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The surprising fact here is that this can mostly be explained pretty well as the lessons of WW2 still being vivid in the memory of many countries...except that

The surprising fact here is that this can mostly be explained pretty well as the lessons of WW2 still being vivid in the memory of many countries...except that Russia suffered by far the most of any countries on the Western front, and still a majority there would fight a war for their own country. The persistent glorification of Russia's role in WW2 (although historically justified) might have something to do with it. The amputation of a quarter of Russia's territory right after the end of the Cold War is also used to great effect by nationalists (just like Germany's territory was reduced, by the same proportion, in 1919 - with the same effects).

taway_1212 9y ago
> The amputation of a quarter of Russia's territory Soviet Union is (was) not Russia, it was a multinational empire, similar to Roman or Mongol Empries. AFAIK, Russia itself did not loose much (any?) territory after 1989.
- othello 9y ago
  I agree, but that measure compares Russia in 1917, before the Soviet Union, with Russia in 1991, which was 25% smaller. The Soviet Union was indeed considerably larger than Russia had been since the 17th century.
- usrusr 9y ago
  Unfortunately, many Russians don't seem to feel that way. They are not alone with that however: all former empires occasionally inspire the idea that their demise is an ongoing historical injustice that needs to be rectified. And in the echo chamber of a former-empire nation this train of thought rarely gets questioned.
- notfromhere 9y ago
  Russians largely saw the Soviet Union as an extension of Russian power. Hence all the russification that occured in non-Russian majority republics
Normal_gaussian 9y ago
From the article Since World War Two, Europe has been relatively peaceful with major exceptions of the Yugoslav Wars in the 1990s and various political suppressions during the Cold War. However, the 19th century was also a relatively peaceful time for Europe that ended with the start of World War I. So no, the vividity of the world wars is popular but unconvincing.
- em3rgent0rdr 9y ago
  > "However, the 19th century was also a relatively peaceful time for Europe that ended with the start of World War I." Operative word: relatively. Still I see more than 18th century (although maybe severity of conflicts vary). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Europe#19th_century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Europe#19...
  - Normal_gaussian 9y ago
    And the 20th century also has a decent list after WWII
  - majewsky 9y ago
    More data: https://ourworldindata.org/war-and-peace/ https://ourworldindata.org/war-and-peace/ I would not want to draw a firm conclusion from this, though. It says that "in Europe the second half of the 20th century was extraordinarily peaceful", but that particular graph only counts wars between nations, not civil wars, guerilla wars and terrorism. There's a lot of data in that page, though, so I can't really compress it into a HN comment.
    - em3rgent0rdr 9y ago
      Thanks, there is quite a bit of info with great visualizations. It seems 1751-1800 was a relative minimum of years of wars.
      - maze-le 9y ago
JPLeRouzic 9y ago
> Russia suffered by far the most of any countries on the Western front, I do not know, Germany had more displaced people => after <= WWII than any other European countries and 500,000 died in the process [0]. Between 1944 and 1948 about 31 million people, were permanently or temporarily moved from Central and Eastern Europe. The newly created UN even decided that a criteria for "migrant/displaced" person would exclude German people from the Poland/Hungary/etc... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_and_expulsion_of_Germans_(1944%E2%80%9350) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_and_expulsion_of_German...
- othello 9y ago
  In terms of loss of civilians and military personnel though, it does not compare: the Soviet Union accounted for more than 40% of all WW2 deaths (both civilian and military) worldwide - including deaths on the Pacific front. The Soviet Union lost a total of 26.6 million people, or 13.8% of their 1939 population. Germany suffered tremendously as well of course, with 5.7 million dead, or 8.2% of their 1939 population [0]. This is obviously not a contest, and I'm sure we can all agree that the suffering was tremendous on all sides. However, when it comes to the perception of war in Russia, the fact that the brunt of the Allied war effort in terms of casualties was borne out by the Soviet Union during WW2 (a fact often little known or recognized in Western countries) is especially relevant. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties
  - JPLeRouzic 9y ago
    That's true, I do not disput it. My point was about the countries as a whole, including civilians and by including the displaced people. And I did include them because you pointed at the amputation of territories, which is something that happened nearly 70 years after the WWII, so I felt I could talk about what happened in the ten years after the WWII. You know this point about displaced people strikes me because I am French: I did work with (old) Germans and sometimes I felt some bitterness, including an occasion where one guy in an hotel told me of bombardments on Heidelberg (not a town that suffered heavily) and I was thinking that my father suffered also from bombardments (bombs exploded around him) as a 18 years old in France, so what was his point? Many years later I learned that the Allied discourse of "the good and the bad people" was an heavy (re) writing of history.
markvdb 9y ago
> The persistent glorification of Russia's role in WW2 (although historically justified) Nazi Germany lost WWII largely because of the USSR indeed. That does not justify glorification of the USSR. It justifies celebrating liberation from nazism only.
- Cyph0n 9y ago
  Maybe not glorification, but definitely respect and appreciation for their sacrifice.

taway_1212 9y ago

> The amputation of a quarter of Russia's territory Soviet Union is (was) not Russia, it was a multinational empire, similar to Roman or Mongol Empries. AFAIK, Russia itself did not loose much (any?) territory after 1989.

othello 9y ago
I agree, but that measure compares Russia in 1917, before the Soviet Union, with Russia in 1991, which was 25% smaller. The Soviet Union was indeed considerably larger than Russia had been since the 17th century.
usrusr 9y ago
Unfortunately, many Russians don't seem to feel that way. They are not alone with that however: all former empires occasionally inspire the idea that their demise is an ongoing historical injustice that needs to be rectified. And in the echo chamber of a former-empire nation this train of thought rarely gets questioned.
notfromhere 9y ago
Russians largely saw the Soviet Union as an extension of Russian power. Hence all the russification that occured in non-Russian majority republics

Normal_gaussian 9y ago

From the article Since World War Two, Europe has been relatively peaceful with major exceptions of the Yugoslav Wars in the 1990s and various political suppressions during the Cold War. However, the 19th century was also a relatively peaceful time for Europe that ended with the start of World War I. So no, the vividity of the world wars is popular but unconvincing.

em3rgent0rdr 9y ago
> "However, the 19th century was also a relatively peaceful time for Europe that ended with the start of World War I." Operative word: relatively. Still I see more than 18th century (although maybe severity of conflicts vary). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Europe#19th_century https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_conflicts_in_Europe#19...
- Normal_gaussian 9y ago
  And the 20th century also has a decent list after WWII
- majewsky 9y ago
  More data: https://ourworldindata.org/war-and-peace/ https://ourworldindata.org/war-and-peace/ I would not want to draw a firm conclusion from this, though. It says that "in Europe the second half of the 20th century was extraordinarily peaceful", but that particular graph only counts wars between nations, not civil wars, guerilla wars and terrorism. There's a lot of data in that page, though, so I can't really compress it into a HN comment.
  - em3rgent0rdr 9y ago
    Thanks, there is quite a bit of info with great visualizations. It seems 1751-1800 was a relative minimum of years of wars.
    - maze-le 9y ago

JPLeRouzic 9y ago

> Russia suffered by far the most of any countries on the Western front, I do not know, Germany had more displaced people => after <= WWII than any other European countries and 500,000 died in the process [0]. Between 1944 and 1948 about 31 million people, were permanently or temporarily moved from Central and Eastern Europe. The newly created UN even decided that a criteria for "migrant/displaced" person would exclude German people from the Poland/Hungary/etc... [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_and_expulsion_of_Germans_(1944%E2%80%9350) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flight_and_expulsion_of_German...

othello 9y ago
In terms of loss of civilians and military personnel though, it does not compare: the Soviet Union accounted for more than 40% of all WW2 deaths (both civilian and military) worldwide - including deaths on the Pacific front. The Soviet Union lost a total of 26.6 million people, or 13.8% of their 1939 population. Germany suffered tremendously as well of course, with 5.7 million dead, or 8.2% of their 1939 population [0]. This is obviously not a contest, and I'm sure we can all agree that the suffering was tremendous on all sides. However, when it comes to the perception of war in Russia, the fact that the brunt of the Allied war effort in terms of casualties was borne out by the Soviet Union during WW2 (a fact often little known or recognized in Western countries) is especially relevant. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties
- JPLeRouzic 9y ago
  That's true, I do not disput it. My point was about the countries as a whole, including civilians and by including the displaced people. And I did include them because you pointed at the amputation of territories, which is something that happened nearly 70 years after the WWII, so I felt I could talk about what happened in the ten years after the WWII. You know this point about displaced people strikes me because I am French: I did work with (old) Germans and sometimes I felt some bitterness, including an occasion where one guy in an hotel told me of bombardments on Heidelberg (not a town that suffered heavily) and I was thinking that my father suffered also from bombardments (bombs exploded around him) as a 18 years old in France, so what was his point? Many years later I learned that the Allied discourse of "the good and the bad people" was an heavy (re) writing of history.

markvdb 9y ago

> The persistent glorification of Russia's role in WW2 (although historically justified) Nazi Germany lost WWII largely because of the USSR indeed. That does not justify glorification of the USSR. It justifies celebrating liberation from nazism only.

Cyph0n 9y ago
Maybe not glorification, but definitely respect and appreciation for their sacrifice.