SONG ABOUT THE KOMSOmol GODDESS
I look at the photo card:
two braids, a stern look,
and a boy's jacket,
and friends are standing around.

Outside the window the rain is still falling:
there's bad weather in the yard.
But usually the fingers are thin
touched the holster.

Soon she will leave the house,
Soon there will be thunder all around,
but the Komsomol goddess...
Ah, this, brothers, is about something else!

And there are no gods in sight,
as soon as things thunder all around,
but the Komsomol goddess...
Ah, this, brothers, is about something else!

B. Okudzhava, 1958

Time passes, you grow up and begin to analyze, and not just sing songs with a guitar, dry wine and barbecue.
From the age of 13, she sang about the “Komsomol goddess” and other “commissars,” and Okudzhava himself was something of a god of the Soviet intelligentsia.
Wherever you come to a gathering, an hour later people with glassy eyes begin to say: “I’ll bury the grape seed in the ground…” - and everyone looked at each other meaningfully. Like we are not some kind of worker-peasants here, but a hardworking intelligentsia terribly oppressed by the government.
There is a brilliant film based on Okudzhava's story - "Zhenya, Zhenechka and Katyusha."
There are several good poems.

But these are “... habitually thin fingers touched the holster,” “commissars in dusty helmets,” who also loved to touch holsters, and how...
Still, time is a great thing. Okudzhava has diamonds, of course, but under a layer of thick ash that covers them.
No, I can’t love him the way I used to, I don’t want to sing about the “commissars” and “Komsomol goddesses” of the 20-30s of the last century. What they did - God will judge them.
But in addition to everything, Yu. Rost laid out “from memory” such statements by Okudzhava, which are simply (if they are absolutely true) difficult to believe. Yu. Rost gave Okudzhava such a big, fat pig for his birthday with his “memories” that only the kindest, most faithful “friend” could give him.
Below is a striking text from Novaya Gazeta.

Okudzhava: “But mostly it was horror and destruction of souls. There were people who remembered the camp with pleasure. One woman sat with my mother. And then, when the convicts met, they talked about the past, about the nightmares of the camp, she happily recalled: “And Do you remember how we lived together in harmony, how I poured soup for you? That was the time!”

My comment: the man SURVIVED thanks to friendship, mutual assistance, and he does not “happily remember” the CAMP - but how everything is turned inside out! A. Sinyavsky wrote “Walking with Pushkin” in the camp, by the way.

Okudzhava: “I wanted to say something else. When I first went to the front, a passion raged in me to protect, to participate, to be useful. It was the youthful romanticism of a person unburdened by worries and family. I don’t remember ordinary people going to the front joyfully. Strangely enough, intellectuals volunteered, but we are bashfully keeping silent about this until now. And so the war was an absolutely strict duty. Moreover, the workers, as a rule, were protected by all sorts of letters, because it was necessary to make shells. But the peasants torn off the ground.
The apparatus of suppression functioned exactly the same as before, only under extreme conditions - more harshly, more openly."

My comment: nonsense. The workers didn't fight? There was a general mobilization, as is known. Only a narrow-minded person can call this a “suppression apparatus.” "Suppression apparatus"? - so these were your own “commissars” and “goddesses”, later sung in songs.

Okudzhava: “I remember a military man wrote one material: war can be glorified either by a stupid person, or if it is a writer, then only by the one who makes it the subject of speculation. And that’s why I can’t read all these stories and novels by our military writers, I understand, that they are unreliable. Miscalculations, defeats - all this is kept silent. And now especially. The past 60 years have generally turned into a lie. There is a poetry evening in the Tchaikovsky hall. I go out, read poems against Stalin, against the war, and the whole hall applauds (that’s me, to for example, I say). Then Andrei Dementyev comes out and reads poetry about how gloriously we fought, how we beat the Germans, so let them know their place, let them remember who they are, and the audience applauds again."

My comment: L. Tolstoy “sang” the war? Or not? Or yes?
And the audience are idiots, of course. The people are a bunch of idiots, obviously incapable of understanding what war is without instructions and generally lacking brains.
What follows is absolutely masterpiece:

Okudzhava: “Few people think that the Germans themselves helped the Soviet Union to defeat themselves: imagine if they did not shoot, but gathered collective farmers and told them: we came to free you from the yoke. Choose the form of government you want collective farm - please, collective farm. If you want individual farming - please. If they turned our slogans into action, they could win the war.

But our systems are similar. They did exactly what we would do. Our country just turned out to be more powerful, darker and more patient."

Yuri Rost

The last two paragraphs... I don't know what words to use here. Strange, to say the least.

Hope I'll be back then
when the trumpeter plays lights out.
When the pipe is brought closer to the lips
Hope I'll stay safe
The earth is not damp for me.
And for me your worries,
and good peace to your worries.

But if a whole century passes and you get tired of hoping,
Hope, if death opens its wings over me,
You give the order, then let the wounded trumpeter stand up,
So that the last grenade couldn't finish me off.

But if suddenly, someday, I fail to protect myself,
Whatever new battle would shake the globe,
I will still fall on that one, on that one civilian,
And the commissars in dusty helmets will bow silently over me.
other chords of Okudzhava Bulat

Translation of the lyrics by O. Mityaev - B. Okudzhava. Sentimental March (Hope I'll be back then)

Hope, I"ll be back then
when trumpeter will play lights out.
When the pipe to the lips will bring
Hope, I will remain whole,
not for me the land of raw.
But for me your worries,
good world and your worries.

But if a century will pass, and you hope you get tired,
Hope, if you need me death will open its wing,
You order, then let the wounded trumpeter will just stand up,
To the last grenade to finish me off failed.

But if suddenly, one day, I to protect themselves will fail
Whatever the new battle was not pocacola b earth,
I will still fall on that, on the one Gradskoj,
And the Commissars in dusty helmets will bend silently over me.
other chords Okudzhava Bulat

“And commissars in dusty helmets...”

Alexander Rifeev
The title uses a line from a very famous song by Bulat Okudzhava. I am on the main avenue named after the leader of the world proletariat in a very large old Ural city. The wide avenue in the center of the passage is divided by a long public garden made of trees and ornamental shrubs; there are benches along the public garden; the public garden itself is fenced with cast-iron bars. Behind the lattice fence on both sides of the park there are tram tracks. Between the tracks and sidewalks there is a road surface. There is also a tram stop on the sidewalk. In the public garden, on a pedestal made of wild stone, facing the main city square “1905” there is a monument. The figure on the pedestal leaned forward in a revolutionary impulse, as if she were speaking at a large and crowded meeting. On the stone: “To Yakov Mikhailovich Sverdlov – the Ural proletariat.” (The city then bore his name - “Sverdlovsk”. Now the city has been returned to its old, no less glorious and famous name - “Ekaterinburg”.) Still, I wonder what kind of knights and leaders of the great Russian revolution you really were?
There is one very important episode in the turbulent Soviet history. This is a villainous attempt by the enemies of the proletarian revolution on the political leader of the Bolshevik-internationalists V.I. Lenin. It was after him that the so-called "Red Terror".
Chronicle from newspapers of that time:
“Yesterday, August 30 (1918) at about 9 o’clock in the evening, an attempt was made on Comrade V.I. Lenin, who was giving a speech at the Mikhelson plant. When leaving the meeting, V.I. Lenin was stopped by two women who started a conversation with him about the latest decree of the Moscow Council on the free transportation of one and a half pounds of bread.
At this time, when they detained V.I. Lenin, shots were fired, with which the chairman of the Council of People's Commissars was wounded in the arm and back. The intelligent girl who shot was detained. Comrade V.I. Lenin was transported to the Kremlin. According to doctors, the injury is not cause for concern.”
Official bulletin.
“Two blind gunshot wounds were confirmed; one bullet, entering above the left shoulder blade, penetrated the chest cavity, damaged the upper lobe of the lung, caused hemorrhage into the pleura and lodged in the right side of the neck above the right collarbone. Another bullet penetrated the left shoulder, shattered the bone and got stuck under the skin of the left shoulder area, there are signs of internal bleeding. Pulse 104. The patient is fully conscious. The best surgeons are involved in the treatment.”
“Not fear and embarrassment, but hatred and revenge...”; “...Beware, gentlemen, white Socialist Revolutionaries and white Mensheviks! Beware, gentlemen officers and saboteurs!”; “Beware, gentlemen, bourgeois, Russian and “allied”, paying money to hired killers!”; “Do you want war, a merciless war - at the front and in the rear, on the streets and in houses? The working class rises to the challenge. He also has means against your leaders. We have enough of your hostages”; “In war it’s like in war. The working class will respond to your vile, petty, individual terror with massive, merciless class terror, the likes of which you have never dreamed of. Workers! The time has come when either you must destroy the bourgeoisie, or it will destroy you..." (Pravda, August 31, 1918)
First information.
“The radiogram from the Chairman of the Central Executive Committee Ya.M. Sverdlov, sent out from Moscow on August 30 at 10:40 pm “to everyone, everyone, everyone,” reports: “On Friday, August 30, V.I. Lenin, who spoke all the time at the workers rallies, spoke to workers of the Mekhelson plant in the Zamoskvoretsky district of Moscow. While leaving the meeting, V.I. Lenin was wounded. Two shooters have been detained." In the same first radiogram, Ya.M. Sverdlov states: “The working class will respond to the assassination attempt directed against its leaders by even greater consolidation of its forces, will respond with merciless mass terror against the enemies of the revolution.”
Simultaneously with Ya.M. Sverdlov, another radio telegram was sent out from the Moscow Council of Workers and Red Army Deputies, signed by Chairman L. Kamenev. The latter also calls for “the iron hand of the insurgent proletariat to fall on the years of dying capitalism.” Kamenev further states: “We will be merciless. We will sweep away all obstacles from our path.” (“Kiev Thought”, September 1, 1918) Source: V.I. Kurbatov “Attempts on the Leaders” pp. 29-32

So, on August 30, 1918, in Moscow at the Mikhelson plant, V.I. Lenin was seriously wounded by two shots. He was shot by Fanny Kaplan, associated with the Socialist Revolutionary Party. On the same day, in Petrograd, Leonid Kannegiser killed the chairman of the Petrograd Cheka, M.S. Uritsky. Although Kaplan and Kanegiser acted alone, these attempts on the lives of V.I. Lenin and M.S. Uritsky were declared the result of a counter-revolutionary conspiracy and served as a reason to launch the so-called. “Red Terror” with mass executions of hostages.
Reference. Fanny Efimovna Kaplan was born in 1890 in the Volyn province in Ukraine. Her father was a teacher at a Jewish religious elementary school. Fani had three sisters and three brothers. Her real name and surname are Feiga Khaimovna Roydman. She lived under this name until she was 16 years old.
During the 1905 revolution, Fanny Kaplan joined the anarchists. In revolutionary circles she was known under the pseudonym "Dora". In 1906, on December 22, she was arrested in Kyiv in the case of organizing a terrorist bomb explosion. During the bomb explosion, Kaplan herself was slightly injured and partially lost her sight. No one else was injured in the explosion (the explosion occurred in a hotel room). Kaplan's accomplice, Yakov Shmidman, managed to escape. On December 30, 1906, the military court in Kyiv sentenced her to death, which, due to F. Kaplan’s minority, was replaced by eternal hard labor.
At first, F. Kaplan was imprisoned in the Maltsevsk convict prison, then in the Akatuy convict prison of the Nerchinsk mountain district (Transbaikalia). There F. Kaplan met Maria Spiridonova, a famous figure in the Russian revolutionary movement. Under the influence of Spiridonova, Kaplan from an anarchist became a Socialist Revolutionary (socialist revolutionary). In 1913, according to the amnesty announced for the 300th anniversary of the Romanov dynasty, F. Kaplan’s stay in hard labor was reduced to 20 years.
F. Kaplan was in hard labor until the February Revolution of 1917. After her release, she lived for some time in Chita. In April 1917 she arrived in Moscow. In the summer of 1917, she was in a sanatorium for former political prisoners in the city of Yevpatoria in Crimea. The October Revolution found F. Kaplan in Kharkov, where she underwent eye surgery (Fanny Kaplan periodically suffered attacks of blindness during hard labor). From Kharkov F. Kaplan moved to Simferopol, where she worked on training courses for volost zemstvo workers.
F. Kaplan with an umbrella and briefcase in his hands was arrested immediately after V.I. Lenin was wounded. Witnesses to the assassination attempt did not see F. Kaplan shooting at Lenin, nor did they see her being next to Lenin. F. Kaplan was found to have a Browning car in her briefcase. During interrogation, F. Kaplan admitted to the attempt on Lenin's life. F. Kaplan was shot on September 3, 1918 in the Kremlin by commandant N. Malkov. The body, according to N. Malkov, was burned and buried in the Alexander Garden.
Now let’s look at the specific circumstances of the case, as they are set out according to V.I. Kurbatov, “Attempts on Leaders,” pp. 32-71. My comments are in italics.
1. The results of shooting from a distance of two to three meters are very mediocre, which is not surprising - F. Kaplan had poor vision and had no experience in shooting with a pistol or revolver (provided that it was really she who shot at Lenin, if we take it as a condition that everyone shot If it’s not Kaplan, then such shooting results can only be regarded as evidence that the assassination attempt was staged).
2. There were three or four shots in total (all witnesses to the assassination heard three shots, after which four cartridges were found at the scene of the assassination).
3. In addition to Lenin, the woman who was talking to him, M.G. Popova, was also slightly wounded. It can be concluded that a small-caliber weapon with a low-power cartridge was used. The book does not say anything about this, it is possible that it was a revolver or a Browning pistol of 6.35 mm caliber.
4. “Browning” No. 150489 was picked up by worker A.V. Kuznetsov near the car and on September 2, 1918 it was handed over (in response to a note in the newspaper about a request to hand over a revolver that was not found at the scene of the assassination attempt) to the investigator leading the case of the assassination attempt. .
5. The execution of F. Kaplan before the end of the investigation proves that either the investigation knew for certain that there was no conspiracy and that the shooter was a lone shooter (I wonder, for what reason, on the 4th day of the investigation one could already be sure of this?), or by the execution of F. .Kaplan cut off her ties with the actual organizers of the assassination attempt (in this case, those interested in hiding traces had to be surrounded by Lenin).
6. The case of the assassination attempt on V.I. Lenin was handled by: Chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee Ya.M. Sverdlov, People's Commissar of Justice D.N. Kursky, member of the board of the same People's Commissariat M.Yu. Kozlovsky, Secretary of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee V.A. Avanesov, member of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and member of the Cheka board V.E. Kingisepp, deputy. Chairman of the Cheka Y.H. Peters, head. dept. Cheka N.A. Skrypnik.
7. Over the course of 4 days and nights (August 30, 31 and September 1, 2), more than 40 witnesses to the assassination attempt were questioned. Fifteen people were involved in the investigation of F. Kaplan. After the execution of F. Kaplan and the end of the investigation, they were all released.
8. In the case of F.E. Kaplan No. N-200, 124 sheets are stitched and numbered. Sheets 52, 76, 102 are repeated twice. Sheets 1, 78 - once each. Case sheets 11, 84, 87, 94 are missing.
9. F. Kaplan was the first to interrogate D.N. Kursky, she refused to answer his questions. The interrogation protocols drawn up by Y.H. Perers and N.A. Skrypnik on August 31, 1918, were signed by the arrested person “F. Kaplan”. On August 31, V.E. Kingisepp joined the interrogations. F. Kaplan gave answers about her past life, but still refused to answer questions about her accomplices in the assassination attempt.
10. The main witness of the assassination attempt, Lenin’s driver Stepan Gil, gave the following testimony: “he saw the shooter” only “after the shots.” Then he remembered “a woman’s hand with a Browning,” from which “three shots were fired. The woman who was shooting threw a revolver at my feet and disappeared into the crowd. This revolver lay at my feet. No one raised this revolver in my presence.” He would later say that he “kicked him under the car.” Neither a revolver under the car nor a Browning gun was found at the scene of the assassination attempt. (Why is there such confusion with weapons, either a Browning revolver or a Browning pistol; was it really impossible to distinguish a revolver from a pistol?)
By the way, in addition to the above: any revolver can fire cartridges with an arbitrarily weakened powder charge; because the mechanism of the revolver operates only from the muscular strength of the shooter and there will be no delays during shooting, so a revolver is an ideal weapon for staging an assassination attempt on Lenin, but firing a pistol with cartridges with a weakened powder charge will lead to a failure of the automatic mechanism and the pistol will have to be fired before each shot recharge manually.
11. The behavior (according to the memoirs of Y. Peters) in these days of the second person after Lenin - Y. M. Sverdlov is as follows. On the evening of August 31, Sverdlov told Peters that in the morning he needed to give an official message in Izvestia of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. Write briefly, he advised, the right-wing Socialist-Revolutionary who shot, her connection has been established with the Samara organization that was preparing the assassination attempt, she belongs to a group of conspirators. These “conspirators” will have to be released - there is nothing against them, Peters said. This lady does not yet smell of any connections with any organization, but the fact that she is a right-wing Socialist Revolutionary, I said. And in general, amateurs like us need to be imprisoned ourselves.
Sverdlov did not answer. On September 2, Sverdlov convenes the Presidium of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and summons Peters. Peters says new data is emerging, an investigative experiment and a fingerprint examination will be carried out. Sverdlov agrees - the investigation must be continued. However, Kaplan will have to decide today. “Is there a confession in the case? Eat. Comrades, I make a proposal - to shoot citizen Kaplan for the crime she committed” (Ya.M. Sverdlov).
“Yesterday, by order of the Cheka, the right-wing Socialist Revolutionary Fanny Royd (aka Kaplan) who shot comrade V.I. Lenin was shot.” "Izvestia of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee", September 4, 1918
There is a clear interest of Ya.M. Sverdlov in the immediate death of F. Kaplan. Already on the second day, even before the end of the investigation, he accused his former comrades in the proletarian revolution of the assassination attempt. Why such a rush?
12. Despite the assertions that the life of the leader of the revolution hangs by a thread, it is reliably known: 1. After being wounded, V.I. Lenin climbed the steep stairs on his own to the third floor (S. Gil). 2. Doctor A.P. Vinokurov, who arrived first, found V.I. Lenin undressing by the bed. 3. When V.I. Lenin was bandaged on his left arm, he did not utter a single groan. This amazed everyone then. (“Izvestia All-Russian Central Executive Committee”). 4. On September 3, 1918, Vladimir Ilyich got out of bed and walked out without outside help. Why the paramedic on duty was punished (ibid.).
It is known that on September 2, 1918, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee made a decision, and on September 5, the Council of People's Commissars adopted a resolution on the “Red Terror.” Therefore, only on September 5, press reports appeared that V.I. Lenin’s life was out of danger.
On the same day, Dr. Obukh gave an interview to the Pravda newspaper. Since there were no press reports about the operation, the correspondent asked: “What about the bullets? What about the operation? In response, Dr. Obukh said literally the following: “Well, well, at least now you can take them out - they lie on the very surface. In any case, removing them does not pose any danger, and Ilyich will be completely healthy in a few days.” If the bullets were under the skin on the surface of the body, then why did no one try to remove them for a whole week?
Based on this, some researchers of the history of the assassination attempt, for example, in the version of the assassination attempt published by O. Vasilyev in Nezavisimaya Gazeta on August 29, 1992, argued that there were no bullets at all, since Kaplan fired blank cartridges! (But what then to do with M.G. Popova’s injury?)
Other researchers of the history of the attempt on the life of the leader claimed that Lenin was shot by his own people and the organizer of the attempt was called none other than Ya.M. Sverdlov himself! (Emperor Nicholas II and his family with those accompanying them, on the instructions of the same Ya.M. Sverdlov, were very successfully killed on July 17, 1918 in Yekaterinburg, but here for some reason they went wrong?)
And the eternal question remains: who is to blame and who benefited from this?
So what was it, a fatal tragedy or a staged comedy with an assassination attempt, which allowed the Bolshevik internationalists to begin the “Red Terror” in the country, in fact the Jewish nationalist terror? And another question, what is the price?
Thus, exclusively freedom-loving and democratic Jewish Israelis valued the freedom of their two soldiers in July-August 2006 at more than one and a half thousand lives of Lebanese Arabs and at more than 160 lives of their own Israelis. But the Bolshevik-Leninists valued the leader’s bullet-ridden suit at the cost of thousands and thousands of lives of victims of the “Red Terror” in Russia.
Which one do you think is more principled?
But it would be dishonest not to mention other, also principled Jewish commissars. In recent years, the so-called Gorbachev's perestroika, Jewish liberal-democratic propagandists, as newly discovered truth, reported various long-known “fried” facts from the times of Lenin, Stalin and Khrushchev. In the then ranking of the main villains of Russian history, the first three places firmly belonged to Lenin, Stalin and Beria. Along with them, the name of another villain was mentioned. He was of a lower rank, but also did not leave our perestroika indifferent. His name is Mehlis Lev Zakharovich, in Stalin's times the head of the Main Political Directorate of the Army and the Minister of State Control. There was a legend told about him, which over time became an anecdote. Here she is.
Mehlis makes a report to Stalin after the war. One of the points: the general (name, surname), famous during the war, left his wife, started a “relationship” with an artist from the Moscow theater, then left her too. Now the general has a new romance with a nurse from the medical unit. Having reported, Mehlis asks: “What are we going to do with the general, Comrade Stalin?” An oppressive silence reigns. Stalin is silent, Mehlis awaits the will of the leader. Without waiting, Mehlis continues further. When the list of points ended, Mehlis again: “Joseph Vissarionovich, so what are we going to do? This is what the general does to his women!” Stalin: “What, what. We'll be jealous!" The listeners concluded that Mehlis was “a big scoundrel.” Not so long ago, Yu. Rubtsov’s book “Stalin’s Alter Ego” appeared at bookstores. This is about Mehlis. I took the book in my hands. Scrolled through. Yu. Rubtsov assesses Mehlis extremely negatively. I put it back. I knew before that Mehlis was bad, and the fact that he is “very bad” is no longer interesting to me at all. Oh, if only I had more sense in my head!
A little information from the Military Encyclopedia. “MEHLIS Lev Zakharovich (1889-1953), Soviet military leader, political worker of the Red Army, Colonel General (1944). In military service in the Russian army since 1911, in the Red Army 1918-1922, 1938-1946. Graduated from the Institute of Red Professorship (1930). Until 1938 he worked in the apparatus of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. In 1938-42, he became deputy with the rank of army commissar of the 1st rank. People's Commissar of Defense of the USSR and headed the highest political bodies of the Red Army (Political Department of the Red Army, from 1940 - Main Directorate of Political Propaganda, from 1941 - Main Political Directorate of the Red Army). Since 1940, People's Commissar of State Control. In 1942-1945, member of the Military Council of the 6th Army, Voronezh, Volkhov, Bryansk, Steppe, 2nd Baltic, Western, 2nd Belorussian and 4th Ukrainian fronts. He was not relieved of his post as People's Commissar of State Control in 1946-1950. continued to serve as Minister of State Control.” A completely normal certificate, there is nothing compromising. But the Military Encyclopedia is not so indifferent to some other famous historical figures.
Here, for example, is a certificate for the villain of all times Lavrentiy Beria:
“BERIA Lavrenty Pavlovich (1899–1953), Soviet statesman and military leader, Marshal of the Soviet Union (1945), Hero of Social. Labor (1943). Graduated from technical school (1919). Since 1921 in state security agencies. In 1938–45 People's Commissar, in 1953 Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR, from 1941 Deputy Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars (from 1946 of the Council of Ministers of the USSR). During the Great Patriotic War, member of the State Defense Committee (GKO), since 1944 deputy. Chairman of the State Defense Committee. He was part of I.V.’s closest political circle. Stalin. One of the most active organizers of mass repressions of the 30s and early 50s, he was arrested in June 1953 and stripped of all titles and awards; on charges of conspiracy to seize power, sentenced to death by the Special Judicial Presence of the Supreme Court of the USSR and executed.” Or another certificate for an equally interesting person.
“FRINOVSKY Mikhail Petrovich (1898-1940), Soviet statesman and military leader, army commander 1st rank (1938). In military service since 1916, in the Red Army since 1918. Graduated from the Higher Academic Courses at the Military Academy. M.V. Frunze (1927). Civil War participant: squadron commander. Since 1919, in various positions in state security agencies. Since 1933, head of the Main Directorate of Border Guards and OGPU Troops, in 1934-37, head of the Main Directorate of Border and Internal Troops of the NKVD, since 1937, 1st Deputy People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR and head of the Main Directorate of State Security. In 1938-39, People's Commissar of the Navy. Arrested in 1939, convicted in 1940, and executed.”
Let's take a closer look at Beria and Frinovsky in Chapter. 5. “The fight of Anticivilization with Russia” in paragraph 3.5.2. “No, guys, everything is wrong, everything is wrong, guys ...”, but for now let’s return to Mehlis. So, thanks to his lack of curiosity and liberal-democratic propagandists, Mehlis became, as in the criminal song, “not at all interesting” to me.
And in the spring of 2006, the TV Center channel broadcast a program dedicated to the Great Patriotic War. The next episode is on the show. In 1941, Mehlis, visiting the front line at the front, noticed that often the dead Red Army soldiers were not buried for several days, information about the dead was not collected, and data on the dead were not kept records. After Mehlis’ report to the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, i.e. Stalin, special funeral teams were created in the army and records of data on dead soldiers were established. And this is already very interesting! It turns out that our generals, making a career and glory for themselves on the blood of soldiers, did not care at all about the dead soldiers, and only the intervention of Mehlis, as the chief commissar of the Red Army, saved thousands of dead from obscurity. It turns out that “bad” Mehlis is morally better than many of our generals, all together and each individual?
And already in the summer of 2006, Yu. Mukhin’s book “If it weren’t for the generals!” appeared on sale. Chapter 6 “Commissars” of this book examines the fate and life of Mehlis on the basis of data from “Alter Ego of Stalin” by Yu. Rubtsov, which I so stupidly once let go of. I offer you an abbreviated text of the chapter, without moral assessments and emotions, in the dispassionate style of the Military Encyclopedia.
Mehlis L.Z. born in Odessa in 1889. He graduated from 6 classes of Jewish school. He worked as a clerk. In 1907 he joined the Zionist party “Paolei Zion” (“Workers of Zion”). Soon he came out of it. In 1911 he was drafted into the tsarist army into the 2nd Grenadier Artillery Brigade. A year later he became a scorer. Later he served in a non-commissioned officer position - as a platoon fireworksman. He served in the old army until January 1918. After demobilization he joined the Bolshevik Party. In 1919 he was sent as a commissar to the active army. At first he was the commissar of the reserve brigade in Yekaterinoslav. On May 10, 1919, the city was captured by the troops of Ataman Grigoriev. Mehlis with two dozen Red Army soldiers makes his way out of the city. He meets reinforcements going to Yekaterinoslav, and with them he fights with the Grigorievites for two days until they are knocked out of Yekaterinoslav.
Then he is appointed commissar of the 2nd International Regiment in the 14th Army. The regiment distinguished itself in battles with Denikin's troops. Then Mehlis is appointed commissar to the 46th division. The division had the reputation of being a partisan, and there “it was risky to call oneself a communist.” “The heaviness of the hand of the new commissar in the division was immediately felt. First of all, the political department, special department and revolutionary tribunal were strengthened, commanders and political workers about whom doubts arose were removed from their posts. Instead, he appointed “verified” people. In relation to “traitors, selfish people and cowards” he acted harshly...” The command at this time valued Mehlis more not as a political commissar, but as someone who knew military affairs. Soon the 46th Infantry Division became part of the 13th Army. The army was entrusted with the task of preventing the withdrawal of the 3rd Army Corps of the Volunteer Army, Major General Ya. A. Slashchev, from Northern Tavria to the Crimea. But it was not possible to intercept Slashchev’s corps. By January 24, 1920, only one 46th division reached the Perekop and Chongar isthmuses. At first, the Reds even took Perekop and Armyansk. But then they paid a very high price for it. Slashchev gathered all the reserves and, with heavy losses for the Reds, pushed the 46th division beyond the isthmus. In March, the 13th Army began to attack again and even broke through the defenses on the Perekop Isthmus, but was again driven back by Slashchev’s troops.
Having accumulated strength by spring, the Whites on April 14, 1920, south of Melitopol, in the area of ​​the village of Kirillovka, landed troops consisting of the Alekseevsky infantry regiment and the Kornilov artillery battery. The enemy sought to cut the railway along which the entire 13th Army was supplied. All this happened directly in the rear of the 46th division. The new division chief, Yu.V. Sablin, and military commissar L.Z. Mekhlis organized the destruction of the landing force. Mehlis, together with a detachment formed from parts of the Melitopol garrison, stopped the landing. And the 409th regiment arrived and defended the railway. The enemy along the coast from the Arbat Spit broke through to Genichesk and entered the rear of the 411th Regiment, the regiment began to retreat. Mehlis hastened to meet the retreating forces, stopped them and organized a counterattack. In this battle Mehlis was wounded. On April 18, 1920, the Revolutionary Military Council of the 13th Army nominated Sablin and Mehlis for awarding the Order of the Red Banner.
On July 22, 1920, the Revolutionary Military Council of the Southwestern Front appointed L.Z. Mekhlis as commissar of the Strike Group of Right Bank Ukraine. The group was tasked with crossing the Dnieper followed by an attack on Perekop. On the night of August 7, the group crossed the Dnieper and captured a bridgehead in the Kakhovka area. Five days later, the enemy forced the Right Bank group to retreat to Kakhovka. Here on the Kakhovsky bridgehead on September 7, 1920, the enemy, going on the offensive with the forces of the Kornilov infantry division, supported by artillery and tanks, tried to capture the Kakhovsky bridgehead. Mehlis also took part in repelling the enemy. “As an experienced artilleryman, he stood at one gun himself and ordered the battery to open rapid fire on the tanks.”
During the Civil War, L.Z. Mekhlis participated: in the battles to liberate the city of Yekaterinoslav from the Grigorievites; in the battles of the 2nd International Regiment with Denikin’s troops; turned the 46th division into a combat-ready formation; in the battles of January 1920 in Crimea; in the defeat of the Alekseevsky landing; in the battles to retain the Kakhovsky bridgehead. It should be noted that Mehlis had experience fighting with an exceptionally strong opponent. Lieutenant General Ya.A. Slashchev was considered one of the most successful and talented commanders of the White movement. In 1921, Slashchev returned from emigration to the USSR and until 1929 he taught tactics at the Higher Command Courses “Vystrel”.
After the end of the Civil War, Mehlis worked in the Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate (Rabkrin), in the apparatus of the Council of People's Commissars. In 1922, Stalin entrusted Mehlis with work in the apparatus of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks. From 1926 to 1929 inclusive, Mehlis studied at the Institute of the Red Professorship. Then he is sent as the executive editor to the Pravda newspaper, and soon he becomes the editor-in-chief of Pravda. In 1937, after the discovery of a conspiracy in the Red Army and the suicide of one of the leaders of the conspiracy, Ya.B. Gamarnik, the post of head of the Political Directorate of the Red Army became vacant. At the end of 1937, Mehlis was appointed to the post of head of the Political Directorate of the Red Army. During these years, the USSR fought two armed conflicts (Khasan and Khalkhin Gol) and the Soviet-Finnish war. At all these theaters of military operations, there was always the chief commissar of the Red Army, L.Z. Mekhlis. The following statements by our political figures about L.Z. Mekhlis are known. N.S. Khrushchev: “He was truly an honest man, but in some ways crazy.” J.V. Stalin about Mehlis: “I can’t do anything with him.” Stalin allegedly said this after Mehlis challenged the decision of I.V. Stalin himself to reinstate an employee who had previously been dismissed for violating labor discipline.
L.Z. Mekhlis did not have any political tact in relation to the so-called. God's chosen nation, which always creates a strong racist political organization in its host country with its worst representatives. When the army was counted after the pre-war purge, the following became clear: among the garbage swept out by Mehlis, the percentage of Jews turned out to be several times greater than their percentage in the army in general. After which the curious asked the question: what nationality is Mehlis himself? He replied that he was not a Jew by nationality, but a communist. And with this, of course, he greatly offended the racists from God’s chosen people. Therefore, L.Z. Mekhlis did not become a victim of Stalinism and a hero of democracy.
In August 1940, the institution of military commissars in the Red Army was abolished and Mehlis was appointed to the post of People's Commissar of the People's Commissariat of State Control. Mehlis became a scourge for the party and state nomenklatura. In the first half of 1941 alone, Mehlis organized over 400 audits, thoroughly disturbing and arousing the hatred of the highest bureaucracy. Hit: People's Commissar of Light Industry, People's Commissar of State Farms, People's Commissar of the Shipbuilding Industry, People's Commissar of the Oil Industry, People's Commissar of the Navy, People's Commissar of the Meat and Dairy Industry. Even the Prosecutor General (unheard of!) was injured. At the request of Mehlis, the Prosecutor General was forced to put some of his department heads on trial.
The day before the start of the Great Patriotic War, namely on June 21, 1941, L.Z. Mekhlis was again returned to the People's Commissariat of Defense and appointed head of the Main Political Directorate of the Red Army. Some examples of the activities of L.Z. Mekhlis during the Great Patriotic War. The episode with Mehlis organizing funeral teams has already been given above. And now how Mehlis cared for the living. Rubtsov’s book contains the memoirs of the head of the Main Directorate of Logistics of the Red Army, Army General A.V. Khrulev (a famous and glorious military name). Quote: “Having checked the situation in the 4th Army, Mehlis telegraphed on January 4 to the chief of rear of the Red Army, General Khrulev: “The situation with food fodder is intolerable. As of January 2, according to the logistics department, in army units and warehouses there was 0 meat, 0 vegetables, 0 canned food, 0 crackers. In some places, 200 grams of bread are given out. What is here—handlessness or conscious enemy work?” Further, “At one of the meetings with the participation of commanders and members of the military councils of the fronts, Stalin asked the question, does anyone have any complaints about material support? Everyone remained silent. Only Mehlis said that “the rear works very poorly and does not fully provide the troops with food.” Stalin immediately summoned Khrulev to a meeting and offered to explain himself.
The logistics chief dared to ask who was complaining and about what? “What do you think? – followed a counter question. Khrulev writes further: “I answer: “Most likely it’s Mehlis.” As soon as I uttered these words, there was an explosion of laughter in the office. It intensified even more when Mehlis outlined the essence of the complaints: “You always don’t give us bay leaves, vinegar, pepper, mustard.”
The fact is that the main food of a Russian soldier is flour products, as the most high-calorie ones, and meat. But these are fresh products, and without acid and spices they very quickly begin to be poorly absorbed by the body. In peacetime, a person obtains the required amount of acids from vegetables, especially pickled ones. In the Russian army, since the time of Peter the Great, this issue was resolved this way: the army was centrally supplied only with bread and cereals, about a kilogram of bread and 100 grams of cereal per person per day. For everything else, sums of money were issued and each company, hundred, squadron or battery ran its own household, purchasing vegetables, meat, other products and fodder for horses. In peacetime, they even started their own vegetable gardens. But already since 1846, soldiers were required to receive: 22 grams of salt, 1 gram of pepper and 62 grams of vinegar per day. For example, in the “Reference Book for Officers” printed in 1913, in the section “Food in Wartime” it was: “2. In addition to all this, corps commanders and equal in power may be allowed to preserve the health of people (per day and per day). converted to grams): vinegar – 62 grams; citric acid – 1 gram.” So it turns out that the political commissar Mehlis, as a former non-commissioned officer of the old Russian army, knew all these subtleties very well, but the chief of logistics of the Red Army, General Khrulev, who received money and orders for this, did not understand the essence of the issue, and did not want to understand . Yu. Rubtsov gives several more interesting facts.
Quote: “Such telegrams were followed by organizational conclusions. In particular, the chief of logistics of the neighboring North-Western Front, General N.A. Kuznetsov, was injured. Under pressure from Mehlis, he was sentenced to death, which, however, was later replaced by demotion to the rank and file.” Further, “On the Volkhov Front, for example, he stood up for the former regiment commander Kolesov, who was groundlessly brought to party responsibility. And at the request of the chief surgeon of the front, Professor A.A. Vishnevsky, he obtained an order for the major of the medical service Berkovsky, who was undeservedly bypassed with awards. On the Western Front, he actively contributed to the restoration of Lieutenant Colonel I.V. Shchukin to his previous position as deputy commander of the 91st Guards Rifle Division for logistics.”
The role of Mekhles in the history of the defeat of the Crimean Front in May 1942 is interesting. In several landing operations from December 25, 1941 to January 2, 1942, they captured a number of bridgeheads on the Kerch Peninsula and liberated Feodosia. Three armies were transferred to Crimea - the 44th, 47th, and 51st. But already on January 15, 1942, the Germans again captured Feodosia, and with much weaker forces. Stalin recalls Mehlis from the Volkhov Front and sends him to Crimea. Two days later, Mehlis reports to Stalin. “I arrived in Kerch on January 20, 1942...I found the most unsightly picture of troop control...Comfront Kozlov (Lieutenant General Dmitry Timofeevich Kozlov. Author's note) does not know the position of the units at the front, their condition, as well as the enemy grouping. For any division there is no data on the number of people, the presence of artillery and mortars. Kozlov leaves the impression of a commander who is confused and unsure of his actions. None of the leading workers of the front have been in the troops since the occupation of the Kerch Peninsula...” Then, on February 15, 1942, Mehlis was summoned to Stalin to report on the degree of readiness of the Crimean Front troops for the offensive. Stalin was dissatisfied with the report and allowed the timing of the offensive in Crimea to be postponed. Mehlis requested 271, 276 and 320 rifle divisions from the North Caucasus Military District to strengthen the front. In a conversation with the commander of the North Caucasus Military District, V.N. Kurdyumov, on February 16, he demanded that the divisions be cleared of “Caucasians” (Mehlis’s term) and replaced with military personnel of Russian nationality. Further notes from Mehlis about the troops of the Crimean Front: “By April 11, the 400th Rifle Division had nothing but rifles,” “12th Brigade. The tank speed is poor. They crawl like turtles." “Military reconnaissance is not working well,” “389 Infantry Division. There were no battle formations, they were moving in herds.” It can be understood that Mehlis was familiar with the real situation and knew the state of the troops of the Crimean Front up to and including the brigade level. The task of the Crimean Front was to advance against the 11th German Army of General Manstein, relieve the besieged Sevastopol and liberate Crimea. The offensive began on February 27, 1942. The Crimean Front, consisting of 13 divisions, acted against 3 German divisions of Manstein's 11th Army. Already on March 2, the offensive was stopped due to obvious failure. On March 9, 1942, Mehlis sent a proposal to Stalin to remove Kozlov. But only the chief of staff of the front, Major General Tolbukhin, was removed. Mehlis sent a new report on March 29, 1942 with a request to replace Kozlov. Stalin replied: “You demand that we replace Kozlov with someone like Hindenburg. But you cannot help but know that we do not have Hindenburgs in reserve.” (The full text of Stalin’s answer to Mehlis is given by A. Isaev in “The Offensive of Marshal Shaposhnikov. The history of the Second World War that we did not know.” pp. 274-275.) Mehlis proposed replacing Kozlov with K.K. Rokossovsky. Realizing that K.K. Rokossovsky would most likely not be given to him, he also suggested others: N.K. Klykov or V.N. Lvov. Stalin did not replace Kozlov, and that’s how it all ended.
The Germans launched their offensive on May 8, 1942. The balance of forces was as follows. The Crimean Front had a strength of 296 thousand people, 498 tanks, 4668 guns, 574 aircraft. The enemy had a strength of 150 thousand people, 180 tanks, 2470 guns, 400 aircraft. The Germans immediately pressed all three armies of the Crimean Front to the sea and already on May 19, 1942, completely captured the Kerch Peninsula. Our losses: 176 thousand people killed, captured, wounded, 3.5 thousand guns and mortars, 347 tanks, 400 aircraft, 10,400 vehicles and 860 artillery tractors lost. Including 1,133 guns, 258 tanks, and 323 aircraft were captured by the enemy. Enemy losses amounted to about 7,500 people. Already on May 13, the command of the Crimean Front began to move to Taman; by May 17, the entire front command had already left the Kerch Peninsula, leaving its troops there. On the night of May 20, 1942, Mehlis with the last groups of soldiers crossed the strait to the Taman Peninsula. After the defeat of the Crimean Front, Lieutenant General D.T. Kozlov was demoted and given command of the 24th Army. In October 1942 he became deputy. commander of the Voronezh Front. And in 1943 he was “pushed” to the Far East. Mehlis was punished more severely (apparently, Stalin could not forgive himself that Mehlis turned out to be more perspicacious than him, Stalin himself!, and removed Mehlis out of sight as a reproach for his personnel error, which led to the Kerch disaster). He was removed from the post of head of the Main Political Directorate of the Red Army and his rank was reduced by two steps from army commissar of the first rank to corps commissar. Subsequently, Mehlis was a member of the Military Council of the 6th Army and a number of fronts (see information), and ended the war on the 4th Ukrainian Front. The last rank is Colonel General.
After the war, L.Z. Mekhlis served as Minister of State Control of the USSR. And the thieves from the party-Soviet nomenclature lost peace for a long time. Here is the data from V. Sirotkin’s book “Who Stole Russia?” pp. 86-87. Quote: “And at the same time in the same year (1948), judging by the report of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, 28 thousand 810 employees of the Ministry of Trade and Consumer Cooperation were prosecuted for theft under the law of 1947 and imprisoned - 10 thousand. 225 people more than in 1947. Moreover, the cost of goods stolen from the state: from January to September 1948 alone, “state traders” stole goods and embezzled 169 million “new Stalinist” rubles - 28 million more than in 1947 ., and their “smaller brothers” - consumer cooperators - by 326 million, or 20.5 million more than in the previous year. ... In April - May 1948, the OBHSS of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs, together with party and Soviet bodies, carried out “control measurements” throughout the country of 81 thousand 700 shops, canteens, tents, stalls of the USSR Ministry of Trade system, as well as numerous ORS of large ministries and departments . And it was discovered: in 16 thousand 087 retail “points” they serve the buyer precisely according to the principle “if you don’t deceive, you won’t sell”... As a result, 4 thousand 929 people were sent to prison with confiscation of property under the law of 1947.” End of quote. And although Mehlis is not mentioned here, remembering his fight against thieves back in 1940-41, one can guess that Lev Zakharovich’s energy and integrity could not have happened here either. At the end of 1949, L.Z. Mekhlis suffered a stroke, followed by a heart attack. In the summer of 1952, L.Z. Mekhlis was sent for treatment to Crimea, where he died on February 13, 1953.
There were also Jewish commissars who, with their vile decisions (like Ya.M. Sverdlov and many others), did not carry out repressions of the Russian population, did not save themselves during the war in rear positions, did not bow to the enemy’s bullets, did not bend before the high authorities, greedy hands to the people's goods were not extended, and they fought for communism not only in words, but also in deeds. But this extremely rare breed of people among our dear Jews died out like mammoths back in the time of Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev. Alexander Rifeev

And here the calculation is very simple. I'll start with the "commissars". This means that the time period has been determined - 1918-1942. It was then that there were commissars. Previously, they did not exist; later they were turned (with the wave of a magic writing wand in the hands of I.V. Stalin) into political instructors.
For reference: “that only civilian” is also limited to the time frame of 1918-1921. Unless, of course, we consider the “liquidation of Basmachi in Central Asia” and other “White Suns of the Desert” to be a civil war.

I will add little by little. And here is a sketch of the 1918 uniform of Vasnetsov and Kustodiev. But the “cloth helmet” here is winter, with a cotton lining.

The same cap, but a summer one, simply made of cloth, without lining, was introduced in 1922 (the order was in January, it seems, so they put it on when switching to the summer uniform in the spring of 1922). And the civil war, in my opinion, had already ended at that time. They took Crimea and Vladivostok.

What could senior command personnel wear at that time? And they, I think, looking back at L.D. Trotsky, wore shiny leather jackets and leather caps.

This is probably the most complete description readily available.
“It should be noted that famous Russian artists took part in the development of a new form of clothing: V.M. Vasnetsov, B.M. Kustodiev, M.D. Ezuchevsky, S. Arkadyevsky and others. The adopted sample, apparently, was composed of two (or more) design headdresses proposed by various authors, and in appearance resembled the traditional protective helmets of the ancient Russian army. At the same time, it seemed to combine: the shape of the pointed helmet of warriors from the nobility with the properties of the “kuyak” felt helmet of ordinary warriors."
“On January 31, 22, by order of the RVSR No. 322, a new, strictly regulated form of clothing was introduced, in which the “revolutionary” style of headdress found a very noticeable place. So, following the example of the winter helmet, the summer headdress also acquired a pointed spherical-conical shape. A summer helmet for everyone branches of the military (photo...) was made of camping tent fabric or cotton fabric of light gray or a color close to it and did not have lapels on the back of the head. (In May 1924, this headdress was again replaced by a cap.)"
http://russfront.ru/news/budenovka

Budennovka 1927

So here it is. What other helmets could there be? Well, if only tropical English cork, with two visors? (See any caricature of an English planter).
Or a flight one, leather (at that time motorcyclists, who were called “scooters”) also had it. With canned glasses on your forehead? The commissar - the person confirming the competence of the orders of the unit commander on behalf of the RCP (b)?

The Germans loved those different leather helmets, yes.

That is, of course, the Russian army also had helmets. In full dress uniform of the Guards regiments. But for someone to appear at the front in them after 7-8 years of war...

Of course, our current generals at the front now walk around in caps, which any Pinochet would die of envy to see, but not in the shakos of the Kremlin regiment, in which the soldiers stand in St. George’s Hall while the President talks with overseas guests...