[ExI] ivanov part 3

[spike at rainier66.com]

From: John Clark <johnkclark at gmail.com <mailto:johnkclark at gmail.com> > 
Subject: Re: ivanov part 3

 

On Mon, Dec 1, 2025 at 1:20 AM <spike at rainier66.com <mailto:spike at rainier66.com> > wrote:

 

 >>… that Death of Stalin movie has the ring of truth.

 

>…Yes, …General Zhukov was wearing a ridiculous number of metals, however the director insisted that they use FEWER medals because if they used as many as the real Zhukov did nobody would believe it.   John K Clark

 

Ja it would appear to be another sight gag.  But the real guy did it:

 



 

Again, it wasn’t a comedy or even a dark comedy, it was what I would consider as good a description of historical events as filmography gets.

 

What I really noticed about this one is how authentic and plausible were the characters along with how much they spent on the sets.  There were what looked like many hundreds of extras, and I never spotted a costume mistake.  They had the cars, the settings, everything looked very authentic.  That was well done.  

 

But also, it presented a very plausible scenario of the Soviet Polit bureau struggling for power, recognizing that it wasn’t clear who would succeed Stalin’s weak legal successor Georgy Malenkov, but it was clear someone would.  The others realized there was a huge power vacuum, and that eventually someone would make a bid for that spot as premier.  But that premier needed a coalition behind him, otherwise the others would gang up on that one guy and remove him, as in REMOVE.  They all knew this.  The premier prize was driving the inner circle polit bureau insane with power lust, but they knew it was fatal if they grabbed for it and failed.

 

The depiction of Beria was terrific.  Most in the west thought he would become premier.  Both Edward Teller and Stanislav Ulam (our nuke guys) understood Berea better than we did.  That is why they kept going on the fusion weapon.  

 

Beria was universally described as a big huggy bear of a man who had no conscience.  If a song were about him, it would be: 

 

For he’s a jolly bad fellow… Which nobody can deny.    

 

In the west, we thought he would be next up.  As soon as it was clear he was pulling out ahead, the others had him… removed.

 

Khruschev became premier.  He exiled the fast-rising Stalin-loyalists that Malenkov had exiled to Siberia, such as “Ivanov” who defected to the USA and sired Ivanov from San Jose State U.  

 

spike

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

 

 

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