Kommersant-History No. 12 (157)

Do you know who has the hardest time looking into the eyes?

Have you thought about it? But people have long believed that the most difficult thing is to face the truth.

In 1930, for example, the USSR drew attention to the fact that Adolf Hitler adopted the idea of ​​​​creating the Third Reich, which he borrowed from the book of the same name, which was extremely popular among Germans nostalgic for pre-war times.

Soviet propaganda mocked the fantasies of the head of the German Nazis in every possible way until they had to face the truth and realize that the shameless exploitation of this slogan helped the Nazi party and its leader gain additional millions of votes in the elections, and then complete power over Germany. All the details of the story, which had terrifying consequences, are in the text “Cloaking his dictatorship in apparent constitutionality”.

And 160 years ago, on April 17, 1863*, Emperor Alexander II abolished severe corporal punishment, and ordinary people expected that, following this, executioners would disappear from Russian life. However, soon enough I had to face the truth. About where they looked for and found master craftsmen – a selection “A murder was committed in a private apartment by an executioner”.

High-ranking citizens of the country often had to face the truth. For example, the fact that V.I. Lenin’s comrade-in-arms, the leader of the creation of the plan for the electrification of Russia, the first chairman of the State Planning Committee G.M. Krzhizhanovsky, was actually accused of sabotage, was to a large extent his fault. What the friend of the leader of the world proletariat was accused of and how he was able to avoid a sad ending – in the material “Actually slowed down the development of this problem”.

It also happened that it was difficult for Soviet leaders to even look at the pages of Pravda. And so much so that in the files of the main newspaper of the country accessible to ordinary readers, unpleasant publications turned out to be neatly cut out. This happened, for example, with one congratulation sent to I.V. Stalin in 1948. Why – in the publication “To the detriment of the interests of the communist movement in Palestine”.

Often pain when looking at the truth was mixed with amazement. This happened 50 years ago, in 1973, when in Leningrad the Soviet people were shown at an exhibition how diverse and interesting the most beloved Russian sweet was before. An article in our regular column “Forgotten Life” is dedicated to her – “It finds its dessert on all the streets”.

This issue of the monthly Kommersant-History is about these and other difficult events of the long and recent past.

Evgeny Zhirnov, head of the historical and archival service of the Kommersant Publishing House

Content

“And if the stolen property is lost” / How the Cossacks were weaned from taking everything that was bad

“A murder was committed in a private apartment by an executioner” / Where did the executioners come from in Russia?

“A small amount of immigration may be acceptable” / The return of which relocants has always been welcomed

“Cloaking his dictatorship in apparent constitutionality” / What details of the scheme for Hitler’s rise to power were stubbornly hushed up

“Actually slowed down the development of this problem” / To whom did the frantic search for enemies lead?

“To the detriment of the interests of the communist movement in Palestine” / What subtleties of Israeli politics were not always understood in Moscow

“It finds its dessert on all the streets” / Without what sweetness it was impossible to imagine Russian life

*All dates before February 1, 1918 are given according to the old style.