Thanks for publishing Mr. Laar's article ["The rebirth of Stalinism in Russia," Opinion, TBT #570, Aug. 23 - 29]. Much of the world knows about the Gestapo and the Holocaust, but much less about the GPU/NKVD/KGB/FSB, the Gulag and the Red Army. This is much as Mr. Putin likes it. He apparently thinks that 100 million East Europeans, who experienced "liberation" by the Red Army, will eventually accept his line, all it takes is a little more bullying and lying. After all they once, at the point of bayonets and visions of the Gulag, were forced to.
Now that the bayonets are gone and visions of the Gulag receding, there is zero, zilch chance of that. Those millions of East Europeans know that the Red Army and the following NKVD were the largest horde of robbers, rapists and murderers in world history. They were liberated of property, freedom and often life itself.
