'It's Imperialism, Stupid!'

[BLUEHAWK]

Originally posted by Seascamp That?s right Blue, the Red scare was a runnin wild in the Mid East, big time and everyone was in on the play, all propaganda guns blazing and skullduggery comin down all over the place. And the Bear didn?t do themselves any favors when they were so damn rude and overbearing in Egypt. Great stories about the ham-handed Bear and the misadventures of Ivan in Cairo. Kind of like ?blond jokes? but delivered by Arabs poking fun at the Ivan?s strange manners, customs and plowboy demeanor, too much. I guess Lenin and all didn?t put knife, fork and napkin school on the instruction agenda and I suppose Procter and Gamble hygiene products or the equal were strictly taboo for the correct thinking Ivan or Helga. Yikes, eh, real yikes. :ek:

Scamp

Gotta hand it to whoever got those rumours started, eh Scamp?

They surely do have one helluva propaganda machinery... it's on the verge of killin' us.

[urbsdad6]

Thank you all for setting the record straight!


Doc Urb

[Seascamp]

Doc,

There is an interesting topic you may wish to have a look at. This is the Soviet built Aswan Dam in Egypt and represents the Russian political high water mark in the area. Soviet Dam builders were among the best in the world at the time but this was their first major outing where the construction equipment and crew were sent out into the world in such numbers.

The Russian equipment turned out to be calamity and totally unsuited to the task given the environment, and western equipment had to be brought in to carry on with the project. For lack of a better term, the Soviets also brought in ?cultural police? and these people circulated in the population centers spreading the ?good word? and bitching-out Egyptians who displayed western tendencies such as speaking English.

This uninvited meddling was a source of contention and the roots of the sea stories and jokes circulating for many years about ?Ivan and Helga go to Cairo?. Eventually there was a confrontation about who was dog and who was tail in Egypt, plus there was some counter battery fire about rude and presumptuous guests.

That project was finished long before I got to North Africa but the ?Old hands? talked about the Aswan Dam project and Ivan?s misadventures all the time. And of course I was all ears and soaked all that stuff up. For me, it put a humorous comic opera face on the much-feared Red Bear and that was a healthy exercize.

Scamp