Politicians from Russia

"Let's not talk about Communism. Communism was just an idea, just pie in the sky."

"What have they done to our poor people?... [the] pain for all of us, for our country so rich, so talented and so exhausted by incessant experiments... I think we have committed a crime against our people by making their standard of living so incomparably lower than that of the Americans."

"A man must live like a great brilliant flame and burn as brightly as he can. In the end he burns out. But this is far better than a mean little flame."

"Despite all the difficulties and severe trials being experienced by the people, the democratic process in the country is acquiring an increasingly broad sweep and an irreversible character. The peoples of Russia are becoming masters of their destiny."

"Storm clouds of terror and dictatorship are gathering over the whole country... They must not be allowed to bring eternal night."

"Your commanders have ordered you to storm the White House and to arrest me. But I as the elected President of Russia give you the order to turn your tanks and not to fight against your own people."

"I believe in this tragic hour you can make the right choice. The honor and glory of Russian men of arms shall not be stained with the blood of the people."

"Using the traditional demagoguery, which has been tried and tested over the years, the putschists blame all our current difficulties on the democrats and promise economic recovery and a better life, security and prosperity for the citizens of the USSR. What a hypocritical lie! Surely Pavlov is responsible for rocketing inflation and unprecedented price rises this year? Surely Yazov as leader of the most corrupt highest placed generals, is responsible for the poverty and lawlessness of our servicemen? Surely Pugo bears personal responsibility for the blood shed in the Baltic republics? Surely Starodubtsev, leader of the organization of Soviet land-owners is to blame, owing to the stance he assumed, for the abortive collection of last year’s bumper crops? And these are the people who promise to “restore order in the country!”"

"Perhaps, for the first time ever there is now a real chance to put an end to despotism and to dismantle the totalitarian order, whatever shape it may take. I trust that after all the unthinkable tragedies and tremendous losses that it has suffered, mankind will reject this legacy. It will not allow the 21st century to bring new suffering and deprivations to our children and grandchildren."

"For many years our two nations were the two powers, the two opposites. They wanted to make us implacable enemies, that effected the destinies of the world in a most tragic way. The world was shaken by the storms of confrontation. It was close to exploding, close to perishing, beyond salvation. That evil scenario is becoming a thing of the past. Reason begins to triumph over madness. We have left behind the period when America and Russia looked at each other through gun sites ready to pull the trigger at any time. Despite what we saw in the well-known American film, The Day After, it can be said today, tomorrow will be a day of peace, a day less of fear and more of hope for the happiness of our children. The world can sigh in relief. The idol of communism which spread everywhere social strife, animosity and unparalleled brutality which instilled fear in humanity has collapsed. It has collapsed never to rise again. I am here to assure you we shall not let it rise again in our land. I am proud that the people of Russia have found strength to shake off the crushing burden of the totalitarian system. I am proud that I am addressing you on behalf of the great people whose dignity is restored. I admire ordinary Russian men and women who in spite of s...severe trials have preserved their intellectual integrity and are enduring tremendous hardships for the sake of the revival of their country. Russia has made its final choice in favor of a civilized way of life, common sense and universal human heritage. I am convinced that our people will reach that goal. There is no people on this earth who could be harmed by the air of freedom. There are no exceptions to that rule."

"You can build a throne with bayonets, but it's difficult to sit on it."

"Liberty sets the mind free, fosters independence and unorthodox thinking and ideas. But it does not offer instant prosperity or happiness and wealth to everyone. This is something that politicians in particular must keep in mind."

"There are numerous bugbears in the profession of a politician. First, ordinary life suffers. Second, there are many temptations to ruin you and those around you. And I suppose third, and this is rarely discussed, people at the top generally have no friends."

"Today is the last day of an era past."

"History demonstrates that it is a dangerous delusion to suppose that the destinies of continents and of the world community in general can somehow be managed from one single capital"

"One could see that what you are writing was that today's meeting with President Bill Clinton was going to be a disaster. Now, for the first time, I can tell you that you are a disaster."

"Then some sort of election race is being created. The elections are not until the year 2000, but already now such a situation is being created that everybody seems to be striving for elections. Of course, such a situation cannot be tolerated any more. Here, on the contrary, there must be a united team. The team must be close-knit and work as a single fist."

"Russia has entered the year 1997 with a heavy burden of problems and the situation in the country is extremely complex, above all as concerns the economy. We have failed to stop the production slump and ensure the influx of investments. Society's belief in the ability of the power structures to stop the onslaught of crime is being undermined. It is ever more difficult to provide the armed forces with the essentials. The already low standard of living for the majority of Russian citizens continues to decline. People are suffering from delays in the payment of wages, pensions and benefits. All efforts to solve this problem have failed to yield tangible results"

"It is time to have order. First of all, inside the power structures. And I will have it. I am not satisfied with the government. The executive power has proved unable to work without presidential peremptory shouts. Most of the promises given to the people, particularly as concerns social questions have not been fulfilled. I have prepared a package of important and urgent measures. The structure of the government will change. Competent, energetic people will join it. I will announce within the next few days. But emergency measures are not enough. For this reason we shall begin to restore order to the entire system of bodies of state authority, state finances, regulation of the economy, and the fulfillment of social promises of the state, and we shall do it this year. This year, we shall draft and approve a program of radical reform of the executive power. Its aim is to radically enhance the efficiency of the state government."

"Great harm to the country is done by the passing of laws that cannot be implemented. No allocations for them are envisaged in the budget. The deputies are aware of this, but still insist on passing laws that require tens of trillions of roubles to implement. It is strange that the authoritative and experienced regional leaders -- members of the Federation Council."

"I told NATO, the Americans, the Germans, don't push us towards military action. Otherwise there will be a European war for sure and possibly world war."

"A sense of proportion and humanitarian action are not issues for terrorists. Their aim is that of killing and destroying."

"Yesterday, Clinton allowed himself to put pressure on Russia. He apparently forgot for a second, a minute, half a minute, what Russia is, that Russia possesses a full arsenal of nuclear weapons. He forgot about this, so he decided to flex his muscles, as they say. I want to say to Clinton: let him not forget what kind of world he lives in. It has never been and never will be the case that he alone dictates to the whole world how to live, how to work, how to rest... And so on. No, and again no. A multipolar world is the basis for everything, as we agreed with Jiang Zemin, President of the People's Republic of China. We will dictate to the world how to live, not him alone."

"Dissidents should be paid 13 months' salary for a year, otherwise our mindless unanimity will bring us to an even more hopeless state of stagnation. It is especially important to encourage unorthodox thinking when the situation is critical: At such moments every new word and fresh thought is more precious than gold. Indeed, people must not be deprived of the right to think their own thoughts."

"I am convinced that the moment is coming when, with its message of eternal, universal values, it will come to the aid of our society. For in these words: "Thou shalt not kill; Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself," lie those very moral principles that will enable us to survive even the most critical situations."

"Quite recently I spoke to very different audiences in Yaroslavl, Kaliningrad, and Novgorod provinces. And although I met with workers, intellectuals, peasants, military men, party employees, and managerial employees, people with diverse political views, sympathies, and passions, it will be a long time before I will be able to recall such unanimity on the most important point, that is, the understanding that the country has reached the very final stage of collapse and that there is no longer anywhere to fall back to. The people who led one of the wealthiest and most talented countries on the planet to a state of destitution and degradation must always have a face of the “enemy” to fall back on, someone they can blame for everything that is going on. We have always had an “enemy” in the seventy-three years of Soviet power: at first we had the bourgeoisie, the gentry, and the capitalists; then we had the counterrevolutionaries, the Trotskyites, and the left- and right-wing deviationists, and also the kulaks; then came the CIA, imperialism, and the Zionist conspiracy. And now we need a new “enemy,” because no one believes in the CIA, the Trotskyites, or the capitalists anymore. The new “enemy” is the so-called democrats, who are destabilizing, tormenting, subverting, disorienting, and committing all other kinds of vile acts in their lust for power. On the basis of this logic, all we would have to do to make everything good in the country would be to remove the democrats and get rid of them somehow, and then there would ensue a glorious time known as the “Communist future,” “the socialist choice,” or the “radiant future.”"

"I trusted Gorbachev. It seemed to me that an alliance with Gorbachev might become very important in stabilizing the situation both in the republics and in the country as a whole. And many people urged me on. Our joint work on the 500-day program brought the interests of a renewed union of republics and the center even closer together. Gorbachev had admitted publicly that the Shatalin-Iavlinskii program looked very interesting and promising to him. It seemed to me that all we had to do was take one more step, and we could walk together onto the road which would lead us out of the crisis. But that didn’t happen. He suddenly changed his position drastically, and the 500-day program collapsed, burying any hopes with it for a way out of the impasse. Instead of breaking with Gorbachev and firmly divorcing myself from the president’s policies of half steps, half measures, and half reforms, I fell prey to the illusion that we could still reach an agreement. But, as it turned out, it was impossible to make an agreement with a president who is simultaneously the general secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist party and to whom the interests of the party caste and the party elite will always take precedence over any other interests. And so we lost four months. We didn’t get anywhere by supporting Moscow indirectly by our silence."

"But I don’t believe in a civil war. No matter how agitated the atmosphere gets and no matter how hard the president and his advisers try to aggravate the situation, I am absolutely confident of the people’s common sense."

"Today I am turning to you for the last time with New Year's greetings. But that's not all. Today I am turning to you for the last time as president of Russia. I have made a decision. I thought long and hard over it. Today, on the last day of the departing century, I am resigning. I have heard many times that "Yeltsin will hang onto power by any means, he won't give it to anyone." That's a lie. But that's not the point. I have always said that I would not depart one bit from the constitution. That Duma elections should take place in the constitutionally established terms. That was done. And I also wanted presidential elections to take place on time — in June 2000. This was very important for Russia. We are creating a very important precedent of a civilized, voluntary transfer of power, power from one president of Russia to another, newly elected one. And still, I made a different decision. I am leaving. I am leaving earlier than the set term. I have understood that it was necessary for me to do this. Russia must enter the new millennium with new politicians, with new faces, with new, smart, strong, energetic people. And we who have been in power for many years already, we must go. Seeing with what hope and faith people voted in the Duma elections for a new generation of politicians, I understood that I have completed the main thing of my life. Already, Russia will never return to the past. Now, Russia will always move only forward."

"I should not interfere with this natural march of history. To hold onto power for another half-year, when the country has a strong man who is worthy of being president and with whom practically every Russian today ties his hopes for the future? Why should I interfere with him? Why wait still another half-year? No, that's not for me! It's simply not in my character!"

"Today, on this day that is so extraordinarily important for me, I want to say just a few more personal words than usual. I want to ask for your forgiveness. For the fact that many of the dreams we shared did not come true. And for the fact that what seemed simple to us turned out to be tormentingly difficult. I ask forgiveness for not justifying some hopes of those people who believed that at one stroke, in one spurt, we could leap from the gray, stagnant, totalitarian past into the light, rich, civilized future. I myself believed in this, that we could overcome everything in one spurt. I turned out to be too naive in something. In some places, problems seemed to be too complicated. We forced our way forward through mistakes, through failures. Many people in this hard time experienced shock."

"Today it's important for me to tell you. The pain of each of you has called forth pain in me, in my heart. Sleepless nights, tormenting worries — about what needed to be done, so that people could live more easily and better. I did not have any more important task. I am leaving. I did all I could — not according to my health, but on the basis of all the problems. A new generation is relieving me, a generation of those who can do more and better. In accordance with the constitution, as I resign, I have signed a decree placing the duties of the president of Russia on the head of government, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. For three months, again in accordance with the constitution, he will be the head of state. And in three months, presidential elections will take place."

"I cannot shift the blame for Chechnya, for the sorrow of numerous mothers and fathers. I made the decision, therefore I am responsible."

"It looks as if some people either have a short memory and are forgetting about that time and the events that occurred then … Let us recall the putsch of August 19, 1991. It was after the putsch that the republics began, one after another, to declare their independence. Russia also declared its independence. This was approved by the Supreme Soviet, and you know and remember that there was the Declaration on the Independence of Russia. So, the entire course of history was leading to a point when the regime, the political regime in the country had to be changed. It demonstrated that the Union was not as strong as this was loudly preached by mass media and the propaganda in general. The republics wished to become independent. This must only be welcomed... We have good peaceful relations and there were no military clashes. None of these countries had revolutions with bloody casualties and there was no civil war in any of the republics... Russia had to change and it did change."

"We don't appreciate what we have until it's gone. Freedom is like that. It's like air. When you have it, you don't notice it."

"At the end of 1991 the USSR disintegrated into fifteen independent nations. Russia’s president, Boris Yeltsin, launched economic reforms that privatized much of the economy but in the process allowed politically connected cronies to acquire vast wealth from what was once state property. The economy spiraled downward and by 1999, 40 percent of Russians were living in poverty. Rates of drug use, crime, and corruption rose, while health care deteriorated and life span declined. Russia’s population fell by more than 500,000 people each year, as death rates far exceeded birth rates. President Vladimir Putin, who took office in 1999, attempted to reduce corruption and the power of the economic oligarchs. With majority public support, Putin renationalized a number of major energy companies. He was accused of shifting government back toward authoritarianism, but some observers thought his actions were necessitated by the nature and scope of the problems his nation faced."

"In June, the biggest republic of them all, the Russian, elected its own president. He was Boris Yeltsin, a former Moscow party boss and now Gorbachev's chief rival. The contrast could not be missed, because for all of his talk of democracy, Gorbachev had never subjected himself to a popular vote. Another contrast, less evident at the time, would soon become clear: Yeltsin, unlike Gorbachev, had a grand strategic objective. It was to abolish the Communist Party, dismantle the Soviet Union, and make Russia an independent democratic capitalist state. Yeltsin was not a popular figure in Washington. He had a reputation for heavy drinking, publicity seeking, and gratuitous attacks on Gorbachev at a time when Bush was trying to support him. He had even once picked a fight over protocol in the White House driveway with Condoleezza Rice, the president's young but formidable Soviet adviser—which he lost. By 1991, though, there was no denying Yeltsin's importance: in "reassert[ing] Russian political and economic control over the republic's own affairs," Scowcroft recalled, "he was attacking the very basis of the Soviet state." It was one thing for the Bush administration to watch Soviet influence in Eastern Europe disintegrate, and then to push German reunification. It was quite another to contemplate the complete breakup of the U.S.S.R. "My view is, you dance with who is on the dance floor," Bush noted in his diary. "[Y]ou especially don't . . . [encourage] destabilization. . . . I'm wondering, where do we go and how do we get there?""

"Yeltsin was not just an unpopular president: he was the first politician who Russians ever trusted—and the disappointment his people now felt was every bit as bitter as the support he had enjoyed had once been inspiring."

"Russia under Yeltsin was at this point experiencing extremes of humiliation and paranoia. It had a wrecked economy and a triumphant western alliance advancing towards its doorstep. Negotiations now began for Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Bulgaria and Romania also to join NATO, turning the earlier necklace of former communist states into what looked to Moscow more like a noose. But Yeltsin had other worries. He decided not to move Russia gradually towards capitalism, by ensuring currency control and strict financial policing. Instead he went full speed ahead. He curbed public spending, cut subsidies, freed prices and gave the ownership of factories and utilities to Russian citizens in the form of share vouchers. These grossly undervalued vouchers were swiftly bought up by middlemen and sold on to a network of oligarchs, who became sensationally rich before vanishing abroad. A Siberian oil well was swiftly converted into a Knightsbridge mansion. The value of Russia’s copious natural resources was thus invested in London, Cyprus, the Middle East and other boltholes in what became one of Europe’s most systematic acts of kleptomania. (William the Conqueror’s plunder of England in the eleventh century at least remained largely in situ.) By the end of the nineties, Russia’s national product had halved and the rouble collapsed. Millions lost their savings and, in some parts of the country, there was a cry for a return to communism. This in turn led to attempts to unseat Yeltsin. If Gorbachev had lost control over the demise of communism, Yeltsin lost it over the rise of capitalism."

"The reformer Yeltsin represents the tendency which wants to reduce the gigantic state apparatus. Consequently he follows in Trotsky's footsteps."

"He's been on the verge of death so many times. … His doctors themselves are in shock that he's still alive. Half the blood vessels in his brain are about to burst after his strokes, his intestines are spotted all over with holes, he has giant ulcers in his stomach, his heart is in absolutely disgusting condition, he is literally rotting … He could die from any one of dozens of physical problems that he has, but contrary to all laws of nature — he lives."

"And for a time, it seemed like that corruption investigation might be the undoing of Yeltsin and his family and his cronies. Vladimir Putin as head of the FSB took care of that problem for Boris Yeltsin. Putin arranged for a video to be broadcast on television that showed the prosecutor or somebody who maybe kind of looked like the prosecutor in bed with not one but two young very young females."

"When he came to power in 1985, Gorbachev had promoted a tall, energetic but reckless new leader named Boris Yeltsin to Moscow party chief and Politburo member. Almost the same age as Gorbachev, Yeltsin was the son of a builder who had been repressed by Stalin. Growing up in Sverdlovsk, he rose to local party secretary by 1976. Yeltsin was the opposite of Gorbachev: while the latter was contemplative, legalistic, sometimes verbose, often witty, and brave, Yeltsin was bombastic, emotional, courageous – and an alcoholic. The two soon clashed, and Gorbachev sacked Yeltsin in 1987, giving him a public dressing-down. But, both opportunistic and idealistic, Yeltsin was ahead of Gorbachev in realizing that the Soviet Union and communism itself would and should soon fall. Yeltsin embraced liberal democracy – yet it also suited him. He was elected president of the Russian Republic in 1989, giving him potential legitimacy unavailable to Gorbachev. In July 1990, he dramatically resigned from the Communist Party."

"In the following months, the strain started to show as ethnic turmoil and bloodshed intensified in the Caucasus and Soviet security forces seemed to be out of control, killing protesters in Lithuania. The Politburo and security service, the KGB, plotted to overthrow Gorbachev: in August 1991, a committee of incompetent drunken communist leaders and Chekists arrested Gorbachev on his Black Sea holiday and sent tanks into Moscow, but crowds defended the White House offices of Yeltsin. Yeltsin bravely climbed onto a tank outside to defiantly address the crowds. The coup fell apart, but its real victim was Gorbachev, who had lost his prestige. When Gorbachev tried to regain the momentum, Yeltsin ended the monopoly of the Communist Party and then conspired with the elected presidents of the other Soviet republics to end the Soviet Union. Gorbachev resigned on Christmas Day 1991, thus ending the Soviet Union, which broke up into its independent republics. Gorbachev realised that communist oligarchy was wrong, and after his fall he sincerely embraced liberal democracy but it was too late."

"Yeltsin dominated Russia in the 1990s and, initially, his enthusiasm and openness were refreshing. Almost for the first time in its history, Russia enjoyed totally free elections, a totally free press, a free economy, a free investigation of history and of state crimes – and all these were Yeltsin’s achievements. But he was fatally flawed: alcoholic, inconsistent and capricious, he ruled like a tsar through cronies and henchmen such as his sinister bodyguard General Korzhakov and his billionaire financial adviser Boris Berezovsky. Yeltsin’s privatisation of the Russian economy was hopelessly mismanaged, making billionaires of the so-called Oligarchs, overpowerful businessmen like Berezovsky. In 1993, communist hardliners in parliament threatened the entire democratic project with an armed revolt that Yeltsin defeated by ordering the storming by special forces of the White House in Moscow. The following year, faced with rebellion and the assertion of independence by Chechnya, Yeltsin invaded the little republic. As they committed atrocities on a vast scale, killing thousands of innocent civilians and utterly destroying cities such as Grozny, Russian forces were humiliated by dynamic Chechen fighters. Yeltsin was forced to retreat, withdraw Russian forces from Chechnya and infamously recognize Chechen independence – an unprecedented Russian humiliation. The decay of financial corruption, Kremlin intrigue, economic chaos, mafia disorder and resurgent repression unleashed by the Chechen war discredited his real achievements."

"By 1996, Yeltsin, ill and isolated, faced a new election that he seemed likely to lose: his billionaire cronies, the Oligarchs, mobilized their fortunes to help him win reelection but even democracy was tainted. The next three years saw economic meltdown and Yeltsin’s personal decline as he sacked prime ministers with imperial whimsy and embarrassed his country with acts of drunken buffoonery. In 1999, he chose a young, ambitious and severe ex-KGB officer and cabinet minister named Vladimir Putin to be his successor, dramatically resigning the presidency. Putin proved more than equal to the task: he restored the power of the state and the prestige of Russia as a great power, crushed mafia corruption and broke the influence of the Oligarchs. At the same time he demonstrated his discipline and vigour by again attacking Chechnya with brutal and bloody competence, crushing the rebellion at the cost of hundreds of thousands of civilian lives. Putin promoted his colleagues from the security services who dominated Russian government and business, diminished democracy and press freedom, ended the election of local governors and personified a new Russian form of authoritarian government that he called sovereign democracy. Putin utterly dominated Russia in a way Gorbachev and Yeltsin had never done, probably the dominant Russian leader of the early twenty-first century."

"Boris Yeltsin was a man of bold and free spirit who, I believe, will remain in the history of not only Russia but also of the Baltic States and the world. His position accelerated Lithuania’s march towards freedom and contributed to the restoration of the independence of all Baltic States. It was a great honor for us to have such a friend and partner."

"As president, he had enormous challenges and difficult mandates, but he certainly brought East and West closer together and helped replace confrontation by cooperation."

"Without a doubt, President Yeltsin — with all the human weaknesses no one is free of — was one of the truly great men of our age. When all was uncertain in the disintegrating Soviet Union, he was the one to set a new course by abolishing the Soviet Union and recognising the independence of the three Baltic States. His repudiation of Communism was unequivocal, and he clearly directed the new Russia towards ever closer cooperation with the rest of Europe. He was a great person in the history of Russia and of Europe."

"He was a remarkable man who saw the need for democratic and economic reform and in defending that reform he played a vital role at a crucial time in Russia's history."

"President Yeltsin was an historic figure who served his country during a time of momentous change. He played a key role as the Soviet Union dissolved, helped lay the foundations of freedom in Russia, and became the first democratically elected leader in that country's history."

"The world will keep of President Yeltsin the memory of a man who, by his courage, his tenacity and his political direction, knew to make the triumph of freedom and engage Russia on the way to democracy."

"No Americans, at least, will forget seeing him standing on the tank outside of the [Russian] White House resisting the coup attempt."

"President Boris Yeltsin was of major importance to the development of democracy in Russia. Yeltsin was President of Russia at a time of great change — he could be said to have brought democracy to Russia and defended it in challenging circumstances. I have great respect for President Yeltsin’s work in developing Russia and I wish to extend my sympathy to the people of Russia on the death of Boris Yeltsin."

"I express my profoundest condolences to the family of the deceased, who had major deeds for the good of the country as well as serious mistakes behind him. It was a tragic destiny."

"I think he will be best remembered as the person who really ultimately did save the arrival of democracy in Russia. That momentous occasion when he stood on the tank outside the Russian Parliament and held back the counter-revolution, if I can put it that way, by the old guard of the former Soviet regime. He has a place in history as a result of that. Later on he lost a lot of credibility on some economic issues, but nothing can wipe out the contribution that Yeltsin made to bringing democracy to Russia."

"[Yeltsin] played a significant role in the dissolution of the Soviet Union as a totalitarian regime and the birth of a new Russia, whereby he contributed to democratic changes in Europe during the 1980s and 1990s."

"The news on the sudden death of the first president of Russian Federation Boris Yeltsin was met with the feeling of a deep sorrow in Uzbekistan."

"President Yeltsin will be remembered for the critical role he played in advancing political and economic reforms in Russia, as well as in fostering rapprochement between East and West."

"A leader of the nation, in the full sense of the word, has quitted life, a true patriot of his country, an outstanding statesman, a man who was rooting for Russia and its people with all his heart. Boris Nikolayevich, a true friend and a great politician, whose name is linked to the most important and memorable pages in the development of the union relationship between the Belarusian and Russian people, will remain forever in the hearts of Belarusians."

"Yeltsin was a great personality in Russian and international politics, a brave fighter for democracy and freedom and a true friend of Germany."

"Yeltsin's presidency has inscribed him forever in Russian and in world history. … A new democratic Russia was born during his time: a free, open and peaceful country. A state in which the power truly does belong to the people. … the first President of Russia’s strength consisted in the mass support of Russian citizens for his ideas and aspirations. Thanks to the will and direct initiative of President Boris Yeltsin a new constitution, one which declared human rights a supreme value, was adopted. It gave people the opportunity to freely express their thoughts, to freely choose power in Russia, to realise their creative and entrepreneurial plans. This Constitution permitted us to begin building a truly effective Federation. … We knew [Yeltsin] as a brave and a warm-hearted, spiritual person. He was an upstanding and courageous national leader. And he was always very honest and frank while defending his position. … [Yeltsin] assumed full responsibility for everything he called for, for everything he aspired to. For everything he tried to do and did do for the sake of Russia, for the sake of millions of Russians. And he invariably took upon himself, let it in his heart, all the trials and tribulations of Russia, peoples’ difficulties and problems."

"It's sad news, that Boris Yeltsin is dead. We owe the former Russian president respect for standing ground for the democracy of Russia."

"When we remember Boris Yeltsin, we remember a person who played an important role in bringing down the Soviet dictatorship and who guided Russia in its first steps towards democracy. Without the contributions Yeltsin made at that time, it is likely that developments could have taken a very different turn. As President, Boris Yeltsin also helped open up Russia for important market economy reforms. In a country where private ownership was previously forbidden or actively opposed, this was an effort that was neither easy nor unproblematic, but was utterly necessary."

"He was a genuine politician. You could change his mind if you talked to him for half an hour. He and Vladimir Putin are two very, very different people."

"Deepest condolences to the family, Russian people and Vladimir Putin for death of the first democratic Russian leader."

"Russia’s First President Boris Yeltsin has invaluable merit to the whole world … At the same time, he was strong opponent of withdrawal of Soviet troops from Poland and our joining NATO. I pity this person, one has to admit, his life was not kind to him. All of us will die some day."

"A great democrat and remarkable politician, whose name is associated with an epoch in the world’s history … Boris Yeltsin made a unique contribution to Russia’s revival, promoting the principles of freedom, equality and sovereignty in the former Soviet Union and seeking to fairly rebuild the modern world, and his contribution can only be compared with those by great leaders."

"With his unfortunate passing, the Chinese people have lost a sincere friend."

"They say that the Soviet delegates smile. That smile is genuine. It is not artificial. We wish to live in peace, tranquility. But if anyone believes that our smiles involve abandonment of the teaching of Marx, Engels and Lenin he deceives himself poorly. Those who wait for that must wait until a shrimp learns to whistle."

"Yes, today we have genuine Russian weather. Yesterday we had Swedish weather. I can't understand why your weather is so terrible. Maybe it is because you are immediate neighbours of NATO."

"Finding a reason for an armed conflict now would be very easy, but finding a way to put an end to such a conflict would be very hard."

"Whether you like it or not, history is on our side. We will dig you in. (.)"

"When it is a question of fighting against imperialism we can state with conviction that we are all Stalinists. We can take pride that we have taken part in the fight for the advance of our great cause against our enemies. From that point of view I am proud that we are Stalinists."

"I am very glad to hear this, since I come from the Ukraine. From now on I can sleep peacefully. I will immediately telegraph my daughter in Kiev."

"If Adenauer were here with us in the sauna, we could see for ourselves that Germany is and will remain divided but also that Germany never will rise again."

"A man emaciated by a grave illness is at first treated by doctors gradually. Food is administered to him in small doses. If more is administered to the patient, it might kill him. And so we want to begin disarmament not with a full dose, although we are prepared even for a full dose. I have said already that the Western powers greatly distrust us. We, too, do not trust them in everything. And so, in order not to destroy a thing which is of great and vital importance to mankind, disarmament, we suggest to begin not with a cardinal but with a gradual solution to disarmament problems."

"The thought sometimes -- the unpleasant thought sometimes creeps up on me here as to whether perhaps Khrushchev was not invited here to enable you to sort of rub him in your sauce and to show the might and the strength of the United States so as to make him sort of … so as to make him shaky at the knees. If that is so, then if I came -- if it took me about 12 hours to get here, I guess it'll just -- it'll take no more than about 10½ hours to fly back."

"I happened to read recently a remark by the American nuclear physicist W. Davidson, who noted that the explosion of one hydrogen bomb releases a greater amount of energy than all the explosions set off by all countries in all wars known in the entire history of mankind. And he, apparently, is right."

"We have come to this town where lives the cream of American art.… But just now I was told that I could not go to Disneyland. I asked "Why not? What is it? Do you have rocket-launching pads there?" I do not know. Just listen to what reason I was told: "We," which means the American authorities, "cannot guarantee your security if you go there." What is it? Is there an epidemic of cholera there or something? Or have gangsters taken over the place that can destroy me? Then what must I do? Commit suicide? … For me, this situation is inconceivable. I cannot find words to explain this to my people."

"Mr. President, call the toady of American imperialism to order."

"I see, Mr. President, that you too are not devoid of a sense of anxiety for the fate of the world understanding, and of what war entails. What would a war give you? You are threatening us with war. But you well know that the very least which you would receive in reply would be that you would experience the same consequences as those which you sent us. And that must be clear to us, people invested with authority, trust, and responsibility. We must not succumb to intoxication and petty passions, regardless of whether elections are impending in this or that country, or not impending. These are all transient things, but if indeed war should break out, then it would not be in our power to stop it, for such is the logic of war. I have participated in two wars and know that war ends when it has rolled through cities and villages, everywhere sowing death and destruction. … If people do not show wisdom, then in the final analysis they will come to a clash, like blind moles, and then reciprocal extermination will begin."

"We and you ought not now to pull on the ends of the rope in which you have tied the knot of war, because the more the two of us pull, the tighter that knot will be tied. And a moment may come when that knot will be tied so tight that even he who tied it will not have the strength to untie it, and then it will be necessary to cut that knot, and what that would mean is not for me to explain to you, because you yourself understand perfectly of what terrible forces our countries dispose. Consequently, if there is no intention to tighten that knot and thereby to doom the world to the catastrophe of thermonuclear war, then let us not only relax the forces pulling on the ends of the rope, let us take measures to untie that knot. We are ready for this."

"Don't you know how to paint? My grandson will paint it better! What is this? Are you men or damned pederasts? How can you paint like that? Do you have a conscience?"

"Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge even where there is no river."

"Berlin is the testicle of the West. When I want the West to scream, I squeeze on Berlin."

"If you start throwing hedgehogs under me, I shall throw a couple of porcupines under you."

"I remember President Kennedy once stated... that the United States had the nuclear missile capacity to wipe out the Soviet Union two times over, while the Soviet Union had enough atomic weapons to wipe out the United States only once... When journalists asked me to comment... I said jokingly, "Yes, I know what Kennedy claims, and he's quite right. But I'm not complaining... We're satisfied to be able to finish off the United States first time round. Once is quite enough. What good does it do to annihilate a country twice? We're not a bloodthirsty people.""

"My arms are up to the elbows in blood. That is the most terrible thing that lies in my soul."

"Comrades! We must abolish the cult of the individual decisively, once and for all."

"Concerning Stalin's merits, an entirely sufficient number of books, pamphlets and studies had already been written in his lifetime. The role of Stalin in the preparation and execution of the socialist revolution, in the Civil War, and in the fight for the construction of socialism in our country, is universally known."

"When we analyze the practice of Stalin in regard to the direction of the party and the country, when we pause to consider everything which Stalin perpetrated, we must be convinced that Lenin's fear were justified. The negative characteristics of Stalin, which, in Lenin's time, were only incipient, transformed themselves during the last years into a grave abuse of power by Stalin, which caused untold harm."

"Stalin acted not through persuasion, explanation and patient cooperation with people, but by imposing his concepts and demanding absolute submission to his opinion. Whoever opposed this concept or tried to prove his viewpoint and the correctness of his position was doomed to removal from the leading collective and to subsequent moral and physical annihilation."

"We must affirm that the part had fought a serious fight against the Trotskyistes, rightists and bourgeois nationalists, and that it disarmed ideologically all the enemies of Leninism. This ideological fight was carried on successfully, as a result of which the party became strengthened and tempered. Here Stalin played a positive role."

"Stalin originated the concept of 'enemy of the people'. This term automatically rendered it unnecessary that the ideological errors of a man or men engaged in a controversy be proven; this term made possible the usage of the most cruel repression, violating all norms of revolutionary legality, against anyone who in any way disagreed with Stalin, against those who were only suspected of hostile intent, against those who had bad reputations. This concept 'enemy of the people' actually eliminated the possibility of any kind of ideological fight or the making of one's views known on this or that issue, even those of a practical character. In the main, and in actuality, the only proof of guilt used, against all norms of current legal science, was the 'confession' of the accused himself."

"When the fascist armies had actually invaded Soviet territory and military operations began, Moscow issued the order that the German fire was not to be returned. Why? It was because Stalin, despite evident facts, thought that the war had not yet started, that this was only a provocative action on the part of several undisciplined sections of the German Army, and that reaction might serve as a reason for the Germans to begin the war."

"We will take America without firing a shot. We do not have to invade the U.S. We will destroy you from within."

"The living will envy the dead."

"We cannot expect the Americans to jump from capitalism to communism, but we can aid their elected leaders in giving them small doses of socialism until suddenly they awake to find they have communism."

"Khrushchev was overthrown in October 1964 by a politburo disgruntled by his brinkmanship over Suez, Berlin, and Cuba and also opposed to his erratic search for coexistence with the United States. During his nine-year rule, Khrushchev had attempted to achieve the impossible: while striving to dismantle the repressive elements of Stalinism, he had used Stalinist measures to crush popular revolutions in Eastern Europe; while seeking to unify global communism, he had created a powerful rival in Mao’s China; while seeking to revive Marxist-Leninist revolutionary impulses in the Third World, he had not only raised Washington’s hackles but also embraced nationalist leaders who imprisoned their left-wing opposition; and while seeking détente with the United States and the end of NATO, his inflammatory language and nuclear threats had underscored the need for a united West. Despite their differences in age and temperament, Kennedy and Khrushchev were both hardened Cold Warriors who only dimly recognized the radical changes in the world landscape that were beginning to reduce the Superpowers’ control. Their successors, less experienced in diplomacy and more intent on domestic reforms, would create a dangerous pause in the Superpowers’ post-Berlin, post- Cuba search for détente."

"Political conditions on the other side had also changed significantly as a result of the Sino-Soviet rupture. In the late 1950s, Mao, resentful of Moscow's refusal to support China's atomic weapons program, condemned Krushchev's abandonment of the doctrine of revolutionary warfare and his pursuit of peaceful coexistence. Krushchev, a critic of Mao's disastrous Great Leap Forward and belligerence toward his neighbors, in 1960 suddenly withdrew Soviet experts and reduced Soviet assistance to China. After the split became public at the Twenty-Second Party Congress in October 1961, Mao openly mocked Krushchev's retreat during the Cuban missile crisis, complained of Moscow's pro-New Delhi stance during the 1962 Sino-Indian border conflict, and denounced the test ban treaty as a means of preventing China from developing its own nuclear weapons. By the end of 1963 the two communist giants were openly competing for leadership of the revolutionary movements in Asia, Africa, and Latin America."

"Our only "crime" is that in Bucharest we did not agree that a fraternal communist party like the Chinese Communist Party should be unjustly condemned; our only "crime" is that we had the courage to oppose openly, at an international communist meeting (and not in the marketplace) the unjust action of Comrade Khrushchev, our only "crime" is that we are a small Party of a small and poor country which, according to Comrade Khrushchev, should merely applaud and approve but express no opinion of its own. But this is neither Marxist nor acceptable. Marxism-Leninism has granted us the right to have our say and we will not give up this right for any one, neither on account of political and economic pressure nor on account of the threats and epithets that they might hurl at us. On this occasion we would like to ask Comrade Khrushchev why he did not make such a statement to us instead of to a representative of a third party. Or does Comrade Khrushchev think that the Party of Labor of Albania has no views of its own but has made common cause with the Communist Party of China in an unprincipled manner, and therefore, on matters pertaining to our Party, one can talk with the Chinese comrades? No, Comrade Khrushchev, you continue to blunder and hold very wrong opinions about our Party. The Party of Labor of Albania has its own views and will answer for them both to its own people as well as to the international communist and workers' movement."

"It is not we who behave like the Yugoslavs but you, comrade Khrushchev, who are using methods alien to Marxism-Leninism against our Party. You consider Albania as a market commodity which can be gained by one or lost by another. There was a time when Albania was considered a medium of exchange, when others thought it depended on them whether Albania should or should not exist, but that time came to an end with the triumph of the ideas of Marxism-Leninism in our country. You were repeating the same thing when you decided that you had "lost" Albania or that some one else had "won" it, when you decided that Albania is no longer a socialist country, as it turns out from the letter you handed to us on November 8, in which our country is not mentioned as a socialist country."

"Nikita Khruschev was a difficult man to deal with, often very hard, always determined. But his peasant side which made him alternatively good-natured and cunning, also made him likeable."

"Comrade Khrushchev often repeats that Socialism cannot be built with American wheat. I think it can be done by anyone who knows how to do it, while a person who doesn't know how to do it cannot build Socialism even with his own wheat. Khrushchev says we live on charity received from the imperialist countries … What moral right have those who attack us to rebuke us about American aid or credits when Khruschev himself has just tried to conclude an economic agreement with America?"

"He's a charming fellow between sentences."

"The peoples of all our democracies are hungry for peace and security. For 20 years some of us have lived either at war or under the shadow of war. They yearn for some alleviation of the exertions and sacrifices that have been demanded of them. They hear the argument put forward that the development of nuclear weapons has rendered conventional forces obsolete and unnecessary, and that it is a waste of money and effort to continue to maintain them. They are asked by some to believe that the hydrogen bomb has rendered war impossible because it is so deadly that both sides would be annihilated. There is therefore a danger that the free peoples may be lulled into a sense of false security, and that they will succumb to the temptation to relax their efforts which are still essential, if peace is to be preserved, and if our freedom and way of life are to be safeguarded. We must therefore be very careful not to be misled by specious and wholly untenable arguments, or read more into the smiles of the Kremlin than the facts of the case warrant. After all, even Mr. Krushev has himself warned us against wishful thinking. Here is what he said at a Kremlin banquet as recently as a fortnight ago: "The West say that the Soviet leaders smile, but that their actions do not match their smiles. But I assure them that the smiles are sincere. They are not artificial. We wish to live in peace. But if anyone thinks that our smiles mean that we abandon the teachings of Marx and Lenin" (i.e. that the ultimate purpose of Soviet policy is world revolution),"or abandon our Communist road, then they are fooling themselves". In the circumstances I submit that our course is plain. If we are to achieve a lasting relaxation of tension between East and West, and with it practical measures for peace, we can only do so by maintaining our unity and continuing to build up our collective strength."

"And lastly, Chairman Khrushchev has compared the United States to a worn-out runner living on its past performance, and stated that the Soviet Union would out-produce the United States by 1970. Without wishing to trade hyperbole with the Chairman, I do suggest that he reminds me of the tiger hunter who has picked a place on the wall to hang the tiger's skin long before he his caught the tiger. This tiger has other ideas."

"In Thompson's mind was this thought: Khrushchev's gotten himself in a hell of a fix. He would then think to himself, "My God, if I can get out of this with a deal that I can say to the Russian people: 'Kennedy was going to destroy Castro and I prevented it.'" Thompson, knowing Khrushchev as he did, thought Khrushchev will accept that. And Thompson was right."

"Khrushchev relaxed somewhat the dead dictator’s regime without changing its basic institutions or laws: one-party rule remained in place, as did the ubiquitous secret police and censorship. Nevertheless, life for Soviet citizens eased considerably. Millions of concentration-camp inmates regained their freedom. Many victims of repression were rehabilitated, which did not benefit them but brought relief to their families. Limited contacts with foreign nationals were permitted once again. More visitors from abroad received entry visas, and more Soviet citizens could travel outside the USSR. The jamming of foreign short-wave broadcasts continued as before, but it was not foolproof, so that the Soviet public could obtain a more realistic picture of life abroad as well as at home. The effect was to open people’s eyes."

"Nikita Krushchev's eagerness to challenge U.S. interests around the world contributed to the spread of the Cold War in the Middle East, East Asia, Latin America, and even Africa. Krushchev's aggressiveness was motivated not only by a desire to take advantage of an opportunity to expand Soviet influence but also by the perceived Soviet need to fend off a growing challenge by China for leadership of the communist movement. Krushchev's willingness to engage the United States in a nuclear arms race was motivated primarily by his realization that the Soviet Union, despite the continuing development of its nuclear arsenal, was still vulnerable to an American nuclear strike. He undoubtedly believed that the best defense is a good offense and that a forward policy would conceal Soviet nuclear weakness while serving to pressure the West to resolve issues, such as Berlin, to the satisfaction of the Soviet Union. Krushchev's aggressiveness also made Soviet-American reconciliation impossible during the 1950s."

"Krushchev's public rhetoric also made Soviet-American reconciliation difficult, if not impossible, early in Kennedy's presidency. On January 6, 1961, the Soviet leader declared his country would support "wars of national liberation" in the underdeveloped world. Krushchev's declaration, wrote the president's confidante and historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., "alarmed Kennedy more than Moscow's amiable signals assuaged him." Although Kennedy was willing to negotiate an end to the Cold War, the Third World challenge which Krushchev threw at him would have to be dealt with first."

"In the opinion of another historian, Bruce Miroff, Kennedy's reaction to Krushchev's blustering revealed an acute inferiority complex, which the president manifested by a perverse need to prove his leadership capabilities. As a result, rather than ignoring or minimizing Krushchev's threats, as Eisenhower usually did, Kennedy personalized them and converted them into tests of will, in the process manufacturing crises that need not have been. "There was really nothing in that Eisenhower] era comparable to the Berlin crisis of 1961 and the Cuban missile crisis of 1962," Miroff observes, both of which represented the closest approaches to a superpower nuclear war during the Cold War. For whatever reasons, whether they were primarily ideological, political, or psychological- and all were important- in formulating his initial response to the Soviet Union Kennedy chose to emphasize Krushchev's bellicose actions rather than his friendly gestures. Only after Kennedy had proved to the Soviet leader that he was not soft on communism would diplomacy make any headway during his presidency."

"Partly to offset America's nuclear superiority, but primarily to deter another U.S.-backed invasion of Cuba, Krushchev decided in early 1962 to deploy on that island nation thirty-six medium-range ballistic missiles (with a range of 2,200 nautical miles). Since the United States had deployed Jupiter IRBMs in Turkey, the Soviet leader had no qualms about trying to do the same thing in Cuba. "It was high time," he recalled thinking in his own memoir, "America learned what it feels like to have her own land and her own people threatened.""

"It is probable that Krushchev also wanted a dramatic way of achieving a breakthrough on the Berlin problem, and perhaps expected that the successful deployment of missiles in Cuba would do much to neutralize U.S. nuclear superiority, thereby enabling him to increase Soviet pressure on that beleaguered city. In addition, some analysts believe, the successful deployment of Soviet missiles in Cuba would distract attention from Krushchev's growing domestic problems, primarily the mediocre performance of Soviet agriculture, and solidify the leadership of the Soviet Union in the international communist movement, which was being increasingly challenged by the Chinese."

"Ironically, the enhanced short-term prestige that Kennedy experienced in the wake of the Cuban missile crisis only produced greater long-term insecurity for his country. The humiliation Krushchev suffered at the hands of Kennedy during the missile crisis contributed to his removal from power in October 1964. The new Soviet leadership, headed by Leonid Brezhnev, was determined to avoid a repetition of the humiliation Krushchev had experienced. Beginning in early 1965, the Kremlin embarked on a massive expansion of the Soviet nuclear arsenal that would enable the Soviet Union to achieve nuclear parity with the United States by the end of the decade."

"Let’s set the record straight. There is no argument over the choice between peace and war, but there is only one guaranteed way you can have peace—and you can have it in the next second—surrender. Admittedly there is a risk in any course we follow other than this, but every lesson in history tells us that the greater risk lies in appeasement, and this is the specter our well-meaning liberal friends refuse to face—that their policy of accommodation is appeasement, and it gives no choice between peace and war, only between fight and surrender. If we continue to accommodate, continue to back and retreat, eventually we have to face the final demand—the ultimatum. And what then? When Nikita Khrushchev has told his people he knows what our answer will be? He has told them that we are retreating under the pressure of the Cold War, and someday when the time comes to deliver the ultimatum, our surrender will be voluntary because by that time we will have weakened from within spiritually, morally, and economically. He believes this because from our side he has heard voices pleading for “peace at any price” or “better Red than dead,” or as one commentator put it, he would rather “live on his knees than die on his feet.” And therein lies the road to war, because those voices don’t speak for the rest of us."

"Both Khrushchëv and his successor Brezhnev asserted that communism around the world outdid the West’s advanced capitalist countries in freedom and welfare. They ignored the point that elections were pointless when a single candidate from one party alone was allowed to stand in them; they glossed over the detention of political, intellectual and religious dissenters in the Gulag. But Soviet leaders were frequently thought to score better on other matters. There was no unemployment in the USSR. Citizens were guaranteed shelter, heating, fuel, schooling, public transport and healthcare at little or no cost. Tourists to the Soviet Union reported that muggings were rare and graffiti scrawls practically unknown; and neon-light advertisements were nowhere to be seen. What is more, Soviet spokesmen castigated racism, imperialism and nationalism. The USSR was a multinational state. Its spokesmen insisted that it had eliminated the iniquities of imperialism, nationalism and racism. Although the European empires dissolved themselves in the 1950s and 1960s, the former colonies continued to face difficulties of economic dependency and under-development. Soviet Azerbaijan was compared favourably with ex-British Nigeria, ex-French Algeria and ex-Dutch Malaysia."

"in January 1961, she (Carol Ruth Silver) saw Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev bang his shoe on the table during his famous address declaring the Soviet Union's support for national liberation struggles in Cuba and Vietnam. Witnessing Khrushchev's historic challenge to U.S. hegemony in international affairs broadened Silver's thinking."

"Even so, the new leadership, among whom Nikita Khrushchev slowly emerged as the head, went ahead with gradually setting free many of those imprisoned in the GULag. While labor camps would continue to exist right up to the end of the Soviet Union, Khrushchev removed them as a key part of the country’s economy, which under Stalin had been completely dependent on prison labor. Hundreds of thousands of prisoners—political protesters, petty thieves, foreign soldiers, those who belonged to the “wrong” nationality, and those many who had no idea why they had been arrested—started to emerge from the camps, and struggled to get home or find a new place in society. These are the people the Russian Nobel laureate Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn immortalized in One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and the process Ilya Ehrenburg called “The Thaw.” But Khrushchev himself later admitted that the new leaders “were scared—really scared. We were afraid that the thaw might unleash a flood, which we wouldn’t be able to control and which would drown us.”"

"The new Soviet leaders understood that some of Stalin’s policies had created the resistance that had boiled to the surface after his death, not just in East Germany but elsewhere as well. But they were also afraid that the East German rebellion could be repeated elsewhere if they were not careful. By late 1953 they had therefore developed what they called a “new course,” which was intent on reform without weakening the Communists’ monopoly on power. The main parts of the reform program were reducing the number of people who were arrested or otherwise excluded from society, amnesty for most political prisoners, cuts in heavy industry and defense industry output, and improvements in the production of food and consumer products."

"It is often said that “the germ of all Stalinism was in Bolshevism at its beginning”. Well, I have no objection. Only, Bolshevism also contained many other germs, a mass of other germs, and those who lived through the enthusiasm of the first years of the first victorious socialist revolution ought not to forget it. To judge the living man by the death germs which the autopsy reveals in the corpse – and which he may have carried in him since his birth – is that very sensible?"

"Revolutionaries knew quite well that the autocratic Empire, with its hangmen, its pogroms, its finery, its famines, its Siberian jails and ancient iniquity, could never survive the war."

"All right, I can see the broken eggs. Now where's this omelette of yours?"

"Never before has so terrible a threat loomed so large and dark over mankind as these days. The only reasonable way out of the existing situation is agreement of the confronting forces on an immediate termination of the race in arms, above all, nuclear arms, on Earth and its prevention in space. An agreement on an honest and equitable basis without attempts at outplaying the other side and dictating terms to it. An agreement which would help all to advance toward the cherished goal: the complete elimination and prohibition of nuclear weapons for good, toward the complete removal of the threat of nuclear war. This is our firm conviction."

"Certain people in the United States are driving nails into this structure of our relationship, then cutting off the heads. So the Soviets must use their teeth to pull them out."

"Democracy is the wholesome and pure air without which a socialist public organization cannot live a full-blooded life."

"For a number of years the deeds and actions of party and government bodies trailed behind the needs of the times and of life. The problems in the country's development built up more rapidly than they were being solved. The inertness and stiffness of the forms and methods of administration, the decline of dynamism in our work and an escalation of bureaucracy - all this was doing no small damage. Signs of stagnation had begun to surface in the life of the society. The situation called for change, but a peculiar psychology - How to improve things without changing anything? - took the upper hand. But that cannot be done, comrades. Stop for an instant, as they say, and you fall behind a mile."

"The accident at Chernobyl showed again what an abyss will open if nuclear war befalls mankind. For inherent in the nuclear arsenals stockpiled are thousands upon thousands of disasters far more horrible than the Chernobyl one."

"The Soviet people want full-blooded and unconditional democracy."

"We are witnessing most profound social change. Whether in the East or the South, the West or the North, hundreds of millions of people, new nations and states, new public movements and ideologies have moved to the forefront of history. Broad-based and frequently turbulent popular movements have given expression, in a multidimensional and contradictory way, to a longing for independence, democracy and social justice. The idea of democratizing the entire world order has become a powerful socio-political force. At the same time, the scientific and technological revolution has turned many economic, food, energy, environmental, information and population problems, which only recently we treated as national or regional ones, into global problems. Thanks to the advances in mass media and means of transportation, the world seems to have become more visible and tangible. International communication has become easier than ever before."

"The [[Berlin Wall|[Berlin] wall]] can disappear when those conditions that created it fall away."

"Dangers await only those who do not react to life."

"Perestroika is an urgent necessity arising from the profound processes of development in our socialist society. This society is ripe for change. It has long been yearning for it. Any delay in beginning perestroika could have led to an exacerbated internal situation in the near future, which, to put it bluntly, would have been fraught with serious social, economic, and political crises."

"If the Russian word "perestroika" has easily entered the international lexicon, this is due to more than just interest in what is going on in the Soviet Union. Now the whole world needs restructuring, i.e. progressive development, a fundamental change."

"Our rockets can find Halley's comet, and fly to Venus with amazing accuracy, but side by side with these scientific and technical triumphs is an obvious lack of efficiency in using scientific achievements for economic needs, and many Soviet household appliances are of poor quality."

"There are different interpretations of perestroika in the West, including the United States. There is the view that it has been necessitated by the disastrous state of the Soviet economy and that it signifies disenchantment with socialism and a crisis for its ideals and ultimate goals. Nothing could be further from the truth than such interpretations, whatever the motives behind them. Of course, perestroika has been largely stimulated by our dissatisfaction with the way things have been going in our country in recent years. But it has to a far greater extent been prompted by an awareness that the potential of socialism had been underutilized. We realize this particularly clearly now in the days of the seventieth anniversary of our Revolution. We have a sound material foundation, a wealth of experience and a broad world outlook with which to perfect our society purposefully and continuously, seeking to gain ever greater returns — in terms of quantity and quality — from all our activities."

"The essence of perestroika lies in the fact that it unites socialism with democracy and revives the Leninist concept of socialist construction both in theory and in practice."

"For all the contradictions of the present-day world, for all the diversity of social and political systems in it, and for all the different choices made by the nations in different times, this world is nevertheless one whole. We are all passengers aboard one ship, the Earth, and we must not allow it to be wrecked. There will be no second Noah's Ark."

"Having conditioned myself for a new political outlook, I could no longer accept in the old way the multi-colored, patchwork-quilt-like political map of Europe. The continent has known more than its share of wars and tears. It has had enough. Scanning the panorama of this long-suffering land and pondering on the common roots of such a multi-form but essentially common European civilization, I felt with growing acuteness the artificiality and temporariness of the bloc-to-bloc confrontation and the archaic nature of the "iron curtain." That was probably how the idea of a common European home came to my mind, and at the right moment this expression sprang from my tongue by itself."

"It is time to consign to oblivion the cold war postulates when Europe was viewed as an arena of confrontation divided into "spheres of influence" and someone else's "forward-based defences", as an object of military confrontation — namely a theatre of war."

"Now it is up to all of us, all the participants in the European process, to make the best possible use of the groundwork laid down through our common efforts. Our idea of a common European home serves the same purpose too. It was born out of our realization of new realities, of our realization of the fact that the linear continuation of the path, along which inter-European relations have developed until the last quarter of the twentieth century, is no longer consonant with these realities. The idea is linked with our domestic economic and political perestroika which called for new relations above all in that part of the world to which we, the Soviet Union, belong, and with which we have been tied most closely over the centuries."

"The social and political order in some particular countries did change in the past, and it can change in the future as well. But this is exclusively a matter for the peoples themselves and of their choice. Any interference in internal affairs, any attempts to limit the sovereignty of states — whether of friends and allies or anybody else — are inadmissible."

"We are convinced that it is high time talks on tactical nuclear systems were initiated among all interested countries. The ultimate objective is to completely eliminate those weapons. Only Europeans who have no intention of waging war against one another are threatened by those weapons. What are they for then and who needs them? Are nuclear arsenals to be eliminated or retained at all costs? Does the strategy of nuclear deterrence enhance or undermine stability? On all these questions the positions of NATO and the Warsaw Pact appear to be diametrically opposed. We, however, are not dramatising our differences. We are looking for solutions and invite our partners to join us in this quest."

"As far as the economic content of the common European home is concerned, we regard as a realistic prospect — though not a close one — the emergence of a vast economic space from the Atlantic to the Urals where Eastern and Western parts would be strongly interlocked. In this sense, the Soviet Union’s transition to a more open economy is essential; and not only for ourselves, for a higher economic effectiveness and for meeting consumer demands. Such a transition will increase East-West economic interdependence and, thus, will tell favorably on the entire spectrum of European relations."

"The market is not an invention of capitalism. It has existed for centuries. It is an invention of civilization."

"I believe, as Lenin said, that this revolutionary chaos may yet crystallize into new forms of life."

"For a new type of progress throughout the world to become a reality, everyone must change. Tolerance is the alpha and omega of a new world order."

"My life’s work has been accomplished. I did all that I could."

"Jesus was the first socialist, the first to seek a better life for mankind."

"We have retreated from the perennial values. I don't think that we need any new values. The most important thing is to try to revive the universally known values from which we have retreated. As a young man, I really took to heart the Communist ideals. A young soul certainly cannot reject things like justice and equality. These were the goals proclaimed by the Communists. But in reality that terrible Communist experiment brought about repression of human dignity. Violence was used in order to impose that model on society. In the name of Communism we abandoned basic human values. So when I came to power in Russia I started to restore those values; values of "openness" and freedom."

"I believe in the cosmos. All of us are linked to the cosmos. Look at the sun. If there is no sun, then we cannot exist. So nature is my god. To me, nature is sacred. Trees are my temples and forests are my cathedrals."

"Preparing for my address I found in an old Russian encyclopedia a definition of "peace" as a "commune" — the traditional cell of Russian peasant life. I saw in that definition the people's profound understanding of peace as harmony, concord, mutual help, and cooperation. This understanding is embodied in the canons of world religions and in the works of philosophers from antiquity to our time."

"Today, peace means the ascent from simple coexistence to cooperation and common creativity among countries and nations. Peace is movement towards globality and universality of civilization. Never before has the idea that peace is indivisible been so true as it is now. Peace is not unity in similarity but unity in diversity, in the comparison and conciliation of differences. And, ideally, peace means the absence of violence. It is an ethical value."

"I see the decision to award me the Nobel Peace Prize also as an act of solidarity with the monumental undertaking which has already placed enormous demands on the Soviet people in terms of efforts, costs, hardships, willpower, and character. And solidarity is a universal value which is becoming indispensable for progress and for the survival of humankind. But a modern state has to be worthy of solidarity, in other words, it should pursue, in both domestic and international affairs, policies that bring together the interests of its people and those of the world community. This task, however obvious, is not a simple one. Life is much richer and more complex than even the most perfect plans to make it better. It ultimately takes vengeance for attempts to impose abstract schemes, even with the best of intentions. Perestroika has made us understand this about our past, and the actual experience of recent years has taught us to reckon with the most general laws of civilization."

"I began my book about perestroika and the new thinking with the following words: "We want to be understood". After a while I felt that it was already happening. But now I would like once again to repeat those words here, from this world rostrum. Because to understand us really — to understand so as to believe us — proved to be not at all easy, owing to the immensity of the changes under way in our country. Their magnitude and character are such as to require in-depth analysis. Applying conventional wisdom to perestroika is unproductive. It is also futile and dangerous to set conditions, to say: We'll understand and believe you, as soon as you, the Soviet Union, come completely to resemble "us", the West. No one is in a position to describe in detail what perestroika will finally produce. But it would certainly be a self-delusion to expect that perestroika will produce "a copy" of anything."

"A period of transition to a new quality in all spheres of society's life is accompanied by painful phenomena. When we were initiating perestroika we failed to properly assess and foresee everything. Our society turned out to be hard to move off the ground, not ready for major changes which affect people's vital interests and make them leave behind everything to which they had become accustomed over many years. In the beginning we imprudently generated great expectations, without taking into account the fact that it takes time for people to realize that all have to live and work differently, to stop expecting that new life would be given from above."

"During the last six years we have discarded and destroyed much that stood in the way of a renewal and transformation of our society. But when society was given freedom it could not recognize itself, for it had lived too long, as it were, "beyond the looking glass". Contradictions and vices rose to the surface, and even blood has been shed, although we have been able to avoid a bloodbath. The logic of reform has clashed with the logic of rejection, and with the logic of impatience which breeds intolerance."

"I have long ago made a final and irrevocable decision. Nothing and no one, no pressure, cither from the right or from the left, will make me abandon the positions of perestroika and new thinking. I do not intend to change my views or convictions. My choice is a final one. It is my profound conviction that the problems arising in the course of our transformations can be solved solely by constitutional means. That is why I make every effort to keep this process within the confines of democracy and reforms."

"Our democracy is being born in pain. A political culture is emerging — one that presupposes debate and pluralism, but also legal order and, if democracy is to work, strong government authority based on one law for all. This process is gaining strength."

"Being resolute today means to act within the framework of political and social pluralism and the rule of law to provide conditions for continued reform and prevent a breakdown of the state and economic collapse, prevent the elements of chaos from becoming catastrophic. All this requires taking certain tactical steps, to search for various ways of addressing both short- and long-term tasks. Such efforts and political and economic steps, agreements based on reasonable compromise, are there for everyone to see."

"After a time of rampant separatism and euphoria, when almost every village proclaimed sovereignty, a centripetal force is beginning to gather momentum, based on a more sensible view of existing realities and the risks involved. And this is what counts most now. There is a growing will to achieve consensus, and a growing understanding that we have a State, a country, a common life. This is what must be preserved first of all."

"The more I reflect on the current world developments, the more I become convinced that the world needs perestroika no less than the Soviet Union needs it."

"To me, it is self-evident that if Soviet perestroika succeeds, there will be a real chance of building a new world order. And if perestroika fails, the prospect of entering a new peaceful period in history will vanish, at least for the foreseeable future. I believe that the movement that we have launched towards that goal has fairly good prospects of success. After all, mankind has already benefited greatly in recent years, and this has created a certain positive momentum."

"The new integrity of the world, in our view, can be built only on the principles of the freedom of choice and balance of interests. Every State, and now also a number of existing or emerging regional interstate groups, have their own interests. They are all equal and deserve respect. We consider it dangerously outdated when suspicions are aroused by, for instance, improved Soviet-Chinese or Soviet-German, German-French, Soviet- US or US-Indian relations, etc. In our times, good relations benefit all. Any worsening of relations anywhere is a common loss."

"Progress towards the civilization of the 21st century will certainly not be simple or easy. One cannot get rid overnight of the heavy legacy of the past or the dangers created in the post-war years. We are experiencing a turning point in international affairs and are only at the beginning of a new, and I hope mostly peaceful, lengthy period in the history of civilization. With less East-West confrontation, or even none at all, old contradictions resurface, which seemed of secondary importance compared to the threat of nuclear war. The melting ice of the Cold War reveals old conflicts and claims, and entirely new problems accumulate rapidly."

"All members of the world community should resolutely discard old stereotypes and motivations nurtured by the Cold War, and give up the habit of seeking each other's weak spots and exploiting them in their own interests. We have to respect the peculiarities and differences which will always exist, even when human rights and freedoms are observed throughout the world. I keep repeating that with the end of confrontation differences can be made a source of healthy competition, an important factor for progress. This is an incentive to study each other, to engage in exchanges, a prerequisite for the growth of mutual trust. For knowledge and trust are the foundations of a new world order."

"I am an optimist and I believe that together we shall be able now to make the right historical choice so as not to miss the great chance at the turn of centuries and millenia and make the current extremely difficult transition to a peaceful world order. A balance of interests rather than a balance of power, a search for compromise and concord rather than a search for advantages at other people's expense, and respect for equality rather than claims to leadership — such are the elements which can provide the groundwork for world progress and which should be readily acceptable for reasonable people informed by the experience of the twentieth century. The future prospect of truly peaceful global politics lies in the creation through joint efforts of a single international democratic space in which States shall be guided by the priority of human rights and welfare for their own citizens and the promotion of the same rights and similar welfare elsewhere. This is an imperative of the growing integrity of the modern world and of the interdependence of its components."

"Have we not been able to cross the threshold of mistrust, though mistrust has not completely disappeared? Has not the political thinking in the world changed substantially? Does not most of the world community already regard weapons of mass destruction as unacceptable for achieving political objectives?"

"I view the award of the Nobel Prize to me as an expression of understanding of my intentions, my aspirations, the objectives of the profound transformation we have begun in our country, and the ideas of new thinking. I see it as your acknowledgment of my commitment to peaceful means of implementing the objectives of perestroika."

"I firmly came out in favor of the independence of nations and sovereignty for the republics. At the same time, I support the preservation of the union state and the integrity of this country. The developments took a different course. The policy prevailed of dismembering this country and disuniting the state, which is something I cannot subscribe to."

"Destiny so ruled that when I found myself at the helm of this state it already was clear that something was wrong in this country. We had a lot of everything - land, oil and gas, other natural resources - and there was intellect and talent in abundance. However, we were living much worse than people in the industrialized countries were living and we were increasingly lagging behind them. The reason was obvious even then. This country was suffocating in the shackles of the bureaucratic command system. Doomed to cater to ideology, and suffer and carry the onerous burden of the arms race, it found itself at the breaking point."

"All the half-hearted reforms - and there have been a lot of them - fell through, one after another. This country was going nowhere and we couldn't possibly live the way we did. We had to change everything radically. It is for this reason that I have never had any regrets that I did not use the capacity of General Secretary just to reign in this country for several years. I would have considered it an irresponsible and immoral decision."

"We're now living in a new world. And end has been put to the cold war and to the arms race, as well as to the mad militarization of the country, which has crippled our economy, public attitudes and morals. The threat of nuclear war has been removed."

"I consider it vitally important to preserve the democratic achievements which have been attained in the last few years. We have paid with all our history and tragic experience for these democratic achievements, and they are not to be abandoned, whatever the circumstances, and whatever the pretexts. Otherwise, all our hopes for the best will be buried."

"On taking office as General Secretary in 1985 I was immediately faced with an avalanche of problems. It was vital to change our relationship with the West, particularly the United States, and to bring the costly and dangerous arms race to an end. We needed to withdraw from the damaging and costly war in Afghanistan. The Soviet Union faced tremendous internal problems. The process of reform required new leadership and courage. Long-term problems needed to be addressed as soon as possible."

"The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power station was graphic evidence, not only of how obsolete our technology was, but also of the failure of the old system. At the same time, and such is the irony of history, it severely affected our reforms by literally knocking the country off its tracks."

"I absolutely reject the accusation that the Soviet leadership intentionally held back the truth about Chernobyl. We simply did not know the whole truth yet."

"The reform of our enormous state indeed demanded decentralization and redistribution of powers between the centre and the regions. But the local elites tried to paint this need in the exaggerated colours of 'national survival'. It worked!"

"The Baltic republics, because of their history and other characteristics, could enjoy special status in the Union. However, the 'sovereignization' of Russia scuttled the search for a new formula for relations with the Baltic republics in a reformed Union. It caused a chain reaction, during which analogous enactments were passed by all of the Union republics and later autonomous republics. A 'parade of sovereignties' had begun. The only means of preventing the collapse of the Union was the preparation without delay of a new Union Treaty."

"The Supreme Soviets of the Republics rejected the Treaty on the Union of Sovereign States, drafted by the USSR State Council under the guidance of the country's President, and swallowed the poisoned fruit of the Belovezh scheme instead. The intelligentsia remained silent. The media were thrown into disarray. My appeals to the deputies of the Supreme Soviet and to the people, my warning that the disintegration of the Soviet Union was fraught with dire consequences, went unheeded - society was bewildered and unable to appraise the crisis. Destructive forces in the country exploited the confusion, usurping the people's right to decide their own future. It was what I had feared most of all."

"Frequently I have heard criticism and even accusations directed against me for my policy towards the countries of Eastern Europe. Some say that Gorbachev did not defend socialism in those countries, that he more or less 'betrayed his friends'. Others, on the contrary, accuse me for having been too patient with Ceaușescu, Honecker, Zhivkov and Husák, who had brought their states to the brink of catastrophe. I firmly reject these accusations. They derive from outdated notions about the nature of relations between our countries. We had no right to interfere in the affairs of our 'satellites', to defend and preserve some and punish and 'excommunicate' others without reckoning with the people's will."

"I find it difficult to say whether the leadership's 'second echelon' could have preserved the German Democratic Republic. Helmut Kohl later told me he had never believed that Egon Krenz was capable of getting the situation under control. I do not know - we are all wiser after the event, as the saying goes. For my part, I must admit I briefly had a faint hope that the new leaders would be able to change the course of events by establishing a new type of relations between the two German states - based on radical domestic reforms in East Germany."

"A German-Russian partnership is a key element in any serious pan-European integration process. It is my ardent wish that Russia and Germany may manage to preserve all the positive achievements of the late 1980s and early 1990s in today's difficult times."

"Political blindness and a narrow-minded vision, fanned by mercenary self-interest, had provoked the actions of the [August Coup] conspirators. The separatists and extreme radicals now possessed the most devastating argument in favour of the break-up of the Union. The leaders of the coup had dislodged the stone that started a landslide."

"As I look back to the events of December 1991, each time I come to the conclusion that I had no right to act differently. To act counter to the decisions made by eleven republics, whose Supreme Soviets approved the Minsk agreement, would have meant to unleash a bloody slaughter, which might have developed into a global catastrophe."

"Perestroika did not give the people prosperity, something they expected of me, as head of state, based on an ingrained, traditional feeling of dependence. But I did not promise that. I urged people to use this new-found freedom to create prosperity, personal and social prosperity, with their own hands and minds, according to the abilities of each."

"In the end, the “model” that came into existence in the USSR was not socialist but totalitarian. This is a serious matter to be reflected on by all who seriously aspire to progress for the benefit of the human race."

"To demonize all Soviet "leaders" at all levels, to portray them as unqualified villains and evildoers, unprincipled self-seeking scoundrels who were indifferent to the interests and needs of the people — that is a shallow and frivolous approach. Of course there were villains, quite a few of them. But most of those who came to power had the intention of serving the "toiling masses" from which they themselves had come. That the system rendered their aspirations useless, reduced their efforts to nothing, and ultimately snuffed out their finer impulses — that is a separate question."

"The aims and ideals of the Soviet revolution inspired the patriotic enthusiasm of millions of people in the 1930s, during World War II, and in the postwar reconstruction period. This explains the Soviet Union's great leap forward, the achievement of a high level of industrial capacity in a very short time, the transformation of the Soviet Union into a major power in terms of science and culture. The historic victory in the Great Patriotic War against Nazism, which was a surprise not only for Hitler but also for the Western democracies is also explained by what we have said above. All this is true. But the historical truth is also that the regime and the system abused the faith of the people in these high ideals, turning them to its own advantage. Rule by the people, equality, justice, and the promise of a happy future — all these ideas were utilized for the sake of maintaining and strengthening totalitarianism."

"The reforms of the perestroika era were aimed at a qualitative renewal of society and at overcoming the totalitarian structure blocking the road to democracy. Fundamental reforms were begun under very complex conditions, but they were cut short by the August coup attempt and the Belovezh agreement that dissolved the Soviet Union."

"The dissolution of the Union radically changed the situation in Europe and the world, disrupted the geopolitical balance, and undermined the possibility of carrying further many positive processes that were under way in world politics by the end of 1991. I am convinced that the world today would be living more peacefully if the Soviet Union - of course in a renewed and reformed version - had continued to exist."

"Preservation, renewal, and reform of the Union was my main political and, if you will, moral task in my position as president of the USSR. I consider it my greatest sorrow and misfortune that I did not succeed in preserving the country as a single whole. All my efforts were focused on trying to preserve that unity. Incidentally, more and more statements are heard today, including some by participants in the Belovezh accord, that the "soft form of Union Gorbachev proposed" might have protected our nations and nationalities from painful experiences. But, as the saying goes, the train has already left the station."

"I began to feel the desire for something more; I wanted to do something to make things better."

"If what you have done yesterday still looks big to you, you haven't done much today."

"With Yeltsin, the Soviet Union broke apart, the country was totally mismanaged, the constitution was not respected by the regions of Russia. The army, education and health systems collapsed. People in the West quietly applauded, dancing with and around Yeltsin. I conclude therefore that we should not pay too much attention to what the West is saying."

"The Soviet Union could have been preserved and should have been preserved. ... I wanted to decentralize the Soviet Union and give the maximum amount of rights to the republics as guaranteed under the constitution, while preserving in the center the most important functions such as defense, diplomacy, coordination."

"Initially, we were under illusions that we could make the system work. But as early as the fall of 1986, all of us had to start shedding those illusions. We had talked of perestroika (restructuring) but nothing was changing. ... But change was not easy. Even new politicians resisted change because they were used to central planning. By 1988 we decided we needed political reform: free elections, the separation of powers, a multiparty system, recognition of market economics as a necessary tool to modernize our society and to create incentives within the economic system."

"The Chernobyl disaster, more than anything else, opened the possibility of much greater freedom of expression, to the point that the system as we knew it could no longer continue. It made absolutely clear how important it was to continue the policy of glasnost, and I must say that I started to think about time in terms of pre-Chernobyl and post-Chernobyl."

"Americans have a severe disease — worse than AIDS. It's called the winner's complex."

"I express the very deepest condolences to the family of the deceased on whose shoulders rest major events for the good of the country and serious mistakes."

"We had 10 years after the Cold War to build a new world order and yet we squandered them. The United States cannot tolerate anyone acting independently. Every US president has to have a war."

"You have to consider that Reagan was twenty years older than I was. He was the age of my mother. So there was a generation gap. During one of our talks, he tried to lecture me and moralize. I said to him, "Mr. President, you are not my teacher, and I am not your student. You are not a prosecutor, and I am not a defendant. So let's not subject each other to lectures. Let's talk frankly and address the issues. If you want to lecture, we might as well wrap it up, because there's really nothing to talk about." He got a little upset. Not long after that, he said, "Why don't we go on a first-name basis? You call me Ron and I'll call you Mikhail." That was an important step."

"The day after I announced that I was stepping down, I was scheduled to come to the Kremlin for an interview with a Japanese reporter. I got a call beforehand from one of my assistants, who said that Yeltsin was in my office with his entourage, finishing off a bottle of whiskey. These people were almost like savages, celebrating their big victory over a bottle in my office. I told myself: That office has been desecrated. I will never set foot in that room again."

"We desperately need to recognise that we are the guests, not the masters, of nature and adopt a new paradigm for development, based on the costs and benefits to all people, and bound by the limits of nature herself rather than the limits of technology and consumerism."

"I was probably too liberal and democratic as regards Yeltsin. I should have sent him as ambassador to Great Britain or maybe a former British colony."

"In 1954 transfer of Crimea, when Crimea were part of the Soviet Union, the Crimean people had not been asked at the time, whereas in the 2014 referendum they had."

"In the summer of 1989, neither Helmut Kohl nor I anticipated ... that everything would happen so fast. We didn’t expect the wall to come down in November. And by the way, we both admitted that later. I don’t claim to be a prophet. This happens in history: it accelerates its progress. It punishes those who are late. But it has an even harsher punishment for those who try to stand in its way. It would have been a big mistake to hold onto the Iron Curtain. That is why we didn’t put any pressure on the government of the GDR. When events started to develop at a speed that no one expected, the Soviet leadership unanimously – and I want to stress “unanimously” – decided not to interfere in the internal processes that were under way in the GDR, not to let our troops leave their garrisons under any circumstances. I am confident to this day that it was the right decision."

"As long as weapons of mass destruction exist, primarily nuclear weapons, the danger is colossal. All nations should declare... that nuclear weapons must be destroyed. This is to save ourselves and our planet."

"We created perestroika to lead the country out of a dead end. In order for the state and economy to flourish, we needed good relations not just with our neighbors, but with the entire world. We didn't need the Iron Curtain. We wanted to get rid of the wall of mistrust between East and West - and all other walls, for that matter, between states, groups of people and individuals."

"United States "grew arrogant and self-confident" after the collapse of the Soviet Union, resulting in "a new empire. Hence the idea of NATO expansion"."

"What we need today is precisely this: political will. We need another level of leadership, collective leadership, of course. I want to be remembered as an optimist. Let us assimilate the lessons of the 20th century in order to rid the world of this legacy in the 21st – the legacy of militarism, violence against the peoples and nature, and weapons of mass destruction of all types."

"Some of my critics reproach me to this day for not having insisted on a legally binding stipulation [in 1990] that would have prevented NATO from expanding into Eastern Europe in the future. But such a demand would have been absurd, even preposterous, because the Warsaw Pact still existed at the time. We would have been accused of destroying it with our own hands."

"The mutual trust that emerged with the end of the Cold War was severely shaken a few years later by NATO's decision to expand to the east. Russia had no option but to draw its own conclusions from that."

"Nuclear weapons are like a rifle hanging on the wall in a play. We did not write the play, we are not staging it and we do not know what the author intends. Anyone could take the rifle from the wall at any time."

"When I rose to the leadership of the USSR and looked into the situation of nuclear disarmament negotiations, I was baffled. Negotiations were taking place, diplomats and military officials were meeting regularly. They gave speeches to each other, hundreds of litres of beverages of various strengths were consumed at receptions, and meanwhile the arms race continued, arsenals increased and nuclear testing carried on. There was a terrible inertia, a vicious cycle it was impossible to escape. In the second half of the 1980s, the political leadership of both the USSR and the USA came to the realization that all of this could not go on indefinitely. I see here a parallel to the motto of perestroika: "We can no longer continue to live this way." Despite all the differences of opinion in my discussions on specific issues with Ronald Reagan and Secretary of State George Shultz, we agreed that the nuclear arms race not only had to be stopped, it had to be reversed."

"As president, I fought for the unity of the country until the very end. I fought by political means – it is important to emphasize this – and I tried to win over Soviet citizens and my colleagues, the leaders of the Union republics. Even today, I believe that the integrity of the country could have been preserved and that a new Union was in everyone's interest. But the coup weakened my position, and the leadership of Russia, the largest republic of the USSR, under Boris Yeltsin decided to dissolve the Soviet Union instead. The country fell apart, the state collapsed."

"Perhaps I lost as a politician, perhaps my self-confidence played a trick on me because I did not recognize the double threat – from zealots and radicals, and from reactionaries in my immediate surroundings. Nonetheless, perestroika won. A relapse into the past is out of the question."

"My ambition was to liquidate communism, the dictatorship over all the people. Supporting me and urging me on in this mission was my wife, who was of this opinion long before I was. I knew that I could only do this if I was the leading functionary. In this my wife urged me to climb to the top post. While I actually became acquainted with the West, my mind was made up forever. I decided that I must destroy the whole apparatus of the CPSU and the USSR. Also, I must do this in all of the other socialist countries. My ideal is the path of social democracy. Only this system shall benefit all the people. This quest I decided I must fulfil."

"And now, the Soviets themselves may, in a limited way, be coming to understand the importance of freedom. We hear much from Moscow about a new policy of reform and openness. Some political prisoners have been released. Certain foreign news broadcasts are no longer being jammed. Some economic enterprises have been permitted to operate with greater freedom from state control. Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state? Or are they token gestures, intended to raise false hopes in the West, or to strengthen the Soviet system without actually changing it? We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace. General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!"

"Whatever his reasons, Gorbachev had the intelligence to admit Communism was not working, the courage to battle for change, and, ultimately, the wisdom to introduce the beginnings of democracy, individual freedom, and free enterprise. As I said at the Brandenburg Gate in 1987, the Soviet Union faced a choice: Either it made fundamental changes or it became obsolete. Gorbachev saw the handwriting on the Wall and opted for change."

"Although Mikhail Gorbachev is a man of quite outstanding talent and ability, he insisted recently that the story of his own family is actually history itself or in other words the history of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev is in fact a child of the revolution and the world war, of Lenin's, Stalin's, Khrushchev's and Breshnev's Soviet Union. And like most people in this world he is a product of the society in which he grew up. Today, this Soviet society is a historical experiment which is being shaken to its foundations, and this is so not least because Mikhail Gorbachev was also capable of breaking the mould of the society from which he sprang. Or as he personally expressed it in the televised interview, in which he spoke of the perestroika which he symbolises: "We came to the conclusion that we could no longer continue to live the way we were. We needed major changes in every department of life.""

"Increased openness, was perhaps the most profound change inaugurated by Mr. Gorbachev. The buried secrets of past regimes and the foibles of the present one were exposed to public scrutiny by a press given freedom to reverse decades of organized disinformation and report honestly about Soviet history and life. By permitting increased openness in the press and in cultural endeavors, he also freed the minds of the Soviet people, who began to voice their long-suppressed thoughts."

"The greatest changes in the world today are those taking place in the Soviet Union and eastern Europe. The reforms undertaken by Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev in the name of glasnost and perestroika, along with the turn toward a more open and pluralist social, economic, and political order in Poland and Hungary, are causes for rejoicing by socialists. I do not believe that they are the omens of the final and inevitable triumph of capitalism, as so often proclaimed in the American media. Gorbachev along with other reform-minded leaders in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe have returned to the project to construct a "socialism with a human face" that the Czechoslovakian Communist Party was forced to abandon in 1968... Gorbachev has made a brave start toward genuine reform. At the same time it would only be repeating the mistakes of the past to fashion around him a new "cult of personality." He is neither infallible nor omniscient, and there will always be a need for independent and critical assessments by both Soviet citizensand glasnost's foreign well-wishers."

"He clearly did not foresee (nor did any of us) how quickly and dangerously things would fall apart in Russia once the strong disciplinary hand of the Party was relaxed. What he did in destroying the old system was a great historic service to Russia and the world. And nobody else could have done it. But he is not a good politician in the democratic sense. He has no adequate inter-action with the people at large. Yeltsin, not an intellectual but quite intelligent, is far ahead of him in these respects."

"There is a saying in Russian that a czar whom no one fears is no czar. We have seen the extent to which Gorbachev was no czar; people did not know whether this was good or bad, because according to their tradition, a leader is someone you fear. Gorbachev was an out-and-out facilitator. He facilitated the passage from the centralism of communism to the Commonwealth of Independent States, for better or worse, and he did it without the shedding of one drop of blood. It is almost certain that no charismatic leader could have accomplished such a swift revolution without leaving hundreds of thousands dead in the streets."

"Gorbachev knew what his problems were but he acted both too fast and too slowly: too fast for the tolerance of his system, and too slowly to arrest the accelerating collapse."

"The U.S.S.R. is at a crossroads. If pressing economic and social problems are not alleviated in the near future, further erosion in its economic system is inevitable, thus endangering, in the long term, its very survival. . . . Gorbachev has definitely initiated a new style . . . But whether his stewardship will open a new era for the U.S.S.R. remains to be seen. . . . He faces problems that are almost insurmountable."

"By the time Reagan entered the White House, the Soviet economy had sunk into such a state of stagnation that it was obvious that communism had failed and a radically new approach was required. No one realized this more than Mikhail Gorbachev. Even though there never was much likelihood that SDI would render Soviet missiles ineffective, he nevertheless was obliged to take seriously America's technological potential and the strategic impact of even an imperfect defense. He also realized that the Soviet Union had insufficient economic strength to compete with the United States in another technological arms race. Nor could the Soviet Union continue to expend its resources competing with the United States in the Third World. Pressed by his country's economic weakness and alarmed by the increasing risks of a nuclear war, Gorbachev was more than willing to attempt to end the Cold War. Its resolution would enable him to reduce his country's expensive military establishment as well as obtain badly needed economic assistance from the West. Accordingly, Gorbachev changed the ideological content and declared goals of Soviet foreign policy and moved away from the concept of international class war toward a vision of peace and cooperation with the West."

"For the first time since the Cold War began the U.S.S.R. had a ruler who did not seem sinister, boorish, unresponsive, senile—or dangerous. Gorbachev was "intelligent, well-educated, dynamic, honest, with ideas and imagination," one of his closest advisers, Anatoly Chernyaev, noted in his private diary. "Myths and taboos (including ideological ones) are nothing for him. He could flatten any of them." When a Soviet citizen congratulated him early in 1987 for having replaced a regime of "stonefaced sphinxes," Gorbachev proudly published the letter. What would replace the myths, taboos, and sphinxes, however, was less clear. Gorbachev knew that the Soviet Union could not continue on its existing path, but unlike John Paul II, Deng, Thatcher, Reagan, and Wałęsa, he did not know what the new path should be. He was at once vigorous, decisive, and adrift: he poured enormous energy into shattering the status quo without specifying how to reassemble the pieces. As a consequence, he allowed circumstances—and often the firmer views of more far-sighted contemporaries—to determine his own priorities. He resembled, in this sense, the eponymous hero of Woody Allen's movie Zelig, who managed to be present at all the great events of his time, but only by taking on the character, even the appearance, of the stronger personalities who surrounded him."

"Mr. President, you did a great thing. You gave up your post as general secretary of the Soviet Union, but now you have become the president of peace. Because of your wisdom and courage, we now have the possibility to bring world peace. You did the most important, eternal, and beautiful thing for the world. You are the hero of peace who did God's work. The name that will be remembered forever in the history of Russia will not be "Marx," or "Lenin," or "Stalin." it will be "Mikhail Gorbachev.""

"President Gorbachev’s achievements were truly great and historic. Not only did he dissolve the Soviet Union more or less peacefully, but he also prevented a major civil war that could have escalated into a nuclear conflict. I sincerely hope that historians in the future will honor the major achievements and statesmanship of President Gorbachev and of the other leading Soviet politicians of that time."

"Few Soviet citizens lamented Gorbachëv’s going. His policies had ruined the economy and smashed the state into fragments. His critics showed him no mercy. This was ungenerous of them since without his introduction of glasnost and perestroika they could never have had the opportunity to calumniate him. Abroad, he was better respected. His disinclination to halt the decommunisation of eastern Europe by force was widely admired. His primary role in the ending of the Cold War was rightly esteemed. There had been many times when a different General Secretary would have called upon the armed forces and the KGB and reversed the reform programme. Yet the verdict on him has to take account of his inability to understand the nature of the Soviet order. He had genuinely believed that the USSR could be reformed and still remain communist. He had a passion for a democratic, humanitarian Lenin who had never existed in history."

"After his arrival in Moscow from Stavropol in 1978, Mikhail Gorbachev quickly became one of the Politburo's most active members and caught the eye of Andropov as a fellow reformer and likely successor. In nominating him to succeed the Brezhnev loyalist Chernenko, Gromyko praised the new leader's "unquenchable energy" and commitment to "put the interests of the Party, society, and people before his own." Young, well-educated, articulate, and backed by the party and military chiefs, Gorbachev accepted a mandate in March 1985 to reform and strengthen the Soviet Union and to "realize our shining future." Nevertheless, during his first two years Gorbachev's domestic policies were erratic and largely ineffective. Without challenging the centerpiece of the Soviet regime- the planned economy- or its outsized military budget, the new general secretary and his political allies launched the politically damaging anticorruption and antialcoholism campaigns and also made futile attempts to boost industrial production and labor discipline. On February 25, 1986, thirty years after Krushchev had exposed Stalin's misdeeds, Gorbachev promoted his perestroika (reconstruction) policy before the Twenty-Seventh Party Congress. Unlike the mix of reforms occurring concurrently in China, which allowed decentralization and focused on agriculture and light industry as the motors of modernization, Gorbachev's was a top-down centralized program emphasizing heavy industry and maintaining many of the macroeconomic aspects of the Stalinist command system. It failed to alleviate the bottlenecks and shortages of the Soviet economy."

"Gorbachev's political views were more audacious. Unlike Deng Xiaoping, who, after the chaos of the Cultural Revolution, was obsessed with stability and ruled out democratic reforms, Gorbachev linked perestroika with a policy of glasnost (openness). Taking aim at the USSR's encrusted ruling party and bureaucracy, Gorbachev adopted a stillborn project of Andropov's to reduce their power by introducing new- even Western- ideas into the Soviet environment and engaging the Soviet population in modernizing the country. He went so far as to authorize the opening of the records of Soviet history, including its darkest moments, which ignited an explosion of criticism reaching back to Lenin's rule. To be sure, Gorbachev's purpose was to preserve the communist system by revitalizing it from above, but by combining perestroika with glasnost the Soviet leader risked unleashing forces he was ultimately unable to control. Gorbachev was even more daring in his foreign policy because he believed that the relaxation of international tensions was indispensable to his political reforms at home. Convinced that the Soviet Union's greatest threat was nuclear war but that its huge military budget was unsupportable, he intended to achieve security by scaling down the global rivalry between Moscow and Washington and reviving détente. After assembling a group of like-minded liberal internationalists, among them the new foreign minister, Eduard Shevardnadze, and his foreign policy adviser, Anatoly Chernyaev, Gorbachev boldly embarked on a step-by-step program of reducing the USSR's isolation and reaching out to the other side, which included Western Europe, Japan, and China as well as the United States."

"Gorbachev faced a wary Western audience, which he had hoped to woo with vows to end the arms race. Before taking office, during his December 1984 visit to Britain, he had referred to Europe as "a common home... and not a theater of military operations" and had convinced Thatcher that he was a man with whom the West could "do business." But the Reagan administration, facing unexpectedly strong congressional opposition to its military budget, was unreceptive to the new leader's message and intensified its charges of the Soviets' untrustworthiness and deplorable human rights record. Nonetheless, in a private message Reagan expressed interest in a summit meeting and assured Gorbachev of his hope to resume the search for "mutual understanding and peaceful development." The US and Soviet leaders met in Geneva in November 1985. At this first Superpower summit in six years, no treaty was signed, but the two-day meeting gave Reagan and Gorbachev an opportunity to evaluate each other and air their differences. Although they jointly declared that "a nuclear war can never be won and must never be fought" and agreed to accelerate work on nuclear arms control, Reagan defended SDI and Gorbachev refused to expand the agenda to include Afghanistan and human rights."

"Refusing to abandon his peace offensive, Gorbachev produced more surprises. Intent on rehabilitating the Soviet Union's reputation in world public opinion, he initiated major breakthroughs in human rights, beginning with the February 1986 freeing of the famed Jewish political prisoner Natan Sharansky. On December 19, 1986, Gorbachev personally phoned the dissident Andrei Sakharov to inform him of his release from his Gorki exile. One month later the Soviets ceased jamming the BBC, the Voice of America, and West Germany's Deutsche Welle broadcasts and lifted the censorship of banned books, such as Boris Pasternak's Dr. Zhivago. The KGB reduced the number of arrests for political crimes, and the government released almost all political dissidents and allowed greater religious freedom and freedom of expression. In 1987 the number of Jews granted exit visas rose to almost eight thousand from fewer than one thousand the year before. Still, Reagan was skeptical over the Soviet leader and hammered away at the "evil empire." During his June 1987 visit to celebrate Berlin's 750th anniversary, the president, standing in front of the Brandenburg Gate, urged Gorbachev to "tear down this wall" that surrounded West Berlin. Both leaders continued to express support for arms control, but it was Gorbachev, by suspending his objections to SDI and removing strategic-weapon reductions from the negotiations, who made a breakthrough treaty on intermediate-range nuclear forces (INF) possible. In 1981 Reagan had overridden NATO's Double-Track Decision by proposing the "zero option" (removing all missiles from Europe) which Moscow, predictably, had refused. The talks, suspended by Andropov in 1983, now resumed."

"Gorbachev's most impressive moment was still to come. On December 7, 1988, in his address to the UN general assembly, he declared the end of the Cold War, renouncing not only the 1945 Yalta settlement but also the ideological struggle between the Soviet Union and the West since November 1917. According to the Soviet leader, the Bolshevik revolution had entered the realm of history, and class conflict would no longer dominate global politics. "We are entering an era in which progress will be based on the common interests of the whole of mankind... The common values of humanity must be the determining priority in international politics, [requiring] the freeing of international relations from ideology." Gorbachev also repudiated the Brezhnev doctrine: "Force or the threat of force neither can nor should be the instruments of foreign policy... To deny a nation freedom of choice, regardless of the pretext or the verbal guise in which it is cloaked, is to upset the unstable balance that has been achieved... Freedom of choice is a universal principal, which knows no exception." Gorbachev's third point was to pronounce a new reality in the arms race: given the unlikelihood of a Superpower conflict, the principle of stockpiling arms was to be replaced with one of "reasonable sufficiency." To make this clear, he announced a unilateral cut of five hundred thousand men from the Soviet army and a withdrawal of fifty thousand soldiers and five thousand tanks from the Soviet forces in Eastern Europe, and he proposed negotiations on even greater reductions. One day later, during his private New York meeting with the outgoing Reagan and the new US president George H.W. Bush, Gorbachev pressed for rapid progress in arms control leading to the complete abolition of nuclear weapons."

"Thus within three years the former Andropov protege had totally transformed Soviet foreign policy, replacing its messianic Marxist creed with a radical internationalism. Among the strongest reactions was the New York Times, whose December 8 editorial stated: "Perhaps not since Woodrow Wilson presented his Fourteen Points in 1918 or since Franklin Roosevelt has a world figure demonstrated the vision Mikhail Gorbachev displayed yesterday at the United Nations." A number of scholars believe that the Cold War ended in December 1988 with neither a winner nor a loser. According to this view, one of the Superpowers simply called off the ideological rivalry that had begun in 1917, withdrew from the post-1945 arms race, and relinquished control over regimes dependent on Soviet force and economic subsidies for their survival. Although not everyone agrees, it is certainly reasonable to assert that without Gorbachev's bold international agenda the world may well have remained divided into two armed camps, and the events that followed would have had entirely different outcomes."

"The story goes back more than three decades to the fall of the Berlin Wall and eventual re-unification of Germany. At the time, the Soviet Union had some 380,000 troops in what was then the German Democratic Republic, or East Germany. Those forces were there as part of the treaty ending World War II, and the Soviets were concerned that removing them could end up threatening the USSR’s borders. The Russians have been invaded — at terrible cost — three times in a little more than a century. So in the early 1990s, West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, U.S. Secretary of State James Baker, and Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev cut a deal. The Soviets agreed to withdraw troops from Eastern Europe as long as NATO didn’t fill the vacuum, or recruit members of the Soviet-dominated Warsaw Pact. Baker promised Gorbachev that NATO would not move “one inch east.” The agreement... was followed in practice. NATO stayed west of the Oder and Neisse rivers separating Germany and Poland, and Soviet troops returned to Russia... But President Bill Clinton blew that all up in 1999, when the U.S. and NATO intervened in the civil war between Serbs and Albanians over the Serbian province of Kosovo. Behind the new American doctrine of “responsibility to protect,” NATO opened a massive 11-week bombing campaign against Serbia... From Moscow’s point of view, the war was unnecessary. The Serbs were willing to withdraw their troops and restore Kosovo’s autonomous status. But NATO demanded a large occupation force that would be immune from Serbian law, something the nationalist-minded Serbs would never agree to. It was virtually the same provocative language the Austrian-Hungarian Empire had presented to the Serbs in 1914, language that set off World War I... But NATO didn’t stop there..."

"The crucial question...what is NATO for? ...From the beginning.. we had drilled into our heads that the purpose of NATO was to defend us from the Russian hordes... OK, 1991, no more Russian hordes. There were negotiations, between George Bush, the first; James Baker, secretary of state; Mikhail Gorbachev; Genscher and Kohl, the Germans, on how to deal... after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the beginning of the collapse of the Soviet Union. Gorbachev... agreed to allow Germany, now unified, to join NATO... There was a quid pro quo, namely that... NATO means basically U.S. forces—not expand to East Berlin, to East Germany... the phrase that was used was “not one inch to the east.” NATO immediately moved to East Germany. Under Clinton, other countries, former Russian satellites, were introduced into NATO. Finally, NATO went so far, as I mentioned before... to suggest that even Ukraine, right at the heartland of Russian strategic concerns...join NATO. So, what’s NATO doing altogether? Well, actually, its mission was changed. The official mission of NATO was changed to become to be—to control and safeguard the global energy system, sea lanes, pipelines and so on. And, of course, on the side, it’s acting as a intervention force for the United States. Is that a legitimate reason for us to maintain NATO, to be an instrument for U.S. global domination? I think that’s a rather serious question. That’s not the question that’s asked."

"The promises given to President Mikhail Gorbachev by President George H. W. Bush, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, President Francois Mitterand, Chancellor Helmuth Kohl and their foreign ministers in 1990—not to expand NATO eastward; not to extend membership in the NATO alliance to former member states of the Warsaw Pact—were ignored... In the 1990s, the Russian threat was nonexistent and there was no reason to suppose it would return. In addition, President Clinton and the Senators who were nominally in charge of overseeing the conduct of U.S. Foreign and Security Policy were mesmerized by the prospects of being on the right side of history and campaign donations. Given the voracious appetite for cash in Congress the defense industriess were clearly interested in NATO expansion and found ways to advocate for it. Weapons sales to East European nations invited to join NATO promised huge profits. Bruce Jackson, a Lockheed vice president from 1993–2002, rushed to set up the Committee to Expand NATO and reportedly used contributions from defense companies to lobby Congress for NATO expansion."

"The wall had come down...Germany was reunifying. The question became ‘where would a united Germany be?’ The West wanted Germany in NATO. For Gorbachev, this was an impossible sell. Twenty-seven point five million Soviet citizens had died in the war against Germany in the Second World War on the eastern front. Contrary to the bunk we’re told, the United States didn’t land on Normandy and defeat Nazi Germany. The defeat of Nazi Germany was done primarily by the Soviet army."

"How could Gorbachev go home and say, ‘Germany is reunited. Great. And it’s going to be in NATO.’ It was impossible. They told Gorbachev, ‘We promise if you agree to a reunited Germany in NATO, NATO will not move—this was Secretary of State James Baker—one inch to the east. In other words, NATO would not move from Germany toward Russia. And it did... As we speak today, NATO is on Russia’s borders,' Every Western leader promised Gorbachev NATO would not move eastward.”"

"The former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has warned that current tension between Russia and the West is putting the world in "colossal danger" due to the threat from nuclear weapons. In an interview with the BBC's Steve Rosenberg, former President Gorbachev called for all countries to declare that nuclear weapons should be destroyed."

"Q: You recently said, not referring to socialism in general but to the USSR in particular, that socialism had been assassinated, stabbed in the back. In this conspiracy of daggers that killed socialism, would you say Gorbachev was one of the assassins? A: No, I could not say that about Gorbachev because I have another view of Gorbachev and it is not one of an assassin who plotted the USSR's destruction. The USSR self-destructed in an incredible way. The responsibility for that self-destruction undoubtedly lies in the hands of the country's leaders, those who led that nation. Now, some of them were aware they were destroying it and others were not. That is what I was trying to say, more or less, and we saw it all from the beginning. I cannot say Gorbachev played a role in which he was aware of the destruction of the USSR because I have no doubt that Gorbachev intended to fight to improve socialism."

"[On trying to preserve glasnost (openness and transparency)] Years later, Gorbachev wanted to preserve this part of his legacy. In 2008, in coöperation with the independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta, Gorbachev formed a working group to try to create a museum of Stalinist terror. As General Secretary, he said, he had received full access to the archives. This was when he had learned that terror had been truly random, that people had been arrested and executed not for any wrongdoing, nor on suspicion of wrongdoing, nor even on specious accusation of wrongdoing, but simply because every local law-enforcement entity had to fill its quota of arrests and executions. He had also learned that at the height of the terror, when thousands of people were executed every day, Soviet leaders had signed off on these executions by the page—with dozens of names per page. Gorbachev, who had created a commission that ultimately reviewed millions of cases from the Stalin era and repealed hundreds of thousands of guilty verdicts, seemed to shudder in disbelief as he talked about the things he had learned. Here was another quality that set him apart from any Soviet leader before him: he could be shaken."

"[I]t soon became clear that the museum Gorbachev wanted to build could not exist in Vladimir Putin's Russia."

"Gorbachev was a leader whose rule brought "absolute sadness, misfortune and problems" for "all the peoples of our country"."

"Gorbachev was a politician and statesman who had a huge impact on the course of world history."

"You must remember that we persecute nobody for religion. We regard religion as an error and fight it with education."

"The national question is purely a peasant question...the best way to eliminate nationality is a massive factory with thousands of workers..., which like a millstone grinds up all nationalities and forges a new nationality. This nationality is the universal proletariat."

"The Jews will become socialist colonisers with strong fists and sharp teeth, a strong national group within the Soviet family of nations."

"For thousands of years humankind's finest minds have been struggling with the theoretical problem of finding the forms that would give peoples the possibility, without the greatest of torment, without internecine strife, of living side by side in friendship and brotherhood. Practically speaking, the first step in this direction is only being taken now, today."

"But even now, after the greatest victory known to history we cannot for one minute forget the basic fact that our country remains the one socialist state in the world. You will speak frankly about this to the collective farmers...Only the most concrete, most immediate danger, which threatened us from Hitlerite Germany, has disappeared."

"The whole history of my life, and in essence the whole history of the working class consists of this: that we have lived and fought under the leadership of Lenin and Stalin."

"These [traits] are first: love, love for his people, love for the working masses...Second, honesty...Third, courage...Fourth, comradely solidarity...Fifth, love for labor. Not only love but an honest attitude to labor, firmly bearing in mind that if a man lives, eats and does not work, this means that he eats someone else's labor."

"The contingencies of the moment may justify the omission of certain conveniences in the building of temporary accommodations."

"If you are called upon to govern humans, treat them humanely."

"The revolutionary despises public opinion. He despises and hates the existing social morality in all its manifestations. For him, morality is everything which contributes to the triumph of the revolution. Immoral and criminal is everything that stands in its way."

"Tyrannical towards himself, he must be tyrannical towards others. All the gentle and enervating sentiments of kind ship, love, friendship, gratitude and even honor must be suppressed in him and give place to the cold and single minded passion for revolution."

"The revolutionary can have no friendship or attachment, except for those who have proved by their actions that they, like him, are dedicated to revolution."

"The revolutionary enters the world of the State, of the privileged classes, of the so-called civilization, and he lives in this world only for the purpose of bringing about its speedy and total destruction. He is not a revolutionary if he has any sympathy for this world. He should not hesitate to destroy any position, any place, or any man in this world. He must hate everyone and everything in it with an equal hatred. All the worse for him if he has any relations with parents, friends, or lovers; he is no longer a revolutionary if he is swayed by these relationships."

"The women who are completely on our side – i.e., those who are wholly dedicated and who have accepted our program in its entirety. We should regard these women as the most valuable or our treasures; without their help, we would never succeed."

"The Society has no aim other than the complete liberation and happiness of the masses – i.e., of the people who live by manual labor. Convinced that their emancipation and the achievement of this happiness can only come about as a result of an all-destroying popular revolt, the Society will use all its resources and energy toward increasing and intensifying the evils and miseries of the people until at last their patience is exhausted and they are driven to a general uprising."

"By a revolution, the Society does not mean an orderly revolt according to the classic western model – a revolt which always stops short of attacking the rights of property and the traditional social systems of so-called civilization and morality. Until now, such a revolution has always limited itself to the overthrow of one political form in order to replace it by another, thereby attempting to bring about a so-called revolutionary state. The only form of revolution beneficial to the people is one which destroys the entire State to the roots and exterminated all the state traditions, institutions, and classes in Russia."

"Our task is terrible, total, universal, and merciless destruction."

"Therefore, in drawing closer to the people, we must above all make common cause with those elements of the masses which, since the foundation of the state of Muscovy, have never ceased to protest, not only in words but in deeds, against everything directly or indirectly connected with the state: against the nobility, the bureaucracy, the clergy, the traders, and the parasitic kulaks. We must unite with the adventurous tribes of brigands, who are the only genuine revolutionaries in Russia."

"To weld the people into one single unconquerable and all-destructive force – this is our aim, our conspiracy, and our task."

"In revolutionary circles, the word Nechaevism was long to be a term of harsh condemnation, a synonym for risky and reprehensible methods of attaining revolutionary goals. Lenin was to hear himself accused hundreds of times of ‘Nechaevist’ methods by his opponents."

"He [Nechaev] was, in short, a Bolshevik before the Bolsheviks."

"Its twenty-six articles [of Nechaev’s Revolutionary Catechism], setting out the principles of the professional revolutionary, might have served as the Bolshevik oath. [Only might?] The morals of that party owed much to Nechaev as they did to Marx."

"If they were real men, following the tradition they would commit a hara-kiri and calm down at last. All they're doing is making noise"

"After analyzing the sanctions against our space industry, I suggest that the USA bring their astronauts to the International Space Station using a trampoline."

"Crimea is ours. Basta."

"If these are "peaceful protests" then Ashton is a ballerina at the Bolshoi Theatre."

"Every former w. who has aged wants to give lectures about morals, especially during tours and gigs abroad…"

"The whole criminal world is in Parliament!"

"There is stud "Khrenovskoy" in my former constituency and that stud is older than all of the United States, older than America. Naturally, that's why we have archaic views."

"…They are countries that were formerly part of either the Soviet Union or Warsaw Pact. We call them NATO's Komsomol."

"Tremble, bourgeoisie! You're screwed. :)"

"Upon US request, Romania has closed its airspace for my plane. Ukraine doesn't allow me to pass through again. Next time I'll fly on board TU-160."

"The answer to Maidan comes from the South-East (Novorossiya) in the form of anti-fascist resistance and struggle for national liberation."

"Before his illness, US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin loved being photographed with pygmies."

"Monkeys should be called monkeys."

"This time we must burn out all this Ukrainianism at the root. Together with their bastard literature, delusional history, cannibalisation of the “ancient Ukrainians”, fascist “aesthetics” and servility to the West. Burn them to death. No truce. Any ceasefire, and even more so an armistice, is certain death for our children and grandchildren."

"Mr. Rogozin is a charismatic orator with a rascally sense of humor, and he at times has succeeded in charming his rivals in Brussels even as he was upbraiding them. More than once in the interview, he ended long discourses in Russian about his views on relations with the West by uttering a single English word that captured how he likes to be viewed: “Troublemaker!”"

"…Russia’s envoy to NATO, Dmitri O. Rogozin, who is known as irascible and an outspoken nationalist and who once hung a poster of Stalin in his office in Brussels, was appointed a deputy prime minister overseeing the military-industrial complex."

"I should like to stress that the party is alive, not because Gorbachev is general secretary of its central committee. If he ceases to be general secretary, another leader will come."

"My body is such that I remain sane even after drinking all my buddies under the table."

"These events weigh on my heart to this day."

"Yanayev lived an interesting, difficult and worthy life. If they had been more decisive, they could have succeeded in preserving our country and completely turned around the difficult situation of that time."

"Well I believe all participants of the six party talks should use their bilateral channels to send necessary messages to North Koreans. Some of us like China and Russia have more channels if you wish. Japan and South Korea have their own. And the United States could also help by stating their strong commitment to the negotiating process, to the six party talks, and I am glad that that's what we hear from Washington in response to the North Korean announcement."

"I am very pleased to be here in Israel, the land of our friends, friends who are going through a complex period like their neighbors. We are convinced that the efforts of all countries and governments in the region will find a way to reach peace and long-term security. I have arrived here after visiting Beirut and Damascus and I want to tell the Prime Minister and all other ministers that today, everyone wants peace more than ever, peace and security.Now, the preferred position is that of those who do not want to live amidst endless arguments about who was right first and last. Everybody wants to sit around the negotiating table. Everyone aspires to reach decisions that will be acceptable to all and certainly to Israel. We always point out the Russian Federation’s full agreement that the State of Israel has the full right to peace and security. We are convinced that that there is no other way to resolve this problem except through peace.We are certain that UN Security Council Resolution #1701, that we all worked on together, will be carried out in full by all sides. We think that the abductees should be released as soon as possible and we are also convinced that the military blockade of Lebanon must be lifted and that the Lebanese army needs to deploy in southern Lebanon in order to facilitate the Israeli army’s withdrawal as quickly as possible. But we are convinced that peace is attainable only if an international conference - with the participation of all sides - convenes. Lastly, I would like to point out that we are very much looking forward to the Prime Minister’s visit to Moscow in order to discuss bilateral relations."

"As to the second question about Gabala Radar Station, I think that you are under the influence of what was previously customary to call "western propaganda." As Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly said in public, which was reconfirmed during his preliminary consultations with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, we perceive no threat from Iran. We do not understand why to justify construction of elements of a US missile defense system in Europe they should be using a thesis about a threat from Iran. We have repeatedly adduced facts, assessments, and professional estimates showing that there is no such threat, which President Putin particularly emphasized. If the American side has suspicions about the presence of any such threat, they can easily be removed by the real-time use of information from Gabala Radar Station. Today I told my friend and colleague, Mr. Mottaki, as well as the President of Iran, Mr. Ahmadinejad, about this. My firm impression is that our explanation was received with full understanding."

"There was an attack on our citizens in South Ossetia since most people had a Russian passport and thus Russian citizenship."

"Ha! I’ve heard about these reports. I think it’s another provocation, coming just before NATO war games on Georgian territory that were in complete disregard of Russia’s warnings. If this is aimed at drawing other participants of the war games into the conflict — prompted by statements from the Georgian government — then this only proves that we were 100% right when we warned those taking part in the war games not to do so as it will lead heighten tensions sharply."

"Instead of the negative and relative stability of Cold War times, we all need positive stability based on collective interaction, an indifferently correct neighborhood is impossible on our continent. The principle of indivisibility of European security should be legally binding, relations between the US, Europe and Russia need a qualitatively new interaction that could help solve common and global challenges."

"We believe that the coalition's intervention in the civil war in Libya has not, essentially, been sanctioned by the UN Security Council resolution, its only purpose is to ensure the protection of the civilian population."

"We think that additional steps, including the cancellation of the no-fly zone, should be taken."

"Members of the international community, first of all our Western partners, have chosen the path of supporting one of the sides in the civil war – probably the party that represented the Libyan people's legitimate aspirations, but this still increased the number of casualties among the civilian population."

"It is no accident that the Office of UN High Commissioner on Human Rights stated today that all circumstances of his (Gaddafi's) death must be investigated and I fully agree that such an investigation will be conducted."

"If something goes wrong in Syria, many countries of the region will feel a negative impact. We can’t support isolation because of the lesson we drew from Libya."

"We believe this would be a huge mistake and we hope that this would never happen."

"As the Libyan experience has shown, sadly, a military scenario is possible. We won’t allow any more such disingenuous interpretations. We will see to it that no resolution is open to interpretation like the one on Libya."

"Absolutely no evidence."

"We discussed this issue. We welcome steps Pakistan and India have taken on confidence-building measures. Both countries are capable of settling their issues on their own without any foreign assistance"

"Congress is a very special group of people. More than 80 percent of them [have] never left the United States. They live in their own walls. So I’m not amazed about this Russophobia which is being displayed by the Congress at the moment."

"A new reality is being formed: the unipolar world is irrevocably becoming a thing of the past, a multipolar one is taking shape. It’s an objective process. It’s unstoppable. In this reality, more than one power will “rule” – it will be necessary to negotiate between all the key states that today have a decisive influence on the world economy and politics. At the same time, realizing their special situation, these countries ensure compliance with the basic principles of the UN Charter, including the fundamental one – the sovereign equality of states. No one on this Earth should be seen as a minor player. Everyone is equal and sovereign."

"As for some UN experts conducting some kind of research about the alleged crimes of the Wagner private military company, I am not aware of any UN experts being empowered to consider any aspect of war crimes, no matter who committed them."

"We have absolutely no intention of — or interest in — crossing Ukraine's borders."

"We see that our colleagues from the NATO countries are pursuing a policy of containing Russia, increasing their military activity on our borders, creating a military infrastructure on the “eastern front”, as they say, and resorting to unsubstantiated accusations instead of diplomatic methods..."

"It is also alarming that our Western colleagues use the term “international law” less and less often. Instead, they talk more about a rules-based order... something they can invent themselves... We urge our colleagues to comply with the agreements reached within the framework of international law."

"Several years ago, the United States started accusing Russia of violating the INF Treaty, without providing any evidence. We basically had to pry the information from the US, information that would help us understand... what they meant. The US eventually mentioned the 9M729 missile, claiming that it had been tested on certain days at a certain testing site, and that the range violated the treaty’s provisions. Our data concerning these tests showed the opposite. The missile’s range is allowed under the treaty."

"NATO foreign ministers met several days ago to support the US position. According to media reports, they did this after Washington presented certain irrefutable documents confirming that the treaty was violated. If this is so, we have not received any such documents from the US side. This is what we have been asking the US to do for a long time. We are still ready for a serious and professional discussion. Instead, the Americans resort to unfounded accusations, and again and again, from high rostrums, make allegations for the entire international community to hear about things that should first be clarified with the other party to the treaty. This would be a more appropriate, polite and correct approach."

"When we are accused...Every time a problem occurs, we ask very specific questions. For example, the crash of the Malaysian Boeing in Ukrainian airspace in July 2014. Where is the data from the Ukrainian radars? We provided our data. Where are the records of what the Ukrainian dispatchers said? No answer. Where is the data from American satellites that surely exists? No answer again. The questions are very specific. So in the case of Salisbury, where are the Skripals? There is no room for “highly likely” here. There can only be two answers here: yes or no, alive or not. Therefore, it is very difficult..."

"We have come up with proposals that we have repeatedly made available to the United States, including in Helsinki, when President Putin met with President Trump. I myself presented one such proposal to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. We re-submitted our proposals during a visit by US National Security Adviser John Bolton to Moscow in August and later in October, when he was in Moscow again. These proposals are about starting a serious, candid and professional dialogue on the INF Treaty, compliance with the START Treaty, and a number of other proposals regarding our approaches to ​​strategic stability. We got nothing in response from the US partners. We occasionally remind them about it. They keep saying that we need to correct our mistakes and stop the violations."

"The people I met with yesterday, including German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, expressed concern about this situation. If they are concerned, they should talk to their ally, the United States, and have the US sit down and talk substantively, rather than accuse us without any grounds from across the ocean. We are ready for such a dialogue and suggested considering the INF Treaty at the Russia-NATO Council. In response, our NATO colleagues completely blocked all communication channels between the Russian and NATO military..."

"In 2014, our Western colleagues “swallowed” the anti-constitutional armed coup in Ukraine, and since then they’ve been unable to hold that government accountable, although they have long since understood who they are dealing with. Having once branded them democrats and partners, they cannot publicly criticise them now. That's the problem."

"President Poroshenko and his regime enjoy impunity and plan provocations like the one that occurred at the entrance to the Kerch Strait from the Black Sea. Literally a day after this blatant provocation, the text of the order...was found on one of the boats... It said that the boats should covertly, without requesting authorisation of the Russian authorities...Why?...There may only be one answer: they wanted to provoke a scandal."

"A day after that, President Poroshenko declared martial law, and three days later the US declared that they need to increase their military presence in the Black Sea.... an incident was inflated into a scandal... used to shore up the absolutely groundless hopes of the incumbent president of Ukraine... in line with the US plans to build up its military presence near our shores. If you follow the logic of “who stands to gain?” you can draw your own conclusions."

"We are concerned about what the US and its closest allies are doing with respect to Venezuela, brazenly violating all imaginable norms of international law and actually openly pursuing the policy aimed at overthrowing the legitimate government in that Latin American country... US companies operating in Venezuela are exempt from these sanctions. In other words, they wish to topple the government and derive material gains from this... According to our sources, the leaders of the opposition movement who have declared ‘dual power’ are in fact receiving instructions from Washington not to make any concessions until the authorities agree to abdicate in some way. Together with other responsible members of the international community, we will do everything to support President Maduro’s legitimate government in upholding the Venezuelan constitution and employing methods to resolve the crisis that are within the constitutional framework... Given signals coming from the EU and... Caribbean countries, as well as...China and India... we would like to figure out what the international community could do to prevent another blatant violation of international law and violent regime change... This is what I discussed yesterday with the Iranian foreign minister, who - just like us - wants to find an opportunity for external players to prove themselves useful to the Venezuelan people."

"What do they mean by insolent remarks that the countries external to the Western Hemisphere are not allowed to have any interests there?... Take a look at the map of the U.S. military bases—the whole world is dotted with red spots and each of them poses rather serious risks."

"We are already used to the fact that the United States and other Western countries simply announce in the media yet another set of accusations against Russia, be it hackers, or some kind of a sensation about the double or even triple poisoning of Navalny. All this news is funny to read, but it says only one thing -- or rather the manner in which this news is presented says only one thing -- that our Western partners do not have any ethical standards and lack skill in normal diplomatic work, and [have] unwillingness to comply with the international legal norms when it comes to finding the facts."

"In a number of Western countries, students learn at school that Jesus Christ was bisexual."

"We know the manners and the tricks that are being used by the western countries to manipulate media, we understood long ago that there is no such thing as an independent western media"

"Any human life is priceless."

"Our military personnel who are now involved in this special operation have a very strict order to only use high precision military equipment to suppress the military infrastructure."

"The questions I receive are as if no one listens."

"We are not planning to attack other countries. We didn’t attack Ukraine in the first place."

"With Ukraine... we didn't just get up and go to war against Ukraine [just because] we didn't like Zelenskyy, or because he stopped appearing in KVN [a Russian and formerly Soviet comedy TV show and international competition] and stopped maintaining his theatre, Kvartal 95 [a publicly owned television production company founded by Volodymyr Zelenskyy]. It was for a reason; we warned [Ukraine] for many, many, many years."

"We see how dangerously our Western colleagues, including in the European Union, are acting now, which, in violation of all its so-called principles and values, encourages the supply of deadly weapons to Ukraine."

"It is not the first time we have seen pathetic outcries concerning the so-called atrocities perpetrated by the Russian military"

"We will deal with Ukraine and we will resolve the future of Ukraine."

"We proposed not creating any threat on the ground and Putin explained very clearly why he took the decision to conduct this special military operation."

"So when they say ‘How can Nazification exist if we’re Jewish?’ In my opinion, Hitler also had Jewish origins, so it doesn’t mean absolutely anything. For some time we have heard from the Jewish people that the biggest antisemites were Jewish."

"If you are worried about the prospect of war in Europe - we do not want that at all."

"The EU has evolved from a constructive economic platform, as it was created, to an aggressive and belligerent player which already displays its ambitions far beyond the European continent."

"The West has declared war on us, on the whole Russian world. The culture of canceling Russia and everything connected with our country is already reaching the point of absurdity."

"It is safe to say that this situation will be with us for a long time."

"In many Western countries, everyday Russophobia has become of an unprecedented nature, and, to our great regret, is encouraged by government circles in a number of countries."

"International officials, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and, to my great regret, the UN Secretary-General and many other UN representatives, are subjected to pressure from the West and often act as mouthpieces for fake news."

"We did not invade Ukraine. We declared a special military operation because we had absolutely no other way of explaining to the west that dragging Ukraine into Nato was a criminal act."

"Russia has an unblemished reputation and is not ashamed."

"The Russian people in Ukraine continued to be discriminated against across the board. Laws banning the Russian language were adopted and Nazi practices (theory and practice of Nazism) were established."

"I didn’t invite anyone to pose for a photo together with me."

"The geography is different. This is far from being only the DPR and LPR. It is also the Kherson region, the Zaporizhzhia region and a number of other territories, and this process continues, and continues consistently and persistently."

"We cannot allow the part of Ukraine that Zelenskyy, or whoever replaces him, will control to have weapons that will pose a direct threat to our territory and the territory of those republics that have declared their independence, those who want to determine their future on their own."

"If the West delivers long-range weapons to Kyiv, the geographic goals of the special operation in Ukraine will expand even more."

"We are determined to help the people of eastern Ukraine to liberate themselves from the burden of this absolutely unacceptable regime."

"We will certainly help the Ukrainian people to get rid of the regime, which is absolutely anti-people and anti-historical."

"This war is being controlled by the Anglo-Saxons."

"When we speak about what is happening in Ukraine - it is a war, not a hybrid one, almost a real war, that the West has been plotting for a long time against Russia."

"The political goal of the United States is directed against the friendship of Moscow and Kyiv."

"Zelenskyy smokes or injects himself or snorts so much stuff that it is impossible to comment on his words."

"The war, which we are trying to stop, which was launched against us using Ukrainian people, of course, influenced the policy of Russia, including energy policy."

"Minister Lavrov said that clearly said we cannot sit with the American to define what Syrian wants to do, this is Syrian's issue, only the Syrian people can define the future of their country and how to solve their problems."

"Unfortunately, it is a classical step, when an occupant state is trying to make legitimate its unlawful decision. It is an attempt, which will remain unsuccessful."

"On Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that any U.S. presence in a CSTO country would need the approval of the alliance, which the Kremlin will veto. One might suggest that there is mistrust about the reliability of Joe Biden and company as a strategic partner, even though there is widespread concern that Afghanistan might become a rogue state. Nevertheless, Washington’s bullying in Iraq, Syria and also against Iran has failed to convince anyone that the U.S. Air Force would make a good neighbor...."

"In 18 years, he went from a professional and educated intellectual, whom many my colleagues held in such high esteem [sic], to a person who constantly … threatens the world (that is, Russia too) with nuclear weapons!"

"Vyshinsky: Were you badly treated? Muralov: I was deprived of my liberty. Vyshinsky: But perhaps rough methods were used against you? Muralov: No. No such rough methods were used. I must say that in Novosibirsk and here I was treated politely and no cause for resentment was given. I was treated very decently and politely."

"We shall provoke you to acts of terror and then crush you."

"We are sometimes up against a flat refusal to apply this law rigidly. One People's Judge told me flatly that he could never bring himself to throw someone in jail for stealing four ears. What we're up against here is a deep prejudice, imbibed with their mother's milk... a mistaken belief that people should be tried in accordance not with the Party's political guidelines but with considerations of "higher justice"."

"We must finish once and for all with the neutrality of chess. We must condemn once and for all the formula "chess for the sake of chess", like the formula "art for art's sake". We must organize shockbrigades of chess-players, and begin immediate realization of a Five-Year Plan for chess."

"So who are the bulk of our clients in these sorts of cases? Is it the working class? No! It's classless hoodlums. Classless hoodlums, either from the dregs of the society, or from the remains of the exploiters' class. They have no place to go. So they take to -- pederasty. Together with them, next to them, under this excuse, in stinky secretive bordellos another kind of activity takes place as well -- counter-revolutionary work."

"After two decades of building socialism in the USSR there is no reason for anybody to be a homosexual."

"The basic mistake in eyery case is made by those women who consider 'freedom of abortion' as one of their civil rights. We need new fighters - they built this life, we need people."

"We will secure peace, over the corpses of the counterrevolutionary command staff if necessary."

"In the absence of a criminal code, a court might give a reprimand for a punch in the nose in Ryazan, while the sentence in Tula might be shooting."

"An epileptic degenerate . . . and the most repulsive type I came across in all my connections with the Bolsheviks."

"Krylenko is brave and fearless. He is one of the typical Russians of whom the great psychologist Dostoyevsky said: "it is not he that created the idea, but the idea that created him.""

"The Bolsheviks had already orchestrated several 'show trials.' The Cheka had staged the 'Trial of the St. Petersburg Combat Organization'; its successor, the new GPU, the 'Trial of the Socialist Revolutionaries.' In these and other such farces, defendants were inevitably sentenced to death or to long prison terms in the north. The Cieplak show trial is a prime example of Bolshevik revolutionary justice at this time. Normal judicial procedures did not restrict revolutionary tribunals at all; in fact, the prosecutor N.V. Krylenko, stated that the courts could trample upon the rights of classes other than the proletariat. Appeals from the courts went not to a higher court, but to political committees. Western observers found the setting -- the grand ballroom of a former Noblemen's Club, with painted cherubs on the ceiling -- singularly inappropriate for such a solemn event. Neither judges nor prosecutors were required to have a legal background, only a proper 'revolutionary' one. That the prominent 'No Smoking' signs were ignored by the judges themselves did not bode well for legalities."

"Krylenko, who began to speak at 6:10 PM, was moderate enough at first, but quickly launched into an attack on religion in general and the Catholic Church in particular. "The Catholic Church", he declared, "has always exploited the working classes." When he demanded the Archbishop's death, he said, "All the Jesuitical duplicity with which you have defended yourself will not save you from the death penalty. No Pope in the Vatican can save you now." As the long oration proceeded, the Red Procurator worked himself into a fury of anti-religious hatred. "Your religion", he yelled, "I spit on it, as I do on all religions, -- on Orthodox, Jewish, Mohammedan, and the rest." "There is no law here but Soviet Law," he yelled at another stage, "and by that law you must die."

"Under the communist dictatorship of Lenin and then Stalin, Krylenko (1885-1938) rose through the Soviet Union’s legal system to become People’s Commissar for Justice and a Prosecutor General. He was a leading practitioner of the theory of “socialist legality,” which held that an accused person’s innocence or guilt depended on that person’s politics (real or imagined). It sounds nuts and indeed, it was. It was the stuff of Orwell’s nightmare, and one of the reasons the Soviet Union thankfully perished of its own poison."

"In The Gulag Archipelago, the famous Soviet dissident and Nobel laureate Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn recounted an episode involving Krylenko. Shortly after Lenin’s Bolsheviks assumed power in 1917, an admiral named Shchastny was sentenced by one of the regime’s judges “to be shot within 24 hours.” When some in the courtroom expressed shock, it was Krylenko who responded thusly: “What are you worrying about? Executions have been abolished. But Shchastny is not being executed; he is being shot.”"

"The Vatican, Germany, Poland, Great Britain, and the United States undertook frantic efforts to save the Archbishop and his chancellor. In Moscow, the ministers from the Polish, British, Czechoslovak, and Italian missions appealed 'on the grounds of humanity,' and Poland offered to exchange any prisoner to save the archbishop and the monsignor. Finally, on March 29, the Archbishop's sentence was commuted to ten years in prison, ... but the Monsignor was not to be spared. Again, there were appeals from foreign powers, from Western Socialists and Church leaders alike. These appeals were for naught: Pravda editorialized on March 30 that the tribunal was defending the rights of the workers, who had been oppressed by the bourgeois system for centuries with the aid of priests. Pro-Communist foreigners who intervened for the two men were also condemned as 'compromisers with the priestly servants of the bourgeoisie.' ...Father Rutkowski recorded later that Budkiewicz surrendered himself over to the will of God without reservation. On Easter Sunday, the world was told that the Monsignor was still alive, and Pope Pius XI publicly prayed at St. Peter's that the Soviets would spare his life. Moscow officials told foreign ministers and reporters that the Monsignor's sentence was just, and that the Soviet Union was a sovereign nation that would accept no interference. In reply to an appeal from the rabbis of New York City to spare Budkiewicz's life, Pravda wrote a blistering editorial against 'Jewish bankers who rule the world' and bluntly warned that the Soviets would kill Jewish opponents of the Revolution as well. Only on April 4 did the truth finally emerge: the Monsignor had already been in the grave for three days. When the news came to Rome, Pope Pius fell to his knees and wept as he prayed for the priest's soul. To make matters worse, Cardinal Gasparri had just finished reading a note from the Soviets saying that 'everything was proceeding satisfactorily' when he was handed the telegram announcing the execution. On March 31, 1923, Holy Saturday, at 11:30 PM, after a week of fervent prayers and a firm declaration that he was ready to be sacrificed for his sins, Monsignor Constantine Budkiewicz had been taken from his cell and, sometime before the dawn of Easter Sunday, shot in the back of the head on the steps of the Lubyanka prison."

"Offering me a seat, Krylenko said: "I have no doubt that you personally are not guilty of anything. We are both performing our duty to the Party—I have considered and consider you a Communist. I will be the prosecutor at the trial; you will confirm the testimony given during the investigation. This is our duty to the Party, yours and mine. Unforeseen complications may arise at the trial. I will count on you. If the need should arise, I will ask the presiding judge to call on you. And you will find the right words."

"Comrade Krylenko concerns himself only incidentally with the affairs of his commissariat. But to direct the Commissariat of Justice, great initiative and a serious attitude toward oneself is required. Whereas Comrade Krylenko used to spend a great deal of time on mountain-climbing and traveling, now he devotes a great deal of time to playing chess... We need to know what we are dealing with in the case of Comrade Krylenko—the commissar of justice? or a mountain climber? I don't know which Comrade Krylenko thinks of himself as, but he is without doubt a poor people's commissar."

"Talks between the Russian and US presidents are important not only for our countries, but for the entire world as well. Russia and the United States bear special responsibility for global security, so they need to act in a balanced way and avoid confrontation"

"Aimed at ensuring US hegemony in a world entangled in a network of Pentagon bases, US military spending has brought death and suffering and not freedom or democracy to people. The case in point is Iraq and Libya, where Washington has sacrificed hundreds of thousands of lives to its ambitions and destroyed countries that used to be prosperous."

"US public should think about the rationale of the US authorities’ decision to withdraw from the INF Treaty and hence to relaunch the arms race. This can only serve the interests of the US defence industry, because it holds the promise of huge military contracts. As for the American people, this will only make their lives less safe."

"Current relations between Russia and the US struggle through the worst times. Historians, politicians, political scientists cannot recall any other time, when our relations were in such a miserable state. Other countries, international peace and security suffer because of this..."

"Moscow hopes that Washington will not delay its response on the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) before it expires... All the more pressing issue is what will happen to nuclear disarmament after 2021, when the New START is set to expire. Due to a deep crisis in the Russia–U.S. relations it would be naive to assume that our countries are likely to conclude a new treaty on strategic offensive arms by 2021..."

"Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested... extending the New START for another five years. The Americans are silent...The Treaty...was previously regarded by the majority of countries as a 'golden standard' in disarmament..."

"US accusations against Russia of violation of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) are groundless... We await clear evidence and continue to deny any groundless accusations."

"The US has deployed 'Aegis Ashore' missile defense systems in its base in Romania and plans to do the same in Poland... Moreover, these systems are being deployed in direct proximity to our borders. If we were to deploy such missiles near the U.S. territory, wouldn’t it be taken in America as a direct threat to its national security?"

"There are a lot of questions on how quickly we can reach denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. We support the American efforts in this area. We stand ready to back the US However, it is concerning that neither a single warhead, nor even a missile has been dismantled to this day....the DPRK has made several direct steps to meet American demands...We think it is high time to think about the whole set of restraints imposed on North Korea...Actions from one side mean that the other side should take steps as well."

"We, as many other states, are troubled by the situation in nuclear non-proliferation... we call upon all countries to clearly and explicitly adhere to their obligations within the nuclear deal. We think that the unilateral withdrawal of the U.S. from the agreement poses a threat to the non-proliferation regime."

"I would like to note a positive momentum for international stability gained during the Russia–U.S. Summit in Helsinki. It was a good talk. The intent of both presidents to bolster international security is evident. It is regretful, though, that it has not been put into tangible actions. We are ready for a constructive dialogue."

"I would like to stress, that if we want to strengthen strategic stability, we will require an equal dialogue with mutual consideration of each other’s interests. It is necessary to revive the channels of bilateral communication on strategic stability and create conditions that will allow us to advance strengthening non-proliferation of the WMD [weapons of mass destruction] and means of their delivery, to preserve and adapt, where necessary, mechanisms of arms control. It all will have a positive impact on international stability, peace and security, on the principles of equal and indivisible security for everyone,"

"If anything represents a threat to peace and security, it is the shameless and aggressive actions of the United States and their allies to oust a legitimately elected president of Venezuela (Nicolas Maduro)."

"You (Germany's delegate) have a very strange way of proposing to prevent this crisis by putting forward an absurd ultimatum. You completely disregard the sovereignty of Venezuela, imposing on it decisions that you prefer and rejecting its people the right to resolve their affairs. Germany’s delegate is calling the legitimate authorities of Venezuela to acknowledge defeat and transfer of power. What you are doing is not prevention, but incitement. How would you feel if the Russian Federation brought the situation and protests in France to the Council? The Russian Federation is proposing to help Venezuela resolve its own affairs."

"This deployment of Russian troops in our own territory is getting our Western and U.S. colleagues to say that there's going to be a planned military action and even an act of aggression ... A military action of Russia against Ukraine that they're all assuring us is going to take place in just a few weeks, if not a few days. There, however, is no proof confirming such a serious accusation whatsoever being put forward."

"This is despite the fact that we are constantly rejecting these allegations, and this is despite the fact that no threat of a planned invasion into Ukraine from the lips of any Russian politician or public figure over all of this period -- no such threat has been made. Rather, at all levels, we've been categorically rejecting such plans"

"Not a single local person has suffered from any violent action."

"Your thoughtless pumping of Ukraine with weapons leads only to the deaths of civilians, not only in Donbas but in Ukrainian cities."

"We are attacking infrastructure facilities in Ukraine in response to the shelling of Ukraine with Western weapons and Kiev's reckless calls for a military victory over Russia."

"Damage to residential buildings and civilian casualties are due to the failure of the Ukrainian air defense"

"The Russian Armed Forces do not fight against the civilian population and do not subject them, unlike the Armed Forces of Ukraine, to targeted strikes."

"Western countries are widely known for their love of the topic of fighting impunity, especially if it does not concern their own crimes"

"All the solidarity of the West with Ukraine is not free, ordinary Ukrainians will have to return the money."

"Call Putin, call Lavrov to stop aggression."

"There is no purgatory for war criminals. They go straight to hell, Ambassador."

"Ambassador Nebenzya has called Kyiv the clients of the West. Actually, Kyiv is fighting to be independent of anybody."

"People in power remind me of people who find themselves in a room with windows and doors, where a huge number of microbes are flying. Sooner or later, the people in power deteriorate, simply because immunity is lost over time, and at some point you get infected with something. Elections and independent press are nothing more than opening those windows and airing the "corridors of power.""

"I actually expect to live in Russia, so I care about what happens here."

"We have few truly patriotic and smart candidates, and those few are busy figuring things out with each other. During the last elections various coalitions were possible, though none of them came to be - everybody was on their own. It is ridiculous."

"Had I held a high position within the government, I'd gather big russian bussiness and give them a strict order: to buy up Sevastopol property under government guarantees. Then the talks surrounding the Black Sea fleet would take on a very different form: it's difficult to ignore investors. Interestingly enough I've received a large amount of offers from Sevastopol enterprises wishing to be bought by Russian capital. I am confident that that is a much more reliable path than shaking the air by statements like "we will never give up an inch of Russian land". Historical justice must be restored by capitalist methods."

"First things first, for many years I've steadily supported the unification of the opposition, but right now I have to say that Jews are more likely to find an agreement with Arabs than for us with Yavlinsky — it's an assessment based on the results of our discussion. It's sad, but true."

"The Magnitsky Act is the most pro-Russian law ever passed by a foreign legislature."

"When we in Russia establish law and order, when the country has an established independent judiciary, I will be the first to go to Brussels and Strasbourg and lobby for the law to be repealed, because we will deal with our scoundrels ourselves, and we won’t need any Magnitsky Law."

"[I]n Europe, faced with the choice between human rights and gas, many politicians pick gas."

"The system always breaks down in Russia when irreconcilable contradictions develop within the ruling clan."

"This isn't your war... It’s Putin’s war for power and money."

"I know what needs to be done... We need to write a report "Putin. War", publish it in huge numbers and hand it out on the streets. We will tell how Putin unleashed this war. That's the only way to defeat propaganda."

"[T]he truth is that Putin is war and crisis."

"Vladimir Putin would have voted for Yanukovych. He's fucking crazy, Vladimir Putin, just so you understand."

"In the tightly controlled and airproof “vertical of power” that is Vladimir Putin’s Russia, even a handful of dissenting voices in legislative institutions—especially when they are loud and persistent—can present a serious threat to the system. Such was the voice of the late Boris Nemtsov."

"Nemtsov sacrificed a lot for politics, for a freer Russia — and I’m not just talking about his life, his mortal life."

"No matter how powerful the forces against them, when people are prepared to stand up for what they believe, they succeed... [T]hat's the basis of my hope for the future of Russia."

"In the tightly controlled and airproof "vertical of power" that is Vladimir Putin's Russia, even a handful of dissenting voices in legislative institutions—especially when they are loud and persistent—can present a serious threat to the system. Such was the voice of the late Boris Nemtsov."

"Perhaps the most important requirement in an election is that voters have a choice. It sounds trivial, but that is something that has been lacking in most Russian elections held under Vladimir Putin’s rule."

"There can be nothing more pro-Russian than to bring much-needed accountability to those who violate the rights of Russian citizens and steal the money of Russian taxpayers — and continue to spend that money, buy real estate and park their families in the West. That is precisely what the Magnitsky legislation, now adopted in six Western countries, does, by prohibiting individuals responsible for human rights abuses and corruption from receiving visas or holding assets in their territories."

"The Magnitsky legislation is a pale substitute for justice. The penalty for torture, murder, wrongful imprisonment or grand corruption should not be canceled vacations in Miami Beach or on the Côte d’Azur but a real trial in a real court of law. One day, this will be possible in Russia. For now, it is not, and targeted sanctions from Western democracies serve as the only mechanism of accountability for corrupt Kremlin officials and human rights abusers. I will continue this work, as I know will many of my colleagues, regardless of any legislative novelties from the Russian government."

"There is hardly a practice of the Soviet repression of dissent that has not been revived by Vladimir Putin’s regime in Russia. A host of draconian new laws has criminalized public criticism of the government and of its actions — especially regarding the war on Ukraine. Political opposition is now officially equated with treason. Opponents of the Kremlin have been murdered, poisoned and imprisoned."

"One by one, Kara-Murza’s colleagues have been exiled, like Khodorkovsky. Or imprisoned. Or killed. Kara-Murza is determined to press on, however, believing that he has important work to do. And if people shrink from doing it, how will it get done?"

"Outspoken Kremlin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza will be a pallbearer for John McCain when the coffin of the late Republican senator is carried at Washington's National Cathedral... Kara-Murza's name was announced this week by the office of McCain, along with other details of his memorial services in Arizona, Washington, D.C., and Annapolis, Maryland. Kara-Murza joins a list of prominent U.S. dignitaries in the honor of carrying McCain's coffin..."

"In principle, Eurasia and our space, the heartland Russia, remain the staging area of a new anti-bourgeois, anti-American revolution ... The new Eurasian empire will be constructed on the fundamental principle of the common enemy: the rejection of Atlanticism, strategic control of the USA, and the refusal to allow liberal values to dominate us. This common civilizational impulse will be the basis of a political and strategic union."

"Trubetskoi can be termed the Eurasian Marx."

"It is especially important to introduce geopolitical disorder into internal American activity, encouraging all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements – extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes in the U.S. It would also make sense simultaneously to support isolationist tendencies in American politics."

"At the basis of the geopolitical construction of this [Eurasian] Empire, there must be placed one fundamental principle--the principle of 'a common enemy.' A negation of Atlanticism, a repudiation of the strategic control of the United States, and the rejection of the supremacy of economic, liberal market values--this represents the common civilizational basis, the common impulse which will prepare the way for a strong political and strategic union. (216). The anti-Americanism of the Japanese, "who remember well the nuclear genocide and the disgrace of political occupation," must be unleashed, as well as the fervent anti-Americanism of fundamentalist Muslim Iranians."

"We, conservatives, want a strong, solid State, want order and healthy family, positive values, the reinforcing of the importance of religion and the Church in society."

"We want patriotic radio, TV, patriotic experts, patriotic clubs. We want the media that expresses national interests."

"Never before has individualism been glorified so much, yet at the same time, never before have people all over the world been so similar to each other in their behavior, habits, appearances, techniques, and tastes. In the pursuit of individualistic ’human rights’ humanity has lost itself. Soon man will be replaced by the post-human: a mutant, cloned android."

"Whoever controls the Snake Island, controls the course of world history."

"I come to very sad conclusion: Donald Trump is totally mad. It is the shame. We loved him,"

"No one should be beaten. [Instead,] everything that bothers us should be carefully, but unyieldingly eliminated by means of deportation... A tooth without a root is considered dead. A nationalist is he who does not want the root ‘Russian’ to be deleted from the word ‘Russia.’ We have the right to be Russian in Russia and we will protect this right."

"I think very poorly of United Russia. United Russia is the party of corruption, the party of crooks and thieves. And it is the duty of every patriot and citizen of our country to make sure that this party is destroyed."

"I had this cliché moment of a Russian émigré abroad: I really missed black bread. I know it’s stupid, but I really missed it."

"[F]orgive me if this sounds pompous, but it’s better to die standing up than live on your knees."

"[I]f tomorrow ten businessmen spoke up directly and openly we'd live in a different country. Starting tomorrow."

"We have problems with illegal migration, we have the problem of the Caucasus, we have a problem of ethnic crimes... the fact that our authorities hypocritically pretend that such problems do not exist leads to people discussing them only in the street, at the Russian March."

"The inner compass of Alexei Navalny tells Alexei Navalny where to go. Everything else is uninteresting to me."

"Listen, I’ve got something very obvious to tell you. You’re not allowed to give up. If they decide to kill me, it means that we are incredibly strong. We need to utilize this power, to not give up, to remember that we are a huge power, that is being repressed by these bad dudes. We don’t realize how strong we actually are. The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to do nothing. So don’t be inactive."

"I have grown a beard for the 20 days of my transportation. Unfortunately, there are no reindeer, but there are huge fluffy, and very beautiful shepherd dogs. And the most important thing: I now live above the Arctic Circle. In the village of Kharp on Yamal. The nearest town has the beautiful name of Labytnangi. I don't say "Ho-ho-ho", but I do say "Oh-oh-oh" when I look out of the window, where I can see a night, then the evening, and then the night again. The 20 days of my transportation were pretty exhausting, but I'm still in a good mood, as befits a Santa Claus. They brought me here on Saturday night. And I was transported with such precaution and on such a strange route (Vladimir - Moscow - Chelyabinsk - Ekaterinburg - Kirov - Vorkuta - Kharp) that I didn't expect anyone to find me here before mid-January. That's why I was very surprised when the cell door was opened yesterday with the words: "A lawyer is here to see you". He told me that you had lost me, and some of you were even worried. Thanks very much for your support! … Anyway, don't worry about me. I'm fine. I'm totally relieved that I've finally made it. Thanks again to everyone for your support. And happy holidays!"

"We — Russia — want to be a nation of peace. Alas, few people would call us that now. But let's at least not become a nation of frightened silent people. Of cowards who pretend not to notice the aggressive war against Ukraine unleashed by our obviously insane czar. I cannot, do not want and will not remain silent watching how pseudo-historical nonsense about the events of 100 years ago has become an excuse for Russians to kill Ukrainians, and for Ukrainians to kill Russians while defending themselves. It's the third decade of the 21st century, and we are watching news about people burning down in tanks and bombed houses. We are watching real threats to start a nuclear war on our TVs. I am from the USSR myself. I was born there. And the main phrase from there — from my childhood — was "fight for peace." I call on everyone to take to the streets and fight for peace."

"Putin is not Russia. And if there is anything in Russia right now that you can be most proud of, it is those 6,824 people who were detained because - without any call - they took to the streets with placards saying "No War". They say that someone who cannot attend a rally and does not risk being arrested for it cannot call for it. I'm already in prison, so I think I can. We cannot wait any longer. Wherever you are, in Russia, Belarus or on the other side of the planet, go to the main square of your city every weekday and at 2 pm on weekends and holidays. If you are abroad, come to the Russian embassy. If you can organise a demonstration, do so on the weekend. Yes, maybe only a few people will take to the streets on the first day. And in the second - even less. But we must, gritting our teeth and overcoming fear, come out and demand an end to the war. Each arrested person must be replaced by two newcomers. If in order to stop the war we have to fill prisons and paddy wagons with ourselves, we will fill prisons and paddy wagons with ourselves. Everything has a price, and now, in the spring of 2022, we must pay this price. There's no one to do it for us. Let's not "be against the war." Let's fight against the war."

"For three years, I've been answering the same question. Inmates ask it plainly and directly. Prison administration staff cautiously, with the recorders off. "Why did you come back?""

"Russian politics over the last decade [has] so inculcated society with cynicism and conspiracy theory that people fundamentally do not believe in simple motives."

"I have my country and my convictions. And I don't want to renounce either my country or my convictions. And I cannot betray either the first or the second. If your convictions are worth anything, you should be ready to stand up for them. And, if necessary, make some sacrifices. And if you're not ready, then you have no convictions at all. You just think you do. But those are not convictions and principles – just thoughts in your head."

"I traveled across the country and declared from the stage everywhere, "I promise, I will not let you down, I will not deceive you, and I will not abandon you." By returning, I fulfilled my promise to my voters. After all, there must eventually be those in Russia who do not lie to them."

"[N]ow, secretarians and marginals are in power. Generally, they have no ideas. Their only goal is to cling to their seats. Perfected hypocrisy allows them to adapt and adopt any disguise, thus polygamists have become conservatives, members of the Communist Party have become Orthodox Christians, owners of golden passports and offshore accounts have become aggressive patriots. Lies, lies, and nothing but lies. It will collapse and fall apart. Putin's state is unviable. One day, we'll look at its place and it will be gone. Victory is inevitable. But for now, we must not give up, and hold on to our convictions."

"The important thing is not to torment yourself with anger, hatred, fantasies of revenge, but to move instantly to acceptance. That can be hard. Russian: Главное – не терзать себя гневом, ненавистью, и фантазиями о мести. А мгновенно прийти к принятию. Это может быть очень непросто."

"What are the chances that I'll survive this morning? I don't know; six out of ten? Eight out of ten? Maybe even ten out of ten? It's not that I'm trying not to think about it, closing my eyes and pretending the danger doesn't exist. But one day I simply made the decision not to be afraid. I weighed everything up, understood where I stand – and let it go. Russian: Какие шансы у меня выжить сегодня утром? Не знаю: шесть из десяти или восемь из десяти. А может, и все десять. Дело не в том, что я стараюсь об этом не думать, зажмуриваюсь и делаю вид, что опасности не существует, – просто однажды я принял решение не бояться. Я всё взвесил, понял и отпустил."

"Today, on this stage, receiving this high amazing award for my father, Aleksei Navalny, I thank you and through all of you I welcome the Europe of ideas and principles. The European Union is an incredible miracle created by nations whose whole history is an endless war with each other. Despite all the difficulties and problems, however, the EU has encountered and will encounter, I believe that in its future one day my country will become a part of it."

"I think many Russians, but also a lot of Westerners, make a very serious mistake in trying to look for… a better person to become president. They are searching for such a person in [Alexei] Navalny, in myself, but that’s a mistake. Anyone who replaces Putin is going to take Russia along the same imperialist route."

"Even behind bars Navalny was a real threat to Putin, because he was living proof that courage is possible, that truth exists, that Russia could be a different kind of country. For a dictator who survives thanks to lies and violence, that kind of challenge was intolerable. Now Putin will be forced to fight against Navalny’s memory, and that is a battle he will never win."

"There is no doubt in my mind this man was a brave fighter against corruption, for justice, for democracy. Look what Putin's Russia did to him – they trumped up charges, they imprisoned him, they poisoned him, they sent him to an Arctic penal colony and he's died – that is because of the action that Putin's Russia took."

"A courageous dissident beyond xenophobic and fascist ideas, which in Italy would have landed him in jail for incitement to racism under the Mancino law."

"They say that we are engaged in the militarization of the country, so that everyone would walk in formation there. This, of course, is far from the case."

"What is on Britain’s] coat of arms, a lion, isn’t it? There is an old saying: every lion is a cat, but not every cat is a lion. Everyone should deal with their affairs. We do not think that there is an animal in their zoo that can tell a bear what to do."

"After everything Germany has done to our country, I think, they should not talk on the issue for another two hundred years. Ask your grandparents about their experience of talking to Russia from the position of strength. They will probably be able to tell you."

"The greatest focus should be on fighting international terrorism, which in short time became the largest threat to global security. The situation is compounded by the numerous local conflicts in the world and the failure of the West to overcome differences and to ensure the creation of a United front against this evil."

"The joint dialogue between the foreign policy and defenсe departments of Russia and Japan makes a serious contribution to creating an atmosphere of mutual trust and security in the Pacific Rim."

"We have achieved a high level of interaction between our armed forces on land, in the air and at sea. This increase is an important trend towards further activity."

"After everything that happened in Syria, we were those who established peace in Syria, from those who had the main influence on the situation in this country, defeated terrorism, starting an operation when Damascus controlled that 18 per cent of Syrian territory, and today in fact more than 90 per cent, then, naturally, they [the West] began to say that "Russia is behaving somehow wrong in Syria.""

"We were lucky in that, we still managed to stop [the West] in time. The process of returning to common sense… began in 1999. Starting from that moment, by putting a lot of effort, we have achieved that the world today has ceased to be unipolar."

"The meaning of what is happening, from my point of view, is as follows: patterns and algorithms for overthrowing any legal authority in any country inconvenient for West, have long been created. Of course, all this is done under the banner of promoting democracy. Well, in which country where they 'came with democracy' did this democracy take root: in Iraq, Afghanistan or Libya? Or in the former Yugoslavia, which they forcibly divided into 6 countries with their 'democratic' bombing in 1999. And you can simply forget about sovereignty and independence after any American intervention."

"Our strategic and long-range bombers have started to conduct flights to areas where they used to fly in the past. These flights are carried out according to schedule… How is it possible to bully your neighbors using strategic bombers?"

"I would not speak about Ukraine as a threat. I think that Ukraine and the Ukrainian people is a brotherly nation. They are not just our neighbors, we are a single people."

"The main goal for us is to protect the Russian Federation from the military threat posed by Western countries that are trying to use the Ukrainian people in the fight against our country."

"During the special operation, we strictly adhere to the norms of humanitarian law. The strikes are carried out with high-precision weapons against the objects of the military infrastructure of the Armed Forces of Ukraine – control points, airfields, warehouses, fortified areas, objects of the military-industrial complex. At the same time, everything is done to avoid casualties among peaceful citizens, of course, it slows down the pace of the offensive, but we do it deliberately."

"Ukraine lost half of the army: 61,207 dead, 49,368 wounded."

"Losses of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation - 5937 people."

"A total of 300,000 reservists will be called up during partial mobilization."

"Today we are at war not only with Ukraine and the Ukrainian army, but with the collective West."

"Victory, like the New Year, is inevitable."

"We firmly believe that elimination of the ISIS in Syria is possible only by the joint efforts of all countries."

"We do not exclude the possibility of closer Russian-American coordination in fight against the ISIS and creation of additional communication channels for rapid resolution of crisis situations."

"I would like to emphasize that Russia's actions for strengthening the defence are the balanced response to the expansion of the North Atlantic Alliance, the development of military infrastructure in the bordering countries, and the deployment of additional military contingents. NATO is a military-political coalition but not a group of philatelists."

"The activity of the NATO’s "police" aviation mission on patrolling the Baltic states’ airspace has actually become a part of the so-called limited access zone, covering the Kaliningrad region and the eastern part of the Baltic Sea. We consider such activities of the NATO as a violation of the power balance in the region, endangering the Russian Federation security."

"I am happy because I, together with my fellow soldiers, with all the soldiers, with our people, achieved victory. When our consolidated regiments stood on Red Square, each of us was filled with this happiness and joy that we lived to see victory."

"I am a military man. It is usually believed that a military man means that there must be a war. But I have been in many wars. And I think that that humanity in general, in principle, should not be engaged in collisions and dismantling these collisions, but should be engaged in saving our planet, our home where we live. no one will encroach, no one will destroy. We need to think about it."

"Two years after the introduction of our troops in Afghanistan, it became clear to the General Staff that we were at an impasse."

"In August 1991 I confronted another enemy, the far more dangerous disguised enemy who wanted to destroy my motherland. I have no regrets about what I did, but I have a bitter feeling that we failed to save our country."

"Under Stalin, we were not buying wheat from the West, we were selling it on international markets. We didn’t go around the world asking for humanitarian aid and loans, we were granting them. That is the paradox."

"The reason for the collapse of the USSR was only the betrayal of Gorbachev and Yeltsin, who were led by the United States. The American administration has always, all the years, strived to destroy the USSR, and now Russia, and take advantage of our wealth."

"There are countries that have entered NATO, like Bulgaria, but their people and clergy do not recognize this. I believe that we should pay more attention to these countries, and even more so to attract those who were once part of the Soviet Union. I believe that the current unipolar world is gradually shaking and becoming multipolar."

"We don’t have any gays. If there are any, take them to Canada. Praise be to God. Take them far away from us. To purify our blood, if there are any here, take them."

"If we have [gay] people here, I’m telling you officially their relatives won’t let them be because of our faith, our mentality, customs, traditions. Even if it’s punishable under the law, we would still condone it."

"Even if I fell sick, in the world millions of people are infected with coronavirus, tens of thousands have died, and am I not human?"

"America is not really a strong enough state for us to regard it as an enemy of Russia. We have a strong government and are a nuclear state. Even if our government was completely destroyed, our nuclear missiles would be automatically deployed. We will put the whole world on its knees and screw it from behind."

"People believe my image that was created by the liberals, that I am frightening, that I will kill whoever says anything about me, that I will put them in a dungeon and stab them. That was invented by enemies of the people, enemies of our state, who know that as long as I am in the Caucasus, the Western, European special services will not manage to change the situation here. That is why they want to make the Russian people have a bad attitude toward me. They want to make an enemy of the people out of me. On the contrary, people run to me. They hug me."

"Once there was a need for people like me to fight, to put things in order. Now we have order and prosperity ... and the time has come for changes."

"Biden, whose country is angry at all Muslim states, is plowing the Arab world with air bombs and has returned troops from Afghanistan in shame, suddenly began to mention the Chechen republic for no reason at all."

"Those who violate the trust between people — who gossip and stage feuds… If we don’t stop them, killing, imprisoning, scaring them, then nothing will work. If the whole world is going to burn in a blue flame and the laws of all countries will be broken, are we really going to spare someone who offends honor? I swear by the holy Quran that we will not!"

"“I always believed that the main goal of any father is to instill piety in his sons and teach them to protect the family, the people, the Fatherland. If you want peace, prepare for war! Akhmat, Eli and Adam are ready to use their skills… And I'm not kidding. It's time to show themselves in a real fight, and this is their desire, I only welcome. Soon they will go to the front line and will be on the most difficult sections of the line of contact."

"We are convinced that even underage children will be able to crush you to smithereens, because you have neither spirit, nor honor, nor dignity."

"As part of its support for Ukraine, Warsaw managed to deplete its own military resources, and now it is confused: what if, after the successful completion of the NMD, Russia begins to denazify and demilitarize the next country? After all, after Ukraine, Poland is on the map!"

"Frankly, I personally have such an intention, and I have repeatedly stated that the fight against Satanism should continue throughout Europe and, first of all, on the territory of Poland."

"I'm convinced 100 per cent we will win."

"We'll finish in Ukraine and we will proceed to those countries that insult the Holy Quran."

"No one today would say that Chechens were traitors. The traitor was Joseph Stalin, who deported not only the Chechen people, but other different nations too."

"We remind you that Russia has never attacked anyone throughout its history. And Russia, which has survived so many wars, is the last country in Europe that even wants to utter the word ‘war.’"

"The Russian troops don’t conduct any strikes against civilian infrastructure and residential areas."

"Russian forces do not fire on civilian targets."

"A real Russian is never ashamed to be Russian."

"Many people show themselves to be what we in Russia like to call traitors. They disappear from our lives on their own. Some resign from their jobs, some withdraw from their professional lives, and some leave the country and move to other places. That’s how the purification happens."

"Right now, everyone is very emotional about what’s going on. And you know what? The overwhelming majority are those who support the president emotionally. There are so many people who want to support the president — not just emotionally, but also in their actions. They’re the overwhelming majority."

"We are speaking of a special military operation that is going on, and it is going strictly in accordance with the plans, and there were purposes, they were established in beforehand of course. First, I think we have to speak about the reasons for this operation. I mean, because speaking of the morale against, in the morale against, among our military. Of course you operate data and information coming from different media and from your intelligence. But you would probably have to doubt it, and you have to think twice whether it is true or not."

"No one would think from the very beginning about a couple of days. It's a serious operation with serious purposes. And I think if we try to remember those purposes, those main goals of the operation, it is to get rid of the military potential of Ukraine, and this is why our military is targeting only military objects on the territory of Ukraine. Not civil ones. Russia military are not hitting civilian aims, civil targets. Number two, it is to ensure that Ukraine changes from entire Russian centered to a neutral country. And in this sense, let's remember that after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the neutral status fixed with us in the declaration of independence of the country. Three, to get rid of the nationalist battalions and regiments who are opposing Russian troops, who are now trying to cover themselves under the shield of civilians, thus paving a way for civil casualties."

"Also to ensure that Ukraine acknowledges the fact that Crimea is also an untakable part of Russia, and that People's Republic of Luhansk and Donetsk are independent states. Ukraine has lost them after the coup that happened in 2014."

"The strategic goal is to clear up the Mariupol from nationalistic regiments who are there in a heavily-covered environment, and so, by the way they're simply not letting people out from this thing, from the town. And this is a problem, because now we're receiving lots of refugees coming from there, and they simply tell us that they were used like a shield. They were used under heavy bombardment, and then those nationalists, they were, they were killing people who would want to leave the city. And now the main goal is to get rid of those bad guys there."

"Russian soldiers are not shooting at civilians. They’re not attacking them but helping them."

"We do not accept the jurisdiction of ICC [International criminal court of justice]. We did not — we did not acknowledge it before, and we do not accept it right now. And we are not going to accept it further."

"From the very beginning of these special operations, Russian military had a very strict order from the chief commander not to aim at civilian targets. And they are not doing that. They are not shelling houses. They are not shelling apartments. They are not shelling civil objects. They are only shelling and they're aiming of military infrastructure, in the context of one of the main goals of the operation, demilitarization of Ukraine. Then who is ruining the infrastructure, the civil infrastructure of Mariupol, for example? Those Nazi battalions inside Mariupol, they're simply killing those who would like to escape from the city. And these Nazi battalions, they are using the apartments as a shelter for their guns, for their armaments, for their tanks, for their snipers. That is causing the reciprocal fire. So, it is not Russian military who are doing that."

"The West is an oasis for criminals from Russia."

"Ukraine is a very difficult country, very difficult for us. In its current state it is hostile towards us."

"We categorically deny any accusations."

"The situation is undoubtedly serious and we would ask that many international leaders not rush with their statements, not rush with their baseless accusations, request information from different sources, and at least listen to our explanations."

"We have significant losses of troops and it is a huge tragedy for us."

"We are in fact now living in the conditions of a perfect storm and the moment of truth, that very storm and moment of truth that will ensure and protect our interests, and make it so that your lives are better, more comfortable, more stable, and more secure."

"Our president knows where he is leading our country."

"The whole country supports him."

"We will win and achieve all our goals."

"We accuse Western countries of taking a series of unlawful actions that has led to the blockade."

"We will never trust the West again."

"Russian Armed Forces do not work with civilian targets."

"The creation of a demilitarised zone around the ZNPP [Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant] is not being considered."

"The operation is being conducted as planned, its goals will be achieved."

"Not at this point. No, we are not discussing that."

"We will continue to consult with the people who live in those regions."

"You should rely only on the data published by the Ministry of Defense of Russia."

"Russians don’t wage war. We’re trying to preserve infrastructure and human lives."

"Waging war is a completely different thing. It entails total destruction of infrastructure, complete destruction of cities. We’re not doing that."

"If a company doesn’t fulfil its obligations, then, of course, it goes in the category of naughty companies. We say goodbye to those companies. And what we do with their assets after that is our business."

"Ukraine was heavily militarized at the time of the start of the [special military operation]. And, as [Russian President Vladimir] Putin said yesterday, one of the tasks was the demilitarization of Ukraine. In fact, this task has been largely completed. Ukraine is using less and less of its weapons. And more and more it uses weapons systems supplied to it by Western countries."

"Russia does not strike at civilian infrastructure."

"There are currently no grounds for an agreement. We will continue the operation for the foreseeable future."

"We just want to control all the land we have now written into our constitution as ours."

"Although elections are a requirement of democracy and Putin himself has decided to hold them, theoretically it’s possible not to hold them, Because it’s already obvious that Putin will be elected."

"Our presidential election is not really democracy, it is costly bureaucracy... Mr. Putin will be re-elected next year with more than 90% of the vote."

"The tragedy is that these lies aren't meant to be believed. What they're meant to do is they're meant to convince Russians that there is no such thing as the truth and that everybody's as bad as the other."

"Dmitri Peskov has served as Vladimir Putin’s spokesperson since 2008. In this capacity, he has played a key role in propaganda and disinformation campaigns to cover up the Kremlin’s links to the 2006 polonium poisoning of former Russian intelligence officer Alexander Litvinenko, the 2018 Novichok poisoning of former Russian military intelligence officer Sergei Skirpal and his daughter Yulia, and the 2020 Novichok poisoning of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny. In all these cases, official and independent sources have debunked the Kremlin’s disinformation and established the Kremlin’s direct responsibility. Serving Putin has been lucrative for Peskov, and despite being a civil servant for his entire career, he and his family are now multimillionaires."

"Before Putin launched his unprovoked and brutal war of choice against Ukraine, Peskov repeatedly denied Russia had any intentions to invade its neighbor. He falsely asserted that Russia did not pose a threat to Ukraine, that Russia had never attacked any other nation, and that Russia would be the “last country in Europe” to think about starting a war. Attempting to discredit Western media reports that exposed the Kremlin’s invasion preparations, Peskov called them “provocations,” an “unfounded fomenting of tension,” “Western hysteria,” “irresponsible fakes,” and “maniacal information insanity.” Russia’s war in Ukraine validated the media reports and undermined Peskov’s credibility."

"Peskov has been one of the key implementers of the Kremlin’s standard disinformation playbook of denial, lies, and obfuscation."

"If a Russian spokesman (e.g. Dmitri Peskov) must be cited, it must be mentioned that this specific figure has lied about every aspect of this war since it began. This is context. Readers picking up the story in the middle need to know such background."

"Are you getting bored doing interviews? That's work. It's the most responsible, representative and solemn work there is — like sport. Anyone who does not aim for the Olympic Games or championships should not be in the sports industry."

"Ukraine is falling apart anyway. Poland should take the western part, Hungary should take the Carpathian Mountains, Romania should take Bukovina and Bessarabia. We'll take the whole of Novorossiya. Ukraine has no future."

"It's better if the West sees us as the enemy and imposes restrictions on us everywhere. Sanctions, sanctions and more sanctions. Then we'll rise up and develop more quickly."

"The policy of my party is to make Russia stronger and to restore to it some of its original territories. The West wants Russia to remain as it is now, that is why they have launched these canards. They want to cut my political base by confusing my supporters. The fact is, more than what I can do in Russia, they are worried by the influence I could have in their internal politics. But I want them to realise that if they persist in their policy of weakening Russia, and continue to support the drunken traitors who run our government, everything will end in agony and anarchy. It won't be good for Russia. It could be much worse for the West."

"Unlike the left, we do not trot out any far-fetched or unachievable promises. Our program is straightforward and clear – there should not be any homeless, unemployed or hungry. This is the minimal goal, while the maximum goal is to make a major leap forward."

"It is necessary to ensure the accelerated development of roads. We have a vast territory and the possibility to move people and goods quickly across it is a guarantee for the economy’s success. Trains should move at a speed of 400km/h similar to what has long been in place in China and Japan."

"We have just another chance to see that the system of government in the United States is not presidential, the country is actually a warped parliamentary republic, since Congress makes all the decisions. If so, there is a need to amend the Constitution so the Congress can elect a president. It would be cheaper and faster."

"The West will have to choose: either to come to terms with Russians, or to receive a retaliatory blow. This retaliatory blow will not be by means of war. We will resort to the same weapon: nationalism."

"All men lie to you. When they tell you that they love you, it’s a lie… All men hate you, ladies, they hate you. Because you prevent men from thriving… This is why all the crimes committed in the world are women’s fault."

"I grew up in a world where there was no warmth - not from my parents, not from my friends or teachers. I felt somehow superfluous, forever in the way, an object of criticism."

"My name Vladimir means 'rule the world'. Let us Slavs rule the world in the 20th century."

"All of humanity knows me. My name is in encyclopedias, in registers and databases. Books have been written; films recorded. I’m happy, I’m satisfied."

"The LDPR doesn’t act against the country, we don’t say: something’s wrong with this country. We say: Our country has problems."

"Democrats in Russia have three paths open to them: the grave, emigration or prison."

"There is no ideal system just as there are no ideal persons, ideal families or ideal cities, we have to get away from ideals."

"At 04:00 on 22 February you'll feel [our new policy]. I'd like 2022 to be peaceful. But I love the truth, for 70 years I've said the truth. It won't be peaceful. It will be a year when Russia once again becomes great."

"There is no such thing as Russian fascism. You won't find a single Russian who considers Russians to be a superior race and who advocate expulsion of aliens."

"When Leninism committed suicide, essentially nothing took its place. Except "transition" and "reform." In 1983, one perceptive scholar, surveying the ostensible hollowing of Communist ideology, had predicted that Russian nationalism "could become the ruling ideology of the state." A decade later, warnings about nationalism became highly fashionable. But such prophecies went unfulfilled. To be sure, Boris Yeltsin sought to rally liberal nationalists with his campaign for Russia's rebirth, which, however, turned out to be more collapse. Hardline nationalists drifted toward the re-established, aging Communist Party, whose cynical leader, Gennady Zyuganov, had conveniently been away "on vacation" when the president bombed the parliament in October 1993, and returned to fill the void in the "opposition." A chauvinistic grouping, led by the media clown Vladimir Zhirinovsky, also garnered a limited protest vote, for a time, while a handful of avowedly fascist associations, some affiliated with the reconstituted Communists, engaged in sporadic acts of violence, most of which went unpunished. But the pundits, mesmerized by the rhetoric and confusing the existence of chaos with the possible onset of powerful dictatorship, were wrong: the much-feared red-brown (Communist-fascist) coalition failed to materialize."

"Vladimir Zhirinovsky, sincerely, in his own way, in special, unique ways, tirelessly fought for the authority of Russia."

"When the post-Soviet experiment in electoral democracy and market economics turned out disastrously for Russia after 1991, movements like Pamyat (“memory”) revived this rich Slavophile tradition, now updated by open praise for the Nazi experiment. The most successful of a number of antiliberal, anti-Western, anti-Semitic parties in Russia was Vladimir Zhirinovsky’s badly misnamed Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), founded at the end of 1989, with a program of national revival and unification under strong authority combined with wild-eyed proposals for the reconquest of Russia’s lost territories (including Alaska). Zhirinovsky came in third in the Russian presidential election of June 1991, with more than 6 million votes, and his LDP became the largest party in Russia in parliamentary elections of December 1993, with nearly 23 percent of the total vote. Zhirinovsky’s star faded thereafter, partly because of erratic behavior and bizarre statements (plus the revelation that his father was Jewish), bt mainly because President Boris Yeltsin held the reins and ignored parliament. For the moment Russia limped along as a quasi-democracy under Yeltsin and his handpicked successor, the former KGB agent Vladimir Putin. If the Russian president were to lose credibility, however, some extreme Right leader more competent than Zhirinovsky would be a much more plausible otucome than any kind of return to Marxist collectivism."

"Founder and longtime leader of one of the country’s oldest political parties, he did a lot for the establishing and development of Russian parliamentarism and domestic legislation, and sincerely strove to contribute to solving the most important national problems. And always, in any audience, in the most heated discussions, he defended the patriotic position, the interests of Russia."

"Zhirinovsky is an evil caricature of a Russian patriot. It's as if someone wanted to use this figure to show Russian patriotism to the world as a repulsive monster. Apart from the financial support he received, the reason Zhirinovsky had so much success in the elections is that by that time all the democratic parties, groups and leaders had completely abandoned Russia's national interests. They remained indifferent to the cruel poverty and hopelessness which has afflicted the majority of the population as a result of Yegor Gaidar's technocratic reform--after so many years of communism, yet another heartless experiment performed on the unfortunate people of Russia."

"Aggressive marketing of war affects people and they start thinking that war is acceptable. Governments and their propaganda supporters are fully responsible for the militaristic rhetoric on state-owned television channels."

"We are journalists, and our mission is clear – to distinguish between facts and fiction."

"Journalism in Russia is going through a dark valley. Over a hundred journalists, media outlets, human rights defenders and NGOs have recently been branded as “foreign agents”. In Russia, this means “enemies of the people.” Many of our colleagues have lost their jobs. Some have to leave the country. Some are deprived of the opportunity to live a normal life for an unknown period of time. Maybe forever."

"This award is for all true journalism. This award is to my colleagues from Novaya Gazeta, who have lost their lives – Igor Domnikov, Yuri Shchekotschikhin, Anna Politkovskaya, Anastasija Baburova, Stas Markelov and Natasha Estemirova. This award is also to the colleagues who are alive, to the professional community who perform their professional duty."

"Propaganda is the kitchen of war, Propaganda is war itself. First comes the militarisation of national holidays, then the news is replaced by propaganda shows."

"The destruction of the media in Russia is more and more like an act of war, like when a rocket launcher destroys everything from the face of the earth. The destruction of the Russian media is complete. The government has undoubtedly won the war against the independent media that presents an alternative point of view. Propaganda has won."

"It is a targeted annihilation of the independent media. Journalists are expelled and made enemies of the people, so-called foreign agents. And why all this? The government has decided to leave the Russian people completely alone with the state propaganda. And that propaganda is slowly but surely destroying society’s brains,"

"Where it’s propaganda, it’s war. Where there is freedom of expression, people do not let the authorities start a war, a war like the one we see in the middle of Europe now."

"The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided to award the Nobel Peace Prize for 2021 to Maria Ressa and Dmitry Muratov for their efforts to safeguard freedom of expression, which is a precondition for democracy and lasting peace. Ms. Ressa and Mr. Muratov are receiving the peace prize for their courageous fight for freedom of expression in the Philippines and in Russia. At the same time, they are representatives of all journalists who stand up for this ideal in a world in which democracy and freedom of the press face increasingly adverse conditions."

"In Russia, independent journalism is a blood sport. Since Dmitry Muratov founded independent newspaper Novaya Gazeta in 1993, six of his reporters have been assassinated for exposing the crimes of Vladimir Putin’s regime and Russia’s oligarchy. In response to one piece in 2012, Muratov’s deputy was taken to a forest by the head of the Russian Investigative Committee, or Russia’s FBI. The official threatened to kill him and then pretend to investigate his death. But nothing has intimidated Muratov and the Novaya Gazeta team. Year in and year out, his newspaper has exposed billions of dollars of the Putin government’s corruption, extrajudicial killings, and rampant human-rights abuses. For this work, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in 2021. Months later, following Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, he pledged to donate the medal to benefit refugees fleeing the crisis. Some heroes show moments of bravery; Dmitry Muratov has shown a lifetime of bravery."

"I have been in the army since I was 17, but I never learned to swear. I think that swearing is good on a collective farm when the bulls do not obey. But with people you can't."

"I cry only for joy. I can see something beautiful and cry. And I'm not ashamed of it. After all, crying from joy is much better than from weakness."

"Russian and foreign historians and politicians said this for me. In their unanimous opinion, the main event of the twentieth century is the Second World War. In it, in the Great Patriotic War, we won. This is the main thing. Although the Americans wrote very different results, for them, the collapse of the Soviet Union was the main event of the past century. There is no more powerful state. The world has become unipolar and it is beneficial for them."

"Russians are used to flaunting their fearlessness, but I'll be honest: no one wants to die. Nevertheless, we rose and shouted: "For the Motherland, for Stalin!" and went on the attack."

"My real friend was my first wife. I could share everything with her without exception. That's how it came together that she became both a wife and a friend. A friend in the full sense of the word happens once in a lifetime or does not happen at all."

"Soviet Marshal Dmitry Yazov was an outstanding commander and a remarkable representative of the iconic generation of victors, a volunteer and a battle-front veteran. He was a man of exceptional courage and determination. He went through the ordeals of the Great Patriotic War with dignity, and after the Victory, he devoted his life to developing the Armed Forces and strengthening Russia’s defence and national security. His loyalty to the Oath and duty as well as his high professionalism and personal qualities earned him undeniable authority and respect."

"After the war, Dmitry Timofeyevich dedicated his entire strength, experience, and knowledge to the development of the Armed Forces and the effort to bolster combat preparedness of the forces and defense capacity of our country. A highly competent and open and principled person who put officer's honor above all else and was highly respected."

"For all of us, he was and will remain a legendary personality, who fought throughout the Great Patriotic War and earned a reputation as a courageous and resolute soldier, as a wise and responsible commander. It was for good reason that he was appointed as the defense minister at a difficult time for the country and fulfilled his duties with dignity, at the same time staying true to his ideals and homeland."

"Using the traditional demagoguery, which has been tried and tested over the years, the putschists blame all our current difficulties on the democrats and promise economic recovery and a better life, security and prosperity for the citizens of the USSR. What a hypocritical lie! Surely Pavlov is responsible for rocketing inflation and unprecedented price rises this year? Surely Yazov as leader of the most corrupt highest placed generals, is responsible for the poverty and lawlessness of our servicemen? Surely Pugo bears personal responsibility for the blood shed in the Baltic republics? Surely Starodubtsev, leader of the organization of Soviet land-owners is to blame, owing to the stance he assumed, for the abortive collection of last year’s bumper crops? And these are the people who promise to “restore order in the country!”"

"Generally speaking, what is the modern Ukrainian state? To put it crudely, it is a prostitute who has got infected with AIDS and wants to infect everyone else – to spread the infection so that more people die."

"The war is being waged with America, which has captured the historical territory of Russia - Ukraine. Roughly speaking, if compared with 1941, Hitler is modern America, the United States did not reach Moscow, but Donetsk, and used the population of Ukraine. The resources of all of Europe, as under Hitler, work, so to speak, for the Reich. All this is completely united - they all help informationally, economically thanks to sanctions, and now by military means. Their military theme is the weakest. They are not ready to suffer losses - they are ready to throw only the same Slavs, that is, Ukrainians, whom they zombified, into the slaughter. This is all they could do from a military point of view."

"There are countries that receive 20% of GDP only from tourism. Clearly, not only Russian. But I don’t think that everyone will rush to Europe now and there will be an invasion of tourists. Given the global crisis, people have little money, so no one will rush anywhere. Everyone will suffer and die from tourism."

"They closed the sky... Let's conditionally take England. 200 planes flew east from London, two planes flew from Russia. We'll be patient if two planes don't fly. And 200 planes to fly around this huge Russia - a sixth of the Earth, over Afghanistan, Iran ... How much will a ticket cost? Plus, for sure, intermediate landings will need to be done somewhere in Dubai and so on, paying for refueling. Tickets will almost certainly be $10,000. They punished themselves again."

"They say return the planes to us. You broke the contract, - our pilots say, - you take these planes. How to pick them up? Where to get these 500 pilot brigades? And at the same time, that they themselves closed the sky. They broke the contract, the planes automatically become foreign, and our skies are also closed to foreign ones. That is, it is generally not clear how to pick them up. And the funny thing is that these aircraft are not needed by leasing companies. They say: why do we need 500 aircraft? Where are we going to put them? And then the question arises about the bankruptcy of all these companies. And given that leasing companies, and all sorts of aviation, and others, are insured in the English "Lloyd" - in general, everything converges there with all insurers, - then the bankruptcy of Lloyd, as the largest, threatens. And banks and many investors had his shares - this is a huge chain ..."

"Europe will suffer very much – it will shrink economically. They already have debts over 100% of GDP. They will borrow more - I don’t know, though, who will give them. They will lose markets forever. It is impossible to say in two years - okay, we are coming back to you. This war, of course, is between the United States and Russia, but it is also a war between the United States and Europe, because there will be a flight of capital to America from Europe, a flight of brains and so on. America will prolong its existence by threatening Europe. Naturally, the niche of Europe will be taken by China, the same Russia and other so-called developing countries. That is, there will be a gigantic redistribution of the world."

"I think huge riots in Europe will start by next winter, when they start cutting all these social programs. In general, in the next few years there will be a reformatting - the overthrow of governments, revolutions, chaos and anarchy. Local Muslims will take advantage of all this, they will probably declare Sharia laws in some cities - there will be territories of disobedience to European authorities, guerrilla warfare, and so on. Chaos will grow. These are the global implications,"

"America will also weaken. Everyone will see that this is a “paper tiger”, that you can do this with him. China is likely to take Taiwan. I think even this year. They will now prepare, see how everything is done. Accordingly, Russia and China will put forward all kinds of ultimatums to America - that, guys, you are no longer the same, so let's redo everything. Subsequently, when we completely pacify Ukraine, and it will be, all the "Nazis" will change their shoes. Do you remember, 20 years ago they said that Chechnya will never forget you, will never forgive you... Guys, look, now the Chechens are the best friends, loyal and so on. Because the Chechens understood, they were explained that they were used as "sixes" by the Anglo-Saxons in the fight against Russia. This is a small nation, each person is worth its weight in gold, and they killed their own children for American and British interests. They realized they didn't need it. Russia has never threatened them with anything. And from American and British politics, they only died in wars all the time. Ukrainians will understand the same thing when they are shown what atrocities the Nazis did... We will show all of this to Europe - how the Anglo-Saxons deceived Europe."

"No New York, no Washington will die for the Baltics in the same way, or be ready to undergo nuclear attacks. In the same way, the Americans will surrender it, they will forget the fifth article, the so-called that they should start a war together there all at once ... Yeah, they fled - all Americans will run straight to the war, they will say - yes, bomb us, Russians, with atomic weapons for the Baltics. Where is she, by the way? Therefore, when they surrender it, and we go back to our borders, all the other European countries will say: wait, why did we pay some money here, arm ourselves, why did we need all this at all? NATO will fall apart, the management of the Americans in Europe will fall apart. Europe will be liberated, as they say."

"Europe will be free, albeit in a very shabby state, and will hate America and adore Russia. Russia will extend a helping hand to her and will help her, including in the fight against all kinds of Muslim terrorists who breed there. We will help them establish constitutional order, we will bring governments loyal to ourselves to power, and we will dominate this entire Europe. Not just like over Eastern Europe, as it was during the Soviet Union, but already over the whole."

"Our task, taking advantage of the situation, is to finish off England - finally and irrevocably, so that such a state will never again exist on Earth. Because 500 years, while it exists, spoils Russia. Even America - it is not important for her to always fight with Russia. It is they who are simply babbled on by English political science, British secret services, English traditions, they conduct English, in fact, politics, copy it. If England is destroyed, peace will come in Eurasia, because the policy of England throughout its history is to quarrel everyone with everyone, otherwise they would not have survived. A small island that no one wants, on which nothing grows, there are no minerals, and so on, ruled half the world and now continues to rule, even America."

"Without Europe as its major base, America will be weakened. There are many political contradictions even now – in the last elections, even the Congress was taken by force. The next elections, I think, will be no less dangerous and bloody. In America, every generation since the 1970s has been living worse than the previous one - a lot of beggars, a lot of weapons, a lot of Mexicans and blacks, and crime. All this is very explosive. Americans spend money not on their social programs, but in order to feed all sorts of Navalny around the world. All this is not “good”."

"Everything will be rosy, wonderful ... We will defeat everyone. But not at once. Now we have, roughly speaking, 1943. The 45th will be in ten years - it's just that the war is stretched out in time, not like with Nazi Germany, but stretched out over a long term. May 9 will be in ten years - victory over the whole world and over the last evil."

"They should understand there could be a strike against Miami, Texas or any other state. Then, they'll tuck their tail in. They aren't very brave over there. This is our truth and what we should aspire to and confidently move toward that."

"The first to be hit will be London. It’s crystal clear that the threat to the world comes from the Anglo-Saxons."

"Second, we’ll mitigate the entire system of anti-missile defence, everywhere and 100 per cent."

"Third, we certainly won’t start from Warsaw, Paris or Berlin. The first to be hit will be London. It’s crystal clear that the threat to the world comes from the Anglo-Saxons."

"In the third stage, I shall see what the USA will tell Western Europe on continuing their fight in the cold, without food and electricity. I wonder how they [the US] will manage to stay aside."

"This is the rough plan, and I deliberately leave out certain moments because they are not to be discussed on TV."

"We'll destroy the entire group of enemy's space satellites during the first air operation."

"No one will care if they are American or British, we would see them all as NATO."

"As part of the operation to destroy critically important sites, Western Europe will be cut off from power supplies and immobilised."

"And we also need to pull Belarus into this."

"If we start working, we will work properly. Everything will be cleared out, because why leave enemies behind your back?"

"I'm not rejoicing that we're grinding [Ukrainians] up. All of us probably know people there. Many have friends and relatives there. But today there's no other choice than to grind it all up."

"We should be talking about this, a happy, well-fed German 'Burger' [citizenship] whose butt is already starting to get cold ahead of the coming winter. [Biden] should understand that if there's a strike against the decision-making centers, the main decision-making center is Berlin. Not only will his house freeze up, but his entire nation will be in total chaos, which essentially means his own demise."

"Biden says there would be a reaction, per their Article 5, but if we turn the British Isles into a Martian desert in 3 minutes flat, using tactical nuclear weapons, not strategic ones, they could use Article 5, but for whom? A nonexistent country, turned into a Martian desert? They won't respond."

"Latvia quacked something - who are you even? You are a pimple on the body of the earth. What's happening today and what will happen soon: It's clear to me that today a decision is the beginning of the end of Ukraine. That's it, that nation no longer exists. It doesn't exist! Film productions about Bucha or Izyum aren't going to change that. Time will come and everything will come out. It will be later - and without Ukraine. Ukraine does not exist! Ukraine's history is ending, perhaps it's a good thing."

"It is up to the state to do it, but there has been nothing but talk and wishful thinking. It's like the tale of the emperor's new clothes. Everyone acted as if the emperor were dressed, until a small boy said he was naked. This is where we stand with reform."

"Chechnya will force the politicians to start serious reform. They can begin by purging the armed forces of windbags and replacing them with a million fighters and half a million support staff."

"To win, you've got to plan carefully and then make war with the speed of lightning."

"Human beings are not trash. Human blood is not water to be spilled."

"I never defended the White House. I defended common sense. They tried to push me, a Russian general, to shoot my own people in the capital of my own state. No such force exists that would compel me to do this. I'm not a policeman. My job is to deal with external enemies. Build up a national guard or whatever you want to deal with domestic problems, but leave the armed forces out of it!"

"No commander can know everything. He must rely on deputies, competent in the narrow areas assigned them. His responsibility is to make sure none of them tugs the blanket to one side of the bed. A deputy who answers 'yes, sir' to every stupid thing his commander says can get his boss into serious trouble. He must have the courage to take a stand and be able to defend it."

"In a normal civilized society, you would have to force the army into politics with a stick. They should not be concerned with who is in power today, be it Czar, General Secretary or President. Presidents come and go, but the motherland always remains. We are not in a normal state."

"I joined the armed forces 25 years ago and still love military service and want to carry on. But these are troubled times, when everything is so confused you can't tell military issues from political ones. So I do not rule out the possibility that I might be forced to it out of necessity. But I don't really want to. If I get carried away in this direction sometimes, it is only out of gloom and desperation, not because I have some overwhelming desire to prove my political mettle."

"Only in the constitutional way. I've had more than my share of war and have come to the conclusion that it doesn't resolve anything. Even the longest wars, lasting a hundred years, still end in peace talks. So why not talk right away and cut out the military fighting stage? There can't be a victor in the kinds of war they are waging now in the former Soviet Union, only throngs of defeated."

"They charged like a bull at the Chechen fence and got their horns stuck. Now they are going crazy out of their own incompetence."

"We have received reliable information from the ground in Chechnya that people there are planning the physical annihilation of Gen. Aleksandr Lebed. These are people who do not want the negotiating process in Chechnya to proceed. We do not believe that it is necessarily the Chechens who plan this action. It is not the first time there have been threats like this. It will have no effect on the work before us."

"You send in the planes to drop the bombs. Then you gather the journalists and tell them to applaud. We need to study that."

"If they want to expand, let them waste the money. Let us be realistic. Who is Russia going to fight now? We are a poor country. We have nothing left to fight with."

"I am ready to lead any regiment into any battle. Just as long as it is a regiment drawn only of children and grandchildren of the people who run our country."

""We are still a great power. We have rockets. They are rusty, but we still have them. It won't make anyone's life easier if a missile is launched, even if it's a rusty one."

"Let us have troops that would scare any aggressor off. These troops should be backed by the nuclear shield."

"If Russia and NATO cooperate, who are they going to be against? There used to be two systems, two military blocs. One system collapsed. Its military bloc collapsed. And the other part remains in perfect operating order. That beautiful NATO bloc was first aimed at the Soviet Union, and it would be a pity to abandon it. So, now it is re-aimed at Russia."

"Russia must be loved, not because you want to. Russia is like gangrene on the leg. If you don't take measures against it, it will infect the whole leg."

"We are standing on one-sixth of the world, a rich country, with our pants down and hoping someone will help us."

"Power must be strong. Patriot will never be a dirty word, whereas democrat has already become one."

"Christ was the new era's first Communist. He lifted his voice in support of the impoverished, sick, and hungry, as well as everyone else in distress, and he would have joined us if he had been alive."

"Put Jesus' Sermon on the Mount and the Moral Code of the Builder of Communism next to each other, and you will just gasp."

"The Belarusian people are prudent enough to make the right choice. You have been moving in the right direction all these years. Yes, there have been difficulties, problems. Crises affected your hard-working country, too, but you have gone through them with fewer losses"

"Yes, Russia has interests concerning the former Soviet republics on its borders, including Ukraine. These are the interests of peace and good neighborliness, a calm and dignified life for citizens, economic development, and cultural cooperation."

"Meanwhile, the West has demonstrated its readiness to rely on the most reactionary circles to pursue its interests."

"We firmly know that the peoples of Russia and Ukraine do not want a war. Such a war would also run counter to the fundamental interests of Europe. But the ruling powers of the United States appear to want it."

"Washington has been defeated in every war in recent decades. Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan are just some of the countries in which the United States has unleashed wars and ingloriously lost. This time, its leaders are eager to fight by proxy in Ukraine. The Washington “hawks” have set out to turn Ukrainians into cannon fodder. Political cover, the supply of weapons, the activities of Western military instructors—all this openly pushes the authorities in Kiev toward a bloody military adventure.'"

"We must, by all means, breathe into the hearts of the inhabitants of multinational Ukraine the readiness to resist the dangerous games of the Western powers and their henchmen in Kiev. The time has come to rise together to thwart their vile and dangerous plans."

"The powerful in their suits and ties are targeting not only Russia and Ukraine but also Europe. The United States insists on tough sanctions against our country, habitually using the “Ukrainian card.” At the same time, they are launching a new stage in the struggle against their competitor, the European Union. The U.S. has extremely low trade with Russia, but Europe has broad and profitable trade and economic ties with our country. A military conflict with Russia would allow Washington to drive European countries into new, economically-destructive sanctions."

"U.S. imperialists’ task is not to protect Ukraine, but to crawl out of the acute crisis of capitalism. It is extremely important for them to score new profits by torpedoing the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline [between Germany and Russia] and hooking the EU economy on the needle of expensive liquefied natural gas from the U.S. This is part of the true rationale behind the current military crisis in Ukraine."

"Russia is finally moving away from the pernicious idolatry of the West…. It’s time to show our character in the Donbass. We are surrounded by a chain of unfriendly states. It is impossible to retreat further. The West must feel Russia’s determination to defend itself and its friends."

"The cause of peace on our planet will always be under threat as long as the supporters of aggression have their hands on the sword. The time has come to fulfill the mission Russians know all too well by experience and firmly say “no” to any international war."

"Combining the national-patriotic idea and the idea of social justice is one of the main tasks facing this country."

"Our nation is being deprived of our very last asset: our fatherland. Look what is happening to our elders, those who fought all the way from Stalingrad to Berlin. . .. Look at how these white-haired veterans are humiliated, how their banners are defiled,"

"Science says if the annual per capita consumption of alcohol exceeds eight liters [2.1 gallons], the nation starts to degenerate genetically. The average consumption in Russia now amounts to 15 to 20 liters."

"Two hundred billion dollars, your money. If it sat in our banks making 6 to 8 percent in interest, it would bring $12 billion in annual profits. There is no need to borrow."

"The oligarchs who ruined the people know better than others that a new economic collapse is rapidly approaching. In order to stay in power, they decided to deceive you one more time by choosing an early election before the truth comes out."

"Last time, when fascism and Nazism engulfed the whole of Europe, mankind paid the cost of 71 million lives, 27 million of which were the lives of the best sons and daughters of the great Soviet homeland."

"On the international arena the time has come to launch a decisive political offensive against any attempts at rehabilitation of Fascism. On the international arena the Russian authorities should use all the influence our country has at international organizations to that end. In mounting anti-Fascist and anti-war movements, we propose to use the whole arsenal of bi-lateral and multi-lateral interaction with other countries, and make wide use of parliamentary and people diplomacy."

"In the majority of countries today the communists are struggling opposition parties. They are in the vanguard of the resistance to the anti-people policies of big capital governments. The coronavirus pandemic merely made more evident the cannibalistic essence of the bourgeois system. Millions of people across the world have become victims of criminal “optimization” of social rights, lack of access to healthcare and mass lay-offs."

"Seventy-five years ago our fathers, grandfathers and great grandfathers upheld the freedom and independence of the Soviet Motherland, ensured clear skies above it, and confidence of tomorrow. We, the heirs to the victorious soldiers, are called upon to defend the truth about the Great Patriotic War and the Great Victory. The forces of evil are at pains to withhold the truth from humanity, to rewrite the results of the war and to carry through Hitler’s hideous plans. The present situation is complex and worrisome. Accomplices of anti-Soviet and Russophobic forces are active inside Russia too. They dish out dirt on the heroes, besmirch their heroic deeds and deny the contribution of the Communists to the Victory. We will do all we can to expose their slanderous attempts."

"Lenin’s discovery has lost none of its relevance today. The features of imperialism have not gone away, and globalization has brought all the contradictions to a head. Thus, the concentration, in the hands of the monopolies, of the means of production, sources of raw materials, transport, communications, scientific and technical discoveries and skilled workers and engineers has reached an all-time high. Five hundred corporations dominate the US economy. Half of them have assets in five or more sectors. They employ 20% of the total workforce and account for 60% of profits."

"The freedom that socialism gave every man and enshrined in its constitution is the freedom not to be a beggar and not to be exploited. Freedom from the fear of losing one’s job tomorrow, of being unable to pay for one’s housing, food, clothing and vital medicines. Of not being able to pay for the education and feed one’s children. Not being able to support elderly parents. A freedom to feel a full individual and not a human good sold in the labour market. A freedom that was granted to all regardless of their background, nationality or profession. To workers, peasants, scientists and artists. Only such freedom can be recognised as true freedom. Its absence makes all the other freedoms meaningless."

"Modern globalism is the highest form of imperialism. The onslaught of capital on workers’ rights is mounting fast. Imperialism is becoming more aggressive in the world and the threat of a new large-scale war is growing. The financial and economic crisis is worsening with each new wave being more grievous and painful. One side effect of the crisis is the groundswell of nationalist and separatist sentiments in contemporary Europe."

"In this struggle we are inspired by the example of those countries where staunch supporters of the socialist option are in power. They are China which has the world in awe of its spectacular successes in the economy and the social sphere. Cuba, which the US imperialism has vainly tried to strangle for six decades. The dynamically developing Vietnam. These countries challenge capitalist globalization, refuse to submit to their diktat and score successes on the socialist path. The experience of fraternal Byelorussia is highly instructive."

"Our main common task is to broaden resistance to the aggressive offensive of capitalism. To form a united front in support of the countries that come under imperialist pressure. To constantly expose the essence of capitalism which cannot exist without terrorism, wars, crises, destruction of nature and the suffering of millions."

"We are confident that the sun of socialism will again rise over Russia and the whole world. The working people will triumph."

"When Leninism committed suicide, essentially nothing took its place. Except "transition" and "reform." In 1983, one perceptive scholar, surveying the ostensible hollowing of Communist ideology, had predicted that Russian nationalism "could become the ruling ideology of the state." A decade later, warnings about nationalism became highly fashionable. But such prophecies went unfulfilled. To be sure, Boris Yeltsin sought to rally liberal nationalists with his campaign for Russia's rebirth, which, however, turned out to be more collapse. Hardline nationalists drifted toward the re-established, aging Communist Party, whose cynical leader, Gennady Zyuganov, had conveniently been away "on vacation" when the president bombed the parliament in October 1993, and returned to fill the void in the "opposition." A chauvinistic grouping, led by the media clown Vladimir Zhirinovsky, also garnered a limited protest vote, for a time, while a handful of avowedly fascist associations, some affiliated with the reconstituted Communists, engaged in sporadic acts of violence, most of which went unpunished. But the pundits, mesmerized by the rhetoric and confusing the existence of chaos with the possible onset of powerful dictatorship, were wrong: the much-feared red-brown (Communist-fascist) coalition failed to materialize."

"Yet the death of communism in Russia had been much exaggerated. The December 1993 referendum endorsed Yeltsin’s constitutional project but only because his officials fiddled the results. Yeltsin also suffered disappointment in the simultaneous election to the State Duma. Instead of a thumping win for his supporters there was much success for the neo-fascist party of Vladimir Zhirinovski. What is more, the Constitutional Court in November 1993 had ruled the ban on the communist party invalid. Back into the legal political arena marched the communists under Gennadi Zyuganov, and they became the most influential party of opposition by the mid-1990s. Zyuganov understood that he would win over few voters if he called for the restoration of a one-party state. He repositioned the Communist Party of the Russian Federation by asserting its sympathy with that bastion of the Russian Imperial tradition, the Orthodox Church, whereas the party of Lenin, Stalin and Khrushchëv had persecuted religion as the opium of the people. Zyuganov anyway cared little for Lenin. The communist he most admired was Stalin, who had led the USSR to victory in the Second World War. Zyuganov denounced the breaking up of the Soviet Union. He and his party hymned the welfare provision available under Brezhnev. They vilified Gorbachëv and snidely fostered antisemitism. Zyuganov stood against Yeltsin in the presidential election of 1996. He was in the lead as the campaign opened but lacked the resources available to Yeltsin, who enlisted the wealthiest businessmen on his side. The communist campaign was anyway a jaded one and Zyuganov proved a distinctly uncharismatic candidate. Despite serious cardiac ill-health, Yeltsin pulled himself together for the electoral contest. He toured the country. He spent freely on political broadcasts. He disbursed budgetary largesse to local administrations. TV and print journalists focused attention on the past iniquities of communism. The result was a second presidential term for Yeltsin and the definitive trouncing of communism in Russia."

"Belarus is a part of Russia."

"I see, how he (Putin) has waged the war, how in the Duma he brokered an alliance with the communists and the nationalists, how he uses methods of force, i hear his absurd rhetoric about a great nation, behind which hides a humiliation of Russia and a desolation of the population. That is enough for me."

"The members of Yabloko only want Russia to become a country in which our children would want to live, from which smart people, intellectuals, entrepreneurs and financiers would not leave abroad. If we'll come to power, we'll achieve that. And if it is necessary for Yabloko to become the conscience of Russia, it will be."

"There is only one party in Russia that defends the system of European values - Yabloko. Others defend conservative or Soviet ideals. It makes no sense to distinguish between those who support private property and those who reject it. Attention should be paid to the position regarding civil liberties and human rights. Which parties are the basis for modern fascism? Those that protect private property but ignore human rights. Who are the Liberals, Democrats and Social Democrats? Those who protect not only private property, but also rights and freedoms."

"Russia in it's scope is such a big and serious country that it will always be a part of world politics."

"...However, working fairly succesfully in «Yabloko», I always had a problem. Better than anybody else, it was accurately and briefly outlined by one of the representatives of the mysterious team of the Chairman of the party, which he always attracts to the elections and which then also mysteriously disappears. «Alexey, — he said, — your problem is that you don't love Yavlinsky sincerely». Yeah. You bet. I respect him for some of his previous achievements, but I don't like him at all."

"It's not about the votes. The elections were rigged. But if they weren't, we'd get even less votes. Because fair elections is not just a live feed for Grigory Alekseyevich. It's also the admission of all those who wish to participate. It means that in that live feed, there would have been the more popular Kasparov and Ryzhkov. It means that Kasyanov would've participated in the election with his financial resources. This means that the issues of uniting Democrats would've been resolved not in the Presidential Administration, but in an open dialogue. I am not sure that the party leadership is ready for such a dialogue. I claim that the main reason for the current electoral disaster is that the Yabloko has turned into a dried-up closed sect. We demand everyone to be Democrats, but we don't want to be Democrats ourselves. We demand responsibility and resignations from the authorities. But we do not see that the government has already been replaced three times, while in Yabloko everything is like in '96. And the worse the results, the stronger the leadership's position. The closer we must gather around him. Since this may be my last speech as a member of Yabloko, I appeal to stop self-deception about our high results, about the possible theft of votes. Stop lying about this topic. Draw conclusions and make decisions. And the first decision that I demand as a member of the Federal Council of the party, elected by the Moscow organization: the immediate resignation of the chairman of the party and all his deputies. I make this demand on my own behalf and on behalf of all my comrades. I also call on the party congress to resign and re-elect at least 70% of the Bureau, which covers incompetent leadership with its silent obedience."