Yakov Kedmi, public figure, Israel: Your naivety will never cease to surprise me. Nevertheless... Do you really think that this director of a Polish museum is ignorant? He justified his words. This is a song for the army that occupied Poland, killed Polish people, and raped Polish women. This is a song of the invader army. I mean, it's not that he didn't know what the Red Army was doing. His perspective is based on what has been already become canon into Poland, it's the Polish government's official position today. And you have good, diplomatic relations with this government. They're not severed. But they still believe that you didn't liberate Poland - you occupied Poland! You used to kill Polish people! You used to rape Polish women!
- That's what they believe.
- Poland believes that. He acted based on that. Not because he's ignorant, on the contrary, he's very well informed, in the Polish way, that is. Today, Poland's official position in relations to Russia is that Poland was occupied, ransacked, and the damage done by it was no less than the damage done by the Nazis. That's what he responded to. Like a typical Pole. What would he think? For a Pole, hating Jews is the same as hating Russians. It's the same. You don't need to teach them how to do it. Moreover, they hate the Russians more now. Because there are less of them in America. There are less of you, Russians, in America. You don't have American dollars, unlike American Jews. And that's all. Otherwise, it'd be the same. It's Poland, it's Latvia.
- To what extent does it correspond…
- It's their official ideology.
- Yakov Iosifovich, to what extent... Yakov Iosifovich, to what extent do this museum director's ideas correspond to the historical truth about what the Red Army did in Poland and how?
- Does it concern anyone?
- It concerns me.
- So, live with it.
- Well, I'm really concerned with the truth.
- It's great. Live with your truth.
- What is the truth?
- While everyone is pouring crap all over you. You just live with your truth, saying, "We are the truth". And you don't do anything against it.
- Why don't you tell us what the truth is?
- No lying!
- What is the truth about what the Red Army did in Poland? Do you want me to answer?
- Yes! Because when I speak about it, I'm told, "Solovyov, it's propaganda, and it's not true." Because when I talk about how the Red Army behaved and how any crime committed by a soldier of our army was punished by a firing squad, how marauding or violence was prevented, I'm told, "Solovyov, what are you talking about? You're a propagandist". But when coming from someone who's not a Russian citizen who was actually there, someone who knows what war is like, you just take their word for it.
- Nothing of the sort. Nothing of the sort. They're not concerned with the truth. You can't talk to thugs and explain to them that they behave like uncultured people. Don't the Poles know the truth? They do. They say this not because they don't know, they do it because they want to turn you into enemies in the eyes of the entire world. They want to turn you into an enemy in the eyes of the Polish people, to root out everything that was sowed during the war and after the war, to mow out all this memory. You're enemies. And what do you do about that? Did Russia react in any way to all the atrocities of the Polish government towards you? It didn't. Did someone react to the smear campaign which was and is still being published in the Western media? Did you do anything apart from saying, "Oh, they don't know the truth, they're ignorant, we'll explain it to them, we'll teach them one more enlightening lesson." There are courts. There are courts! In the West. Did someone sue the schmuck or the people who wrote about the rapes by the Red Army soldiers in Germany? Why would they?
- Nobody even sued the schmuck who talked nonsense on a radio program funded by Gazprom about the Red Army being an army of rapists. Because, now, we live in an environment where they say, "We can't do that! Every opinion matters".
- The problem is not about your people. Your local lowlife is not a concern, it's your problem. It's not them who determine the mood in the West. What happened today in Poland, in Gdansk, in that museum, couldn't have happened five years ago. Why? Because the atmosphere in society has evolved to the point where they can place you on an equal footing with the Nazis. But the Nazis are in the past, they have repented, and you haven't. Because you're an enemy of yesterday, today, and tomorrow. This is propaganda, and they can do anything on the background of this propaganda. On the background of this propaganda, an owner of a Czech hotel says, "No!" A Czech! Who saved Czechoslovakia? Konev's army, if I'm not mistaken, was rushed to liberate Prague. But he says…
- Front.
- Huh?
- Front. Yes, they sent the First Ukrainian Front to liberate Prague. So, he says, "I'm not letting any Russians into my hotel". Russians can't be staying in a hotel in Prague, the city your soldiers shed their blood for. But the Germans are welcome!
- He justifies it by citing modern politics.
- It doesn't matter how he justifies it. This is the result of the atmosphere they have in the Czech Republic today. Who cares for their explanations? You shouldn't explain. You should react. In a way that'll hurt.
- I agree.
