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Comment by mirimir | Hacker News Reader

There has never been good reason to believe them. Sometimes you can see that clearly. Consider how Germany, Japan and Russia were portrayed in movie newsreels during 1900-1970, and in TV news. It's all propaganda.

Edit: For example, why did the US leave so many troops in Germany after WWII? Standard dogma is the Cold War. But, perhaps not surprisingly, some German veterans weren't all that happy about the outcome. About occupation. That came out in disputes about pacification after the US invaded Iraq.

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>Standard dogma is the Cold War.

Yes, it's "standard dogma" to use your pointlessly biased phrase. It's also an incredibly plausible explanation considering that Russian troups were stationed in East Germany and in the rest of Eastern Europe.

>But, perhaps not surprisingly, some German veterans weren't all that happy about the outcome.

That's right, some of those who had faught in the Nazi war were unhappy about having lost.

However, most Germans never voted for Hitler in the first place and once liberated they happily went on to become one of the most prosperous nations on earth. All during "occupation" as you call it.

Pretty safe to say that those in West Germany were happier to lose to the US or UK forces than those in the East losing to the Soviets.

Yes, but I fear that the US may have drawn a somewhat flawed conclusion from that success. I think the outcome of toppling a dictator depends hugely on the reason for that dictator's ascent and the cultural context.

They were happy to loose to the West who had less reason (by an order of magnitude or more) to hate them.

That Stalin was butcher seems a bit mute compared to the German responsibility of the savagery of the Eastern Front.

It's perhaps worth remembering that Putin is from Leningrad, and that his older brother died in the German siege. Also, he was close to Yeltsin, and watched him die from alcoholism, after relentless humiliation by the US and allies.

So it's a fair bet that he has issues.

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