russian leaders: S and D

posting excerpts i copied from KHRUSHCHEV: THE MAN, HIS ERA by william taubman in this thread because they are not u.s. politics:

‎[Khrushchev] didn't like being denied Disneyland either. He'd been told he couldn't go because the Los Angeles Police Department couldn't guarantee his safety without emptying the whole park... It was at this point that Frank Sinatra whispered to David Niven, Nina Khrushcheva's neighbor at the table, "Screw the cops! Tell the old broad you and I'll take 'em down this afternoon."

Eisenhower tried to deflect the conversation. After complaining that the telephone kept ringing while he was on vacation, he asked whether Khrushchev's did too. At this point Khrushchev "became almost violent, stating that telephones were even installed on the beach when he went swimming, and that he could assure us that soon in the USSR they would have more and better telephones than we have and that then we would cut off our telephones since we are always afraid of comparisons."

As in December, aides had prepared a moderate text, and once again Khrushchev "didn't use a word of it." No sooner had he welcomed his guests than he suddenly declared, "All volunteer informers for foreign agencies--I ask you to please leave the hall ... I know you can't just get up now and give yourselves away, so during the break, when we're in the cafeteria, you just pretend to go to the toilet and then get lost. You understand?"

laughing out loud at sinatra

"So, you're Aksyonov," roared Khrushchev. "I know what you're doing. You're taking revenge on us for the death of your father..."

"But I'm not Aksyonov," replied Golitsyn.

"What do you mean, you're not?" grumbled Khrushchev. "Who are you?"

"I--I'm Golitsyn."

"Prince Golitsyn? So you're a prince, are you? Is that what you are? A prince?"

"No, no, I'm not a prince, I'm just an artist, a realist, Nikita Sergeyevich. If you like, I can show you a piece of my work."

"No, no. Not necessary. But say something!"

"What should I say?"

"You're asking me? You're the one who came up here to speak."

"I don't know what to say. I wasn't planning to speak."

"Don't you know why you were called up here?"

"No, I don't."

"Well, think about it."

"Was it because I applauded Voznesensky?"

"No."

"Then I don't know."

"Well, think about it."

"May I keep working?"

"Yes, you may."

anyway as long as i've revived this, s: ivan the terrible (part one), boris godunov (first amongst usurpers), peter the great (great), anna (sadistic ice palace), alexander i (1812 + weird christian-mystic phase in later life), alexander ii (emancipation + might have drafted a constitution if he hadn't been blown up), kirov (jfk), stalin (fascinating), khrushchev (hilarious), yeltsin (drunken gangster)

d: catherine the great ("liberalism"/"modernization" as meaningless fashion), nick 1 (militant asshole), alex 3 (ditto), nick 2 (incompetent), trotsky (snot), brezhnev (who cares), yeltsin (drunken gangster)

lenin: lenin

(on the other hand alex 3 can probably be excused his militant assholism because terrorists did blow up his dad)

kruschev needs a tv show

Are Russian leaders all either rubbish or authoritarian maniacs, or both?

Though I am a sneaking regarder of Khruschev.

the real authoritarian maniacs are the most successful, too. the key to all that exaltation of stalin in the 30s probably isn't in the conformist nature of man or the propaganda talent of the soviet state; it's in how russians feel about peter.

anyway, alex 2 has a lot going for him, even though he dies an autocrat just like all the others, and a cynic would point out that though he emancipated the serfs he also put them in lifelong debt to the owners of the land they lived on, which means that for a lot of them it was a pretty technical emancipation. there is also a spasm of potential light in the mid-20s, before lenin dies, the New Economic Policy is undone, and stalin starts herding the peasants into the collective farms. and don't forget gorby! which i apparently did, right up there! he would have gone under S even though he arguably had no idea what he was doing and in '90-'91 got totally outmaneuvered by yeltsin in true though obv less extreme trotsky vs. stalin style. he just seems like a nice guy is all.

(ha -- like all the others except nicholas ii, i should say.)

hard to believe there haven't been any bio-type films about Soviet premiers and Kremlin machinations (any in Russia?), but hell, they were always so drab and stolid... George Clooney IS Leonid Brezhnev.

Wasn't there an incident in The Final Days where Brezhnev spontaneously drove a car with Nixon in it like a maniac, scaring the shit outta Dick?

ah:

http://www.historykb.com/Uwe/Forum.aspx/what-if/18415/Brezhnev-kills-himself-and-Nixon-unintentionally-of-course

there was a tv movie called STALIN starring, wait for it, robert duvall, but it kind of sucked, which is too bad because a good stalin movie would make there will be blood look like mamma mia.

as for kremlin machinations though there is eisenstein's ivan the terrible! which i have never finished.

and as for khrushchev, i like khrushchev too! he is pretty much the poster boy for Imperfect Humanity: he runs soviet agriculture into the ground (again), loses on his cuban bluff, presides over the disappearance of any potential for parity with the west (not that i know what he should have done), and makes russia look silly on tv; but de-stalinization really was a big deal. and if he never could quite acknowledge just how completely he (and every other politburo member who survived the 30s) was submerged in blood, well, who knows who could and lead, or live.

Woah! at that Nixon/Kruschev story.

khrushchev by the way also totally ninjaed the throne out from under lavrenti beria, which blew everybody's mind (including, not to be crass, beria's) and which he is to be thanked for because lavrenti beria was a more thorough psychopath than stalin.

the robert duvall movie has one of those scenes where the 8-ish-year-old svetlana stalin is playing in a garden and suddenly runs up against a pair of neat shoes and looks up apprehensively and we cut to an ominous low-angle shot of lavrenti beria smiling down at her and it is a total cliche but if ever it were deserved

Only one person mentioned Gorbachev!

according to wikipedia: "According to a major Russian pollster, the only eras of the 20th century that Russians evaluate positively are those under Nicholas II, and under Khrushchev.[268] A poll of young Russians found that they felt Nicholas II had done more good than harm, and all other 20th century Russian leaders more harm than good—except Khrushchev, about whom they were evenly divided."

khrushchev by the way also totally ninjaed the throne out from under lavrenti beria, which blew everybody's mind (including, not to be crass, beria's) and which he is to be thanked for because lavrenti beria was a more thorough psychopath than stalin.

I would have to agree that Beria was a very bad man... but in his defence, I would say that he had a flexible and pragmatic side. One reason why Khrushchev was able to get Politburo buy-in to Beria's elimination was that Beria was acting in a frighteningly liberal manner - shutting down the Gulag, proposing to replace the hardline DDR leader with someone a bit more accomodating, etc.

definitely! but his pragmatic side is actually his only side -- the reason he's willing to concede in germany (in exchange for american aid) and khrushchev isn't is because khrushchev still believes in socialism and its redemption from stalinism and beria doesn't believe in anything except the GAME OF THRONES. but you're right: he might well have run things better than k, whose frothing impetuosity pervaded the state almost as much as had stalin's paranoia (and he probably would have de-stalinized, though maybe just to beriaize). but he would still have been an nkvd tsar -- a tsar who came through the Organs -- and the whole thing just would have been really creepy. plus there would probably have been a lot of teenage girls raped in his office.

i saw this movie about stalin's projectionist called 'the inner circle' in HS, i remember it being decent.

the most genuinely admirable russian leader was prince georgy l'vov, who led the provisional government for like two months after the february revolution in 1917. lenin himself said that russia was "the freest country in the world" for those few months.

the whole provisional government era is extremely confusing, which is prob why most ppl seem to just ignore it and act as if lenin and company overthrew the tsar.

Woah! at that Nixon/Kruschev story.

― Ismael Klata, Tuesday, June 7, 2011 5:31 PM (2 hours ago)

Why oh why did I write this when it was so obviously Brezhnev? Why oh why couldn't I at least have spelt 'Khrushchev' right?

the whole provisional government era is extremely confusing, which is prob why most ppl seem to just ignore it and act as if lenin and company overthrew the tsar.

i've been over the prov-govt period a couple times and yeah i can never keep it straight.

that nixon/brezhnev story refers to "the lincoln's powerful engine". shades of kinbote.

I've been listening to bbc radio series The Wild East the past couple of weeks. Anyone else hear it? It was a real pleasure, such a fascinating and disastrous country.

It should be so easy to find a rotund Eastern European actor (a Wadja film relic, say) to play Brezhnev.

Top thread this..what're good books on 20th century Russia for someone with pretty much zero grounding in the topic?

i was stupid about catherine itt i think