I wouldn't do this comparison. The horrors of nazi Germany exceed any scale or measurement, and any such comparison would diminish them. History only teaches us that Putin is on a horrible path.

Seeing that you're from Ukraine: I also in no way mean to understate the devastation he is causing in your country. The loss of life, the destruction, the incredible violence, it is so terrible. I completely understand the anger. If you wish to and this is possible for you in the current situation, please feel free to share your personal experience. People everywhere need to hear it.

He still yet to reach Barack Obama or George Bush level, Hitler is far away.

Please be careful with such generalizations. I can understand the anger, but we must not give in to these instincts. Think of Alexej Nawalny and the tens of thousands of brave Russians who took to the streets at significant personal risk. Think of all the decent Russians here on codeforces, who speak up strongly against this war.

They have my admiration, they deserve our support! All the people who have learned from our history must stand together now.

Is gnomina bothering you in private messages?

There are Nazis in every country. In most of those countries they are marginals. In most countries, but not in Ukraine.

So called Azov batallion and a few other military units are officially a part of Ukrainian military forces. They use Nazi and SS symbolic and don't even hide it. According to Wiki, Azov is a right-wing extremist, neo-Nazi, formerly paramilitary unit of the National Guard of Ukraine.

They supposed to be volunteer militia, but they posses heavy guns and vehicles, which only regular army should possess.

They look as Nazis, but what's more they also behave as Nazis.

Ukrainian army has been killing civilians in the Donbass region since 2014.

For example, this UN monitoring mission report shows, that from 1 January 2017 to 15 September 2020 Donbass suffered almost a thousand of civilian casualties, most of them were in Donetsk, and most of them from shelling. About 14000 both military and civilian people died in total since 2014.

Western media tell you that Russia invaded Ukraine on Feb 24, but they completely ignore the fact that Ukraine started fiercely shelling both military and civilian Donbass objects a week before then, probably preparing an invasion. OSCE Special Monitoring Mission had been counting many hundreds of ceasefire violations and explosions on daily basis since Feb 18, in both Donetsk and Luhansk. Soon, SMM decided to leave the area.

Note, that according to the Minsk II agreements, Ukraine must keep all heavy guns out of the 70 km security zone. In order to be able to shoot at Donbass, Ukraine violated the agreements.

P.S. Despite my black nickname, I'm no longer part of the CF team. I left it many years ago. The writing consists only of pure facts and my personal opinion.

Hi Bidanets. Welcome to this comment section!

My aspiration here has been to make a personal plea for humanity, and to give room for an exchange of opinions on the war this is going on right now. This is a brutal war where people are being killed every hour. And it is a war that concerns many coders greatly, I would say more than anything else right now, which I believe has become visible by the reactions, by the emotional pleas of our numerous Ukrainian friends here. So I hope that through discussion of the matters at hand we can all gain a better understanding of the events that are occurring and learn to appreciate also the arguments that people with a different perspective may have. This is probably what is most important at times of war — to listen to the other side.

You clearly seem to be discontent with this approach. Could you please elaborate which part of this post in particular you disagree with? Then we can both look into it and perhaps come to more similar viewpoints.

In case you are referring to my overall message that human life is precious and that people should not be killed as 'European propaganda', then I shall from this point forward live on as a proud and passionate European propagandist.

Two points here:

First of all, I'm not 'Germany', I'm just a coder from Germany. Opinions of German people are diverse, I certainly do not represent everybody.

Secondly, as much as I would like to, I'm afraid it would be entirely impossible for me to dishonor Putin. He has already dishonored himself to the maximum amount possible.

Hi gnomina007! First of all, thank you for writing this friendly text. It is important now more than ever that we address each other in a civilized manner, like you have done just now.

You do not want to argue, I can understand you well — but in the way you describe the motives, I am afraid I could not resist to write another post, which has gotten quite long. Because maybe there is a chance, while we strongly seem to disagree about the facts, that we can find more common ground regarding the motives of each player. I want to tell you about my motives first, and the motives of people all around me in Germany.

I really like Russia! I've had the chance to visit Moscow twice and have met so many wonderful people. It's not just me, this is a broad sentiment in Germany. Speaking of history, you will without doubt know that Eastern Germany has been part of to the Soviet Union until 1990 (Note from StarCuriosity: socialist bloc, not Soviet Union). Many people in Germany speak Russian. We cherish Soviet and Russian technological discoveries, we celebrate the anniversary when Juri Gagarin went to space. And boy, I can't even tell you how impressed people in my peer group are of Russian competitive programming performance! These are just a few examples.

It is not just the people. It is our government as well. They prioritize trade almost above everything else. You cannot imagine how hard it is for our government right now to impose sanctions on Russia, how hesitant they are. Their motivation is quite simple: a good economy makes people happy and will help them at their next election. If the Russian economy is doing well, this will be good for the German economy as well. This is not a zero-sum game, but quite the opposite actually. Through collaboration, we all win. Your success is our success, too. And it is not just the German government that acts this way, either. This is how people and politicians all over Europe feel. Even for Ukraine, I believe Russia has been the biggest and most important trading partner. And in many other parts of the world, this holds true as well. So please, let me assure you unequivocally, in case there is even a shred of doubt: we don't want to fight against Russia. We don't want to damage your economy. We also don't want to be superior in any way, we don't want to hold leverage over Russia. All we want for Russia is to prosper and for Russian people to have a good life and a bright future. This is in the interest of German people, and in the interest of German governing parties, and in the interest of all of Europe and to a large extent in the interest of the US as well.

We also don't want Russia to take control over us, I hope you will understand. Just like we don't want the US to take control over us, but they are not attempting it. And we absolutly don't want a war in Europe. This is why there are sanctions now. This is why we are part of NATO. This is why we are increasing our military budget. We absolutly don't want that, really nobody wants that in Germany. It only happens because we currently see a direct threat aimed at us and our freedom.

So when you're asking for motivation: why is there a threat, why can't we just get along with each other peacefully and in prosperity? Why can't we simply strive to provide a good life for everybody? Wouldn't that be in everybodies interest? Who wouldn't share this motivation?

Would German people like that? Absolutely, yes! Would German government like that? Yes, they would in fact be totally addicted to Russian trade and investment opportunities. Would the Russian people like that? You can speak to this better, but I do believe so. Who is left? Putin. Please let me explain why I think he has different interests. First of all, this is of course conventional wisdom, but relevant nevertheless: he is a former KGB agent, and he is still living like nothing has changed in the past 30 years. He is still acting like we are in times of the cold war, when Russia and the US have been threatening each other. He now wants to rebuild some form of Soviet Union by all means, to rule over the territories all around Russia. He wants to reclaim former Soviet states that are now independent, that have taken control over their own destinies. He apparently sees this as his historic obligation. How do we know this? Because he has told us so pretty directly, stating that Ukraine is not an independent country. And he is not simply attacking the eastern part of Ukraine, where there are alleged crimes against Russians, but instead he is sieging Kyiv as his primary target. His motive is obviously to take control over the entire country.

And there is a lot of indication that he is fearful. I'm really not saying this to be mean or anything. Like a KGB agent, he is on his own and trusts nobody. He has become much more isolated over the past two covid years. He is outright paranoid now, have you only seen how far away people have to sit from him so that he will by no chance catch covid or who knows what else he fears from them? Like here, here, here, here or here. This is not normal behavior! This is not a stereotype or populist argument. His visitors have even all taken covid tests beforehand. He must be full of fear in this otherwise peaceful world. And sadly, I believe Putin is enforcing his worldview on the people in Russia. Throught laws that threaten harsh sentences for minor crimes or no crimes at all (see: calling a war a war), but also through a media that will always depict the outside world as a threat. Isn't this correct, aren't NATO and neo-nazis and so on not often presented as a threat to Russia? These threats don't exist. Nobody has any motivation to threaten Russia. Russia is becoming a dark and isolated place in a bright world, because of his wrong understanding of reality.

This is why he must be failing to realize that the world does not consist mostly of adversaries anymore. Times have changed. Internet is now wildly distributed and connects us all. People everywhere realize how much they are alike, how well they can work together. Just like we do here on Codeforces. Aren't we a great community? We have a global economy that is (or was, until last month...) deeply interconnected. Countries have no motivation anymore to harm each other, they only have a motivation to work together. There really is no reason for this fear.

In summary, this is the issue that seems to be at the core here: former Soviet states, and countries all around the world in general, want to decide their own fate. They don't want to be controlled by anybody else. And this can work out — and is working out — very well in most places, particularly in Europe. Putin meanwhile, fearful and from a different time, fails to notice this. He sees everybodies else's harm as his own win. He wants to reestablish some Soviet empire, keep states nearby under his control, and is doing so with incredible violence, with no regard to the interests that people in his 'colonies' have, and with no regard to their lives. Because he feels like this is necessary for Russia, while in fact it is only necessary for his own historic ambitions. It does not bring people in Russia any prosperity, it does instead harm everybody. It completely devastates Ukraine, but it also harms Russia, Europe, and the entire world.

This is why I felt compelled to write my post: This conquest can bring nothing but death and destrucion, endless devastation and hate for generations. There is no sensible reason for it. There is no rational motivation, it's bad for everybody. It is caused by a single actor who is out of touch with reality and acting irrationally.

Okay, I've now been watching the upvotes/downvotes for your post, gnomina007, and for my answer continuously tick up (your post) and down (my post) in regular frequency for 3 minutes or so, going from roughly 0 to +50 and -50 in this time. Clearly, somebody is doing some extra work here to disrupt our exchange, which is actually just really sad. I feel pity for whoever is doing this, you obviously have so much to learn in this world. I don't think this will matter much, though. Every friendly and sincere comment here should receive the same attention, I think we all know that. Just for the record, I have upvoted your original comment, gnomina007.

We, Russians, who are supporting our army, are not maniacs/rasists/victims of propaganda — in Russia we can hear like polar points of view in services like Youtube. Emotions are the thing which are very affected by propaganda of each side, so please, think rationally.

You are from Izhevsk. Wikipedia says that "Military industry remains the backbone of the local economy, with a number of enterprises operating in the city. By far the most important of these is Izhmash, which produces small arms and assault rifles popular both in Russia and abroad." Are wars just a good business opportunity for your city and did this affect your opinion?

The military industry of the USA is likely also secretly very happy about the war in Ukraine, because they can make a lot of money by selling weapons to the NATO countries in Europe. Maybe Putin thought that he was doing a great favour to the USA and now feels "betrayed"? But regardless of whether the USA profits or not, Putin is 100% responsible for the invasion and can't shift blame to anyone else.

This is not true. The only reason I would see why a blog got deleted is that it threatened or encouraged violence against some race / ethnic group. But otherwise, if you search either Palestine or Israel in the search bar you will find some results from a year ago, which invalidates your point.

Additionally, if you wanted to talk about Israel and Palestine, maybe create a new blog instead of branching off from the ongoing Ukrainian conflict against the Russian forces.

Do not be so prejudiced, think for yourself and do not believe what you see in the news. Yes, they celebrate the massacre of millions of Iranians every year. They occupied a country and thousands of children died of starvation and poverty in Palestine. Your media does not show this. Palestine is in a very bad situation (although a group of Jews oppose it). Do you not see what injustices the United States, Britain, Russia, etc. did? Hitler did bad things, but what these countries did is hundreds of times worse. Wake Up

This is such a terrible and repugnant thing to say. And, very obviously, anti-Semitic. It is impossible to leave this here unanswered.

Please let me explain to you how Hitler — and millions of Germans who followed him — have carried out what can only be described as pure and unfathomable evil. Perhaps you will find this message convincing, since it comes from the country of the perpetrators.

I have visited a concentration camp twice. I've been to Buchenwald and to Dachau. The latter camp is only 10 kilometres away from where I was born. It is the darkest place on earth. If you ever visit such a place, you will remember every single detail of it for the rest your life. It will be imprinted deeply on your mind forever. No matter how evil you think humans can be — the history of these places teaches us that they can go far beyond anything. Jewish people — for no other reason than their descent — have been dehumanized there. They have been subjugated and tortured with unbearable gruesomeness. They were treated like cattle and much worse. They have been robbed of all their belongings, of their clothes and of their names and identity and were only addressed by numbers, which were painfully engraved in their skin. Virtually every possible way to degrade and harm people has been exercised there by prison guards with unlimited power over human lives, who have not only willingly participated in these depraved acts, but in many cases gained joy from their own brutality. And they were killed. In systematic fashion and over the course of many years, with the goal to eliminate them all. Between 1941 and 1945, six million Jews were systematically murdered, around two-thirds of Europe's Jewish population.

So don't you dare to deny what cannot be denied. I've seen some of the crime scenes with my own eyes. It exceeds any comparison and any imagination. These concentration camps are warnings to future generation about the abyss of the human soul that can become reality when the varnish of civilization gets lost. We must never forget.

Hitler started the war on September 1, 1939, when he invaded Poland for no other reason than to gain power and territory and a pervert feeling of superiority. And Jewish people had absolutely nothing to do with that. When your leaders spew such heinous lies, it is likely because they need an enemy to blame for their own failures and their own bottomless incompetence.

You are living proof that there are people in the world who think that literally everyone else in the world is planning a conspiracy against you and is hiding the truth from you. You are defending one of the murderous and damned people in history, while obviously spreading hatred on the Internet. How low can it further go?

Although I'm trash at politics, I still had to say that this is bullshit and largely Nazi propaganda.

Some basic history knowledge tells you that 'Aryans' actually mean 'Indian-European people' (or something like that). It actually has nothing to do with the stuff that the Nazis said. The Nazis made this out of nowhere.

Hitler is no devil

If you are one of those Jews who are massacred or imprisoned in a concentration camp, what will you think? People's lives are more important than anything else. Same goes for the Ukraine issue. Politics aside, Putin is doing wrong for starting a war and killing innocent people.