Valentin Falin: respect his Majesty a fact
08.04.2016
Valentin Falin – a diplomat, politician and public figure, scientist.
From 1986 to 1989 years he headed APN.
I am convinced that the main task of journalists is to remain faithful to the fact.
In the framework of the jubilee project for the 75th anniversary of the Soviet information Bureau in the International multimedia press center MIA “Russia today” held a creative meeting with Valentin Mikhailovich Falin, who yesterday turned 90 years old. He was the Soviet Ambassador to Germany, Advisor to prominent politicians such as Andrei Gromyko and Nikita Khrushchev, Leonid Brezhnev, Yuri Andropov, worked with Mikhail Gorbachev. The speech of Valentin Falin wrote Vladimir Ardev.
Media as a weapon of mass destruction
When asked about the fact that today most threaten humanity and all life on Earth, usually referred to as nuclear, chemical, biological weapons. But forget about one more truly terrible weapons of mass destruction, aimed primarily on the human brain. This is the information. Propaganda and agitation. It is a reading of history that is causing the repetition of all that has been, for the near and distant future. They forget about the fact that the twentieth century is qualitatively different from all that has been before, and XXI.
Today we influence nature to a much greater extent than it affects us. By clicking the biological life on Earth may disappear. The cost of failure now is completely different, and we need to be very clear about where the beginning of what peoples are experiencing now.
Example. The first armed U.S. attack on Syria is 1958. American planes from airfields in Germany violating neutral airspace of Austria, flew to the middle East and bombed Lebanon and Syria. And if the connection times to take into account, much of what is happening now will be differently served by many media outlets, including a number of Russian.
The cold war also did not begin with the creation of the Soviet Union – the first models of the Russia section in the form in which they exist today, date back to the First world war. And the cold war ended in 1989 at the Malta summit Gorbachev-Bush, which, by the way, I was. She continues today.
Sanctions, the creation of a belt of military bases along the border with Russia – all this is just a continuation of the former policy of the West, only the methods change. After the creation of the Soviet Union of thermonuclear weapons and, thus, the elimination of the monopoly of the United States in this region, the arms race has become a form of warfare. And now the us imposition of new turns of the race pursues a very specific goal – to bring the Russian economy to collapse. And the USA hardly will refuse from this idea.
Most of my life I spent looking for answers to critical questions. When really started the Second world war? Who and when invented the “iron curtain”? Irrefutable facts convince us that the Russophobia is a historical phenomenon, taking sources from the beginning of the schism in Orthodoxy and Catholicism. It exists many centuries, and will continue to make itself felt.
So with everything else. What is happening now is not new, this is a continuation. It is very important to understand it. And not to forget anything, not delete, not erase, to store historical memory, to be able to look into the past to understand the present. And to see the possible future.
No fact, no phenomenon cannot be considered outside the system, out of context. Otherwise not to avoid mistakes, the price of which is becoming more expensive. Today the mind control people with the use of the mass media leads to the most painful consequences.
“To make public the wings”
At the head of the APN I was, at first glance, accidentally. But only at first.
In 1978 I returned to Moscow from Bonn, where he worked with the Soviet Ambassador 7 years, 4 months and 3 days. Withdrew at my request, because I had a very difficult relationship with foreign Minister Gromyko. By order of Leonid Brezhnev, I was sent to the division of international information CPSU Central Committee.
Secretary of the CPSU Mikhail Zimyanin had asked me to present considerations, as we better rebuild job information – domestic and international broadcasting – as has been the practice, in particular, Germany. I wrote a letter which was sent to Mikhail Andreyevich Suslov. He imposed a resolution: “the Authors of this paper want to acknowledge that I’ve spent my life not doing what is necessary”.
Then the following happened. I had a serious conflict with Andropov. In 1979 I was against the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, and in 1982 attempted to prepare the ground for their return home. I was accused of abuse of power and expelled from the Central Committee apparatus.
Several years were spent running a political observer in the newspaper “Izvestia”. Then he defended his doctoral thesis on “Conflicts of interest in the anti-Hitler coalition”.
In 1986, Mikhail Gorbachev invited me to lead the ALP. At first I refused. “Try, try yourself to implement everything that was once offered to Suslov. This is the perfect chance!” — tried to convince me Yakovlev (ed: Alexander Nikolaevich Yakovlev, a Soviet and Russian political figure, publicist, academician of Russian Academy of Sciences, one of the main ideologists of perestroika). And I said Yes.
“We need to make public the wings” — was set the task of the Secretary General. I had to remind him that during the Second World war, the British made a rule: how about victories and about defeats to inform its population first – to stop hostile propaganda to get ahead of myself. And he confirmed this principle for our work.
I offered not to justify, but to explain things, including tragic events in our country, why it happened and what was behind it. For example, Stalin’s policy in relations with the United States and the West after the Second world war was derived from the change milestones Washington after the death of Franklin Roosevelt. Not considering the stakes Truman on planetary domination of the United States, it is difficult to understand the logic of the then Soviet policy.
That is the journalism, based on deep, not superficial knowledge of any socio-political processes, and I tried to implement during my work at the APN.
White black spots
Each employee of APN was given the right to write on any subject which he considered important and by which he wanted to Express his opinion, with one condition: to adhere strictly to the facts. With this, problems sometimes arise. It was difficult, when the Agency tried to understand the closed to the journalism sphere.
Lazar Kaganovich (ed: Lazar Kaganovich – the Soviet state and party leader) suggested to me as Chairman of APN elaborate on how Stalin took decisions discussed in the narrow format – Beria, Molotov, Kaganovich himself and someone else from the top of the circle, only three or four people. At such meetings not conducted any protocols. I wrote a note to the CPSU Central Committee and received the answer: “Your proposal is considered. Not feasible to revive political corpses”. Five years later, Kaganovich did not, and this part of history has sunk into Oblivion.
The lost library of Stalin – on the margins of books he usually made notes. Very interested in history, including ancient, especially the campaigns of Alexander the great. I called to save this library so that we or someone in the future could understand the personality of Stalin. But was not heeded.
We probably don’t know the real story of the trial of Soviet generals in 1937. Transcripts of telephone conversations of Tukhachevsky, Yakir, Egorov, Blucher and others that led to their death sentences, were destroyed by order of Khrushchev.
After us there is a lot of white spots — black spots in our history. Make them smaller, only want one thing: to respect his Majesty the fact. To fix it, and for contemporaries, and for posterity.
Because the young, embarking on the path of journalism, I can advise the main thing: as he said Kozma Bars, behold the root.
Don’t be superficial.
Learn to get to the bottom.
And – learn to meditate.
RIA Novosti
