V-E Day + 60: Putin in Serious Denial

Vladimir Putin criticizes the Allied bombing of Dresden in WW II.

Highlights are.....

Putin: “It’s incomprehensible to me to this day why Dresden was destroyed. There was no military reason for it.”

Putin...said the civilian population in Germany had suffered greatly during the war but said it was not the Soviets’ fault.

Denying that Moscow was to blame for Germany’s post-war division, Putin said Soviet leaders had worked hard “to preserve the integrity and unity of Germany” after the war. “But some of our allies unfortunately took the opposite position.”

“It wasn’t the Soviet Union that started the war.”

Say what?!? I don't even know where to begin....(but I'll try)

Dresden was a dreadful mistake and regarding Putin's statement about military reasons, he is correct. However, "incomprehensible" is a little over-the-top when you consider Soviet behavior in East Prussia and other areas in Germany where civilians were indiscriminately killed, raped, and robbed by Soviet forces. Not the Soviets fault?!?

The post-war division of Germany was actually proposed at the Yalta Conference by none other than Josef Stalin, who argued vociferously that Germany must be dismembered for the Soviet Union's future security. The Western Allies went along with it, as Stalin had a sort-of moral imperative there - having been invaded - but Churchill had misgivings on the idea.

'It wasn't the Soviet Union that started the war'

In the very, very strictist sense, that is - in terms of direct German-Soviet conflict - this is correct. However....

in 1939, the Soviets occupied eastern Poland and parts of Romania under the Molotov Pact with Germany, and immediately rounded up and massacred 30,000 Polish officers in the Katyn forest.

Also in 1939, the Soviet Union invaded Finland in what became known as The Winter War.

In 1940, annexed the Baltic countries under secret terms of the aforementioned Molotov Pact.

Took about a 100,000 prisoners at Stalingrad in 1943; only 5-6,000 survived the war.

In 1940, considered a surprise attack on Germany for the spring of '41. Had several operations plans to attack Germany in 1943 or later as well.

Declared war on Japan a few weeks before the end of the war to pursue territorial gains. Hundreds of thousands of civilians in the Manchuria/Manchukuo area killed or missing.

The chutzpah of Putin!