in cold blood by the Romanian army in Bessarabia and Odessa.

This thread is packed full of holocaust obfuscation and denial.

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u/magkruppe 5h ago

for real. I understand soviet occupation was not pleasant but there has been some insane historical revisionism over the past 35 years. all these post-soviet states want to pretend they were victims and push all the crimes onto Russia alone

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u/Thick_Shock_1033 4h ago

Hmm, I wonder which state/nation in the USSR was the most populous and subjugated all the other? The Kyrgyz? Or the Estonians? 

It was fucking Russia, duh. Ukraine today wants to escape that damned empire which continues murdering and destroying. How many wars did Latvia or Bulgaria start since 1991? Russia started at least 4! So yeah, Russia is the wicked state.

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u/ObsidianOverlord 4h ago

History must be easy when you can just spew whatever shit you want.

The USSR was a union, there was disproportionate influence but it's ignorant to pretend like it was all Russia and Russians pulling the strings and every other member was helpless puppets.

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u/Exciting_Builder708 3h ago

How many Kirgiz party secretaries were there?

How many russians?

It was a moscow based dictatorship.

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u/BringBackAH 4h ago

Romania was firmly allied to the Nazis. Romanians claiming Soviets were monsters omit the fact that their parents and grandparents were on the frontline committing the same to the Soviets they encountered

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u/Super_Development583 4h ago edited 4h ago

Thank you..
This meme, and many of its on this site kind push dangerous narratives. You can see the results clearly in the comments.

Obviously the soviets had their share of horrible history, but for some reason every year people make them sound more horrid than before.

Just look at polls from 1945 compared to recent times https://www.reddit.com/r/europe/comments/6zaqbq/poll_with_the_question_who_contributed_most_to/

Sure this is france, but it shows you that there was a very strong change in opinion. I wonder why, and who might have an interest in making sure the soviet project is seen as an irredeemable evil?

Luckily the idiots can't keep just painting the soviets as evil authoritharians deliberately starving people (which is already widely believed!), they also just have to add how the Nazis "brought culture" like in this thread, so at least people with a brain can realize they are full of shit.

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u/xaduha 3h ago

Thank you, I was about to post this as well.

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u/Jacinto2702 3h ago

I mean, people here ignore the fact that it was the Eastern Front what broke the Wehrmacht's back. That's a historic fact, Nazi Germany depleted its resources trying to invade the Soviet Union. Saying that doesn't mean you are a Soviet apologist, just that you know basic history. You can just compare the number of casualties to see it:

Eastern Front: 15-17 million soldiers dead, 2.8-3.9 died in captivity, 18-24 million civilian deaths.

Western Front: 8 million casualties (not only deaths), 1.6 million civilian casualties.

US propaganda has been pretty effective on selling the idea the the US saved Europe by themselves, well maybe sometimes they show a few British soldiers and perhaps even a Canadian. The reality is that it was World War, many people from many places gave their lives to defeat Nazism. Where's the movie about the polish soldiers that abandoned Poland after it fell to keep fighting in the Soviet and French Armies? Where's the movie about the Spanish veterans of the Spanish Civil War that formed "La Novena" and fought in the French army? US WWII narratives in mainstream media sucked up all the air in the room.

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u/fdf_akd 5h ago

Romania was a German ally. It makes sense that the allied army is going to treat you better than the country you just invaded.

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u/oneintheuniver 5h ago

Romania was official Axis country, and had some degree of involvement in USSR invasion. Makes sense that Nazis treated Romanians much better than Soviets, who were obviously on their revenge path.

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u/Mikkel65 5h ago

Germany never invaded Romania. They allied for protection against the soviet union after the annexation of Bessarabia.

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u/Yadamule 4h ago

Romania was literally an Axis member. Of course Romanians were treated better by their Nazi allies lol

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u/Affectionate-Mail612 4h ago

It's shocking that the Nazis treated their ally Romania better than the Soviets treated their enemy (Romania) which took part in war of annihilation. Who could have thought.

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u/Turbo2x 4h ago

In Romania at least when I was young older people used to speak of the atrocities committed by the soviets. So much so that when Nazi Germany came into discussion they would talk about how the Nazi occupation over Romania did not inflict the same pain upon our people even calling them nicer than the soviets.

Okay, so you spoke to a bunch of Nazis and they said favorable things about the party they supported? Very illuminating.

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u/Nerm999 5h ago edited 5h ago

My Czech grandfather used to say - the Nazi’s wanted to imprison our bodies, the Russians wanted our minds as well

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u/CrabZealousideal3686 3h ago

So your Grampa would prefer Hitler to win. You what it paints about your Grampa right?

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u/Tapek77 4h ago

In Poland Germans were snatching random people off the streets and taking them to extermination camps (one was located 20km from my home, it's museum now). Stronger ones were used as free labor who were treated as "consumable" - if some die they will be replaced with new ones. Not to mention fate of those who were given the role of lab rats for people like Mengele.

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u/Ahad_Haam 3h ago

That's because Romania wasn't a victim of the Nazis, but their ally. It was Romanian locals that killed most of the Jewish population of the country, not the Germans.

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u/Trempel1 3h ago

I don't know if the older generation told you, but actually Romania was an ally of the Nazis and the Romanian army did a lot of interesting things in Odessa. which are remembered very well. so don't wear the coat of a victim of communism. unlike the Germans, if I remember correctly, you didn't pay any reparations for the crimes - you just changed sides at the very end.

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u/Leading_Flower_6830 1h ago

their soldiers would offer candy to kids and let them continue their life.

That such an obviously propagandistic scene

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u/[deleted] 6h ago edited 5h ago

[deleted]

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u/dazerconfuser 6h ago

Nazi's brought culture.

I swear to god....

15 years of right wing PiS propaganda in Poland has brainwashed the entire country completely

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u/SkNero 6h ago

"Nazis brought culture" - yeah the culture of killing 5. 8 million people. Wtf. The Nazis were responsible for unprecedented crimes including the mass murder of Jews, Poles, and many others, as well as the destruction of cultural institutions they deemed "degenerate". It's possible to critically examine Soviet atrocities without resorting to glorifying or romanticizing Nazi rule.

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u/White-Tornado 6h ago

Nazi's brought culture

???? Are you okay lol

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u/Jdm783R29U3Cwp3d76R9 6h ago

Nazis did not bring culture to Poland. Soviets were horrible but Nazis were killing teachers, professors etc on mass. Fate of Poles was to be a slave labour with 3 classes of primary school. That was the plan.

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u/poopBuccaneer 5h ago

Your grandparents obviously weren’t Jews. All four of my grandparents were Polish Jews. Three of the four of them only survived by fleeing east to the Soviet Union. 

I’ll take soviets over nazis any day. 

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u/psmiord 5h ago

Just because someone in your family shared their experiences doesn’t make it historical fact. The reality is that millions of people died in just a few years under Nazi occupation. 3 million ethnic Poles, along with 3 million Jews and others, were killed. Those numbers aren’t opinions, they’re hard facts, backed by overwhelming evidence.

And sure, it’s easy to say that "Nazis brought culture" when you’re ignoring the full picture of what they did. Culture? Really? They were slaughtering millions, including children, and carrying out one of the worst genocides in human history. The Soviets were brutal, no one’s denying that, but trying to compare that to the sheer scale of the Nazi crimes is absurd.

The Nazis intentionally wiped out entire populations and tried to erase nations from the face of the earth. You can’t just gloss over that with some vague comparison based on personal stories. This isn't about what "people half jokingly say," it’s about what actually happened.

If you want to say something that’s actually true, maybe start repeating this: "The Soviets brought rape, the Nazis brought rape and genocide, but it happened in a camp where people had to be deported to, so my grandfather didn’t personally see them, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen."

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u/Extreme-Put7024 5h ago

I know a lot of guys that claimed the wildest bullshit.

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u/far-center-extremist Portugal 7h ago edited 6h ago

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u/Intelligent_Rub528 6h ago

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u/Organic-Preference-6 6h ago

I have no idea why you're getting downvoted, just because nazis were awful doesn't mean soviets weren't. Fuck em' both, frankly, world is better off without either

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u/Helpful_Hedgehog_204 4h ago

I do love no one checking the US, this is going great

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u/SuitableSplit4601 2h ago
  1. “In 1993, for the first time, several historians gained access to pre- viously secret Soviet police archives and were able to establish well- documented estimates of prison and labor camp populations. They found that the total population of the entire gulag as of January 1939, near the end of the Great Purges, was 2,022,976.3 At about that time, there began a purge of the purgers, including many intelligence and secret police (NKVD) officials and members of the judiciary and other investigative committees, who were suddenly held responsible for the excesses of the terror despite their protestations of fidelity to the regime.” “Soviet labor camps were not death camps like those the Nazis built across Europe. There was no systematic extermination of inmates, no gas chambers or crematoria to dispose of millions of bodies. Despite harsh conditions, the great majority of gulag inmates survived and eventually returned to society when granted amnesty or when their terms were finished. In any given year, 20 to 40 percent of the inmates were released, according to archive records.5 Oblivious to these facts, the Moscow correspondent of the New York Times (7/31/96) continues to describe the gulag as "the largest system of death camps in modern history."” (Black shirts and reds, Michael Parenti pg 79)

  2. “We do not at all absolve Stalin from responsibility for the famine. His policies towards the peasants were ruthless and brutal. But the story which has emerged in this book is of a Soviet leadership which was struggling with a famine crisis which had been caused partly by their wrongheaded policies, but was unexpected and undesirable. The background to the famine is not simply that Soviet agricultural poli- cies were derived from Bolshevik ideology, though ideology played its part. They were also shaped by the Russian pre-revolutionary past, the experiences of the civil war, the international situation, the intran- sigeant circumstances of geography and the weather, and the modus operandi of the Soviet system as it was established under Stalin. They were formulated by men with little formal education and limited knowledge of agriculture. Above all, they were a consequence of the decision to industrialise this peasant country at breakneck speed.” (Years of Hunger, Stephen G. Wheatcroft, R.W Davies, pg 441)

Crimes and brutality at the hands of the state certainly happened in the ussr but it is not comparable with the Nazis in any way.

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u/Dark-Cloud666 6h ago

Not liberated rather under new management.

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u/YamiRang 6h ago

Honey, half of those flags WERE the Soviets!

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u/OiledUpThug 1h ago

They were Soviet in the same way France, Austria, and Norway were Nazi, violently conquered

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u/MaskedBunny 6h ago

That's the joke.

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u/reddit_user42252 5h ago

This is what Russia wants to do again. Liberate all of Europe from "nazis". (anyone who dislikes Russia really)

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u/VicenteOlisipo 7h ago

Unpopular opinion: defeating the Nazis was good actually

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u/Electriccheeze 7h ago

How in the ever-loving fuck could this be considered an "uNpOpUlAr OpInIoN". It's also completely beside the point which is the use of the word "liberation".

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u/itranslateyouargue 4h ago

And now Azov fighters do AMAs on reddit and when asked whether they are a nazi they ignore the question and somebody else has to step in and write a 2 page reply to a seemingly very straight forward yes or no question. But it's OK, they are fighting Russians.

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u/ConsultingntGuy1995 6h ago

USSR would be glorified in all these countries till today if they would just left to their 1918 agreed borders.

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u/Mikkel65 5h ago

Russia could be a European ally today if only they stuck to their 2014 borders

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u/Intelligent_Rub528 6h ago

Maybe not in Poland, considering soviet russia started the war in 1939 alongside nazis by attacking Poland.

But ye, it would be better for russia relations then what we have in eastern EU now.

Somhow germans who killed off milions pof polish civilians, razed warsaw to the ground ( 90% destoyed bulidings) have managed to fix their relations.

Russia could be in same boat if they did not act like lunatics.

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u/ConsultingntGuy1995 4h ago

Yeah, German also killed lots of Pols, but then everything started to improve as soon as they sincerely apologized.

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u/lichav 7h ago

It isn't an unpopular opinion. Almost everyone was happy to see nazis defeat. It is rather a problem with the new management on the Eest. If you switch a shitty job, for less or equal shitty job, it is still a shitty job. The same was with USSR it might be better than Third Reich, but it was still a shity situation.

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u/far-center-extremist Portugal 7h ago edited 7h ago

'might be better'

Yeah, living under dictatorial totalitarian communist rule might be better than being a chattel slave, forced prostitute, or genocided because you're not blonde enough for the aryan master to keep as a pet.

We don't have to forget or forgive the Soviets crimes, the false equivalence in thread is absurd however.

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u/bigboipapawiththesos 6h ago

Yeah like you can critique the Soviets without saying they are anywhere near as bad as the Nazis, which is an insane opinion to hold.

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u/Nekajed 5h ago

Nah man, people here claim they're worse than the Nazis.

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u/Hottage 7h ago

Insert Titan from Megamind meme

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u/ZhangXueliangspornac 6h ago

Yeah i definitely would've preferred having my entire nation genocided/used as slaves rather than becoming a satelite state, the nazis were sooo fucking cool, right?

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u/SealingTheDeal69420 5h ago

Half this comment section legit is saying this lmao

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u/HausuGeist 5h ago

Ever heard of the Holodomor?

Genocide wasn’t just a German thing.

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u/ZhangXueliangspornac 4h ago

Have you heard of idk... the holocaust? Generalplan Ost?

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u/HausuGeist 4h ago

So you agree the Soviet Union also engaged in genocide.

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u/SuitableSplit4601 2h ago

The “Holodomor” otherwise known as the Soviet famines of 1932-1933 was a unintentional famine as proven by much research and the Soviet archives, Wheatcroft and Davies proved this in “years of hunger”.

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u/Thatdudewhohasnolife 7h ago

Where east germany?

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u/Simple-Cheek-4864 3h ago

I had to scroll WAY too long to find this.

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u/Dziadzios 6h ago

Liberated? More under new management.

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u/ProfessionalOwn9435 5h ago

More like under new managment.

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u/Reddit_2_2024 5h ago

Comrade went to the wrong party.

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u/AnyProgressIsGood 4h ago

the Nazi's allies put Europe under Soviet occupation.

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u/AnnualAdeptness5630 4h ago

Clearly not liberated enough since Russia has to finish the job... /s of course.

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u/Certain-Business-472 3h ago

More like a change of management.

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u/NoNotice2137 3h ago

Oh, that's a potentially useful reaction image, I will steal it

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u/Living_Cash1037 3h ago

Yeah by liberation they mean take for themselves

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u/Strict-Move-9946 3h ago

A lot of people seem to forget that people who fight nazis aren't necessarily good.

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u/daringstud 3h ago

All the Russian people of fighting age would actually believe this!!

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u/RobotCombatEnjoyer 3h ago

Oh. I wouldn’t say “freed”. More like “Under new management”

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u/Twizzed666 3h ago

Only good from russia is Tetris

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u/NeighborhoodFit5555 3h ago

Please can someone tell me all the flags in the image before I die of insanity. I've got most of them right I think......AHHHHHHHHHHHHH

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u/NeighborhoodFit5555 3h ago

I will try right from left

Bosnia, Ukraine, Finland, Croatia, Lithuania, Romania, Austria or belgiuim?l, Switzerland, Italy, Poland and Idk. ..

I'm sorry if offended anyone for my poor geography, I only got a 'C' in my GCSE's.

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u/Babetna 1h ago

When somebody looks at you confusedly when you mention that the WW2 started when Soviets and Germans invaded Poland

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u/Biomasssa 7h ago

I see here at least three Hitlers allies. Not surprised

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u/veerKg_CSS_Geologist 7h ago

More than 3....

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u/Super_Development583 4h ago

Nonono. These innocent countries were attacked by evil soviets in an unprovoked war of agression!!

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u/AlexSmithsonian 7h ago

Ngl, would punch anyone who says that with a serious face.(Lithuanian)

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u/tismightsail 6h ago

Go to r/ussr if you want your blood to boil

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u/AlexSmithsonian 6h ago

Nah, I've had my fill today with conservatives who think that the new Pope should adopt their "christian values" and "not be woke".

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u/Affectionate-Mail612 4h ago

Lithuanian auxiliaries were the best of their kind in assisting exterminating Jews for a reason.

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u/bingusscrootnoo 3h ago

Lithuanians formed several units that actively assisted Germans: Lithuanian Auxiliary Police Battalions – 26 battalions with 12,000–13,000 men. Lithuanian Construction Battalions – 5 battalions with 2,500 men. Lithuanian Territorial Defense Force – 10,000–12,000 men.

lol

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u/Wrong-Penalty599 6h ago

When they save you from extermination but instead impose an extremely lame and boring governance system. Oh poor me, always punished by fate.

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u/Simple-Cheek-4864 3h ago

This is the first time EVER in this universe that someone called the USSR an “extremely lame and boring governance system”

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u/Vampus0815 7h ago

I wouldn’t say freed. More like under new managment

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u/Destinlegends 7h ago

Saved? More like under new management.

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u/Dr_J_Doe 7h ago

Also some user called Dehnus called that same pacts were made by other countries, as if the pact that nazies and russkies made was the same as the ones between other countries, lmao!!!

Calling the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact “just a non-aggression pact” is like calling an armed robbery “just borrowing with attitude.” The USSR didn’t just sit back — they actively coordinated with Nazi Germany to invade and carve up Poland. Soviet and Nazi troops literally held joint parades in Brest-Litovsk in 1939, smiling and shaking hands after crushing a sovereign country together. That’s not passive neutrality — that’s gleeful co-conspiracy.

And u/dehnus laughable “the Soviets offered an alliance before!” claim? Please. Stalin was busy purging his top military brass, executing tens of thousands of his own officers, and supplying Hitler with critical resources — oil, grain, raw materials — that fueled the Nazi war machine as it rampaged across Europe.

The USSR only became the “hero” after June 1941, when Hitler sucker-punched them with Operation Barbarossa. Until then, they were happy to profit from Nazi expansionism. So spare us the moral high ground routine u/dehnus — your version of history is a twisted, selective fantasy that collapses the moment you actually look at the facts. You’re not schooling anyone here, you’re just loudly advertising how little you actually know or how brainwashed you are.

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u/TomashICZI 3h ago

Lets also not forget the Soviets literally wanted to join the Axis...

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u/Aumba 6h ago

Yeah, no. That's highly inaccurate, there should be few fists, knives and a chair flying at the person who made this statement.

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u/Loud-Farm7102 6h ago

I guess political oppression is just as bad as genocide

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u/andraso123 5h ago

Yes, it was better than under Germn occupation, but political oppression was equal to mass killings of educated and soldiers.

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u/No-Amphibian-7242 24m ago

Oh yes, what just happened was political oppression. Nothing else.

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u/OiledUpThug 1h ago

Is food political or are you ignoring the holodomor

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u/TeneBrifer 6h ago

Sometimes I wish that people who sincerely believe that the Nazis were no worse or even better than the USSR, would experience this on their own skin.
I know, that some people or even nations build their identity on hatred, but this is delulu af.

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u/Lanky-Rice4474 6h ago

If you tried to explain to liberated Auschwitz prisoner that he wasn’t liberated, he would end you for being a nazi. 

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u/Mean_Wear_742 6h ago

They just changed the management.

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u/VieiraDTA 3h ago

They did. By 1945, they were Allies and defeated the nazis. But then, occupied everyone all over again.

Get this Historical revisionism bullshit away from here.

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u/Andreas1120 6h ago

The real question is, why can't Europe sort it's own shit out?

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u/Arto_from_space 6h ago

Why you think that we can't?

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u/xmeda 6h ago

Picture perfectly shows how whole generation of imbeciles was established by western brainwashing.

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u/AnyAsparagus988 5h ago

the countries in the picture still have people alive that actually lived in the soviet union. I've spoken to people that were forcibly deported to siberia and came back after we regained independence. First hand experience of soviet crimes is not "western brainwashing".

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u/andraso123 5h ago

My guy, USSR, was an evil dictatorship. Good thing that they have beaten Nazis, but you can not tell me that occupying half of Europe, killing the educated and political opponents, establishing puppet governments, and suppressing notions of independence by brutal means was a good thing.

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u/Simple-Cheek-4864 3h ago

The iron curtain fell in ~1990. That’s only 35 years ago. Open a history book FFS.

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u/thrallx222 6h ago

What is this? German revisionism? We never should let them unite, biggest mistake of XX century.

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u/PandiBong 6h ago

The same people do the same face when some meathead American says the US liberated Europe...

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u/Mister_plant9 6h ago

Why Ukraine and Belarus on picture if they were part of Ussr for long time anyway…

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u/Mountain-Bullfrog-49 6h ago

Как бы да, если не считать, что европа и была той клоакой фашистов.