70 Years Ago: End of World War II

Update added on 8th May 2015, 70 years after Germany
surrendered to allied forces at the end of World War II.

Update for Russian V-Day celebrations added on 9th May.
Update for Russia's short war against Japan on 10th May.



INO TV, the Russian language program of RT TV (Russia Today) now celebrating
70 лeт Великой Победы
70 Years of Great Victory
commemorating Russia's victory over Nazi-Germany in a devastating World War II.
The series of articles loaded by INO TV is related to Russia and the crisis in Ukraine.




Germany 1945 - U.S. troops advancing toward river Elbe,
and the liberation of Dachau concentration camp.




Russian language footage of Russian troops entering Berlin.
Authentic scenes of street fighting [British Pathé News]

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Moscow: V-Day Celebrations and Military Parade on 9th May






China's leader Xi Jin Ping and Russia's president Putin,
both linked in some kind of strategic partnership, are
just whispering during the parade of Russian missiles.



俄罗斯总统普京称俄中关系已经达到空前水平

Russia's president Putin says Russian - Chinese
relations already reached an unprecedented level.

According to Russian satellite news on 8th May, Putin
should have said this in the frame of a "Russia 24 TV"
broadcast. The complete phrase applied by Putin had
been quoted beforehand in a motion picture " Russia
and China - At the Heart of the Eurasian Continent ".
[Source: People's Network, Beijing, on 9th May 2015]

中俄贸易前景广阔 2015年将达到1000亿美元
The prospects for Chinese-Russian trade are wide-ranging.
In 2015 a 100 billion U.S.-$ trade volume will be reached.
By 2020, bilateral trade volume should reach 200 billion $.
[Source: People's Network, Beijing, on 11th May 2015]

An earlier blogspot of " blueprint news " is related to
the military partnership between China and Russia:
[ Chinese-Russian Naval Exercises in 2013 ]

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Another related blogspot of "blueprint news", and which is dating back to March 2014, reminds the historic development in Eastern Ukraine. Russian literary sources from the early years after World War II indicate that after German forces could be beaten back in 1943/44, workers came from all over Russia to the Donezk bassin to restore the essential coal mining industry and connected industrial branches. Some industry important as well for the production of arms had been partly transferred to regions east of the Ural mountains or to the Sverdlovsk area at a time when German troops still hurried eastwards toward Stalingrad, the place that should become a graveyard for many of them.




Most recent visitors from Russia and their subjects of interest.

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A visitor from Manchuria reminds Russia's short war against Japan




Since 1930 Japan had increased its sphere of influence in China's territory of Manchuria. That region had always been the target of Russia's and Japan's opposing interests because of its natural resources. The town of Harbin, an important junction for Russia's Manchurian railway line was so much under Russian influence that, both, Chinese and Russian was spoken there.

When Japan in 1932 finally invaded essential parts of Manchuria and founded the puppet state of Manchukuo with its capital Hsinking (now: Changchun), they employed PuYi, the last emperor of China who had just succeeded to get out of the hostile Republic of China. As emperor KangDe (since 1934) he tried to give reputation to the Japanese protectorate of Manchukuo, however with rather modest success.

When Japan surrendered to the western alliance in 1945 after the nuclear strikes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, PuYi / KangDe tried to leave for Japan in order to surrender to U.S. forces. Unable to find a plane, he finally decided to surrender to a Russian unit that followed fleeing Japanese troops, now that Stalin could afford sending troops to the Far East after the fall of Berlin. From his autobiography PuYi is quoted as saying: "We could have been hiding there for weeks but it would have made no sense any longer."
[浦仪：我的前半生]

Much later, Puyi was transferred from Russia to a Chinese prison for war criminals where he was held during the years of the Korean war when Manchuria served the People's Republic of China as a base for their "Chinese Volunteers' Army" on duty in North Korea. After reeducation, he became a regular citizen and, much later, even a member of the National Commission of the Political Consultation Conference for the People of China. China's first minister of foreign affairs and later prime minister Zhou EnLai ensured his protection up to the end. PuYi died in 1967, probably from cancer of the kidneys.

Editor's Remark:
As to the truth of that Chinese reeducation story, there are lots of photos showing PuYi during and after reeducation, together with remaining members of his imperial family (especially with younger brother PuJie) or in the presence of Zhou Enlai on official occasions. So, if the whole story was a fake, it would be a very well done fake and a highly professionally staged plot.
- Ulysses -

[ "History, place of birth and culture are three elements making up for a chemical reaction." ]
- China's leader Xi Jin Ping 2015 -




Japan Extending its Zone of Influence (1930-33).




The Soviet Invasion of Manchuria (1945).

The Manchurian Strategic Offensive Operation (Манчжурская стратегическая наступательная операция) began on 9th August 1945, with the Soviet invasion of the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo and was the last campaign of the Second World War and the largest of the 1945 Soviet–Japanese War which resumed hostilities between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan after almost six years of peace. Soviet gains on the continent were Manchuria, Inner Mongolia and Northern Korea. The rapid defeat of Japan's Kwantung Army with its central command in Hsinking (Changchun) has been argued to be a significant factor in the Japanese surrender and the end of World War II, as Japan realized the Soviets were willing and able to take the cost of invasion of its Home Islands, after their rapid conquest of Manchuria and South Sakhalin.



As agreed with the Allies at the Tehran Conference in November 1943 and the Yalta Conference in February 1945, the Soviet Union entered World War II's Pacific Theater within three months of the end of the war in Europe. The invasion began on 9th August 1945, exactly three months after the German surrender on 8th May (9th May, 0:43 Moscow time).

Although the commencement of the invasion fell between the atomic bombings of Hiroshima, on 6th August, and Nagasaki, on 9th August, the timing of the invasion had been planned well in advance and was determined by the timing of the agreements at Tehran and Yalta, the long term buildup of Soviet forces in the Far East since Tehran, and the date of the German surrender some three months earlier. On 3rd August, Marshal Vasilevsky reported to Premier Joseph Stalin that, if necessary, he could attack on the morning of 5th August.

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A visitor from Prague reminds German occupation of Czechoslovakia



On 15th March 1939, German troops entered Prague on behalf of Nazi-leader Adolf Hitler who then proclaimed from Hradjin Castle the German protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia ("Böhmen und Mähren"). During German occupation (1939-45), most members of Prague's once extensive Jewish community were deported and killed. In 1942, Prague witnessed the assassination of one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany – Reinhard Heydrich – during Operation Anthropoid, accomplished by Czechoslovak national heroes Jozef Gabčík and Jan Kubiš. Heydrich was chief of the "Reichssicherheitshauptamt" (Reich Main Security Office) that comprised all essential German police organizations and "Stellvertretender Reichsprotektor" (Deputy Reich-Protector) of Bohemia and Moravia. On 5th May 1945, shortly before Germany capitulated, an uprising against Germany occurred. Four days later the 3rd Shock Army of the Soviet Red Army liberated the city. The majority (about 50.000 people) of the German population of Prague either fled or was expelled by the Beneš decrees in the aftermath of the war.