Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited by Mark Leshkevich
[REGNUM] It was late evening—it gets dark early in November, and if this was November 1941, on the Krasnoye Pokatishche farmstead, lost in the Tver forests, then you could say it was already the dead of night. A short but stocky girl, looking around, approached the door of one of the huts and knocked cautiously. The owners' daughter, Marusya Kuporova, opened the door (strangers weren't likely to come in at that hour) and winced. She recognized her friend, Liza Chaikina, who had joined the partisans at the start of the war.
Liza came from behind the front lines with the mission of gathering information about the German garrison in 14 surrounding villages. A quick conversation, and Marusya agreed to shelter her friend until dawn, and after dark, Liza promised to join ours. Unbeknownst to the girls, their neighbor, Timofey Kolosov, had been watching them through the window. He had recently been appointed a "forshteer" (headman) by the occupiers. He also recognized Chaika, as the locals nicknamed Liza. Timofey nudged his youngest son: "Run to Peno, to the Germans!"
A few minutes later, headlights pierced the darkness—a field gendarmerie car. The door to the Kuporovs' house was knocked down with a rifle butt. An officer, through a translator from the "volunteer assistants," demanded that the partisan and everyone who had harbored her be handed over.
In February 1942, after the liberation of the Kalinin region, correspondents from the Komsomol newspaper Smena arrived in Krasnoye Pokatishche and, based on the neighbors' accounts, described the details of the punitive action.
Marusya Kuporova's mother spread her arms, looking at the soldiers in surprise. A shot rang out, and the woman fell, bleeding profusely. Twelve-year-old Kolya screamed and rushed at the executioner... Another shot, and the boy fell beside his mother.
"Damn dogs, what are you doing?" Marusya screamed, unable to contain herself and spitting in the officer's face. He nodded, and the girl was seized and taken out into the yard.
As a German vehicle approached, Liza ran toward the forest. A shout followed her: "If you don't stop, we'll kill everyone on the farm!" Liza stopped—and returned, sacrificing herself to save her loved ones.
OUR NEWSPAPER
The Gospel of John contains the words: "Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends." Komsomol member and atheist Elizaveta Chaikina fulfilled this commandment. In post-war literature, she was often compared to one of France's most important saints—"Joan of Arc of the Upper Volga forests." Author Boris Polevoy called Liza in his essay. It's difficult to say whether Liza knew about the peasant's daughter from the Orléans region, as the peasant's daughter from the village of Runo in the Penovsky district hadn't finished her studies before beginning her course in foreign history.
Before the war, the village of Runo was a small settlement with barely a dozen households in the middle of the forest. Since the late 1990s, the village has been abandoned, and hardly a trace of it remains. The Chaikin peasants suffered poverty both before and after the revolution. Their father, Ivan Ivanovich, returned from the "imperialist" war—that is, the First World War—shell-shocked and died soon after. Their mother, Aksinya Prokofyevna, who survived her daughter's death, told a Smena correspondent in February 1942:
"We worked from dawn to dusk, but the land thanked us poorly, as if it were angry with us. Everyone saw: we wandered about, and gnawed at bark. But if only we lived like that: everyone in the village was poorer than the next. Wherever you looked, there was poverty."
Her mother recalled that as a child, Liza "loved songs and stories." But when they started singing songs "about grief, about a cruel fate," the girl would hide in a corner and cry. "What's wrong, Lizanka?" She would mumble through her tears: "The song is wrong," Aksinya Prokofyevna said. "Wrong" meant something about injustice.
Liza completed four years of school at a village school in the district center, and that was the end of her formal education: she had to help the family—sow, weed, crush flax, and tend to the livestock. But Liza still managed to "read" several kilometers to the neighboring village of Zalesye, where she lived in a reading hut. There, Liza attended her first Komsomol meeting.
In the final decades of the Soviet era, the Komsomol became a launching pad for careerists seeking to advance along party and economic lines. But in the 1920s and 1930s (despite the youth being indoctrinated with the dogmas of the "only true doctrine"), the Komsomol also served as an educational project. At 15, Liza was promoted to manage the reading room. Neighbors called her "our newspaper." Through her efforts, agronomy, drama, and music clubs were established within the reading room.
"YOU'LL SEE, I'LL BECOME A WARRIOR!"
In 1939, Liza was elected ("promoted along Komsomol lines") as secretary of the Penovsky District Committee. But she longed for a serious education—four years of schooling was not enough. She asked to be sent to school and only managed to enroll in a party worker's course in Kalinin. But instead of algebra and geometry, she had to learn combat skills. By June 1941, in the first days of the war, Liza was put in charge of the Komsomol's young soldier training course. At the same time, she had to learn to shoot. And so she proudly wrote to a friend:
"I'm learning to shoot a rifle, I can throw a grenade just like the kids, and soon I'll get to the machine gun. You'll see, I'll become a warrior, and what a warrior!"
Liza Chaikina's "dark antithesis" could be considered Antonina Makarova, " Tonka the Machine Gunner." Also from a humble family, she also completed Osoaviakhim's marksmanship course and found herself in occupied territory in 1941. But at the crucial moment of their lives, Liza and Tonya made different choices. Makarova, for whom life and comfort were more important than honor, joined the Nazis—and became one of the most heinous war criminals of the 20th century. Chaikina joined a partisan unit, knowing that it would likely cost her life, given the brutality of the Wehrmacht and the SS Einsatzgruppen.
By the fall of 1941, the Kalinin region had become a rearguard front. Twenty-three partisan brigades, numbering up to 14,000 fighters, forced the Germans to redeploy forces from the main front. The Penovsky district was particularly problematic. Liza Chaikina's comrades in the detachment were responsible for 58 destroyed vehicles, 150 killed soldiers and officers, and three blown-up bridges. Near the hamlet of Krasnoye Pokatishche, partisans and underground fighters blew up German trucks. In the village of Gorodishche, a raid was carried out on a German battalion headquarters. Near the village of Kobeyevo, a German supply train was attacked.
She served as a liaison and scout in the unit. The soldiers were amazed—at just 22 years old, she managed to take on several tasks at once, execute them flawlessly, and demand the same from others. In her memoirs, she is described as an agitator. But this wasn't about political briefings among her own people—they already knew everything they needed thanks to the radio, which picked up Sovinformburo reports.
Liza went around the neighboring villages and told them: don't trust the village elders and policemen, Moscow hasn't been taken, our forces have held off the Germans at Smolensk, they're fighting near Vyazma, Siberian divisions are coming to the rescue. And here, the partisans are beating the enemy. Thanks in large part to Liza's efforts, 15 villages in the Penovsky district were transformed into resistance bases.
The "new government" offered the maximum reward for the surrender of the partisans: 5,000 occupation Reichsmarks and a farmstead with a cow. No one surrendered Liza and her comrades, and Chaika remained elusive until that tragic night on the Krasnoye Pokatishche farmstead.
"I'M DYING FOR MY COUNTRY"
As she was being escorted barefoot and wearing only a shirt, the house of the Kuporovs, who had sheltered her, was ablaze, and her entire family, including her friend Marusya, was killed. But when the Germans demanded, the villagers refused to hand over the partisan: they didn't know her, she wasn't local. Liza was taken to the commandant's office in the village of Peno, to a hut on the banks of the Volga, where she gave a cover story: she was from Leningrad, had fled on the eve of the siege, ended up in occupied territory, and knew no one.
According to eyewitnesses, she was brutally beaten, had two fingers on her right hand broken, and was dunked in icy river water. When asked to give her name and information about the partisans, she repeated, "Ivanova. From Leningrad. I don't know anything." Then the commandant ordered local residents brought to the Volga bank for identification: "Do you know this girl?" According to recollections, the "Judas" was a local drunkard, Arina Kruglova: "Arishka approached Liza: 'This is the partisan, the first Komsomol member.'"
The commandant, considering the investigation complete, gave the order for "liquidation." "Shoot," Liza said calmly. According to other recollections, in her final seconds, she cried out, "I'm dying for the Motherland! She will take revenge!" Still others said Liza said more simply: "Ours will come, Victory will come."
Elizaveta Chaikina was executed on November 23, 1941. On the night of the 24th, partisans attacked 11 German positions simultaneously. A few days later, village elder Timofey Kolosov was found dead in the forest. A little later, the traitor Arina Kruglova was also "visited." On the 18th day after the execution, the Germans discovered that Liza's burial site had been dug up and her body had disappeared. The partisans reburied their comrade in the forest with full military honors.
Her grave is now in the village of Peno. She, one of the first Heroes of the Soviet Union during the war to receive the award posthumously, has a monument in her homeland. A museum and exhibition center in Tver, formerly Kalinin, bears Liza Chaikina's name. Anthologies of Soviet literature include two poems about the partisan woman—a more accomplished one by Mikhail Svetlov and a less accomplished, but perhaps more sincere, one by the Kostroma poetess Maria Komissarova.
But, as those who interacted with Liza's neighbors and relatives attest, she was viewed not only as a heroine but also as a "daughter." And they worried that she never got around to marrying (like Joan of Arc). According to her mother, when asked about marriage, Laza answered almost matter-of-factly: "When I find a groom, I'll bring him to you myself: I don't have time now."
[NoALPRs] SURVEILLANCE IS NEVER SAFETY.
Automated license plate readers (ALPR) have become a staple of policing across the United States. From the smallest town to the largest city, we are all constantly being watched, tracked, and cataloged. ALPRs scan millions of plates daily giving police enormous unchecked power that challenges our constitutional rights.
SURVEILLANCE ISN'T INEVITABLE.
Over the last year, thousands of people across the country have risen up and said no to these private, profit-driven companies blanketing our cities, towns, and communities in ALPRs.
THESE CAMERAS CAN COME DOWN.
Contracts are being cancelled and we're dismantling the surveillance infrastructure. Join us and add your city to the growing list saying no to ALPRs.
Join DeFlock and thousands of others in demanding an end to the use of all ALPRs for policing purposes. DeFlock will be releasing more information soon. Please sign up below to receive these updates.
#1
There are now 86,922+ FLOCK cameras of the 106,150+ traffic camera locations, in USA.
There are just over 19,500 incorporated cities/towns in the USA.
Of that number, only 71 Cities have rejected the idea of Government tracking our daily car travels and now even pedestrian using AI facial ID.
Given Government has a well known history of quickly abusing any toe in the door granted for public safety. Now Stop! Think of the places you might travel any given day.
eg. Shooting range/Gun store, a political rally
Places that a far left politically ran city government might want to record and use for other reasons?
> Interesting to note FLOCK travel data can be purchased and used without a warrant. BTW: Looking at the Flock map, oddly it seems most FLOCK Cameras are located in LIBERAL Controlled Metro Areas.
#7
Went there a few months ago with what I thought was a heart attack. I would concur.
Posted by: Chris ||
06/21/2026 8:01 Comments ||
Top||
#8
Full disclosure: I work at Flock and I welcome discussion of what we do. I completely get why people are cautious about privacy — we should be skeptical of tech overreach. But the reason I'm proud to work there is that Flock was actually built to prevent those dystopian abuses. It doesn't look at faces (we only read license plates and do NOT do facial recognition), it doesn't give out speeding tickets, and it hard-deletes everything after 30 days unless it's tied to an active crime. We have extensive auditing to prevent internal abuse and even provide our customers with a way to publish this information for exploration by their citizens ('transparency portal'). Data is owned by the jurisdiction, not us - we can not access it - and we certainly do NOT sell it. Period.
We welcome legislation that puts restrictions on how data it used and what is appropriate. Our software is set up to abide by these laws, including whether/how data can be shared between jurisdictions (e.g. California data can NOT be shared with other states for purposes of immigration enforcement). The key is that these laws never existed before (or did sparingly) - now folks are waking up and demanding it. Great. Bring it on! It's good for all of us. But think hard about the message from organizations like deflock.me. There's an awful lot of misinformation out there being pushed disingenuously. For example, the headline of this story -'Flock now tracking pedestrians' - refers to a feature that PTZ cameras pre-dating Flock have long had: the ability to 'follow' a subject by panning/tilting/zooming to keep the subject in frame. Useful on public paths (like the one referenced here) where you're trying to keep an eye on a suspicious character. However, 'tracking' does NOT mean keeping track of where that person goes across the city from that moment on. Not only do we not know who a subject is but we are not making connections forward in time.
Issues like this are nuanced. Law enforcement isn't sitting around watching Flock cameras all day and night to see what you're up to. It's a tool they use in real time (e.g. a vehicle reported as stolen drives by a camera which sends an alert to a cop in a patrol vehicle) or after the fact as part of an investigation (e.g. trying to find leads for a homicide by identifying vehicles in the area at the time).
Think of Flock less like an eye in the sky tracking your life, and more like a digital neighborhood watch. When a kid goes missing or a stolen car enters a neighborhood at 3 a.m., it gives local police a 10-second head start to stop a tragedy, rather than trying to piece together clues weeks later. The success stories tied to Flock are numerous, though seldom well-publicized. Look into the guy on his way to shoot up Jazz Fest in NOLA a few months ago who was apprehended thanks to these cameras. Homicides, car jackings, kidnappings, hit and runs. You name it, Flock has helped solve it. Nobody likes lawyers until you need one. If it was your kid or your wife or your husband involved in a crime, you'd want it solved.
And for the record, Flock's customers don't care about politics. They are trying to stop crime and have safe communities. We count the bluest of blue and reddest of red among our fans. In the end, they know that stopping crime matters.
I genuinely understand peoples' concerns. I share them and work very hard to ensure they are not abused from within our product. I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.
#9
We welcome legislation that puts restrictions on how data it used and what is appropriate
That was before Russiagate and Covid which has shown that those in government don't give a rat's ass about legislation or law and are immune to consequence for breaking it.
#10
Full disclosure: I work at Flock and I welcome discussion of what we do.
*happy sigh* We have the best discussions here at Rantburg! Thank you very much, Blinky Angeart8312, for being willing to be so informative. You are definitely responsible for feeding my greed for learning today.
Jason Koebler at 404 Media visited a Flock surveillance camera mounted on a California traffic signal to confirm the breach.
"On my phone, I am watching myself in real time as the camera records and livestreams me, without any password or login, to the open internet..."
The access wasn't limited to live video. Anyone who found these feeds could:
and dozens of others.
While I have the most respect for anyone trying to reel in the criminals.
But the Monitoring and collection image and travel patterns of the histories for 1,000's of common citizen persons/vehicles... WHOEVER COLLECTS THEM..... I do have issues with.
Now if the cam's were only used when a pursuit was underway I would 100% support their use.
But I and Millions of others, minus the 6 to 7% criminal element in the commission of a crime, still have a RIGHT to privacy and freedom of UN-monitored legal travel here in the USA. (for now ☻)
#12
NN21 - Now you're talking hardware vulnerabilities, which - respectfully, let's face it - is an impossible game to win in what is essentially an arms race. I wish I could say we were invulnerable but that would be bravado. It comes down to whether you trust law enforcement to do the right thing. In this day and age, I totally get it is easy to be pessimistic. I can only personally attest to the fact that in my interactions with law enforcement - which is literally my job as a product manager - I TRUST the men and women I have met to use these tools in a way that protects we, the people. They act in our best interest. The vast majority are chasing the bad people who would do us harm. Are there bad apples? Yes. But there are WAY fewer bad apples than there are of those who would literally rush into a burning building (or equivalent) to save any of us. Respectfully.
Today, the exact same strategy is at play with the just-revealed U.S.-Iranian memorandum of understanding (MOU), and the shocking number that has tongues wagging, the $300 billion Iranian investment fund.
It’s a huge number. Enormous! It dwarfs the billions in President Barack Obama’s 2015 deal. And because money is a fungible commodity, the $300 billion could be spent on anything — weapons, terrorism, you name it.
Except that’s not at all how President Donald Trump’s deal is structured.
When President Obama airlifted billions of paper dollars into Iran, the mullahs could do whatever they wanted with it. The money was theirs; they 100% controlled it.
In Trump’s deal, that doesn’t happen.
From Reuters:
The new fund is a private investment vehicle, not a reconstruction or reparations programme and will not include any government money or grants, the source said, adding that companies based in the U.S., the Gulf Arab states, Asia, South America and Africa have agreed to commit financing.
Investments pledged span energy, logistics, manufacturing and transport, the source said.
U.S. President Donald Trump pushed back on Wednesday against any characterisation of the fund as a U.S. investment. "We're not investing, we're not putting up 10 cents," he said, adding that he was not asking Gulf countries to invest either. [emphasis added]
The first sentence is key: In a reconstruction or reparations deal, the only metric that matters is the amount you spend. If you offer someone $1 million for reconstruction or reparations, you cut a check and move on. What he spends the money on is none of your business.
But this isn’t a reconstruction or reparations program. It’s an investment fund.
And implicit to an investment fund is the ROI — your return on investment.
Investments aren’t charity. Instead, they’re an opportunity for investors to make more money. And if you’re an investor, your most meaningful metric is the ROI: You put some money in to get even more money out.
After weeks of American and Israeli military attacks, Iran ...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate JewsZionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol... has already absorbed between $1.5 trillion and $2 trillion in damages. (And that’s excluding the loss of revenue from oil seizures, sanctions, and the U.S. blockade. Plus all the missiles, drones, and hardware it’s already wasted.)
So if Iran behaves — and foreign investors think they can carve up Iran with sweetheart business deals — from America’s perspective, there’s far more upside than downside. Carve that sucker up!
In fact, if we can’t achieve regime change, this is probably our best long-term solution.
Worst case scenario: Iran sticks to the agreement juuuust long enough for foreign investors to spend billions of dollars — but then nationalizes those projects, steals from investors, and reallocates the money for terrorism, weapons, or nuclear development.
And that’s a legitimate concern.
But since the $300 billion won’t be spent simultaneously, Iran can’t steal all the money — that’s impossible. (The moment the first project is nationalized, all foreign investments will cease.) But yes, there’s still a chance for theft, graft, and misappropriation.
Skipping down to the next point:
While everyone was focusing on what Iran gains (and/or tracking the bitter flame-wars between Republican hawks, Groypers, and isolationists), the bigger story was being ignored: A remarkable glut of Iranian oil is about to hit the global market!
Iran now has a ridiculous amount of oil to sell. Because of the war, sanctions, and the U.S. blockade, all that oil’s been sitting on a shelf, getting stockpiled. And if Iran gets slapped with sanctions again, the oil goes back on the shelf.
Thus, Iran is heavily incentivized to sell its oil ASAP — and flood the market to offset all the revenue it lost. (And if doing so lowers the price for Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the U.A.E., and the OPEC states that sided against it, too bloody bad.)
This means that — just in time for the midterms — oil prices are going to crash!
Everything that’s shipped by truck, ship, or plane will be cheaper. And as inflation drops, the new Fed Chair, Kevin Warsh, will have a free hand to fulfill one of Trump’s biggest economic goals: lowering the interest rate.
Prediction: When the Federal Reserve meets again on July 28 — a mere 98 days prior to Election Day — interest rates will FINALLY be cut. The collapsing oil prices will negate the Fed’s (earlier) fear of inflation.
And that’s enough time for the American people to feel the benefit!
The 2026 midterms won’t rise or fall on the Iran War. Despite all the teeth-gnashing, the American people don’t care that much about it: Economic concerns still reign supreme. We care about gas, groceries, and household goods.
It’s (still) the economy, stupid!
The least-charitable interpretation of the MOU is eliciting gasps, curses, and moans from the MAGAverse — with the $300 billion payoff serving as Exhibit A. But that money doesn’t belong to Iran, and the MOU was never intended to be the finished document. They’re both a means to an end —and then, perhaps, to a new beginning.
And so was the Iran War.
President Trump had to thread the needle between an unpopular conflict, a vulnerable economy, a still-standing Iranian regime, and the 2026 midterms. Whether or not he struck the right balance remains to be seen — but the short-term political benefits for the GOP are considerable. Ignore them at your own peril.
These were Iranian monetary funds that were frozen / secured to begin with. The released funds are NOT being DUMP'ed in the IRGC's lap to re-arm.
Unlike too many Democrat funding / bailouts, have done over many past (D) administrations (eg. the California Rail & Covid-19 $$$$$, Somali daycare $$$$). The funds will applied as approved, and will be tracked.
No mater what the final MOU or virtual joke agreement is.
I don't expect Iran to honor it more than it takes them to rearm and acquire even more deadly weapon via other redirected funds no longer needed due to the unfrozen IRR's.
Think of a Bio-Weapon Lab working with China to develop a DNA/RNA tuned Bug.
#4
it will a while before much Iran oil is exported
pretty sure many of the crude oil production complexs were shut down and that it takes quite a bit of work/money to restart them
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
06/21/2026 8:59 Comments ||
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#5
From Reuters:
The new fund is a private investment vehicle, not a reconstruction or reparations programme and will not include any government money or grants, the source said, adding that companies based in the U.S., the Gulf Arab states, Asia, South America and Africa have agreed to commit financing.
Investments pledged span energy, logistics, manufacturing and transport, the source said.
Posted by: Bobby ||
06/21/2026 10:56 Comments ||
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#6
Frankly I don't expect Iran to see a dime of that money
Expect some initial funds from Qatar affiliated companies. Probably targeting oil production and/or refining where it is at least possible to get some of the loans paid back.
What happens after then, well who knows.
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
06/21/2026 18:45 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for 
