Simon Sebag Montefiore Quotes

Stalin is the most popular figure in all of Russia.

The Soviet state builds bodies—mounds of them.

If only I could dine with Stalin once a week, there would be no trouble at all.

It's bleak behind the Iron Curtain, although they do have the strongest vodka I've ever had in my life.

Despite what many Americans think, most Soviets do not yearn for capitalism or Western-style democracy.

The statues of Lenin and Stalin are down, but the fight against their ghosts seems harder.

Throughout Soviet times, I understood what was really happening in the world around me.

Even now we feel that Stalin was devoted to Communism, he was a Marxist, this cannot and should not be denied.

Stalin's policies pushed the world into the Cold War. Putin has the potential to be equally as dangerous.

Hard men present hard choices - none more so than Vladimir Putin, the President of Russia.

For dynamic energy, driving force, and discipline, the Russian Communist Party is unique the world over, perhaps even throughout history.

Psychology and economics are Stalin's favorable winds. He is also the party 'boss.' But he is, in addition, the Soviet Union's most striking personality.

Only enemies of the Soviet Union can think of the KGB as some kind of secret police.

Russia is now a horrible picture with its revolutionary double nature. It lies there like a huge wreck on the shore, broken up by its revolution.

Heaven’s Yes. I was hopelessly naïve regarding Joseph Stalin. I thought he just drove too hard.

… the unfortunate but inevitable connection between the word “socialism” and the unmitigated crucifixion of Civil Liberties in the East [Eastern Europe dominated by the Russian Communist Party.

As colonial puppeteer and successful restorer of Russia as imperial superpower, Mr. Putin is Stalin's consummate heir.

Russia is now very far from being a communist country, but when I walked around Moscow, I kept glimpsing these haunting images. There were statues of Lenin and some neon signs of the hammer and sickle. I remembered myself then as a little girl, living under that oppression.

Too many countries of the former Soviet bloc remain under the control of authoritarian leaders, including some, like the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, who have learned how to maintain a more convincing facade of elections than their communist predecessors.

Stalin is a shameful stain on our country's history.

I love the good Russian world, the humanitarian Russian world, but I do not love the Russian world of Beria, Stalin, and Shoigu.

Bulgaria is fascinating. Because it had been a Communist country until the mid-80s, so it had just recently transitioned. And there were still the police towers on the street corners, where they look down - they were still there, although no one was in them.

In Georgia, people had already understood that communism couldn't survive, and I came to the institute in Moscow, and people still believed in it. They were completely different people, and I found it very difficult psychologically.

Anyone who doesn't regret the passing of the Soviet Union has no heart. Anyone who wants it restored has no brains.

From behind the Iron Curtain, there are signs that tyranny is in trouble and reminders that its structure is as brittle as its surface is hard.