It can be assumed that the scenario of Putin's "liberation march" against Ukraine was generally ready already in the summer of 2021.

And obvious parallels with the events of September 1939 were meant here from the very beginning and taken into account - even in propaganda.

Please note: first, on June 7, 2021, Lukashenka suddenly announces September 17 as a national public holiday - in honor of the events of 1939.

Then, in July, Putin's conceptual historical article appears, in which the author justifies the inferiority of Ukraine as a state and Ukrainians as a nation, positively evaluates Stalin's aggression against Poland in 1939.

And finally, in September 2021, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia for the first time in post-Soviet history will return to use the term of Stalin's Soviet historiography - "liberation march" - calling the events of September 1939 that way.

SEE ALSO: Jealousy and revenge of a polenophobe.

Why does Lukashenko dislike Poland and Poles so much

Tried to repeat

Stalin's "liberation march" of 1939 is the ideal scenario of the almost bloodless annexation of foreign territories, which Putin, with the complicity and support of Lukashenka, planned to implement in February 2022.

History was expected to repeat itself.

That crowds of delighted Ukrainians, who "groaned under the yoke of bandera-fascists", will greet the tank knees of the "liberators" with flowers and pies.

That pre-prepared Russian FSB cells will immediately take over power in the "liberated" territories (as activists of the pro-Moscow KPZB and KPZU did in 1939).

And Ukrainians, shocked by the power and total superiority of Putin's and Lukashenka's "union" armies, will obediently raise their hands and surrender.

And after the annexed,

Map of Medvedev

SEE ALSO: "Leave with what you came with."

What will be left of Ukraine and Belarus if Putin wins the war

During the first celebration of the newly announced "Day of National Unity" in September 2021, Lukashenka dutifully repeated all Putin's new postulates regarding the events of 1939:

• "Poland itself is to blame",

• "in Western Belarus in 1939, the liberators were enthusiastically welcomed", "Belarusians groaned under the yoke of the Polish oppressors",

• "Western Belarus was occupied by Poland in 1920"...

The public had no idea yet, but it is clear from the height of today: even then it was a propaganda preparation of public opinion for the future aggression against Ukraine, which in the minds of two strategists (Moscow and Minsk) obviously had to look like a big "liberation campaign" - but not at all like war.

It is even surprising why in February 2021 the Kremlin finally settled on the term "special military operation".

Although the cynical Stalinist term would fit much better.

National Unity Day is September 17, 2021.

Minsk, Kastrychnitskaya square

"Paper Tiger"

The end of the 1930s was the time of total militarization of Soviet society.

The myth about the invincibility of the Red Army was cultivated.

According to the number of bayonets (more than 4 million people), it was considered the largest army on the continent.

Red Army soldiers and officers surrendered to the Germans in 1941

How combat-capable and technically prepared for a real war it was at the same time is a vague question.

Anyone who at that time expressed even the slightest doubt about her invincibility was awaited by the Gulag or execution.

Many Soviet military commanders of that time (including the executed "red marshals" Blucher, Tukhachevsky and Yegorov) were convinced of this by their own tragic fate.

On the eve of the Second World War, the "Soviet people" had to enthusiastically sing Stalinist marches like this:

We don't want war, but we will defend ourselves -

Thus, the Stalinist regime saw the future war as just that: quick, with small losses, on foreign territory.

The events of September 1939 greatly strengthened this myth - about the invincible Stalinist army, which no one can resist.

On September 17, 1939, a group of more than half a million Red Army invaded the territory of a foreign country, meeting virtually no resistance.

The Polish army at that time was fighting hard in the west, trying to contain Hitler's aggression.

Of course, no one then knew about the secret protocols signed by Molotov and Ribbentrop in August 1939, about the fact that the two dictators had long ago divided Eastern Europe between themselves.

Captured Soviet soldiers in southern Ukraine, 1942

The Polish leadership mistakenly believed that the Red Army was entering only to limit the zone of German occupation, but not to destroy Polish independence and not to stay here forever.

On the evening of September 17, the Commander-in-Chief of the Polish Army, Edward Rydz-Smigli, issued an order on the radio:

"The Soviets invaded our land... We will not engage in hostilities with the Bolsheviks, except in case of an attack from their side or attempts to disarm our units."

The order was mostly carried out.

There are still great doubts about its correctness.

Was the then Stalinist army such a formidable force?

What could have been the result if Poland had organized resistance?

Yes, the Bolshevik invasion army was huge, but there were great doubts about its fighting ability and effectiveness.

Publication in the newspaper "Sovetskaya Belorussia", 1939

At one time, I had to talk with many witnesses of that "liberation march" - and with those who marched in September 1939 to Western Belarus with rifles on their shoulders, as part of marching soldiers' regiments;

and with those who, some with interest, some with anxiety, and some with hope, watched these generations from the windows of their houses.

The general impression of both: the occupying army was huge, but at the same time clearly backward, battered, with imperfect and primitive machines that constantly broke down or stopped due to lack of fuel and spare parts;

with poorly dressed and half-starved soldiers who were constantly looking for or begging for food from local residents.

One can only guess what the result of this campaign could have been if the Polish army had organized a counterattack.

By the way, here and there such resistance was shown on the territory of Western Belarus - without coordination with Warsaw.

For example, during two days - September 20-21 - Hrodna tried to defend itself from the Soviet aggressors.

It was a hopeless attempt: against the Stalinist divisions, several battalions of infantry together with volunteers, most of whom were patriotic high school students, high school students, teenagers... Nevertheless, the defenders managed to cope with the first onslaught and even knock out several tanks.

After capturing the city, the Bolsheviks brutally took revenge on the defenders — they shot about 300 prisoners, among whom the majority were young people.

Advertisement of the first film about the Soviet attack on Poland.

Warsaw, September 15, 2022

's film

"Eagles.

Grodno'39" (original title: "Orlęta. Grodno'39") is a poignant story of September 1939 through the eyes of a 12-year-old boy from Grodno who was among the defenders of his hometown.

By the way, this is the first feature film about the Soviet invasion of Poland in 1939.

Today — Kyiv, tomorrow — La Manche

Putin and Lukashenko, no doubt, envied the fortune that fell to Stalin in 1939-1940.

The geopolitical map for the Kremlin tyrant was so successful that he could row the heat with other people's hands: the Germans conquered Poland in the West with heavy battles, and at that time, he, taking advantage of a secret agreement with Hitler, annexed much larger territories in the east without actually resisting.

And what was the propaganda effect, what space was opened for blackmail and bluff!

All of Eastern Europe watched Stalin's multi-million-strong army rapidly occupying new lands with horror and trembling.

In 1939-40, the communist empire quickly returned under its wing hundreds of thousands of square kilometers of territories lost after the First World War - from the Gulf of Finland in the north to the mouth of the Danube and the Black Sea coast in the south.

Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia did not dare to offer even minimal resistance and obediently fulfilled all the demands of the Kremlin, renouncing their own independence.

Romania behaved in a similar way: Bucharest, yielding to blackmail, gave Moscow tens of thousands of square kilometers of its territories - Moldova and Northern Bukovina - without objection.

Eastern European countries fell at Stalin's feet like ripe apples.

The outlines of the former imperial Russia returned to the political map of Europe.

SEE ALSO: In post-war Russia, the denial of the Ukrainian and Belarusian nations should become a criminal offense

And how can we not mention this year's January ultimatum of Moscow, addressed to NATO: "to collect the coins and correct at the turn of 1997" (quote from the speech of the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, Rabkov, on January 9, 2022).

The ultimatum was sounded when Russian troops were already concentrated along the eastern border of Ukraine, as well as in the north, on the territory of Belarus - under the guise of military maneuvers.

A new "liberation march" to the west was already planned.

These plans and calculations, by the way, Alexander Lukashenko blurted out in an interview with the Russian propagandist Soloyev, with his characteristic reluctance to keep other people's secrets, two weeks before the invasion, on February 7, 2022:

"Ukraine will never fight with us: this war will last a maximum of three or four days.

There will be no one to fight against us."

And also eloquent plans for the future attack of Putin and Lukashenka against Europe - after Ukraine is brought to its knees:

"It will be easier in Europe... If they deploy there and send some troops here, we will already be standing at the English Channel."

Poster at a rally in Kazakhstan, March 2022

Today, in September 2022, speculations about how Putin's and Lukashenka's troops "will stand by the English Channel" sound like the ravings of a mentally ill person.

But at the beginning of the year, everything looked completely different.

Not only supporters of Putin and Lukashenka believed that Kyiv would be occupied within 36 hours from the start of the invasion.

The myth about the power and invincibility of Putin's army was perceived not as a myth at all, but as a real threat.

What is remarkable, the Kremlin itself, with the help of its own propaganda, blew up this myth, and obviously believed in it.

— the usual rhetoric of the Kremlin on the eve and in the first weeks of the war with Ukraine.

One can imagine what kind of militaristic hysteria all this would lead to, if the Russian army really entered Kyiv in a victorious march in February 2022, if Russian flags then appeared in Odessa, Dnieper, Zaporozhye... Someone doubts that Putin and Lukashenka wouldn't stop after crushing Ukraine?

Uladzimir Zielensky arrived in liberated Izyum, September 14, 2022

"Cardboard Marshals"

Similarly, the "liberation campaign" of 1939, during which the Red Army "valiantly defeated" those who did not resist it, did not stop at the banks of the Bug and San.

And here again there are interesting parallels with the present.

The People's Commissariat of Defense was then headed by Kliment Varashilov and Semyon Budany, two of the five Stalinist marshals who managed to avoid execution in 1937.

Both of them at one time zealously fought against the "enemies of the people" in the ranks of the army, with their consent tens of thousands of innocent Soviet officers ended up in the Gulag.

Their cult as invincible military leaders grew.

Streets, factories and even cities were named after them.

A militant march was played daily on the radio:

"Budyonny is our brother,

Putin's Minister of Defense

did not go so far as to immortalize himself in military marches and city names, although before the start of the war with Ukraine he was defined by belligerent promises and shone at parades with general epaulettes and hero stars no less than Varashilov in 1939.

In July 2021, he boasted that under him the Russian army is completely rearmed, more than 70 percent of its weapons are new modern models, according to this indicator it is the first in the world.

Russian captured soldiers in a Ukrainian court, May 2022

Varoshilov and Budzionny were let down by their ruthless devotion to cavalry, sabers, chariots, and dashing cavalry attacks.

In September 1939, during the "liberation campaign", where there was no need to fight, it still "rolled over".

However, already in the winter of 1940, when little Finland - the first of many victims planned by Stalin for annexation - unexpectedly decided to offer armed resistance to the aggressor, it turned out that the invincible Red Army is powerful and terrible only when they are not at war with it.

The cavalry of Budzionny and Varashilov turned out to be helpless and useless against Finnish snipers and forest partisan units.

Another "liberation campaign", during which Stalin's divisions were supposed to liberate the Finnish proletarians from "capitalist slavery", failed ingloriously.

And as a result of this war, the Red Marshal Varashilov lost his position as the Narkom of Defense.

Destroyed Russian military equipment near Izyum, Kharkiv Region, September 13, 2022

Approximately the same may soon happen to Putin's Minister of Defense, Army General Shaigu, who is considered almost the main culprit of the failed war in Ukraine.

True, he no longer calls his army the "second" or even the "first army in the world."

And in general, recently he rarely appears in front of television cameras and does not wear his ceremonial general's uniform with many medals and accelerants.

But the insulting nicknames ("cordon marshal", "reindeer breeder", "general who has not served a day in the army") stuck firmly to him: even persons close to the Kremlin do not hesitate to repeat them.

Doubtful holiday

This year, September 17 is the second attempt by the regime to organize a national celebration of a date that is very ambiguous in Belarusian history.

It is already clear: there will be no great triumph.

The holiday for its main initiator is hopelessly spoiled.

The "liberation march" in Ukraine has stalled.

"The second army in the world" escapes from Izyum.

The future of the arsonists and restorers of the Soviet empire is bleak.

SEE ALSO: Lukashenka wants to return the people's love — and for this he made Poland enemy No. 1

It is unlikely that it will be possible to unite the Belarusian nation under the slogans of September 17 in a more distant perspective.

For the population of Western Belarus, this date is not only a happy memory of the reunification of a divided people.

Those who were "liberated" well remember how the punitive detachments of the NKVD followed the "liberators", how thousands of innocent people were arrested, how their property was confiscated and forced into collective farms, how tens of thousands of the most diligent workers, teachers, doctors, officials, students exiled to Siberia.

(And in the two years after "liberation", until the fascist invasion, Western Belarus experienced four such mass deportations).

Alexander Lukashenko during a visit to the border post "Divin", 2018

Last year, during the first celebration of September 17, Alexander Lukashenko bitterly accused the "Polish invaders":

"For 20 long years, more than four million people who lived in the territory occupied by Poland were deprived of the right to speak their native language, study in national schools, and develop their original culture."

SEE ALSO: Lukashenka once again spoke in favor of amnesty, but does not want to release "bandits" and "extremists" from prisons

The hypocrisy and cynicism of this statement lies in the fact that the "liberation campaign" of 1939 brought nothing to Belarusians - neither Belarusian schools, nor Belarusian newspapers, nor the Belarusian language and culture.

Everything was replaced by Russia, "Russian world".

From one captivity, Belarusians got into another, much more cruel, brutal, inhuman one.

A dubious and shaky basis for a holiday that the regime wants to make nationwide.

What is there to celebrate?

The opinions expressed in the blogs represent the views of the authors themselves and do not necessarily reflect the position of the editors.