Did Lenin spoke about the upcoming seizure of Eastern Europe, Asia and the environment of the United States?

In a number of publications, one can find a quote from the leader of the world proletariat, in which he describes the future global victory of socialism. We checked whether Lenin said such.

The quote is usually given in the following form: “First we capture Eastern Europe, then the masses of Asia, then we will surround the United States - the last stronghold of capitalism. We will not need to attack him: he will fall into our hands himself, like an overripe pear. ”

In Russian, it can be found in the book of Evgeny Messner "Ecumenical typhoon", a journalistic collection "Knights of Russia", as well as in the translated literature - publications of Nicholas Hagger "Syndicate. The history of the world government", Iana van Helzing "Secret societies and their power in the twentieth century", Ben Makintire "Agent Sonya. Mistress, mother, spy, fighter" and Richard Wurmbrand "Marx and Satan". The quote in the West is much more popular-for example, it was given by ex-president of the United States Ronald Reagan in speech 1959 years, interviews 1985 year, as well as in its Autobiography. She sounded in the House of Representatives of the United States from the mouth Tima Lee Carter In 1977. Different sources indicate that Lenin said this phrase either in 1922 or in 1923, shortly before his death.

We could not find the statements of Vladimir Lenin, similar to the specified phrase, nor in his multi -volume collections of works, or in other archival documents in the public domain. Moreover: both the popularity of quote in English-speaking sources, and the discrepancies in Russian with the exact synonyms (“capture” and “take”, “stronghold” and “bastion”)-all this suggests that she could get to us from abroad.

If you conduct a study of sources in English, then we will see that for the first time a quote appears in print in the transcript of various performances in the American Congress. So, on January 15, 1951, the statement was quoted by the senator from South Carolina Olin Johnston, and even indicated a specific place: the 10th volume of the collected works of Lenin, the page on March 17, on March 16 of the same year at the Congress hearings under a certain law of the phrase brought The invited speaker George Washington Williams, also mentioning the collected works and 1923. June 17, 1954 in the Senate used a quote J. Anthony Marcus, director of the New York Institute of Foreign Trade, and on July 15-an emigrant of the second wave Nikolai Goncharov. IN Congress She still sounded, for example, in 1960, and in 1958 she was repeated in State Department USA.

At the same time, in the collections of Lenin's works in English, the indicated words could not find American authors Harry and Bonaro overstat. Moreover, the 10th volume The most famous English-language collection of Lenin’s works contains only work for 1905-1906.

And if the speeches in the American state institutions in the 1950-1960s did not and could not become a topic for a wide discussion in the USSR, then many years later, when the quote attributed to Lenin began to sound from the lips of the most senior officials of the United States, it became interested in it in the country of Soviets. On May 20, 1988, US President Ronald Reagan gave an interview to Soviet journalists Leonid Zorin and Boris Kalyagin. The latter at one point turned to politics:

“Mr. President could not help but ask you the question that interests the Soviet public, many ordinary people in our country. In your speeches, you have repeatedly quoted Lenin’s work, referred to them. In these quotes, it was about the expansionist planes of the Soviet Communists. Soviet experts, as I know from the American press, the employees of the Congress library, qualified people, carefully studied all Lenin’s works and did not find any of such quotes or even something approximately in this spirit. Therefore, I want to ask you what you read from the works of Lenin and where do the quotes you used from? ”

To which Reagan answered:

“Oh my god. I do not think that I can remember and indicate the exact place. But I am old enough to have great interest in the Soviet Union, and I know that in the works that I studied in college when I received a scientific degree in the field of economics and sociology, there were statements by Karl Marx. For example, he said that your system, communism, can only be successful when the whole world becomes communist. So, the goal was to be a single world communist state.

Now, as I said, I cannot recall all the sources from which I gleaned this, and maybe some things were interpreted not like in modern versions, but I know that Lenin stated it and said that it should be a goal. But I also know - and for this it is not necessary to read Lenin - that every leader, each general secretary, except the current, in his speeches before the CPSU congress, confirmed his loyalty to the Marxist theory that the goal is one world communist state. This man (Gorbachev. - Approx. Ed.) Did not say this. So, I did not invent anything; This is what we were told. For example, here, in our government, we know that Lenin expressed part of the plan regarding Latin America and so on. And one line sounded very ominous for us: when he said that the last bastion of capitalism should not be taken - he would fall into their outstretched hand as an overripe fruit. ”

As you can see, Ronald Reagan not only did not recognize his mistake with the attribution of the quote to Lenin, but also actually repeated it. Was he based in his knowledge of quotes from Congress? Most likely, no, because in 1959, when Reagan (or one of his speakers) first included this quote in his speech, he was not yet engaged in great politics. But that year, two publications won very popularity in the United States: brochures called "Ideology and coexistence"The American movement" For moral re -equipment ", released in 24 languages ​​with a circulation of more than 20 million copies, as well as the work of the conspiracyologist Robert Welch"The Blue Book of the Society of John Berch", Where this phrase of Lenin was mentioned. And although we are not owed to them by the appearance and primary spread of the fake, they played a role in its popularization.

The fate of the statement before his first voiceing in the Congress remains unknown. You can only pay attention to the ending of the phrase - it resembles the so -called theory of ripe fruits, stated In 1823, US President John Cuinsey Adams: “Both an apple, divorced from his native apple tree, cannot but fall to the ground, and a cube, forcibly devoid of his unnatural connection with Spain and incapable of self-sufficiency, can only gravitate to the North American Union.” Several decades later at this quote He responded Political journalist Park Godwin: “The fruit will fall into our hands when it matures, without an annoying shaking of a tree. Cuba will be ours ... in due time, without the evil impudence of the war. "

Thus, the final part of the quote we consider, like the whole phrase, could well be born in the West. But Vladimir Lenin, as far as you can judge today, has nothing to do with it.

Photo on the cover: Wikipedia.

Incorrect attribution of quote

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