#Guerrilla Records

[stardust-bridges]

Club Furies Premiere: Matt Correa - Cucarachas (Extended Mix) [Guerrilla Records]

Our dear friend returns to our pages. For a few months, he has dedicated himself to mixing live music under the Marbella sun, while the night falls. And, on the other hand, like any restless producer, he has dedicated himself to producing music. And he has done it to present his next album. We are talking about Matt Correa, who returns to present Cucarachas. This is the beginning of a series of…

[guerrilla-operator]

"EYE OF THE THRASH GUERRILLA" (SELFISH RECORDS, 1988)

[actionflickchick]

Red Dawn (1984): Avenging Before the Avengers Made It Cool

WOLVERINES! Red Dawn might be about Soviet/Cuban soldiers invading America, but it’s also about MAN STUFF! I’m talking about growing up too fast, eating raw meat, killing without flinching, refusing to process trauma, not showing any emotion other than anger and all sorts of other things that lead to severe, lingering emotional problems. MAN STUFF! Continue reading Untitled

[savage-kult-of-gorthaur]

"FUCK IS WOMENS MONEY. DESIGN WORK ETC. BY GISM."

PIC(S) INFO: Spotlight on the complimentary poster included with original pressings of the "Detestation" 12 inch EP/mini-LP by Japanese hardcore punk/heavy metal band G.I.S.M., released on Dogma Records in 1983.

Bass – Cloudy

Chorus – Execuitinary

Drums – Mario

Guitar, Design [Jacket Design] – Randy Uchida

Vocals – Sakevi

Source: www.picuki.com/media/3090338405744634048.

[formerlyashkatom]

today I had my first planning meeting to get disability supports and afterwards I went to get a conch piercing and it was a good day.

my ear does hurt tho :(

[billlaotian]

[thenwothm]

MECHANIC TYRANTS – ST. DIEMEN RIOTS COMING SEPTEMBER!

Get ready to ignite your senses with the blazing debut album of Mechanic Tyrants! Jawbreaker Records proudly presents St. Diemen Riots, a ferocious and electrifying album set to drop in September. Mechanic Tyrants burst onto the scene during the pandemic, quickly establishing themselves as a force to be reckoned with. Vocalist/guitarist Flo and bassist Danny spearheaded this project with potent,…

[doyoulikethissong-poll]

M.I.A. - Paper Planes 2008

"Paper Planes" is a song by British hip hop artist M.I.A. It was released on 11 February 2008 as the third single from her second studio album, Kala (2007). It samples English rockband the Clash's 1982 song "Straight to Hell", leading to its members being credited as co-writers. A downtempo alternative hip hop, pop track combining African folk music elements, the song has a less dance-oriented sound compared to other songs on the album. Its lyrics, inspired by M.I.A.'s own problems obtaining a visa to work in the USA, satirise American perceptions of immigrants from war-torn countries, and said that the issue was probably "them thinking that I might to [sic] fly a plane into the Trade Center".

M.I.A. had wanted to work with American producer Timbaland for the album Kala, but her application for a long-term US work visa was rejected. This was allegedly due to her family's connection to the Tamil guerrillas, commonly known as the Tamil Tigers, a claim M.I.A. denied. Her visa problems were also attributed to her criticism of the Sri Lankan government's discrimination and alleged atrocities committed against the Tamils, with whom M.I.A. shares an ethnic and cultural heritage. She expressed this on her politicised debut album Arular. The unexpected success of "Paper Planes" paralleled M.I.A.'s condemnations of the Sri Lankan government's war crimes against the Tamils, generating accusations that she supported terrorism.

The song received widespread acclaim from contemporary critics, who complimented its musical direction and the subversive, unconventional subject matter. It won awards from the Canadian Independent Music Awards and the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), and earned a Grammy nomination for Record of the Year. The song has received praise in publications such as NME, Pitchfork and Rolling Stone, each naming it among either the best songs of the 2000s decade or of all time. The review aggregator Acclaimed Music reports it as the second-most acclaimed song of the 21st century.

"Paper Planes" was used in the theatrical trailer for the 2008 stoner comedy Pineapple Express, directed by David Gordon Green, which catapulted the song to mainstream success in the US. "Paper Planes" and the DFA remix appear on the soundtrack to Danny Boyle's drama Slumdog Millionaire, released in 2008. The video game Far Cry 3 (2012) begins with "Paper Planes" used in the opening cinematic sequence.

"Paper Planes" received a total of 68,9% yes votes!

[manuhigueras]

Se ha tratado de una improvisada acción de street marketing de la cadena de hamburgueserías Goiko con motivo de la recuperación -durante varias semanas para su menú- de dos populares hamburguesas: la Chiliraptor y la Kevin Serrana.

Apple Tree es la agencia de relaciones públicas que ha trabajado con Goiko en esta acción.

https://youtu.be/d_hUrHhs8Tc

https://youtu.be/-Uyi30Xh7nY

https://youtube.com/shorts/NYTATk48qjA

https://youtube.com/shorts/n5GfEO4OD9g

https://www.reasonwhy.es/actualidad/solucion-misterio-dinosaurios-goiko-hamburguesas-madrid 

https://www.marketingdirecto.com/anunciantes-general/anunciantes/goiko-dinousarios-madrid-metro

[starminzoo]

╭──────────────────✎

╰─▗ ▘➤𖥸 rockstar!hongjoong

꒰ risa's note ꒱ god ik most of y'all have seen the video of hongjoong singing guerrilla like omfg his voice, his growl, his neck veins god i love this man sm <3 so just everything I was feeling seeing that video + did you saw the way he grabbed the bar over his head to sing 👺 omg choke m- anyway enjoy

warnings: nipple play, marking, slapping ass, pussy eating, giving head, fucking (taking about positions), nudes, nasty pictures, cockwarming, squirting

rockstar!hongjoong who you have been dating for a year now

rockstar!hongjoong who claims you as his lucky charm so you are always present at his rehearsals or concerts

rockstar!hongjoong who points at you as he sings his part of song

rockstar!hongjoong whose kisses are sloppy but filled with love and passion, and always kisses you as a reaches backstage

rockstar!hongjoong whose body is filled with adrenaline and just wants to bend you over and fuck you till you pass out

rockstar!hongjoong whose hands roam all over you body during kisses, which gets you all hot and bothered but you push him away as half the concert is still remaining

rockstar!hongjoong who gets all hard when he glances at you, to see you palming your boobs with the hazy and lust filled stare you were giving him

rockstar!hongjoong who gives you that killer smile of his to let you know that your are fucked after the stunt you pulled

rockstar!hongjoong who wastes no time in the car and pulls you over his lap, lips hurriedly attacking your neck as his hands roams all over your body (poor driver)

rockstar!hongjoong whose hands travel inside your blouse palming your boobs, he unbuttons your blouse pushing your bra down so he is eye level with you boobs

rockstar!hongjoong who takes one of your nipples in his mouth and starts to suck like a child while his hand pinches and slap your other boob providing both nipples with the rightful attention

rockstar!hongjoong who fucking loves it when you ride him so he can peacefully ogle at your boobs as they bounce in front of him fuck you were so perfect

rockstar!hongjoong who loves to slap and grope your ass during sex

rockstar!hongjoong who obviously loves doggy style as he ravishes in the view of his dick moving in and out of your cunt

rockstar!hongjoong who loves marking you up so your whole body yes your whole body is covered with his marks

rockstar!hongjoong who is fucking incredible with his fingers along with his tongue

rockstar!hongjoong whom you can't pull away from you cunt until you are about to pass out

rockstar!hongjoong who is a messy pussy eater, lapping up at all your juices so none goes to waste

rockstar!hongjoong who loves when you give him head. after a concert in the car, a quickie before the concert, or while he is working in his studio he loves it and would do anything for your mouth to be wrapped around him

rockstar!hongjoong who loves cock warming with you as he works and you sit atop of him looking pretty

rockstar!hongjoong who starts to thrust upwards in you while holding you with one hand down and records those soft moans to later on use them in his music

rockstar!hongjoong who wears lots of rings so when he is knuckles deep in you he especially loves to wear them as he knows they drive you crazy and you end up squirting

rockstar!hongjoong who made you squirt one time accidentally due to overstimulation but after that he made it his goal to always have you squirting around him

rockstar!hongjoong whose necklaces dangle in your face as he fucks you missionary, you love the cold feeling they provided as he bents down to capture your lips in a kiss

rockstar!hongjoong who fucking loses it as you sometimes bite down on his necklace to control your screaming as he urges you to cum for him for the 5th time

rockstar!hongjoong who has nudes of you in his phone (with your consent)

rockstar!hongjoong who sometimes takes pictures of you and himself during sex. pictures of your mouth wrapped around his dick, his lips around your nipples, a mirror picture where his both hands are holding your boobs while you sit on his lap in black knee high socks, and his favorite which you took when you were riding his face your hands in his hair while he gave a pussy drunk look eyes hazy and teary and many more.

rockstar!hongjoong whose thrust sometimes becomes too powerful so he has to grip tightly on the headboard of the bed to hold himself up

rockstar!hongjoong who stares at the mirror and smiles when he sees the crescent shapes on his arm , shoulder, waist and even sometimes on his ass a reminder of you on him

rockstar!hongjoong who you love and adore the most with your whole heart and would fight the whole world for him if the need arises.

not proof read and this piece is a mess i just wrote down whatever came to my head and totally based on the feelings I had when I saw rockstar!hongjoong

[ragnarokhound]

thinking fondly of you<3 want to ditch the kids and go to a winery this weekend? (drink some red wine(supernova))

also thinking fondly about jaytim. specifically, about how oftentimes we think of them as a slow burn… but you know what might make them a fast burn (an explosion?)?

one of them gets kidnapped and everyone thinks they’re dead:( but then they’re alive

Always, love, I'm sure they'll be happy to spend some time with their favorite familial babysitters, I'll give them a call tonight🍷💥

And OUGH. Yes. SUCH a classic action hero hurt/comfort trope, I'm always here for mortal peril being the trigger that forces a couple to realize what they mean to each other and that they WANT to take that chance!!

I am reminded strongly of one of feyburner's comics that I love so much... in this comic they were hooking up beforehand and this is the scenario that like. Makes it emotionally REAL for Tim and i love that sooo much... but also OwO

thinking about The Scenario:

One of them is kidnapped. Due to inspo in part from feyburner's comic, I'm thinking Jason. But it's been so long/the method in which he was taken leads everyone to believe that Jason's dead. EVERYONE. Tim included. Thinking that he's dead hits Tim harder than expected. Why? It doesn't make sense. I didn't even like him that much, what the fuck.

But he goes after the bastards who did it twice as hard, ridden by this sharp grief he didn't know he would feel. He's on a warpath. He's chasing down leads, shaking down goons, snapping at everyone that it doesn't matter that Jason's already dead this is about justice this is about vengeance this is about preventing it from happening again-- and finally finds the Organization's big base. Their big HQ.

Methodically he goes about tearing it down, one-man guerrilla style. As he moves through the complex, KO'ing goons, sabotaging weapons and computers, hell he might even rig this place to blow--

He picks up chatter about moving the 'livestock' and 'dealing with the troublemaker' and figures there must be human prisoners here. Possibly trafficking victims. He's been raising all kinds of hell, and security is just now going on alert as they find the evidence of his entry--

--when over one of the radios on the goons he just took out, Tim hears a very familiar and very alive voice taunting the Organization that he's out. They should have killed Jason when they had the chance.

Tim immediately factors Jason and the victims into his plans, gets in contact with Jason over the radio (full mission mode, no time for feelings or explanations yet) to work together on bringing this place down.

So by the time things are cleared up-- bad guys busted, victims rescued, base blown to smithereens-- Tim has been wildly coming to grips with the fact that Jason is alive after all and the confusing rush of emotions that's inspired in him, but Jason still has no idea that everyone thought he was dead.

So when Tim finally sees Jason in person, missing half his gear and still wearing the clothes he was snatched in, dirty and bloody and asking what took him so long-- he's not exactly thinking clearly, okay? Kissing him was a purely adrenaline/relief fueled action.

"Woah," Jason breathes once Tim gives him the chance. "What was that for?" "Thought you were dead," Tim muffles against the skin of Jason's throat. His pulse beats hard against Tim's cheek, his lips, sternly refuting the allegations. "Oh," Jason says, bowled over and bewildered. He's still holding Tim with an arm around his waist, his other hand cupping the back of his head, big and steady. "Well. I'm not." Tim squeezes tighter, his fists trembling in the back of Jason's shirt. Jason is solid, and warm, and alive-- and Tim might be in love with him. "Yeah," he apologizes. "Sorry. Had to check." Tim's clearly stumped him. "Huh." Tim doesn't let go. But neither does Jason. Jason clears his throat. "You know, I don't have the best track record with being alive after all," he says in a rambling tone so casual it makes Tim's chest hitch. "You maybe wanna... check again?"

[stardust-bridges]

Club Furies Premiere: Matt Correa - Straight To The Dancefloor [Guerrilla Records]

Matt Correa is a DJ and producer with over 20 years of experience in both fields. It has been 15 years since his first vinyl release (2004). His performances in different clubs and discotheques of the peninsula are countless. After 10 years living in Madrid, producing for other artists and programming in his own clubs, in 2010 he returned to Marbella to develop his musical activity. As a DJ he…

[mariacallous]

In late August 2023, Ilya Gambashidze was in a conference room at the office of Social Design Agency, a Russian IT company he founded that is based in Moscow, close to the world-renowned Moscow Conservatory. Gambashidze was relatively unknown in Russian politics at the time, but just a month earlier his name had appeared on a Council of the European Union’s list of Russian nationals subjected to sanctions for playing a central role in a sprawling disinformation campaign against Ukraine.

In the conference room, Gambashidze was laying out his plans for a new target: Along with his colleagues, he began drafting what would become known as the Good Old USA Project. The project was supposed to influence the outcome of the US presidential election in favor of former president Donald Trump, specifically targeting certain minorities, swing-state residents, and online gamers, among others, in a scheme that included a full-time team dedicated to the cause.

On Wednesday, Gambashidze and his company were named by the US Department of Justice among the architects of a disinformation campaign known as Doppelganger that has for the past two years been targeting Ukraine and, more recently, US elections. The Doppelganger campaign uses AI-generated content on dozens of fake websites designed to impersonate mainstream media outlets such as The Washington Post and Fox Business, using a network of fake social media accounts to disseminate pro-Russian narratives targeting audiences across the globe. Doppelganger is a Kremlin-aligned disinformation campaign that was first linked to the Kremlin in 2023 by the French government.

On Wednesday, the Justice Department announced the seizure of 32 internet domains it says are linked to the Doppelganger campaign which violate US money laundering and criminal trademark laws.

“Today’s announcement exposes the scope of the Russian government’s influence operations and their reliance on cutting-edge AI to sow disinformation,” FBI director Christopher Wray said in a statement. “Companies operating at the direction of the Russian government created websites to trick Americans into unwittingly consuming Russian propaganda.”

The Treasury Department had previously sanctioned SDA and Gambashidze in March for its part in the Doppelganger campaign. But the court documents unsealed on Wednesday contain a treasure trove of documents and meeting notes from Gambashidze and his colleagues, outlining in unprecedented detail the goals and tactics that the Kremlin has been deploying in order to influence the outcome of the 2024 US election.

The records also reveal the plan was discussed at the highest levels of the Russian government, with Sergei Kiriyenko, the first deputy chief of staff of the presidential executive office, playing a key role. The notes appear to show that President Vladimir Putin may have been updated on the campaign; in one meeting with Russian government officials, Gambashidze wrote that government officials told him they had “reported to the President about the project,” which the FBI agent who authored the affidavit said he took to refer to Putin.

The documents show that the orchestrators of the campaign targeted existing divisions within US society, using racist stereotypes and far-right conspiracies to target supporters of former president Donald Trump.

​​"They are afraid of losing the American way of life and the ‘American dream,’” Gambashidze writes in one document outlining his “guerrilla media” plan. “It is these sentiments that should be exploited in the course of an information campaign in/for the United States.”

The same document is full of racist and conspiratorial claims, including that Republicans are “victims of discrimination of people of color.” It adds that white middle-class people are being discriminated against with high inflation and rising prices, while “unemployed people of color end up being privileged groups of the population.”

And the goal of the campaign, from the beginning, was crystal clear: “To secure victory for [Donald Trump],” Gambashidze wrote in the Good Old USA Project planning document.

The Good Old USA plan openly admits that “none of the significant American politicians can be considered pro-Russian or pro-Putin,” and so rather than focus its efforts on trying to convince people that Russia is great, the plan called for promoting the idea that the US should be focusing its resources less on Ukraine and more on domestic issues, such as rising inflation and high gas prices.

“It makes sense for Russia to put a maximum effort to ensure that the Republican Party’s point of view (first and foremost, the opinion of Trump supporters) wins over the US public opinion,” the Good Old USA Project planning document reads. “This includes provisions on peace in Ukraine in exchange for territories, the need to focus on the problems of the US economy, returning troops home from all over the world, etc.”

As well as getting Trump elected, the campaign’s secondary goals included increasing the percentage of Americans who believe the US is doing too much to aid Ukraine to 51 percent, and reducing the percentage of Americans who have confidence in President Joe Biden down to 29 percent.

The plan lists a variety of audiences the campaign specifically wants to target, including residents of swing states, American Jews, “US citizens of Hispanic descent,” and the “community of American gamers, users of Reddit and image boards, such as 4chan.”

The document describes this category of gamers and chatroom users as the "backbone of the right-wing trends in the US segment of the Internet.” In recent months, the Trump campaign has embraced many of the most influential figures within these communities, including many who share deeply misogynistic rhetoric on a regular basis.

To spread their narrative, the plan called for the creation of YouTube channels that shared pro-Trump content as well as other viral videos (“music, humor, beautiful girls etc,” according to the documents) in order to appear at the top of search results for “US elections.”

Meanwhile, Gambashidze and his colleagues used Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit to create community groups of Trump supporters, with one sample name given as “Alabama for America the Great.” The document also reveals that the Russians planned to use Reddit as a vector to disseminate their propaganda as it is a platform “free from democratic censorship.”

Gambashidze’s plan outlined how Doppelganger would create 18 “sleeper cells” on social media platforms in each of the swing states, which would “at the right moment, upon gaining momentum, become an important instrument of influencing the public opinion in critically important states and portals used by the Russian side to distribute bogus stories disguised as newsworthy events.” It’s unclear if these so-called sleeper cells were created and, if so, whether they are still present on the platform.

The campaign also used targeted ads on Facebook to not only promote their narrative but also to gain valuable insight into what messages were sticking and which were falling flat. “Targeted advertising in Facebook allows tracking reactions of users to the distributed material in real time and directing the psychological response group to contribute to comments thereof,” the document reads. “With the help of a network of bots the psychological response group moderates top discussions and adjusts further launches depending on which group was affected the most.”

One of the key aspects of the Kremlin’s campaign is also to engage with influencers. According to the FBI’s affidavit, Gambashidze’s company ​​“extensively monitors and collects information about a large number of media organizations and social media influencers.”

According to the Good Old USA project document, the Kremlin was seeking to work with influencers who are “proponents of traditional values, who stand up for ending the war in Ukraine and peaceful relations between the US and Russia, and who are ready to get involved in the promotion of the project narratives.”

Among the types of influencers listed as possible collaborators are actors, politicians, media representatives, activists, and clergymen.

The affidavit references one document maintained by the Social Design Agency, which is not included in the unsealed court documents, that contains a list of more than 2,800 people identified as influencers. While this list is global, US-based influencers account for around 20 percent of the accounts being monitored, including many US lawmakers, according to an analysis of the list by the FBI.

The Social Design Agency also maintains another list, again not included in the court documents, that tracks over 1,900 “anti-influencers” from 52 different countries, with US-based accounts. The FBI agent who authored the document assessed that “anti-influencer” refers to accounts which post “content that SDA views as contrary to Russian objectives.”

In a note from one of the meetings with Russian government officials discussing the campaign’s use of influencers, Gambashidze wrote: “We need influencers! A lot of them and everywhere. We are ready to wine and dine them.” Though no links have been confirmed, hours before the Doppelganger affidavit dropped on Wednesday, Tenet Media, an organization that features a slate of right-wing commentators, was alleged in an unsealed Department of Justice indictment to have been largely funded by Russian state-backed news network RT.

The Social Design Agency operation appeared to be extremely well-run and well-resourced. There is a “project office” consisting of four teams that include one entire group dedicated to monitoring the social media posts from GOP lawmakers in order to generate ideas for topics to cover.

These would then be handed to a “text factory," with orders to whittle down the topics handed to them by the monitoring team to four to five main issues, along with eight to 10 basic posts for social media platforms and 40- to 60 comments to post under those social media posts for the network of bots. Another team was called the “manga editorial office,” which was charged with producing a daily output of three to four images, including memes. Finally, a video team was tasked with producing three to four videos each day.

“In order for this work to be effective, you need to use a minimum of fake news and a maximum of realistic information,” the document’s authors wrote. “At the same time, you should continuously repeat that this is what is really happening, but the official media will never tell you about it or show it to you.”

Antibot4Navalny, a group of anonymous Russian researchers who have been closely tracking Doppelganger’s activity, are doubtful that the affidavit will have a significant impact on the campaign’s activity.

“Frankly, I believe it's whack-a-mole as long as EU providers keep doing business with [Social Design Agency], and UK-registered shell companies keep helping SDA with its operation,” the researchers told WIRED, citing their own investigations earlier this year.

[savage-kult-of-gorthaur]

""M.A.N." HARNESSES G.I.S.M.'s FRANTIC, AGGRESSIVE TAKE ON HARDCORE PUNK, AND CHURNS OUT A HEAVY METAL EDGE."

PIC(S) INFO: Spotlight on G.I.S.M.'s first ever authorized and licensed reissue of their cult second album, 1987's "Military Affairs Neurotic" (M.A.N.). The reissue was remastered by the late, great Sakevi himself, and was released officially for the first time ever on compact disc by Relapse Records in January 2023.

ALBUM OVERVIEW: "A successor to the band's legendary "Detestation" LP, "M.A.N." harnesses G.I.S.M.'s frantic, aggressive take on hardcore punk, and churns out a Heavy Metal edge. Out of the gate, Uchida's guitar solos and soaring leads on the classic opener "Good As It Is" pave the way for what follows - M.A.N. is unmistakably metal, atmospheric, and uncompromising in its vision.

M.A.N. is simply incomparable. The album's production, visual presentation, and the songwriting encapsulates the sound of burning punk spirit and heavy metal grit, and cement G.I.S.M.'s legacy as one of the underground's most idiosyncratic, genre bending, and truly unique bands."

-- RELAPSE RECORDS, c. January 2023

Sources: www.discogs.com/release/25903387-GISM-Military-Affairs-Neurotic, GISM bandcamp (official), various, etc...

[fuckyeahmarxismleninism]

April 7, 1930: Birthday of Comrade Vilma Espín, Cuban revolutionary, anti-imperialist guerrilla fighter, founder of the Federation of Cuban Women - Federación de Mujeres Cubanas. She made a crucial contribution as an early champion of queer rights in socialist Cuba.

Last year I learned from her daughter, Mariela Castro Espín, that Vilma initiated what would eventually become Cenesex under the auspices of the women’s federation. She was responsible for importing and publishing scientific and political materials from the German Democratic Republic on LGBTQ rights, contributing to Cuba becoming a leading example of queer and trans rights today.

Vilma also rescued the records of the Women's International Democratic Federation - Federación Democrática Internacional de Mujeres during the counterrevolution in Eastern Europe in 1990, and made sure Cuba undertook keeping the global women’s organization alive. Today Women In Struggle - Mujeres En Lucha is a proud member of the WIDF.

-redguard

[mesetacadre]

Aviation in the USSR

A collection of excerpts from Anna Lousie Strong's The Soviets Expected It, compiled for @czerwonykasztelanic

[...] Or the guerrilla detachment which captured six German planes, destroyed five of them, and sent the sixth to the Red Army, piloted by an amateur air enthusiast, who was a tractor driver in ordinary life. Lt. Talalikhin’s initiative is already a Soviet aviator’s tradition. Exhausting his ammunition in a fight with three enemy planes, he rammed the tail of one enemy with his propeller, smashed the tail of another enemy plane with his wing tip, and then bailed out of his own plane safely. Moscow parks displayed the wreckage of the German planes, and other Soviet pilots quickly copied the tactics. An aviation technician, Konikov, won renown by attaching the fuselage of a plane he was repairing to the front platform of a military train whose locomotive had been bombed by the enemy; he thus pulled the most necessary parts of the train to safety.

pg. 14

The Soviet people glimpsed and felt victory. For the first time they began to feel that they were no longer “backward Russians.” They were beginning to challenge the world. With this went a proud sense of their unity as a nation. Cotton growers in Turkestan exulted, “We have conquered the Arctic,” though they themselves would never see the snow. Bearded peasants, who had never sat in an airplane, began to talk about “our conquest of the air.” Young Nina Kameneva expressed the mood of the country’s young people when she broke a world’s altitude record in parachute jumping and remarked on landing: “The sky of our country is the highest sky in the world.”

pg. 46

Moscow can make all the implements of war, including planes and motor trucks, inside the city. [...] Moscow’s sky is covered by an air defense that was the marvel of the London experts who visited it after the war began to make suggestions and found it far superior to London’s. Anti-aircraft shells make a thick blanket at four distinct levels to London’s one, and observation planes patrol the heavens night and day. Moscow’s four million people also offer a night-and-day defense.

pg. 51

Alma Ata, the capital of this area, has grown from a town of 60,000 to a proud young city of 260,000 in the ten years since the railroad reached it. Its life has leaped at once from the nomad epoch to the airplane. The railroad is too slow to tame the wastes of Kazakstan. From Alma Ata Airport the planes shoot forth, east, west, south, north, on new discoveries. [...] Kazakstan is only one of the energetic regions behind the Urals. South of it lie the lands of the Uzbeks and Tadjiks, where some of the largest textile mills of the U.S.S.R. work up the locally grown cotton and where automobile and airplane parts are produced by mass production in the historic city of Samarkand.

pg. 58

I have traveled many times on the Trans-Siberian. In the spring of 1935, I went from Vladivostok to Moscow with a stop-over in the Jewish autonomous territory whose capital is Birobidjan. The train was crowded with pioneering people in warm woolen clothes and padded leather jackets, engineers, Army men, developers of the Far East. [...] An army engineer who shared my table at dinner was celebrating his return by airplane from the northern wilderness by consuming a whole bottle of port and bragging about the Far Eastern pioneers.

pg. 59

According to Pierre Cot, the French Air Minister, who visited Moscow in 1933, the Soviet air arm was at least equal to the best in Europe in numbers, technical equipment, and, above all, in the productive capacity of the aviation industry.‡ Thus, by the end of 1932, which ended the first Five Year Plan, the Soviet Union had reached the level of Western Europe in armaments – a fairly modest level judged by standards of later years.

pg. 65

Other official indications of the extent of the Red Army’s mechanization come from Voroshilov’s report in 1934 [...]. Five years later [...]. He claimed that the “bomb salvo” of the Soviet air force (the number of bombs that can be dropped by all planes at once) had tripled in five years and had reached more than 6,000 tons.

pg. 66

Soviet airplane pilots also hold many world records, both in altitude and long-distance flights. Their conquest of the Arctic and its difficult weather has accustomed them to the severest conditions. Americans well remember the Soviet pilots who twice made world records by flying from Moscow to America. These were individual exploits, but the development of Arctic aviation on which they were based was the work of large numbers of pilots and implies a whole air tradition

pg. 67

Parachute jumping has become a national sport in the Soviet Union. Soviet people are probably the most air-minded people in the world. Training for air-mindedness begins in the kindergarten. Small tots play the “butterfly game” and jump around with large butterflies pinned on their hair, gaining the idea that flying is fun and a natural activity. Children in their teens make jumps from “parachute towers” which are far rougher and more realistic than the parachute tower in the New York World’s Fair, which was copied from them. The sport is popular not only in the cities but on the farms. Several years ago a Ukrainian farmer told me of his trip to the nearby city with a group of farm children, all of whom immediately formed in line in the recreation park to go up in a tall tower and jump off under a parachute. “I thought it very terrifying,” he said, “and wondered why the park authorities allowed it. Then I saw that my own thirteen-year-old daughter was at the head of the line. These children of today aren’t afraid of anything.” At an older age, Soviet young people jump from airplanes, learn to operate gliders, or even become amateur pilots in their spare time. Every large factory, government department, and many of the larger collective farms have “aviation clubs,” which are given free instruction by the government. Probably a million people in the Soviet Union have made actual jumps from parachutes. It is not surprising that the Red Army was the first to use parachute troops in active service several years before the Germans adopted them. In 1931 a small detachment of parachutists surrounded and cleaned up a bandit gang in Central Asia. The making of airplane models by young people is taken seriously in the U.S.S.R. In 1937 over a million school children were spending after-school hours in aviation model stations. At a later stage, young people of talent create real airplanes and demonstrate them at Tushino aviation exhibitions. Owing to the wide interest in aviation and the public ownership of factories, a bright Soviet youth who invents a new type of airplane may get it constructed by his factory sports club and show it off. At one of the aviation festivals I attended, I saw a score of different amateur planes, including every possible shape of flying object – short, stubby ones, long thin ones, others shaped like different kinds of insects. They added greatly to the gaiety of the occasion. Whether or not they produced any really valuable new invention, they at least encouraged the inventiveness of their makers.

pg. 72

In the past two years, especially, all this training has been given a very realistic turn. [...] Only a month before the Germans attacked the Soviet borders, 7,000 Moscow citizens practiced a special drill in repulsing parachute troops over the week end. The large numbers of such trained citizenry, both among recruits entering the Red Army and among the older citizens assisting it, greatly add to the Soviet Union’s total defense.

pg. 73