I was happy about Israel in 1947 and about the fact that we voted for it at the United Nations Organization. However, it turned out that this ‘voting’ had a background. Stalin wanted to strengthen his positions in this area. I know only but too well how he ‘loved’ Jews. He did not care about Jews, he just wanted to have a base there. He thought this state was going to work for him. But the fact that our state and army supported Arabs in the war against this state was very sad for me, particularly that Israel took every effort to protect itself. Of course, this dishonest and hypocritical policy of the Soviet Union could only raise anger in me. I knew that our tanks were involved there and that they did not fight for the right. I was ashamed. Why send tanks there? Why arm the enemies of Israel? Who benefited from it?
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Displaying 38401 - 38430 of 50826 results
Moisey Marianovskiy
I traveled to Israel in the early 1990s at the invitation of the veterans of the Great Patriotic War. The country struck and enamored me. An amazing garden created by loving people in the stone lifeless desert! It raises admiration. I’ve never considered moving there. My roots are here. I defended this land. My followers, friends, colleagues are here. My dear ones were buried here and this is where I’m bound to be. There was an incident at the airport. We were thoroughly searched at the airport. My companions went through the electronic detector, but when I stepped there it gave an alarm. The frontier men told me to put away everything metal. I emptied my pockets, but it did not help. The chief told me to go to an X-Ray room. I went there and took off my clothes. There were two doctors and an X-ray man in the room. When they X-rayed me, they were horrified. There were multiple splinters in my body. They let me go, shook hands with me and wished me good luck. On my way back there was the same shift. Their chief called them to attention and they saluted me.
I think that our country does not treat those who had marched the paths of the war with due care. They deserve more. They lived their life in terrible living conditions for decades. They were deprived of the very primary needs. They stood in lines and were abused and humiliated. And the Central Committee of the CPSU called this ‘modesty of a common Soviet person, veteran or invalid of the war.’ They made this formula. He cannot get an apartment and they tell him he is modest. How many of us are left?! What kind of attitude are we talking about now? Recently they increased our pension, but it was impossible to live on it! And it is the soldier who actually rescued the world from the Hitler’s plague. How should they have treated him? Germans and German veterans of the war live much better lives than those who won the victory! And the only reason is that our government has never thought about people. Never! All they care about is their career.
I received this apartment recently. The mayor of Moscow promised me to improve my living conditions and ordered his subordinates to find a better apartment for me. These officials kept leading me by my nose trying to make me agree to a new apartment in a new building in distant neighborhoods in Moscow. I’m an old and ill man and it would be difficult for me to commute that far away to do my public activities. It took a long time before they offered me this apartment in a quiet neighborhood in the very center of Moscow. Arkadiy Gaidar [26], a popular writer, lived here before the war and then his son Timur Gaidar lived. It was vacant before we moved in here. It looked quite abandoned and I felt like refusing it again, but my daughter thought different. We had to fix and refurbish this apartment which took a lot of money and effort, but I like it now. It’s spacious and my daughter made it very cozy. Everything would be well if it were not for my ailments. We are a close and loving family. I have everything I need. I receive a bigger pension being a veteran and invalid of the war, Hero of the Soviet Union.
The breakup of the USSR [1991] was sad for me. Like millions of other people who marched the roads of the war shedding our blood it hurt to know that we did this for the sake of the state that broke up Where was my consolation? I knew this would happen one way or another. It was built on the Stalin’s policy which was absurd in all respects. So, this feeling of being hurt was mixed with the sound feelings.
I was very negative about the perestroika. This had nothing to do with perestroika. There was a lot of chatting about it, but nobody, including Mikhail Gorbachev, knew what it was about. They went from one extreme to another until they came to a collapse instead of perestroika. These are different things. Our country has not matured for transition to capitalism. People need to be prepared. The majority of them have never heard about freedom of speech, press and entrepreneurship! How could a poor, badgered person understand this? They had to wait till the country matured enough for this transition. This was the only way to do it! We had nothing like this before. The country lived a bizarre life. From the scientific, technical and social standpoint the country was one of the last ones in the world. Our state focused on nuclear missiles and deference. It needs to be said that the people were working hard for it living in poverty and being paid 12 kopeck of each earned ruble. Nobody respected this country. The world and every honest value turned away from us. They turned away from us seeing that we had nothing in common with the values that we declared.
Of course, I identify myself as Jew. My parents were Jewish and I was born into a Jewish family. I’ve never kept the fact of my Jewishness a secret. We did not celebrate these holidays, but this was the life we lived, all in this country were raised atheists. There were other things concerning us besides religion.
I happen to take an active part in the Jewish life in Russia. I have been at the head of Council of the Jewish War Veterans and invalids [Moscow Council of the Jewish War Veterans: It was founded in 1988 by the Moscow municipal Jewish community. The main purpose of the organization is mutual assistance as well as unification of front-line Jews, collection and publishing of recollections about the war, and arranging meetings with the public and youth.] for 12 years. I’ve actually been at its head since the date it was established. There were rumors that Jews had never been at the front during the Great Patriotic War staying in the rear spread in Russia. They used to say ‘fought in Tashkent’ [Editor’s note: Tashkent is a town in Middle Asia; it was the town where many people evacuated during the Great patriotic War, including many Jewish families. Many people had an idea that all Jewish population was in evacuation rather than at the front and anti-Semites spoke about it in mocking tones]. This was a widely spread and abusive rumor. I think these rumors were spread by our ‘glorious’ bodies: NKVD [27], KGB [28]. These were probably the first steps before of persecution of Jews in the late 1940s-early 1950s. I’ve always believed it was my duty to oppose those slanderers. It was not by hearsay that I knew about the war. Our Council was established to put an end to these rumors. After I retired I got involved in this life. I spoke out and suggested creating a Book of memory to list the names of all Jews who perished at the front during the Great Patriotic War. This was my initiative. I do believe this to be very significant and great thing to do. Ukraine and Byelorussia took up this idea and started publishing these books in their countries. They make use of our data and search for the names of their citizens who perished at the front during the Great Patriotic War. One cannot hold back tears reading the feedback from relatives in response to this book. This book is like a message from their children and fathers whom they had lost. I included the name of my brother Shimon Marianovskiy in the 2nd volume of this book. It’s very difficult to publish these books. Hard to find money to publish them. Besides, thousands and thousands of Jews have left the country. Some are in Australia, the others are in Canada or Israel. Where can we find them? And we need to find them all. They have documents with them, the death certificates. We need to include the names based on the archive documents. Our archives have no information about those who perished at the front during the Great Patriotic War. No such names. I’ve never dealt in the book publishing business. As I imagined, we would go to the archive and that will be it. Nothing of the kind! Firstly, our archives are just terrible. It’s humiliation of the dignity of the deceased. Meeting with the English or Americans I told them we have no book of memory. They could not believe it. ‘You mean, no book of memory?. I said ‘Right, we have no book of memory’. It’s hard to organize this. Now we’re finishing the 8th volume. There is a Grave of the Unknown Soldier in the center of Moscow, the symbol of the war and our victory. This is where the survivors of the war, members of the government and the visiting VIP’s come to honor the memory of those who paid their lives for the victory, but this is very wrong! The memory of each person who gave his or her life, the most valuable thing that they had, must be cherished in the hearts of citizens of the country they protected.
Grigoriy Kagan
My grandfather was a cabman and owned horses and wagons.
My father’s mother tongue was Yiddish. I think the only place my father’s brothers studied was cheder. My father studied in the cheder for two years, but he did not finish it. He could write a little and knew only one arithmetic action: addition. My father and his brothers were religious. When they were growing up, the community only acknowledged religious way of life, and different views were not appreciated.
In 1918 my father married Doba Braginskaya, a cheerful girl from the nearby Romanovka village. I don’t know how my parents met. Their marriage may have been prearranged that was quite common at their time. I think my parents had a traditional Jewish wedding.
My mother’s family spoke Yiddish. They also spoke Russian and Ukrainian with their non-Jewish neighbors.
The Elman family observed no Jewish traditions. Elia did not allow having his sons circumcised. He did not acknowledge religious rituals. By the way, this served his youngest son well. During the Great Patriotic War 6 Pyotr was recruited to the army, and his military unit was encircled. They were captured by Germans, who could not ignore Pyotr’s Semitic appearance, of course. The Germans asked his name and Pyotr replied he was Ukrainian and his surname was Vasilenko. This was his older sister Ida husband’s surname. The Germans ordered him to take his pants down and were surprised to see that he was not circumcised. This was probably one of just few cases, when the communist ideas had served anybody well.
I cannot say my parents were strongly religious. My father often worked on Saturday. We did not celebrate Sabbath. My father went to the small one-storied nearby synagogue in Bolshaya Vasilkovskaya Street on the main Jewish holidays. He took me with him after I turned five. The building of the synagogue was removed in the 1930s. I remember celebration of Pesach in our family. There was no bread in our house through 8 days of Pesach and we only ate matzah. Mama cooked delicious food: chicken broth, stuffed fish, chicken neck filled with liver and strudels. In the evening we sat at the table and my father recited a prayer. We also celebrated other Jewish holidays as well, but I don’t remember any details. My parents spoke Yiddish and Russian at home and I spoke both languages well.
When I turned five, my parents decided it was time for me to start my studies. It was common for Jewish children to go to study at the age of 5. I don’t know the reason, but at least all our relatives and friends sent their children to study at the age of 5. However, I could not go to school before turning 8 years of age, which was a rule, at that time children went to school at the age of 8 according to Soviet standards, but my parents arranged with the teacher to give me classes at home. Within three years I attained the knowledge corresponding to the syllabus of 3 grades of general education school. I turned 8 in 1928 and my mother and I went to the nearby 7-year Ukrainian school. It was a small 2-storied building. Its director told mama that there was an order issued by the people’s commissar of education for Jewish children to study in Jewish schools, Russian children in Russian schools and Ukrainian children in Ukrainian schools. He refused to admit me to the 1st grade. Mama asked him whether it was possible for me to go to the 2nd grade. Since the order was issued in 1928 it did not refer to pupils of the 2nd grade. I was given an entrance test: the teacher of mathematic wrote a problem on the blackboard during a break at school and I resolved it instantly. I was admitted to the 2nd grade. My classmates were one year older than me. They were born in 1919. However, I was the best pupil in my class. I was one of the first to become a pioneer [All-Union pioneer organization] 9 in my class, though I was the youngest. I was elected chairman of the pioneer unit in my class and then chairman of the pupils’ committee at school. There were few other Jewish children in my class. There was no anti-Semitism. There was no national segregation in my school.
1932-33 was the period of terrible famine in Ukraine 10. The food store arranged in our 3-bedroom apartment on the 1st floor turned out to be very helpful. People had to stand in lines at night to get some bread. The shop assistants used to come by our apartment to heat or cook some food in our kitchen during their lunch time. They did it since we moved into the house. Thanks to this we did not have to stand in long lines. The shop assistants brought us bread and mama gave them our bread coupons. We somehow managed through this hard time.
There was a club and a gymnasium in the basement of the house where I had been born. When I was in the 5th grade, I enrolled into a wrestling club. When I told my father in the evening, he said I was a fool, and on the following day I enrolled in a box club. My father didn’t mind it, though he did not quite like the idea. Having attained numerous bruises and bumps, I was soon awarded a junior category, and before finishing the 7th grade at school I already had the 3rd grade in boxing. This helped me to enter a military school later. Boxing was not my single hobby. I went to the radio station the moment I heard there was one, established by Ierehim Tolochinskiy, a smart and keen Jewish guy. We studied the Morse receipt and transmission. It didn’t take me long to learn it. Ierehim sent me to the short wave class on the corner of current Kreschatik and Institutskaya Street. My trainer was Aaronov, unfortunately, I cannot remember his first name. I learned the Morse code receipt and transmission promptly.
In 1936 I returned to Ierehim’s radio station, but this time I became an operator. The call letter of the radio station was UK5KJ, and I was assigned a personal international call letter: ORS 1030. There was an operator work schedule. I was to take up the shift, sign up in the roster and work 2-3 hours before the next shift man came. This short-wave transmission hobby spread all over the world at that time. I sent messages and someone responded. I corresponded with many people. To confirm our communication my partners were supposed to send me their QSL-cards and I sent them mine. Once I established communication with a radio amateur, whose call letter was W2KK. ‘W’ stood for America! This was the first time I contacted someone from so far away. He sent me his QSL-card, and before sending him mine I boasted to Ierehim of this contact with America. He told me not to send him my card and never show his to anybody since this was a direct path to the GULAG 11 in Kolyma. This occurred in 1936, during the period of arrests [Great Terror ] 12. Later I understood that Ierehim saved my life giving his advice, but at that time I was rather upset that nobody would ever hear about my accomplishment.
After finishing the lower secondary school I had to go on with my studies. I was admitted to the 8th grade of a Russian school. Russian was no problem for me. I joined Komsomol 13 in the 8th grade. I wouldn’t say I made my parents happy with my successes at school. The radio station was what I dedicated most of my time to. After classes I went to my club and returned home before my father was to come home. My classmates went to the cinema or theater and met with their girlfriends while I spent my time sitting by the radio transmitter sending my call letter on the air. I finished school in 1937.
Every day newspapers and radio published about new arrests and discovering new ‘enemies of the people’ 14. My friends and I admired Yezhov 15 and those decisive efforts he undertook to discover and eliminate enemies of the people and enemies of the Soviet power. Of course, my friends and I believed it all, being Komsomol members. How could we doubt the Communist Party and Stalin’s decisions! When my mother’s brother Boris Braginskiy was arrested, I started having doubts about what was happening. I knew and admired him since my childhood. He was a wonderful person. We didn’t see him often: he was a high official and did not have much in common with an ordinary cabman’s family. Boris and his wife Alla visited us occasionally. Once he told me that Trotskiy 16 was a great man. I never mentioned it to anybody since we had this discussion after Stalin deported Trotskiy from the USSR. Boris may have spoken it out elsewhere. He was arrested, prosecuted for being a Trotskist and enemy of the people and executed in August 1936.
I finished the 10th grade in 1937. I did not have the highest marks in my certificate and knew that I hardly had a chance to enter a college and decided to go to a military school. I went to Kharkov [440 km from Kiev] where I entered the Kharkov Air Force School of Communications. There were two companies in this school: one trained radio operators for landing troops and another company trained operators for Air Force troops. I became the best cadet at this school.
I finished this school with honors. In August 1939 I was awarded the rank of lieutenant and was assigned to serve in Engels town [800 km from Moscow] near Saratov in Povolzhiye populated with German colonists 17. My Yiddish helped me to communicate with them. I served in the 202nd airborne landing brigade. About one month later my headquarters informed me that the 64th howitzer artillery regiment in Saratov needed communication officer and I was sent to Saratov. I became communication commanding officer at the age of 20.
In June 1941 I finished my first academic year in the Academy. I was eager to visit my parents on vacation, and we were surprised to hear that we were supposed to stay in the Academy after exams. My distant relative living in Leningrad invited me to the opening of fountains in Petergof [Petergof or Peterhof - a palace, fountain and park ensemble built by Peter the Great in the early 1700s, often called the ’ Russian Versailles’ and ’Capital of Fountains', is situated 30 km from Saint Petersburg. The fountains operate during the summer.] on 22nd June 1941. We went to Petergof and were walking around, when a military patrol approached me and ordered to go back to my military unit. I was bewildered: I had a leave and observed the rules so there seemed to be no reason for me to be notified like this. Another patrol repeated this requirement. I went to the station to take a local train and that was where I heard that the Great Patriotic War began. However, people had a rather optimistic attitude we had been convinced that if somebody attacked us, the war would be instant and we would defeat the enemy on its own territory. This was a common belief. The vacation was cancelled and we started having classes in the Academy again. Then there was an order to form the 11th special infantry brigade from cadets issued. I was appointed commanding officer of a squad. We were given no weapons, but some digging tools. We marched to the front line in the south of Leningrad.
It stated that all Academy cadets had to go back to Leningrad. When our replacement forces arrived, I transferred command to another lieutenant and we went back to Leningrad to continue our studies. And then the siege of Leningrad [Blockade of Leningrad] 19 began. This was when I learned what starving was like. We, strong guys, received small pieces of bread per day. We ate our ration at once and then had nothing to eat until the following morning.
In 1942 I submitted my request for joining the Communist Party. This was my sincere step. I believed the party consolidated the best part of society. This was the way my generation was raised. I became a candidate for the Party membership. I received my party membership certificate in early 1943. It was a big honor for me. Later, in my peaceful life, it turned out that this party membership was also important for making a career, but I did not give this a thought at that time. I was not looking for any personal benefits.
In March 1942 we were awarded the rank of lieutenants and took a train to Moscow to the Communication Headquarters of the army. I was assigned to the 99th Guard tank brigade as communication commanding officer. However, before I could make my appearance at the point of destination, the Communication Headquarters human resource officer took back my assignment notice. I asked him what happened and he explained that commander of the Air Force communications General Vasiliev requested that I was assigned to his unit. General Vasiliev was deputy chief of Kharkov School and knew me well. He appointed me chief of the radio center of the Air Force headquarters located in Moscow. My subordinates were the girls, who volunteered to be radio operators. We received ciphered cables and I submitted them to the headquarters. One month later General Vasiliev notified me that the radio operator of the 4th Air Force Corps under the command of General Kazankin deployed in the German rear near Smolensk perished from an antipersonnel mine. Vasiliev asked me whether I wanted to go there as a radio operator. I was very surprised that my general asked my consent rather than issuing an order to me. I agreed to go. I took a plane with two soldiers. I was given two parachutes and they had one each. One of them had a receiver on his chest and another had a dynamo machine (we called it a ‘soldier engine’ since it had a handle generating power by continuous turning of this handle). It was necessary since batteries were only sufficient to support the receipt, but not transmission. We flew at night. In landing troops their commander is person number one, and number two is the radio operator receiving directions of the headquarters and hands them to the commander. These were ciphered messages and I was the only person, who knew the content. The deployment of our landing troops in the German rear was very dangerous for them. Our 6 brigades were well-trained paratroopers, and we caused severe damages in the enemy’s rear. On 6th May 1942 I received another cipher message from Moscow. It was a direction for us to leave the site of our deployment. My brigade and I relocated to Ramenskoye. Our brigade commander Colonel Rodimtsev, who was promoted to general soon, thought high of me, but I did not stay in his brigade. General Vasiliev ordered me to come to his office in Moscow and sent me to Teykovo town where I was appointed communication chief of the 4th maneuver airborne landing brigade. I had to train its radio operators. Commander of this brigade was Colonel Zhelo drank at least one liter of vodka per day and was never sober. He was a partisan before he was appointed commander of the brigade, but this appointment was cancelled before long. Our new brigade commander was Lieutenant Colonel Nikolay Dvornikov, a highly-skilled parachutist, who had over 200 parachute jumps. He was an idol for me: I had over 50 jumps by then. I arrived at the brigade in the rank of captain, and I was appointed assistant chief of communication of the brigade. Chief of communication, a major, was a stupid person having no idea of our area of responsibility. He was concerned that I when I was promoted to the rank of major, this would jeopardize his position, and this conviction of his postponed my promotion to this rank. I wasn’t promoted to the rank of major until I was back in the Academy after the war.
Fortunately, my father, who had little education, happened to be smarter than me. He didn’t wait till our brave army would defeat the enemy. He harnessed the horses and my mother, my sister and my father headed to the east. He tried to convince his older sister Zelda to join them, but Zelda and her husband refused. They said they were too old to leave home. They were killed on 29th September 1941 in Babi Yar 24.
Our division was involved in the liberation of Vienna. In early May 1945 we stopped in a small village near Vienna, unfortunately, I forgot its name. Our paratrooper forces were in the 2nd echelon. The village was lovely and we enjoyed the quietude and calmness. On 8th May 1945 we got together for a division meeting, when our division commissar came in and declared: ‘Guys, the war is over!’ We rushed outside and started shooting into the air. The commissar allowed us some time to express our cheers before he announced that the war was over for all, but for us. There was still action in process in Prague, Czechoslovakia. Stalin issued an order: ‘Tank brigades and paratrooper forces, go ahead to Czechoslovakia to rescue it from German forces’. We relocated there immediately. We separated, when we arrived in Czechoslovakia: one part moved in the direction of Prague, and we headed to Ceske Budejovice. We were merciless towards German troops. We exterminated all of them: taking captives was out of the question. The war was over for our division 24 km from Ceskе Budejovice.
Maria was a siege survivor. We decided to get married after the war. I went to see her and we registered our marriage in a registry office. Of course, we had no wedding party considering the circumstances. I was allowed a few days’ leave to spend with my wife and then I returned to my division. My parents had nothing against my marriage with a non-Jewish woman. They thought that our love was what mattered.
I graduated from the Academy with honors on 25th August 1950, and my Jewish surname was written in golden letters on the white marble board in the Academy. There was already strong anti-Semitism in the society. It grew stronger since 1948, the period of struggle against cosmopolitism [Campaign against ‘cosmopolitans’] 25. However, I did not face it during my study in the Academy. Upon graduation I was promoted to the rank of major. I was appointed deputy chief of communication forces of the 25th Air Force army deployed in Leningrad. I went to the human resource department of the 25th army. Their HR manager was happy to see me and said I was expected. However, when he read my surname in my diploma, his expression changed and he said that regretfully he had forgotten that this position had already been assigned to someone else. After graduating the Academy with honors and having a job assignment I had no job while I had to provide for my wife and my 4-year old son. I could not find a job. The three of us had to live on 90 rubles per month. I received this allowance for my rank and this was the only income our family had. Of course, I understood this had to do with my Jewish identity: the other graduates of the Academy, who had worse marks than I, were appointed to higher positions and were duly promoted. The military career was closed for me. Some time later I was invited to Moscow where I got an offer to fill the position of a lecturer at a military school. I had a choice to teach electric engineering in Zhytomyr, and this position corresponded to my rank of major, or physical basics of radio equipment and location in anti-aircraft artillery school #3 in Aluksne town in Latvia, and this position corresponded to the rank of lieutenant colonel. I decided for Aluksne, thought Zhytomyr was near Kiev and I could visit my parents if I had decided to go there.