Almost missed the First Tsar question because I recently learned that the first person ever to have the title was Simeon I of Bulgaria, and the last person ever to bear the title is Simeon II of Bulgaria.
I believe what he actually means is the first tsar of russia as a whole country. By all means there have been tsars before ivan the terrible, nevertheless their title was tsar of moscow, not russia.
Before Ivan the Terrible, the title of the ruler was Grand Prince of Moscow - Moscow was a Grand Duchy. Ivan was the first monarch with the specific title of Tsar, which he adopted in 1547, 13 years after his reign started.
Stalin won WW2 just as much as Churchill or Roosevelt. Without the USSR then the Allies wouldn't have stood a chance. Maybe with Trotsky or another leader then the USSR might have looked different, maybe less industrialised or with a smaller military. It might not have stood up to Germany. This is all speculation, but if you did have to pin down the "Winner of WW2" one one man, ridiculous as that would be, Stalin would be a good contender.
The Soviet Union lost almost as much as every other country in World War II combined. About 11 million out of 25 million. Two thirds of casualties occurred on the Eastern Front between the Soviet Union and Germany+allies. The Soviets reached Berlin first, losing more casualties in the siege than the US has lost in all wars combined. So yes, the Soviet Union won World War 2.
The Soviets took the most losses, but they wouldn't have been able to keep fighting without the American Lend Lease act that gave them the supplies to do so. The Soviets suffered huge production and supply issues to the point that more than half of all the equipment they used in the field was American made. Stalin and Khrushchev both stated that the USSR would have lost had it not been for the lend lease act.
Compare the positions of the countries at the beginning and at the end of the WWII. Who gained the most? USSR and USA. So Stalin definitely has won the WWII
I went to Cavendish, Vermont a few years ago (since I was more or less in the neighbourhood), just out of curiosity, to see where Solzhenitsyn had spent nearly two decades in exile. When I went to the gas station to check if there was anything to see, my query caused a bit of a stir, highlighted (for me) by the question: "You mean that Russian guy?" The next day I was at the library in Keene, New York - built in the year before Gorky wrote his most famous novel (Mother) while staying in the tiny community. I asked the librarian if there was anything commemorating his time there. The librarian had never heard of him but did ask if I had checked the shelves under "G".
Some of these questions show a strong political slant. Reading news from non-American sources would help with inaccurate words like "seized" and "invaded."
You mean reading news from Russian propaganda mills? What would you call what happened in Georgia? They were just coming to pay a neighborly visit? In tanks? The Russian air force were dropping fruit baskets on Tbilisi and it was only the biased American media that reported it was bombs?
Also, propaganda is propaganda, positive or negative, regardless of what country it comes from. And let's be honest here, no country's media is entirely unbiased.
While I also see the strong political slant, I argue that "invaded" is technically correct even when Russia was in a defensive war against Georgia. Just like Americans and Russians invaded Germany in 1945, but nobody claims that USA started WW2, right? Invaded is a neutral term.
true. Though calling any of these invasions defensive wars is silly. Russia-proper was never threatened at all during the 2008 conflict, and the Russian separatists in South Ossetia (Georgia) provoked the Georgian response.
Good one, but still think there should be some more truth in it. Looks like the history of Russia is only "invading" and "seizing" someone. I wonder how would we describe the American history then, in their police of "America to Americans". And I didn't even mention The UK...
Russia has been built on assertion of power via invasions. It's not anti-Russian; it's just the truth. Even today, Putin uses invasions to divide countries that are straying too far to the West to keep them in his sphere of influence (see Georgia and Ukraine). While the US is imperialistic in its own right, it's invasions are less about hegemony.
The Serfs were hardly liberated. They may have called it that at the time, but they were pretty much still slaves up to the Revolution. A matter of opinion of course.
For gulag would you accept Glavnoye Upravleniye ispravitelno-trudovyh Lagerey? (Just kidding, but saw that on Wikipedia while looking up Solzhinetsyn, and I'd forgotten the word gulag is a Russian acronym.)
It's uncomfortable for the US and UK to acknowledge their debt to a monster like Stalin but nevertheless it's a reality.
Learn some history, or at least try to be a bit more objective.