<blockquote>'He points out that “the final disappearance of the Bolshevik leader from the pedestal coincided with the decision of the European Council on the final offering to Ukraine of a visa-free regime with the EU.” For him, the Ukrainian commentator says, “this is not simply a coincidence” but a sign of a broader civilizational shift.
But while in Ukraine, “the very memory of Lenin is disappearing,” Portnikov continues, “in Russia memories of Stalin are being revived. Precisely about Stalin and not about Lenin” because for the Putin regime, “after the unmasking of the Stalin cult of personality, Lenin was the symbol of ‘a good communist.’”
From all available evidence, he says, “the present-day rulers of Russia cannot agree with this image of the humanist leader because the real Lenin was never a humanist. They need Stalin because Stalin was an all-powerful ruler and someone that led the entire world to fear Russia. Putin wants that both his own and outsiders fear him.”
Despite the historical record of Stalin’s crimes, Putin’s promotion of a cult of the late Soviet dictator has become ever more hyperbolic with each passing year, Portnikov says, and “every Victory Day is becoming a step toward the return of Stalin to the pedestal and to the rebirth of total Chekist power and the fear of the world toward Russia’s unpredictability.”
“The civilizational divorce of Ukraine and Russia,” Portnikov argues, “to a large extent is driven not by the fact that one country is striving to become part of present-day Europe while the other is returning to medieval Asiatic values and practices. Instead, it is drive by the fact that Ukrainians have turned away from Lenin while Russians are returning to Stalin.” '
- Paul Goble,
The Real Clash of Civilizations: Last Lenin Comes Down in Kyiv as Stalin Cult Rises in Moscow, May 14, 2017</blockquote>
Context<blockquote>
'..Ukraine, she says, "is looking toward the future." ..''..the Russian Federation is facing the same problem as the Soviet Union did..'(Ukraine) - '..now that they have started throwing off their Soviet past..'</blockquote>