-with a little help from their ‘friends’
WW2 was the deadliest conflict in human history. There were 85 million fatalities, most of whom were Russian civilians. Russia lost up to 27 million people in the war, nearly 13% of their entire population at the time.
But they did win the war, a little known fact that the Hollywood Culture Factory fails to mention in their endless stream of WW2 movies.
The United States, feared around the globe as an awesome war machine, waited until the last moment before committing to the fight to save the world from Fascism. In the hope, no doubt, that the Russians and the Germans would annihilate each other. But once it was obvious to all that Germany would fall to the Russian army, the U.S. and its allies made a mad dash to grab as much territory as possible, under the astute assumption that Russia would not stop at Berlin, but continue westward until they reached the Atlantic.
It is well documented and not disputed that the Soviet Union did 3/4 of the fighting in WW2. 3/4 of the casualties were Russian. Russia was responsible for 3/4 of the german soldiers killed or captured. The same goes for tanks destroyed, planes shot down, etc, etc.
We may detest Stalin and Putin, but that does not give us the right to write Russia out of history.
We talk today about the unprecedented distortion of the truth facilitated by the internet, but the almost unanimous denial of the fact that Russia won the second world war, almost single-handed, goes unremarked.
Good point Ben. But you have to worry about a nation that will sacrifice millions of their own in battle. Mao was similarly ruthless.