The Soviet Story (2008)

I recently watched this movie (well it's actually a documentary) and found it to be very interesting and poised many questions. It focuses on the Soviet-Nazi collaboration before 1941. It also shows the similarities between the USSR and Nazi Germany: the concentration camps and the gulags, the forced deportations of whole groups of people, the one-party system (Communist Party and Nazi Party), the dictatorship (Hitler and Stalin), the mass murder of whole groups of people, the forced Germanization and Russification of people, the secret police (Gestapo and NKVD) and many others.

I do not see a difference between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union (except that one lasted 12 years and the other 74.) I do not understand why Soviet symbols are legal why most of the world bans Nazi symbols. Of course I also don't get why the US doesn't ban Nazi, Soviet and Confederate symbols.

Germany has had to fully accept all the evil things that the Germans allowed to happen during the time of Nazi Germany yet Russia does not have to do the same for all the horrible things that the Russians (and other former Soviet nations) allowed to happen during the time of the Soviet Union. Some countries of the former USSR (mostly the Baltics) banned all Soviet symbols and any praise for them, but the vast majority of people and countries continue to twist everything Soviet to the good rather than to the bad. Prime Minister Putin recently said that he wished the Soviet Union could come back as it was because it produced many great things. President Medvedev countered that the USSR should never be brought back because it was a failed, authoritarian system. These two people are 10 years a part and yet have vast differences to the Soviet Union. Hopefully, once the "old" guys are voted old of power the "young" ones will take over and bring about real change and tell the Russians and other former Soviets the complete truth about what the USSR did.

Another issue the film addressed is why the EU, the US and other countries do not try to bring any real, democratic change in Russia or the former USSR. I thought their answer was very interesting.

Everyone (whether they were alive during Nazi times, Soviet times or afterwards) should see this movie because most of the issues addressed are very relevent to today's world.