Victory Day And Victory Parades.

[godefroy]

Originally Posted by Tretov

The awards of these so-called veterans are total mishmash. Just look at the first one, three Order of October Revolution (just one among many examples of obvious errors)? Did anyone except Brezhnev receive more than one?

Exactly, what you would say about 7 orders of Lenin, seems this guy is a collector

[Bill Garvy]

Much of what is seen here is, I strongly suspect, "Umalatova".

[Tretov]

Originally Posted by godefroy

Exactly, what you would say about 7 orders of Lenin, seems this guy is a collector

Agreed, 7 orders of Lenin is way over the top, although Ustinov was the #1 collector sporting no less than 11 Order of Lenin. Still, I am more concerned with the three Octobers. Much may be Umalatova, yes. Much may be just crap.

[desantnik]

Wishing everyone a happy 8 or 9 May Victory Day whenever you choose to celebrate it!

[ABQ]

Since today is Victory Day, I decided to walk through Botkin Cemetery located in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. It is a large cemetery with about 500,000 graves, mostly European. There is one particular section of the cemetery for those killed during the Soviet-Afghan War. In this section, I observed about ten men gathered in and around a few rows of Soviet Air Force pilots and aircrew. I decided to approach them and see if they were interested in speaking with me, which they were.

Three of the ten were wearing uniforms/medals. One man was wearing an Uzbek Jasorat medal (I later learned he received it for service during the Tajik Civil War, which I found interesting). Eight were pilots/aircrew, one was a mechanic, and the last guy was a morse radio operator. They were there to honor their comrades who were killed in Afghanistan, but a few also carried large photos of their grandfathers who had fought during WW2. They walked me through the rows, pointing out their friends, telling stories, explaining how they died, etc. Interestingly, none of the graves indicated they were killed in Afghanistan, just something along the lines of, "killed serving the Soviet Union during international service." They explained that at the time of their deaths, the government forbid families from mentioning anything about Afghanistan on the gravestones. There were a few awkward minutes as they specifically pointed out those killed by, "your Stingers." However, we eventually made our way through this sensitive topic. After about 45 minutes, they poured me a shot of vodka and we toasted to their lost friends. After the toast, we all walked out of the cemetery together and went our separate ways.

I did not take photos today, but here is a photo of the same area from a previous trip.