The Soviet Story

This documentary focuses on the atrocities committed against innocent people, mainly by Stalin and other high ranking Soviet leaders in the name of Marxism and Communism prior, during, and after the Second World War.

The documentary consists of much original footage, newspaper clips, interviews with witnesses and even some present day footage, all very well edited and cut.

The story told in this documentary is the best one I've yet to see regarding horrible crimes committed against humanity, because it is very well substantiated in terms of source-material and historical argumentation. The delight of seeing this educational footage is strengthened even more due to its addressing of one of the most inconceivable facts in the post-WWII world: How Adolf Hitler was forever after unconditionally condemned by close to everyone across the globe for his crimes, and how Joseph Stalin was commemorated for aiding the Allies in liberating Europe of fascism, regardless of the fact that in total more than 20 million (some even claim up to 50 or 60 million) people was murdered by the hands of the Soviet Gulag State. A fact which nobody in the western world seems to care about.

What this documentary furthermore achieves which is what eventually made me give it the 10th star, was the fact that the story was told very honestly and very unbiased, unlike much historical media, and the scriptwriters have done an extremely well job in mastering the whole aspect of the stories, and not just focused on narrow one-sided details.

Regardless of the fact that most people see Hitler as the "far-right", and Stalin as the "far-left", this documentary raises the ultimate question: were they indeed that different, after all?

This is a sledge-hammer documentary that even the most partial viewers would find difficult and hard to digest - many simply cannot or refuse to endure it, the stuff being too heavy. It is important to observe, that the film is Latvian, it is written and directed by a Latvian, and Latvia has a special trauma from the Soviet days, having suffered more from the Soviet ethnic cleansing after the war than both Estonia and Lithuania, large parts of the population being simply abducted to Siberia and concentration camps in other remote parts of the union with no possibility of any return, since most of them died, like people usually do in concentration camps. These Soviet crimes against innocent Latvian people, the Russians have never been brought to account for, in contrast to the Nazis for their crimes, which is one of the major points of the film. Latvia was not alone. The Soviets did the same although on a lesser scale in Estonia and Lithuania and in most east European countries under Russian occupation and above all in Ukraine, where in a single year seven million were intentionally starved to death. Already Lenin started persecutions in Ukraine, but Stalin expanded them into a holocaust from fear of losing Ukraine, and he saw a major reduction of the population as a means of reducing that danger. Edvins Snore, who made the film, points out the fact, which few have been aware of, that already Karl Marx in 1849 professed it as a necessity that all parasites of society and lower races (like Basques and Scottish highlanders) should be cleansed out of humanity to provide room for abler people, an inhuman philosophy that even Bernard Shaw as a socialist advocated and which turned into a trademark for all kinds of socialism, Russian Bolsheviks first of all and later Nazis. The documentary actually shows how Bolsheviks and Nazis learned from each other and instructed each other, Stalin and Hitler collaberated closely all the way up to 1941, Stalin using the Ukrainian harvests for export abroad to let the Ukrainians starve, and Nazis showing Stalin how to organize death camps. There is a grotesque irony in the film, showing Bolsheviks and Nazis partying and toasting each other in one scene to in the next show the harvest of corpses of starvation in Ukraine - the film is full of such horrible social penetrations into the dictatorial system. The film is vital for its message of telling inconvenient truths that so far haven't been generally known and can be seen as actually a resounding cry for retribution for all those millions unknown and buried alive who were intentionally sacrificed to suit the inhuman long term strategy of this ideology and its dictatorships.

The Soviets and the Chinese Communists killed about 100 million of their own peoples. There is not the slightest historical doubt about this. The fact that some imbecile here says this is propaganda and "why bother" since the USSR disintegrated 20 years ago merely amplifies one of the film's points -- that the history is being whitewashed. We continue to hear, almost daily, about Hitler this, Hitler that, Hitler the other thing ... and he was a freakin' pantywaist compared to the Soviets and Chicoms. It matters, particularly since the so-called intellectual left in the West was complicit, starting with Walter Duranty and his phony reporting for the NYT. It's a reminder that today's fathead libs don't want. I am also quite down on the GOP, so don't lump me with them. I am a libertarian, actually, and find nothing to respect in either major political party in the U.S. today. However, it's the left that bears the greatest complicity in the murder of millions, by providing cover for the killers. Screw 'em.

The Soviet Story is a very important contribution for understanding a series of questions about leftism and Marxism outcomes. But other questions remain. First, _how_ is it possible at all that so many young people, as well as oldies, are still impressed by such ideologies? _How_ could it ever be possible that a historian such as Hobsbawn considers himself a communist socialist today, having declared not long ago that if it was not for being a Jew, in the 30s could very well have enthusiastically joined Nazism? With a huge lot of information and discussion nowadays freely available?

Many good comments on the documentary have already been made. But the main question that remains after it is: _how_ came that a Marxist "theory", that started copying the condolent humanitarians in the XIX century, defending egalitarianism ... terminated by practicing the most cruel and extensive genocides of the whole History of mankind?

Unfortunately, the answers to these questions are not short, and not without some work. And perhaps not bound to be contained in movie documentaries, however well performed as is this one. Only through some reading can we begin to see the answers, in analyses made clear along the last century by people such as Isaiah Berlin (as in 'Against the Current') and Karl Popper (as in 'The Open Society and It's Enemies'). Do enjoy them piecemeal.

I have to make a comment for zvesda and its followers (do read his other review and please get that he is a pro-socialism pro-imperialism creature who could theoretically almost justify to the ignorant the enormously tragical mass murders of the Soviet Union). The most unbelievable thing is, though, that some would buy his strange endeavor - could be because of lack of knowledge.

Please also get that Russia has no enemies, as zvesda imperiously sustains, and that the theory of "hatred" is extremely dangerous and entails the majority of the citizens of a nation to incredible crimes justified by noble ideas such as "patriotism" and "defense from the enemy of the state". The documentary shows us the atrocities carried out by some dictators, and is not a personal attack to you, zvesda, or to the citizens of Russia, whether old or young (not to mention those crimes were against the Soviet Union's own citizens!). But stating expressions such as "the Jewish fascism" in today's Russia is mind-blowing (of course, the 20.000.000 killings in the Soviet Union, solely in terms of number, is quite mind-blowing too...).

Those atrocities did exist, whether you acknowledge it or not, and everyone should be reminded of the possible crimes of any dictatorship through fear, censorship, craziness, torture and murder. Whatever dictatorship that might be, at the shadow of whatever ideology.

It's hard to see the harsh images of afflicted children, women and men; but ignorance is never an excuse, and this documentary will definitely wake you up, if only to make you read a bit more about our recent and insane history.