198-405: PJSC Aeroflot – Russian Airlines ( Russian : ПАО «Аэрофло́т — Росси́йские авиали́нии» , PAO Aeroflot — Rossiyskiye avialinii ), commonly known as Aeroflot ( English: / ˈ ɛər oʊ ˌ f l ɒ t / or / ˌ ɛər oʊ ˈ f l ɒ t / ; Russian : Аэрофлот , transl. "air fleet" , pronounced [ɐɛrɐˈfɫot] ), is the flag carrier and
396-649: A constitutional referendum on whether to adopt Russian as a second official language. According to the Central Election Commission, 74.8% voted against, 24.9% voted for and the voter turnout was 71.1%. Starting in 2019, instruction in Russian will be gradually discontinued in private colleges and universities in Latvia, and in general instruction in Latvian public high schools. On 29 September 2022, Saeima passed in
594-638: A low-cost carrier . The Aeroflot fleet , excluding subsidiaries, includes 171 airplanes: 112 Airbus planes and 59 Boeing planes. The company plans on making the Yakovlev MC-21 its flagship plane, with deliveries expected to start in 2025 or 2026. On 17 January 1921, the Sovnarkom of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic published "About Air Transportation". The document signed by its chair Vladimir Lenin set out
792-510: A new education law which requires all schools to teach at least partially in Ukrainian, with provisions while allow indigenous languages and languages of national minorities to be used alongside the national language. The law faced criticism from officials in Russia and Hungary. The 2019 Law of Ukraine "On protecting the functioning of the Ukrainian language as the state language" gives priority to
990-651: A renewed federation , an attempted coup against Gorbachev by hardline communists prompted the largest republics—Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus—to secede. On December 26, Gorbachev officially recognized the dissolution of the Soviet Union . Boris Yeltsin , the leader of the RSFSR, oversaw its reconstitution into the Russian Federation , which became the Soviet Union's successor state; all other republics emerged as fully independent post-Soviet states . During its existence,
1188-580: A closer relationship with France and Britain. In 1939, half a year after the Munich Agreement , the USSR attempted to form an anti-Nazi alliance with France and Britain. Adolf Hitler proposed a better deal, which would give the USSR control over much of Eastern Europe through the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact . In September, Germany invaded Poland, and the USSR also invaded later that month, resulting in
1386-433: A distance of 1,000,000 kilometres (620,000 mi), carrying 14,000 passengers and 127,500 kilograms (281,100 lb) of freight, on a route network extending to 5,000 kilometres (3,100 mi). Ukrvozdukhput merged with Zakavia in 1925. Dobrolyot was transformed from a Russian to an all-Union enterprise on 21 September 1926 as a result of Sovnarkom resolutions, and in 1928 Dobrolyot was merged with Ukrvozdukhput, making it
1584-545: A distance of 321,500 kilometres (199,800 mi). The 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , held in 1956, included plans for Aeroflot services to be dramatically increased 3.8 times, with a target of 16,000,000 annual passengers by 1960. To meet these goals, Aeroflot introduced higher capacity turbojet and turbine-prop aircraft on key domestic routes, and on services to Aeroflot destinations abroad. A major step for Aeroflot occurred on 15 September 1956 when
1782-554: A formula with V standing for the nucleus (vowel) and C for each consonant, the maximal structure can be described as follows: (C)(C)(C)(C)V(C)(C)(C)(C) Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ( USSR ), commonly known as the Soviet Union , was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. During its existence, it was the largest country by area , extending across eleven time zones and sharing borders with twelve countries , and
1980-479: A language that "belongs to the European cultural space". The financing of Russian-language content by the state will cease, which the concept says create a "unified information space". However, one inevitable consequence would be the closure of public media broadcasts in Russian on LTV and Latvian Radio, as well as the closure of LSM's Russian-language service. In Lithuania , Russian has no official or legal status, but
2178-572: A lesser extent the languages to the south and the east: Uralic , Turkic , Persian , Arabic , and Hebrew . According to the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California , Russian is classified as a level III language in terms of learning difficulty for native English speakers, requiring approximately 1,100 hours of immersion instruction to achieve intermediate fluency. Feudal divisions and conflicts created obstacles between
SECTION 10
#17328546071552376-758: A major reorganisation during which most of the Soviet aircraft were replaced by Western-built jets; concerns over fuel consumption rather than safety concerns were cited for such a move. Airbus A319s and A320s for short-haul flights in Europe; and Boeing 767s and Airbus A330s for long-haul routes; were gradually incorporated into the Aeroflot fleet . Aeroflot began working with the US travel technology firm Sabre Corporation in 1997, and in 2004 signed an agreement to use Sabre's software as its new computer reservation system , further extending
2574-607: A minority language under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities . 30% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 2% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. In Azerbaijan , Russian has no official status, but is a lingua franca of the country. 26% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 5% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. In Georgia , Russian has no official status, but it
2772-592: A new profitable market. In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Stalin ordered Marxist-Leninist parties across the world to strongly oppose non-Marxist political parties, labour unions or other organizations on the left, which they labelled social fascists . In the usage of the Soviet Union, and of the Comintern and its affiliated parties in this period, the epithet fascist was used to describe capitalist society in general and virtually any anti-Soviet or anti-Stalinist activity or opinion. Stalin reversed himself in 1934 with
2970-641: A priority in the immediate postwar years to expand services from Moscow to the capital of each of the Republics of the Soviet Union , in addition to important industrial centres on the country and transferred to Aeroflot many Lisunov Li-2s , which became the backbone of the Aeroflot fleet . The Ilyushin Il-12 entered service on Aeroflot's all-Union scheduled routes on 22 August 1947, and supplemented already existing Li-2 services. The original Ilyushin Il-18 entered service around
3168-516: A qualitatively new entity can be said to emerge—the general language of the working class... capitalism has the tendency of creating the general urban language of a given society. In 2010, there were 259.8 million speakers of Russian in the world: in Russia – 137.5 million, in the CIS and Baltic countries – 93.7 million, in Eastern Europe – 12.9 million, Western Europe – 7.3 million, Asia – 2.7 million, in
3366-917: A result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine , Aeroflot and other Russian airlines were banned from the airspace of many countries and several routes were cancelled as a result. Russian airlines were added to the list of air carriers banned in the European Union for safety reasons because planes were re-registered in Russia and no longer had foreign airworthiness certificates. The U.S. Department of Commerce banned companies from servicing Boeing planes operated by Aeroflot, Aviastar , Azur Air , Belavia , Rossiya and Utair . Manchester United F.C. cancelled its sponsorship agreement that made Aeroflot its official carrier since July 2013. Sabre Corporation and others removed access by Aeroflot to their computer reservation systems and global distribution systems . In response to
3564-612: A result of the signing of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact , and they continued until the opening of the Eastern Front in World War II in 1941. Under the third five-year plan, which began in 1938, civil aviation development continued, with improvements to airport installations being made and construction of airports being commenced. In addition to the expansion of services between the Soviet Union 's main cities, local routes (MVL) were also expanded, and by 1940, 337 MVL routes had operations on
3762-615: A scheduled basis. Serial production of the Lisunov Li-2 (license-built Douglas DC-3) commenced in 1939, and the aircraft became the backbone of the Aeroflot fleet on mainline trunk routes. The day after Operation Barbarossa , the invasion of the Soviet Union by Nazi Germany , on 22 June 1941, the Sovnarkom placed the Civil Air Fleet under the control of Narkomat , leading to the full-scale mobilisation of Aeroflot crews and technicians for
3960-469: A union of equals, in practice the Soviet Union was dominated by Russians . The domination was so absolute that for most of its existence, the country was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to as 'Russia'. While the Russian SFSR was technically only one republic within the larger union, it was by far the largest (both in terms of population and area), most powerful, and most highly developed. The Russian SFSR
4158-527: Is Belarusian, among ethnic Belarusians this share is 28.5%; the highest share of those who speak Belarusian at home is among ethnic Poles — 46.0%. In Estonia , Russian is spoken by 29.6% of the population, according to a 2011 estimate from the World Factbook, and is officially considered a foreign language. School education in the Russian language is a very contentious point in Estonian politics, and in 2022,
SECTION 20
#17328546071554356-475: Is a co-official language per article 5 of the Constitution of Kyrgyzstan . The 2009 census states that 482,200 people speak Russian as a native language, or 8.99% of the population. Additionally, 1,854,700 residents of Kyrgyzstan aged 15 and above fluently speak Russian as a second language, or 49.6% of the population in the age group. In Tajikistan , Russian is the language of inter-ethnic communication under
4554-401: Is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between Russian, Belarusian and Ukrainian , and a moderate degree of it in all modern Slavic languages, at least at the conversational level. Russian is written using a Cyrillic alphabet. The Russian alphabet consists of 33 letters. The following table gives their forms, along with IPA values for each letter's typical sound: Older letters of
4752-593: Is a post-posed definite article -to , -ta , -te similar to that existing in Bulgarian and Macedonian. In the Southern Russian dialects , instances of unstressed /e/ and /a/ following palatalized consonants and preceding a stressed syllable are not reduced to [ɪ] (as occurs in the Moscow dialect), being instead pronounced [a] in such positions (e.g. несл и is pronounced [nʲaˈslʲi] , not [nʲɪsˈlʲi] ) – this
4950-485: Is being used less frequently by Russian-speaking typists in favor of the extension of Unicode character encoding , which fully incorporates the Russian alphabet. Free programs are available offering this Unicode extension, which allow users to type Russian characters, even on Western 'QWERTY' keyboards. The Russian language was first introduced to computing after the M-1 , and MESM models were produced in 1951. According to
5148-613: Is called yakanye ( яканье ). Consonants include a fricative /ɣ/ , a semivowel /w⁓u̯/ and /x⁓xv⁓xw/ , whereas the Standard and Northern dialects have the consonants /ɡ/ , /v/ , and final /l/ and /f/ , respectively. The morphology features a palatalized final /tʲ/ in 3rd person forms of verbs (this is unpalatalized in the Standard and Northern dialects). During the Proto-Slavic (Common Slavic) times all Slavs spoke one mutually intelligible language or group of dialects. There
5346-627: Is his background, his education , his profession . These are the questions that will determine the fate of the accused. That is the meaning and essence of the Red Terror ." During his rule, Stalin always made the final policy decisions. Otherwise, Soviet foreign policy was set by the commission on the Foreign Policy of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , or by
5544-486: Is mined, all forests have been destroyed by contamination, while the northern and other parts of Russia have been affected by emissions. During the 1990s, people in the West were also interested in the radioactive hazards of nuclear facilities, decommissioned nuclear submarines , and the processing of nuclear waste or spent nuclear fuel . It was also known in the early 1990s that the USSR had transported radioactive material to
5742-518: Is more spoken than English. Sizable Russian-speaking communities also exist in North America, especially in large urban centers of the US and Canada, such as New York City , Philadelphia , Boston , Los Angeles , Nashville , San Francisco , Seattle , Spokane , Toronto , Calgary , Baltimore , Miami , Portland , Chicago , Denver , and Cleveland . In a number of locations they issue their own newspapers, and live in ethnic enclaves (especially
5940-564: Is odd") – чу́дно ( chúdno – "this is marvellous"), молоде́ц ( molodéts – "well done!") – мо́лодец ( mólodets – "fine young man"), узна́ю ( uznáyu – "I shall learn it") – узнаю́ ( uznayú – "I recognize it"), отреза́ть ( otrezát – "to be cutting") – отре́зать ( otrézat – "to have cut"); to indicate the proper pronunciation of uncommon words, especially personal and family names, like афе́ра ( aféra , "scandal, affair"), гу́ру ( gúru , "guru"), Гарси́я ( García ), Оле́ша ( Olésha ), Фе́рми ( Fermi ), and to show which
6138-402: Is recognized as a minority language under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities . Russian is the language of 9% of the population according to the World Factbook. Ethnologue cites Russian as the country's de facto working language. In China , Russian has no official status, but it is spoken by the small Russian communities in the northeastern Heilongjiang and
Aeroflot - Misplaced Pages Continue
6336-569: Is sometimes considered to have played a significant role in the formation of modern Russian. Also, Russian has notable lexical similarities with Bulgarian due to a common Church Slavonic influence on both languages, but because of later interaction in the 19th and 20th centuries, Bulgarian grammar differs markedly from Russian. Over the course of centuries, the vocabulary and literary style of Russian have also been influenced by Western and Central European languages such as Greek, Latin , Polish , Dutch , German, French, Italian, and English, and to
6534-576: Is spoken by 14.2% of the population according to an undated estimate from the World Factbook. In 2005, Russian was the most widely taught foreign language in Mongolia, and was compulsory in Year 7 onward as a second foreign language in 2006. Around 1.5 million Israelis spoke Russian as of 2017. The Israeli press and websites regularly publish material in Russian and there are Russian newspapers, television stations, schools, and social media outlets based in
6732-468: Is the most spoken native language in Europe , the most spoken Slavic language , as well as the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia . It is the world's seventh-most spoken language by number of native speakers , and the world's ninth-most spoken language by total number of speakers . Russian is one of two official languages aboard the International Space Station , one of
6930-686: Is the native language of the Russians . It was the de facto and de jure official language of the former Soviet Union . Russian has remained an official language of the Russian Federation , Belarus , Kazakhstan , Kyrgyzstan , and Tajikistan , and is still commonly used as a lingua franca in Ukraine , Moldova , the Caucasus , Central Asia , and to a lesser extent in the Baltic states and Israel . Russian has over 258 million total speakers worldwide. It
7128-518: Is the stressed word in a sentence, for example Ты́ съел печенье? ( Tý syel pechenye? – "Was it you who ate the cookie?") – Ты съе́л печенье? ( Ty syél pechenye? – "Did you eat the cookie?) – Ты съел пече́нье? ( Ty syel pechénye? "Was it the cookie you ate?"). Stress marks are mandatory in lexical dictionaries and books for children or Russian learners. The Russian syllable structure can be quite complex, with both initial and final consonant clusters of up to four consecutive sounds. Using
7326-461: The 2011 Lithuanian census , Russian was the native language for 7.2% of the population. In Moldova , Russian was considered to be the language of interethnic communication under a Soviet-era law. On 21 January 2021, the Constitutional Court of Moldova declared the law unconstitutional and deprived Russian of the status of the language of interethnic communication. 50% of the population
7524-966: The Apollo–Soyuz mission, which first flew in 1975. In March 2013, Russian was found to be the second-most used language on websites after English. Russian was the language of 5.9% of all websites, slightly ahead of German and far behind English (54.7%). Russian was used not only on 89.8% of .ru sites, but also on 88.7% of sites with the former Soviet Union domain .su . Websites in former Soviet Union member states also used high levels of Russian: 79.0% in Ukraine, 86.9% in Belarus, 84.0% in Kazakhstan, 79.6% in Uzbekistan, 75.9% in Kyrgyzstan and 81.8% in Tajikistan. However, Russian
7722-628: The Barents Sea and Kara Sea , which was later confirmed by the Russian parliament. The crash of the K-141 Kursk submarine in 2000 in the west further raised concerns. In the past, there were accidents involving submarines K-19 , K-8 , a K-129 , K-27 , K-219 and K-278 Komsomolets . There were three power hierarchies in the Soviet Union: the legislature represented by the Supreme Soviet of
7920-413: The Constitution of Tajikistan and is permitted in official documentation. 28% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 7% used it as the main language with family, friends or at work. The World Factbook notes that Russian is widely used in government and business. In Turkmenistan , Russian lost its status as the official lingua franca in 1996. Among 12% of the population who grew up in
8118-612: The Era of Stagnation , was marked by economic decline, political corruption, and a rigid gerontocracy . Despite efforts to maintain the Soviet Union's superpower status, the economy struggled due to its centralized nature, technological backwardness, and inefficiencies. The vast military expenditures and burdens of maintaining the Eastern Bloc, further strained the Soviet economy. In the 1980s, Mikhail Gorbachev 's policies of Glasnost (openness) and Perestroika (restructuring) aimed to revitalize
Aeroflot - Misplaced Pages Continue
8316-548: The Georgian Affair of 1922, Lenin called for the Russian SFSR and other national Soviet republics to form a greater union which he initially named as the Union of Soviet Republics of Europe and Asia (Russian: Союз Советских Республик Европы и Азии , romanized : Soyuz Sovyetskikh Respublik Evropy i Azii ). Joseph Stalin initially resisted Lenin's proposal but ultimately accepted it, and with Lenin's agreement he changed
8514-729: The Land Forces , the Air Force , the Navy , Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU) and the Internal Troops . The OGPU later became independent and in 1934 joined the NKVD secret police, and so its internal troops were under the joint leadership of the defense and internal commissariats. After World War II, Strategic Missile Forces (1959), Air Defense Forces (1948) and National Civil Defense Forces (1970) were formed, which ranked first, third, and sixth in
8712-518: The Moscow State Institute of International Relations . The Marxist-Leninist leadership of the Soviet Union intensely debated foreign policy issues and changed directions several times. Even after Stalin assumed dictatorial control in the late 1920s, there were debates, and he frequently changed positions. During the country's early period, it was assumed that Communist revolutions would break out soon in every major industrial country, and it
8910-761: The Popular Front program that called on all Marxist parties to join with all anti-Fascist political, labour, and organizational forces that were opposed to fascism , especially of the Nazi variety. The rapid growth of power in Nazi Germany encouraged both Paris and Moscow to form a military alliance, and the Franco-Soviet Treaty of Mutual Assistance was signed in May 1935. A firm believer in collective security, Stalin's foreign minister Maxim Litvinov worked very hard to form
9108-564: The Procurator General and the Council of Ministers (known before 1946 as the Council of People's Commissars ), headed by the Chairman (Premier) and managing an enormous bureaucracy responsible for the administration of the economy and society. State and party structures of the constituent republics largely emulated the structure of the central institutions, although the Russian SFSR, unlike
9306-537: The Russian Civil War , the Soviet Union quickly became a one-party state under the Communist Party . Its early years under Lenin were marked by the implementation of socialist policies and the New Economic Policy (NEP), which allowed for market-oriented reforms. The rise of Joseph Stalin in the late 1920s ushered in an era of intense centralization and totalitarianism. Stalin's rule was characterized by
9504-622: The Russian Empire , the State Council , which functioned from 1810 to 1917, was referred to as a Council of Ministers. The Soviets as workers' councils first appeared during the 1905 Russian Revolution . Although they were quickly suppressed by the Imperial army, after the February Revolution of 1917 , workers' and soldiers' Soviets emerged throughout the country and shared power with
9702-802: The Russian Provisional Government . The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin , demanded that all power be transferred to the Soviets, and gained support from the workers and soldiers. After the October Revolution , in which the Bolsheviks seized power from the Provisional Government in the name of the Soviets, Lenin proclaimed the formation of the Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic (RSFSR). During
9900-567: The Russian invasion of Ukraine . Management of the company is appointed by the Russian government due to its ownership stake. The headquarters of Aeroflot are on Arbat Street , Arbat District , Central Administrative Okrug , Moscow. The Federal Agency for State Property Management , an agency of the Government of Russia , owns 73.77% of the company, with the rest of the shares being public float . The company owns airline subsidiaries Pobeda and Rossiya Airlines . In September 2018, Aeroflot served 146 destinations in 52 countries. In 2022,
10098-542: The Soviet Air Force ); atmospheric research; and remote area patrol . It operated hundreds of helicopters and cargo aircraft in addition to civil airliners. It also operated the Soviet equivalent of a presidential aircraft and other VIP transports of government and Communist party officials. Aeroflot was also responsible for such services as ice patrol in the Arctic Ocean and escorting of ships through frozen seas; oil exploration; power line surveillance; and transportation and heavy lifting support on construction projects. For
SECTION 50
#173285460715510296-451: The Tupolev Tu-104 jet aircraft entered service on the Moscow- Omsk - Irkutsk route, marking the world's first sustained jet airline service. The airline began international flights with the type on 12 October 1956 under the command of Boris Bugayev with flights from Moscow to Prague . The aircraft placed Aeroflot in an enviable position, as airlines in the West had operated throughout the 1950s with large piston-engined aircraft. By 1958,
10494-476: The Ukrainian language in more than 30 spheres of public life: in particular in public administration , media, education, science, culture, advertising, services . The law does not regulate private communication. A poll conducted in March 2022 by RATING in the territory controlled by Ukraine found that 83% of the respondents believe that Ukrainian should be the only state language of Ukraine. This opinion dominates in all macro-regions, age and language groups. On
10692-507: The United States Census , in 2007 Russian was the primary language spoken in the homes of over 850,000 individuals living in the United States. Russian is one of the official languages (or has similar status and interpretation must be provided into Russian) of the following: The Russian language is also one of two official languages aboard the International Space Station – NASA astronauts who serve alongside Russian cosmonauts usually take Russian language courses. This practice goes back to
10890-489: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), saying that it was "overly juridical" and potentially infringed on national sovereignty. The Soviet Union later signed legally-binding human rights documents, such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights in 1973 (and the 1966 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights ), but they were neither widely known or accessible to people living under Communist rule, nor were they taken seriously by
11088-411: The Western Bloc during the Cold War . This period saw the USSR engage in an arms race, the Space Race , and proxy wars around the globe. The post-Stalin leadership, particularly under Nikita Khrushchev , initiated a de-Stalinization process, leading to a period of liberalization and relative openness known as the Khrushchev Thaw . However, the subsequent era under Leonid Brezhnev , referred to as
11286-426: The Yakovlev Yak-40 regional jet began operations on short-haul services. That same year, the Il-62 inaugurated the long-delayed service between Moscow and New York, which finally began in July and was operated by Aeroflot and Pan Am jointly. According to the book The Aeroflot Story: From Russia With Luck : "This business relationship became an acrimonious affair in which both parties complained it had been wronged by
11484-401: The first probe to land on another planet . In 1985, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev , sought to reform the country through his policies of glasnost and perestroika . In 1989, various countries of the Warsaw Pact overthrew their Soviet-backed regimes , and nationalist and separatist movements erupted across the Soviet Union. In 1991, amid efforts to preserve the country as
11682-442: The general secretary (First Secretary from 1953 to 1966), the de facto highest office in the Soviet Union. Depending on the degree of power consolidation, it was either the Politburo as a collective body or the General Secretary, who always was one of the Politburo members, that effectively led the party and the country (except for the period of the highly personalized authority of Stalin, exercised directly through his position in
11880-619: The international sanctions during the Russian invasion of Ukraine , Aeroflot migrated to a Russian-based passenger service system , began sourcing aircraft parts via obscure trading companies, free-trade zones and middlemen in countries that have not imposed sanctions on Russia such as United Arab Emirates and China, and placed orders for Russian-made jets such as the Yakovlev MC-21 to reduce its dependence on foreign-made jets. In September 2023, Aeroflot paid $ 645 million to acquire 17 aircraft and five spare jet engines that were leased to Aeroflot and owned by AerCap and were stranded in Russia upon
12078-485: The right to food , the right to work , and the right to education . The Soviet conception of human rights was very different from international law . According to Soviet legal theory , "it is the government who is the beneficiary of human rights which are to be asserted against the individual". The Soviet state was considered as the source of human rights. Therefore, the Soviet legal system considered law an arm of politics and it also considered courts agencies of
SECTION 60
#173285460715512276-413: The system of appointments . All senior government officials and most deputies of the Supreme Soviet were members of the CPSU. Of the party heads themselves, Stalin (1941–1953) and Khrushchev (1958–1964) were Premiers. Upon the forced retirement of Khrushchev, the party leader was prohibited from this kind of double membership, but the later General Secretaries for at least some part of their tenure occupied
12474-433: The third-most populous country . An overall successor to the Russian Empire , it was nominally organized as a federal union of national republics , the largest and most populous of which was the Russian SFSR . In practice, its government and economy were highly centralized . As a one-party state governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , it was a flagship communist state . Its capital and largest city
12672-481: The 1920s, it refused to rubber stamp proposals from the party and Council of Ministers. In 1990, Gorbachev introduced and assumed the position of the President of the Soviet Union , concentrated power in his executive office, independent of the party, and subordinated the government, now renamed the Cabinet of Ministers of the USSR , to himself. Tensions grew between the Union-wide authorities under Gorbachev, reformists led in Russia by Boris Yeltsin and controlling
12870-405: The 20th century, Russian was a mandatory language taught in the schools of the members of the old Warsaw Pact and in other countries that used to be satellites of the USSR. According to the Eurobarometer 2005 survey, fluency in Russian remains fairly high (20–40%) in some countries, in particular former Warsaw Pact countries. In Armenia , Russian has no official status, but it is recognized as
13068-412: The Belarusian society the Russian language prevails, so according to the 2019 census 6,718,557 people (71.4% of the total population) stated that they speak Russian at home, for ethnic Belarusians this share is 61.4%, for Russians — 97.2%, for Ukrainians — 89.0%, for Poles — 52.4%, and for Jews — 96.6%; 2,447,764 people (26.0% of the total population) stated that the language they usually speak at home
13266-416: The Central Administration of International Air Traffic (Russian: Центральное управление международных воздушных сообщений ) (TsUMVS) was established within the framework of IATA , and became the sole enterprise authorised to operate international flights. Abroad, the airline was known as Aeroflot Soviet Airlines. In 1976, Aeroflot carried its 100 millionth passenger. Its flights were mainly concentrated around
13464-402: The Civil Air Fleet, and after the war were placed into regular service across the Soviet Union. Whilst civil operations in European Russia west of the front line, which ran from Leningrad to Moscow to Rostov-on-Don , were prevented from operating because of the war, services from Moscow to the Urals , Siberia , Central Asia, and other regions which were not affected by the war, continued. By
13662-411: The Communist authorities. Under Joseph Stalin , the death penalty was extended to adolescents as young as 12 years old in 1935. Sergei Kovalev recalled "the famous article 125 of the Constitution which enumerated all basic civil and political rights" in the Soviet Union. But when he and other prisoners attempted to use this as a legal basis for their abuse complaints, their prosecutor's argument
13860-420: The Council of Ministers rather than the Politburo after 1941). They were not controlled by the general party membership, as the key principle of the party organization was democratic centralism , demanding strict subordination to higher bodies, and elections went uncontested, endorsing the candidates proposed from above. The Communist Party maintained its dominance over the state mainly through its control over
14058-409: The Great and developed from the Moscow ( Middle or Central Russian ) dialect substratum under the influence of some of the previous century's Russian chancery language. Prior to the Bolshevik Revolution , the spoken form of the Russian language was that of the nobility and the urban bourgeoisie. Russian peasants, the great majority of the population, continued to speak in their own dialects. However,
14256-578: The Institute of Russian Language of the Russian Academy of Sciences, an optional acute accent ( знак ударения ) may, and sometimes should, be used to mark stress . For example, it is used to distinguish between otherwise identical words, especially when context does not make it obvious: замо́к ( zamók – "lock") – за́мок ( zámok – "castle"), сто́ящий ( stóyashchy – "worthwhile") – стоя́щий ( stoyáshchy – "standing"), чудно́ ( chudnó – "this
14454-610: The Latin alphabet: SSSR ) is the abbreviation of the Russian-language cognate of USSR, as written in Cyrillic letters . The Soviets used this abbreviation so frequently that audiences worldwide became familiar with its meaning. After this, the most common Russian initialization is Союз ССР (transliteration: Soyuz SSR ) which essentially translates to Union of SSRs in English. In addition,
14652-515: The Middle East and North Africa – 1.3 million, Sub-Saharan Africa – 0.1 million, Latin America – 0.2 million, U.S., Canada , Australia, and New Zealand – 4.1 million speakers. Therefore, the Russian language is the seventh-largest in the world by the number of speakers , after English, Mandarin, Hindi -Urdu, Spanish, French, Arabic, and Portuguese. Russian is one of the six official languages of
14850-533: The Politburo after the deaths of Lenin and Stalin, as well as after Khrushchev's dismissal, itself due to a decision by both the Politburo and the Central Committee. All leaders of the Communist Party before Gorbachev died in office, except Georgy Malenkov and Khrushchev, both dismissed from the party leadership amid internal struggle within the party. Between 1988 and 1990, facing considerable opposition, Mikhail Gorbachev enacted reforms shifting power away from
15048-807: The Russian alphabet include ⟨ ѣ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ е ⟩ ( /je/ or /ʲe/ ); ⟨ і ⟩ and ⟨ ѵ ⟩ , which both merged to ⟨ и ⟩ ( /i/ ); ⟨ ѳ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ ф ⟩ ( /f/ ); ⟨ ѫ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ у ⟩ ( /u/ ); ⟨ ѭ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ ю ⟩ ( /ju/ or /ʲu/ ); and ⟨ ѧ ⟩ and ⟨ ѩ ⟩ , which later were graphically reshaped into ⟨ я ⟩ and merged phonetically to /ja/ or /ʲa/ . While these older letters have been abandoned at one time or another, they may be used in this and related articles. The yers ⟨ ъ ⟩ and ⟨ ь ⟩ originally indicated
15246-458: The Russian principalities before and especially during Mongol rule. This strengthened dialectal differences, and for a while, prevented the emergence of a standardized national language. The formation of the unified and centralized Russian state in the 15th and 16th centuries, and the gradual re-emergence of a common political, economic, and cultural space created the need for a common standard language. The initial impulse for standardization came from
15444-460: The Russian short form name Советский Союз (transliteration: Sovyetsky Soyuz , which literally means Soviet Union ) is also commonly used, but only in its unabbreviated form. Since the start of the Great Patriotic War at the latest, abbreviating the Russian name of the Soviet Union as СС has been taboo, the reason being that СС as a Russian Cyrillic abbreviation is associated with
15642-661: The Soviet Union and turned into SSRs, which was not recognized by most of the international community and was considered an illegal occupation . After the Soviet invasion of Finland , the Karelo-Finnish SSR was formed on annexed territory as a Union Republic in March 1940 and then incorporated into Russia as the Karelian ASSR in 1956. Between July 1956 and September 1991, there were 15 union republics (see map below). While nominally
15840-600: The Soviet Union in 1922. Following Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin came to power, inaugurating rapid industrialization and forced collectivization that led to significant economic growth but contributed to a famine between 1930 and 1933 that killed millions. The Soviet forced labour camp system of the Gulag was expanded. During the late 1930s, Stalin's government conducted the Great Purge to remove opponents, resulting in mass death, imprisonment, and deportation. In 1939,
16038-536: The Soviet Union , the government represented by the Council of Ministers , and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), the only legal party and the final policymaker in the country. At the top of the Communist Party was the Central Committee , elected at Party Congresses and Conferences. In turn, the Central Committee voted for a Politburo (called the Presidium between 1952 and 1966), Secretariat and
16236-581: The Soviet Union produced many significant social and technological achievements and innovations . It had the world's second-largest economy and largest standing military. An NPT-designated state , it wielded the largest arsenal of nuclear weapons in the world . As an Allied nation, it was a founding member of the United Nations as well as one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council . Before its dissolution,
16434-466: The Soviet Union undertook a campaign of de-Stalinization under Nikita Khrushchev , which saw reversals and rejections of Stalinist policies. This campaign caused tensions with Communist China . During the 1950s, the Soviet Union expanded its efforts in space exploration and took a lead in the Space Race with the first artificial satellite , the first human spaceflight , the first space station , and
16632-411: The Soviet Union was the world's largest country, a status that is retained by the Russian Federation . Covering a sixth of Earth's land surface, its size was comparable to that of North America . Two other successor states, Kazakhstan and Ukraine , rank among the top 10 countries by land area, and the largest country entirely in Europe, respectively. The European portion accounted for a quarter of
16830-636: The Soviet Union's priorities changed. Despite previous conflict with the United Kingdom , Vyacheslav Molotov dropped his post war border demands. The Cold War was a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc , which began following World War II in 1945. The term cold war is used because there
17028-638: The Soviet Union, but the airline also had an international network covering five continents: North and South America, Europe, Africa and Asia. The network included countries such as the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Spain, Cuba, Mexico and the People's Republic of China. Aeroflot service between the Soviet Union and the United States was interrupted from 15 September 1983 until 2 August 1990, following an executive order by U.S. President Ronald Reagan revoking Aeroflot's license to operate flights into and out of
17226-410: The Soviet Union, denoting the importance of the operation of holiday aircraft services to Aeroflot. Statistics for the same year showed Aeroflot operating an all-Union route network extending over 400,000 kilometres (250,000 mi), and carrying 36,800,000 passengers. By 1966, Aeroflot carried 47,200,000 passengers over a domestic route network of 474,600 kilometres (294,900 mi). For the period of
17424-531: The Soviet aircraft industry to make it less dependent on foreign built aircraft; in 1930, 50% of aircraft flying services in the Soviet Union were of foreign manufacture. Expansion of air routes which had taken shape in the late 1920s, continued into the 1930s. Local (MVL) services were greatly expanded in Soviet Central Asia and the Soviet Far East , which by the end of the second five-year plan in 1937
17622-405: The Soviet era can speak Russian, other generations of citizens that do not have any knowledge of Russian. Primary and secondary education by Russian is almost non-existent. In Uzbekistan , Russian is the language of inter-ethnic communication. It has some official roles, being permitted in official documentation and is the lingua franca of the country and the language of the elite. Russian
17820-513: The Soviet system but instead accelerated its unraveling. Nationalist movements gained momentum across the Soviet republics , and the control of the Communist Party weakened. The failed coup attempt in August 1991 against Gorbachev by hardline communists hastened the end of the Soviet Union , which formally dissolved on December 26, 1991, ending nearly seven decades of Soviet rule. With an area of 22,402,200 square kilometres (8,649,500 sq mi),
18018-479: The Soviet war effort. Prior to the invasion, the Aeroflot network extended over 146,000 kilometres (91,000 mi), and amongst the longest routes being operated from Moscow were those to Tbilisi (via Baku ), Tashkent and Vladivostok . Aeroflot aircraft, including PS-35s and PS-43s, were based at Khodynka Aerodrome in Moscow; and important missions undertaken by Aeroflot aircraft and crews included flying supplies to
18216-454: The USSR and Nazi Germany signed a nonaggression pact , but in 1941, Germany invaded the Soviet Union in the largest land invasion in history, opening the Eastern Front of World War II . The Soviets played a decisive role in defeating the Axis powers , suffering an estimated 27 million casualties , which accounted for most Allied losses. In the aftermath of the war , the Soviet Union consolidated
18414-535: The USSR from the United States . The country's highest mountain was Communism Peak (now Ismoil Somoni Peak ) in Tajikistan , at 7,495 metres (24,590 ft). The USSR also included most of the world's largest lakes; the Caspian Sea (shared with Iran ), and Lake Baikal , the world's largest (by volume) and deepest freshwater lake that is also an internal body of water in Russia. Neighbouring countries were aware of
18612-692: The USSR was one of the world's two superpowers through its hegemony in Eastern Europe, global diplomatic and ideological influence (particularly in the Global South ), military and economic strengths, and scientific accomplishments. The word soviet is derived from the Russian word sovet (Russian: совет ), meaning 'council', 'assembly', 'advice', ultimately deriving from the proto-Slavic verbal stem of * vět-iti ('to inform'), related to Slavic věst ('news'), English wise . The word sovietnik means 'councillor'. Some organizations in Russian history were called council (Russian: совет ). In
18810-430: The USSR. Moscow eventually stopped threatening other states, and instead worked to open peaceful relationships in terms of trade, and diplomatic recognition. The United Kingdom dismissed the warnings of Winston Churchill and a few others about a continuing Marxist-Leninist threat, and opened trade relations and de facto diplomatic recognition in 1922. There was hope for a settlement of the pre-war Tsarist debts, but it
19008-460: The United Nations. Education in Russian is still a popular choice for both Russian as a second language (RSL) and native speakers in Russia, and in many former Soviet republics. Russian is still seen as an important language for children to learn in most of the former Soviet republics. In Belarus , Russian is a second state language alongside Belarusian per the Constitution of Belarus . 77% of
19206-636: The United States following the downing of Korean Air Lines Flight 007 by the Soviet Air Force. Flights resumed in April 1986. At the start of the 1990s, Aeroflot reorganised again giving more autonomy to territorial divisions. R. E. G. Davies , former curator of the Smithsonian Institution , claims that by 1992 Aeroflot had over 600,000 people operating over 10,000 aircraft. Once the world's largest carrier , Aeroflot did not restrict its operations to
19404-491: The accident were unknown, 4,000 new cases of thyroid cancer which resulted from the accident's contamination were reported at the time of the accident, but this led to a relatively low number of deaths (WHO data, 2005). Another major radioactive accident was the Kyshtym disaster . The Kola Peninsula was one of the places with major problems. Around the industrial cities of Monchegorsk and Norilsk , where nickel , for example,
19602-484: The airline itself came under control of Russia, the largest of the CIS republics, and was renamed Aeroflot – Russian International Airlines (ARIA) . In 1992, Aeroflot was divided into approximately 400 regional airlines informally known as Babyflots , which included BAL Bashkirian Airlines , KrasAir , Moscow Airways and Tatarstan Airlines , with Aeroflot keeping the international routes. In 1994, Aeroflot
19800-546: The airline launching flights to Crimea . In late August 2014, Aeroflot announced the launch of Pobeda , a new LCC to replace Dobrolet using aircraft transferred from Orenair. It started operations from Vnukovo Airport in December 2014. In March 2014, as a response to the Revolution of Dignity , the company announced rerouting of flights to avoid flying over Ukraine. Also, in March 2014, Aeroflot 's IATA airline designator ″SU″
19998-426: The airline was of Leon Trotsky . The basic objectives were the organisation of airmail, cargo and passenger lines, aviation related solutions of national economic problems (for example, aerial photography of localities) and also the development of the domestic aircraft industry. Dobrolyot constructed airports and weather stations. Artist Alexander Rodchenko developed the corporate identity and advertising strategy of
20196-404: The basic regulations on air transport over the territory of the RSFSR. The document was significant as it was the first time that a Russian state had declared sovereignty over its airspace . In addition, the document defined rules for the operation of foreign aircraft over the Soviet Union's airspace and territory. After Lenin issued an order, a State Commission was formed on 31 January 1921 for
20394-548: The besieged cities of Leningrad , Kyiv , Odessa and Sevastopol . During the Battle of Stalingrad , between August 1942 and February 1943, Aeroflot operated 46,000 missions to Stalingrad, ferrying in 2,587 tonnes (5,703,000 lb) of supplies and 30,000 troops. Following the defeat of the Wehrmacht , 80 Junkers Ju 52 /3ms were captured from the Germans, and were placed into the service of
20592-403: The broader sense of expanding the use of Russian alongside or in favour of other languages. The current standard form of Russian is generally regarded as the modern Russian literary language ( современный русский литературный язык – "sovremenny russky literaturny yazyk"). It arose at the beginning of the 18th century with the modernization reforms of the Russian state under the rule of Peter
20790-419: The company from 51% to 100%; soon afterwards, Aeroflot-Nord was created following the buyout of Arkhangelsk Airlines . In December 2009, after it filed for bankruptcy, Aeroflot-Cargo merged into Aeroflot. In November 2011, Rostec , a state agency, merged five airlines it owned - Vladivostok Avia , Saravia , Rossiya Airlines , SAT Airlines and Orenair - into Aeroflot, acquiring an additional 3.5% of
20988-709: The company in a ₽2.5 billion deal. Saravia was then sold to private investors. In September 2013, Aurora (originally called Taiga) was created, combining Vladivostok Air and SAT Airlines . In June 2013, at the World Airline Awards which took place at the 50th Le Bourget air show, Aeroflot was awarded the international prize as the best air carrier in Eastern Europe. In October 2013, the company introduced an affiliated low-cost carrier (LCC), Dobrolet . It started operations in June 2014; however, it ceased on 4 August 2014 ( 2014-08-04 ) due to EU sanctions over
21186-645: The company to cancel some of its jet orders. Subsidiaries Rossiya Airlines, Donavia and Orenair combined operations in late March 2016. Orenair 's AOC was cancelled by Russian authorities in late May 2016 ( 2016-05 ) . Donavia and Orenair were declared bankrupt in 2017. In June 2018, the company signed a codeshare agreement with Aerolineas Argentinas . In December 2020, the company sold its 51% stake in Aurora to Sakhalin Region Development Corporation for ₽1. In February and March 2022, as
21384-467: The company. He designed posters encouraging citizens to buy stock in Dobrolet and also designed the "Winged Hammer and Sickle" logo. A capital of 2 million gold rubles was authorised to fund its early projects and this was later augmented by funds derived from the issuance of shares, which were initially offered to Soviet enterprises at the cost of one gold ruble each. Those who bought 25,000 shares were given
21582-492: The country was limited. The state restricted rights of citizens to private property . According to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights , human rights are the "basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled." including the right to life and liberty , freedom of expression , and equality before the law ; and social, cultural and economic rights, including the right to participate in culture ,
21780-643: The country's area and was the cultural and economic center. The eastern part in Asia extended to the Pacific Ocean to the east and Afghanistan to the south, and, except some areas in Central Asia , was much less populous. It spanned over 10,000 kilometres (6,200 mi) east to west across 11 time zones , and over 7,200 kilometres (4,500 mi) north to south. It had five climate zones: tundra , taiga , steppes , desert and mountains . The USSR, like Russia , had
21978-562: The country. There is an Israeli TV channel mainly broadcasting in Russian with Israel Plus . See also Russian language in Israel . Russian is also spoken as a second language by a small number of people in Afghanistan . In Vietnam , Russian has been added in the elementary curriculum along with Chinese and Japanese and were named as "first foreign languages" for Vietnamese students to learn, on equal footing with English. The Russian language
22176-526: The distinction is a prominent feature of the language, which is usually shown in writing not by a change of the consonant but rather by changing the following vowel. Another important aspect is the reduction of unstressed vowels . Stress , which is often unpredictable, is not normally indicated orthographically , though an optional acute accent may be used to mark stress – such as to distinguish between homographic words (e.g. замо́к [ zamók , 'lock'] and за́мок [ zámok , 'castle']), or to indicate
22374-541: The duty of the Russian Bolsheviks to protect what they had in Russia, and avoid military confrontations that might destroy their bridgehead. Russia was now a pariah state, along with Germany. The two came to terms in 1922 with the Treaty of Rapallo that settled long-standing grievances. At the same time, the two countries secretly set up training programs for the illegal German army and air force operations at hidden camps in
22572-429: The early 2000s, the airline hired British consultants for rebranding. From the start, plans were afoot to replace the hammer and sickle logo, a symbol of Soviet communism; despite this the logo was not scrapped, as it was the most recognisable symbol of the company for over 70 years. A new Aircraft livery and uniforms for flight attendants were designed and a promotional campaign launched in 2003. Its fleet has undergone
22770-563: The eighth five-year plan, which ran from 1966 to 1970, Aeroflot carried a total of 302,200,000 passengers, 6.47 billion tons of freight and 1.63 billion tons of mail. During the five-year plan period, all-Union services were extended over an additional 350 routes; an additional 1,000 MVL routes were begun, and 40 new routes were opened up with all-cargo flights. In 1967, the Ilyushin Il-62 and Tupolev Tu-134 were introduced, and in September 1968
22968-605: The end of 1924 the subdivision had carried 480 passengers and 500 kilograms (1,100 lb) of mail and freight, on a total of 210 flights. In March 1924, Dobrolyot began operating flights from Sevastopol to Yalta and Yevpatoriya in Crimea . Dobrolyot's route network was extended during the 1925–1927 period to include Kazan and regular flights between Moscow and Kharkov were inaugurated. Dobrolyot flights to Kharkov connected with Ukrvozdukhput services to Kiev , Odessa and Rostov-on-Don . In 1925, Dobrolyot operated 2,000 flights over
23166-463: The end of the war, Aeroflot had flown 1,595,943 special missions, including 83,782 at night, and carried 1,538,982 men and 122,027 tonnes (269,023,000 lb) of cargo. At the end of World War II , the Soviet government repaired and rebuilt essential airport infrastructure, and it strengthened the Aeroflot units in the European part of the Soviet Union. In 1945, Aeroflot carried 537,000 passengers, compared with 359,000 in 1940. The government made it
23364-614: The expansion of the Red Air Fleet, and it is this date which was officially recognised as the beginning of civil aviation in the Soviet Union. On 9 February 1923, the Council of Labour and Defence passed a resolution to create the Civil Air Fleet of the USSR . After a resolution of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , the Enterprise for Friends of the Air Fleet (ODVF)
23562-413: The factory and the industrial plant their local peasant dialects with their phonetics, grammar, and vocabulary, and the very process of recruiting workers from peasants and the mobility of the worker population generate another process: the liquidation of peasant inheritance by way of leveling the particulars of local dialects. On the ruins of peasant multilingual, in the context of developing heavy industry,
23760-451: The final reading amendments that state that all schools and kindergartens in the country are to transition to education in Latvian . From 2025, all children will be taught in Latvian only. On 28 September 2023, Latvian deputies approved The National Security Concept, according to which from 1 January 2026, all content created by Latvian public media (including LSM ) should be only in Latvian or
23958-540: The following airlines: Aeroflot was a member of SkyTeam airline alliance from April 2006 until 27 April 2022, when its membership was suspended as part of the corporate responses to the Russian invasion of Ukraine . Russian language Russian is an East Slavic language belonging to the Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European language family . It is one of the four extant East Slavic languages, and
24156-530: The forced collectivization of agriculture , rapid industrialization , and the Great Purge , which eliminated perceived enemies of the state. The Soviet Union played a crucial role in the Allied victory in World War II , but at a tremendous human cost, with millions of Soviet citizens perishing in the conflict. The Soviet Union emerged as one of the world's two superpowers, leading the Eastern Bloc in opposition to
24354-478: The formation of Deruluft in Berlin on 11 November 1921, as a joint venture between the Soviet Union and Germany. The company, whose aircraft were registered in both Germany and the Soviet Union, began operations on 1 May 1922 with a Fokker F.III flying between Königsberg and Moscow. The service was initially operated twice a week and restricted to the carriage of mail. On 3 February 1923, Sovnarkom approved plans for
24552-691: The founding republics who signed the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR in December 1922. In 1924, during the national delimitation in Central Asia, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were formed from parts of Russia's Turkestan ASSR and two Soviet dependencies, the Khorezm and Bukharan PSPs . In 1929, Tajikistan was split off from the Uzbekistan SSR. With the constitution of 1936, the Transcaucasian SFSR
24750-617: The generation of immigrants who started arriving in the early 1960s). Only about 25% of them are ethnic Russians, however. Before the dissolution of the Soviet Union , the overwhelming majority of Russophones in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn in New York City were Russian-speaking Jews. Afterward, the influx from the countries of the former Soviet Union changed the statistics somewhat, with ethnic Russians and Ukrainians immigrating along with some more Russian Jews and Central Asians. According to
24948-480: The government bureaucracy for the lack of a reliable tool of communication in administrative, legal, and judicial affairs became an obvious practical problem. The earliest attempts at standardizing Russian were made based on the so-called Moscow official or chancery language, during the 15th to 17th centuries. Since then, the trend of language policy in Russia has been standardization in both the restricted sense of reducing dialectical barriers between ethnic Russians, and
25146-491: The government. Extensive extrajudicial powers were given to the Soviet secret police agencies . In practice, the Soviet government significantly curbed the rule of law , civil liberties , protection of law and guarantees of property , which were considered as examples of "bourgeois morality" by Soviet law theorists such as Andrey Vyshinsky . The USSR and other countries in the Soviet Bloc had abstained from affirming
25344-484: The height of the 1970 summer holidays season, the airline was carrying approximately 400,000 passengers per day, and 90% of passengers were being carried on propeller-turbine and jet aircraft. In March 1970, Aeroflot had amassed a route network that was 600,000 kilometres (370,000 miles) long, a quarter of which covered international destinations. At this time, the carrier had agreements with 59 countries but it only served 54 of them, including 55 destinations. In January 1971,
25542-454: The high levels of pollution in the Soviet Union but after the dissolution of the Soviet Union it was discovered that its environmental problems were greater than what the Soviet authorities admitted. The Soviet Union was the world's second largest producer of harmful emissions. In 1988, total emissions in the Soviet Union were about 79% of those in the United States. But since the Soviet GNP
25740-459: The highest bodies of the party and making the Supreme Soviet less dependent on them. The Congress of People's Deputies was established, the majority of whose members were directly elected in competitive elections held in March 1989, the first in Soviet history. The Congress now elected the Supreme Soviet, which became a full-time parliament, and much stronger than before. For the first time since
25938-594: The infamous Schutzstaffel of Nazi Germany , as SS is in English. In English-language media, the state was referred to as the Soviet Union or the USSR. The Russian SFSR dominated the Soviet Union to such an extent that, for most of the Soviet Union's existence, it was colloquially, but incorrectly, referred to as Russia . The history of the Soviet Union began with the ideals of the Bolshevik Revolution and ended in dissolution amidst economic collapse and political disintegration. Established in 1922 following
26136-543: The largest airline of Russia. Aeroflot is headquartered in the Central Administrative Okrug , Moscow , with its hub being Sheremetyevo International Airport . The Federal Agency for State Property Management , an agency of the Government of Russia , owns 73.77% of the company, with the rest of the shares being public float . During the time of the Soviet Union , Aeroflot was one of the largest airlines in
26334-586: The late 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, including the creation of new state commissions and committees. It gained additional powers relating to the approval of the Five-Year Plans and the government budget . The Supreme Soviet elected a Presidium (successor of the Central Executive Committee ) to wield its power between plenary sessions, ordinarily held twice a year, and appointed the Supreme Court ,
26532-542: The late 1970s and early 1980s. The constitution , which was promulgated in 1924 , 1936 and 1977 , did not limit state power. No formal separation of powers existed between the Party, Supreme Soviet and Council of Ministers that represented executive and legislative branches of the government. The system was governed less by statute than by informal conventions, and no settled mechanism of leadership succession existed. Bitter and at times deadly power struggles took place in
26730-561: The latter tasks, Aeroflot used, in addition to smaller helicopters, the Mil Mi-10 flying crane capable of lifting 11,000 to 14,000 kilograms (24,000 to 31,000 lb). Hauling of heavy cargo, including vehicles, was performed by the world's largest operational helicopter, the Mil Mi-26 . Its unusual eight-blade rotor enabled it to lift a maximum payload of 20 tons. The medium- and long-range passenger- and cargo aircraft of Aeroflot were also part of
26928-469: The mostly ceremonial position of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet , the nominal head of state . The institutions at lower levels were overseen and at times supplanted by primary party organizations . However, in practice the degree of control the party was able to exercise over the state bureaucracy, particularly after the death of Stalin, was far from total, with the bureaucracy pursuing different interests that were at times in conflict with
27126-465: The name "Aeroflot" was officially adopted for the entire Soviet Civil Air Fleet. The Communist Party of the Soviet Union Congress in 1933 set out development plans for the civil aviation industry for the following five years, with air transportation becoming one of the primary means of transportation in the Soviet Union, linking all major cities. The government also implemented plans to expand
27324-410: The name to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), although all republics began as socialist soviet and did not change to the other order until 1936 . In addition, in the regional languages of several republics, the word council or conciliar in the respective language was only quite late changed to an adaptation of the Russian soviet and never in others, e.g. Ukrainian SSR . СССР (in
27522-417: The newly elected Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR , and communist hardliners. On 19–21 August 1991, a group of hardliners staged a coup attempt . The coup failed, and the State Council of the Soviet Union became the highest organ of state power 'in the period of transition'. Gorbachev resigned as General Secretary, only remaining President for the final months of the existence of the USSR. The judiciary
27720-516: The northwestern Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region . Russian was also the main foreign language taught in school in China between 1949 and 1964. In Kazakhstan , Russian is not a state language, but according to article 7 of the Constitution of Kazakhstan its usage enjoys equal status to that of the Kazakh language in state and local administration. The 2009 census reported that 10,309,500 people, or 84.8% of
27918-480: The number of destinations was significantly reduced after many countries banned Russian aircraft as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine . It currently operates service to/from Armenia , Azerbaijan , Belarus , China , Cuba , Egypt , Hong Kong , India , Iran , Kazakhstan , Kyrgyzstan , Maldives , Mauritius , Seychelles , Sri Lanka , Thailand , Turkey , United Arab Emirates , Uzbekistan , and Vietnam . Aeroflot only has codeshare agreements with
28116-495: The number of passengers carried in 1961 skyrocketing to 21,800,000. Further expansion came in 1962 when both the Tupolev Tu-124 and Antonov An-24 entered regular service with Aeroflot on various medium and short-haul routes. By 1964, Aeroflot operated direct flights from Moscow to 100 cities, from Leningrad to 44 cities, and from Kyiv to 38 cities. The airline also operated direct flights from Mineralnye Vody to 48 cities across
28314-603: The official Soviet system of importance (ground forces were second, Air Force fourth, and Navy fifth). The army had the greatest political influence. In 1989, there served two million soldiers divided between 150 motorized and 52 armored divisions. Until the early 1960s, the Soviet navy was a rather small military branch, but after the Caribbean crisis , under the leadership of Sergei Gorshkov , it expanded significantly. It became known for battlecruisers and submarines. In 1989, there served 500 000 men. The Soviet Air Force focused on
28512-504: The only civil aviation airline in the Soviet Union. In 1932, its name was changed to Transaviatsia and later that year, all civil aviation activities were consolidated under the name of Grazhdansky Vozdushny Flot (Civil Air Fleet), known as Aeroflot . Responsibility for all civil aviation activities in the Soviet Union came under the control of the Chief Directorate of the Civil Air Fleet on 25 February 1932, and on 25 March 1932
28710-543: The other constituent republics, for most of its history had no republican branch of the CPSU, being ruled directly by the union-wide party until 1990. Local authorities were organized likewise into party committees , local Soviets and executive committees . While the state system was nominally federal, the party was unitary. The state security police (the KGB and its predecessor agencies ) played an important role in Soviet politics. It
28908-515: The other hand, before the war, almost a quarter of Ukrainians were in favour of granting Russian the status of the state language, while after the beginning of Russia's invasion the support for the idea dropped to just 7%. In peacetime, the idea of raising the status of Russian was traditionally supported by residents of the south and east . But even in these regions, only a third of the respondents were in favour, and after Russia's full-scale invasion , their number dropped by almost half. According to
29106-455: The other three languages in the East Slavic branch. In many places in eastern and southern Ukraine and throughout Belarus, these languages are spoken interchangeably, and in certain areas traditional bilingualism resulted in language mixtures such as Surzhyk in eastern Ukraine and Trasianka in Belarus. An East Slavic Old Novgorod dialect , although it vanished during the 15th or 16th century,
29304-418: The other. Pan Am accused the Soviets of illegally siphoning away Moscow-to-New York passengers, whilst in turn; Aeroflot accused US consular officials in Russia of having steered passengers to Pan Am flights." In 1968, the company opened its first office in the United States. By 1970, the last year of the five-year plan period, Aeroflot was operating flights to over 3,500 destinations in the Soviet Union, and at
29502-446: The parliament approved a bill to close up all Russian language schools and kindergartens by the school year. The transition to only Estonian language schools and kindergartens will start in the 2024-2025 school year. In Latvia , Russian is officially considered a foreign language. 55% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 26% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. On 18 February 2012, Latvia held
29700-494: The partition of Poland. In response, Britain and France declared war on Germany, marking the beginning of World War II . Up until his death in 1953, Joseph Stalin controlled all foreign relations of the Soviet Union during the interwar period . Despite the increasing build-up of Germany 's war machine and the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War , the Soviet Union did not cooperate with any other nation, choosing to follow its own path. However, after Operation Barbarossa ,
29898-429: The party's highest body the Politburo . Operations were handled by the separate Ministry of Foreign Affairs . It was known as the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (or Narkomindel), until 1946. The most influential spokesmen were Georgy Chicherin (1872–1936), Maxim Litvinov (1876–1951), Vyacheslav Molotov (1890–1986), Andrey Vyshinsky (1883–1954) and Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989). Intellectuals were based in
30096-404: The party, nor was the party itself monolithic from top to bottom, although factions were officially banned . The Supreme Soviet (successor of the Congress of Soviets ) was nominally the highest state body for most of the Soviet history, at first acting as a rubber stamp institution, approving and implementing all decisions made by the party. However, its powers and functions were extended in
30294-453: The peasants' speech was never systematically studied, as it was generally regarded by philologists as simply a source of folklore and an object of curiosity. This was acknowledged by the noted Russian dialectologist Nikolai Karinsky , who toward the end of his life wrote: "Scholars of Russian dialects mostly studied phonetics and morphology. Some scholars and collectors compiled local dictionaries. We have almost no studies of lexical material or
30492-554: The period 1951–1955, emphasised Aeroflot expanding night-time operations, which vastly improved aircraft utilisation. By 1952, 700 destinations in the Soviet Union received regular flights from Aeroflot. On 30 November 1954, the Ilyushin Il-14 entered service, and the aircraft took a leading role in the operation of Aeroflot's all-Union services. The number of passengers carried in 1955 increased to 2,500,000, whilst freight and mail carriage also increased, to 194,960 and 63,760 tons, respectively. By this time, Aeroflot's route network covered
30690-406: The population aged 15 and above, could read and write well in Russian, and understand the spoken language. In October 2023, Kazakhstan drafted a media law aimed at increasing the use of the Kazakh language over Russian, the law stipulates that the share of the state language on television and radio should increase from 50% to 70%, at a rate of 5% per year, starting in 2025. In Kyrgyzstan , Russian
30888-418: The population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 67% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. According to the 2019 Belarusian census , out of 9,413,446 inhabitants of the country, 5,094,928 (54.1% of the total population) named Belarusian as their native language, with 61.2% of ethnic Belarusians and 54.5% of ethnic Poles declaring Belarusian as their native language. In everyday life in
31086-440: The post-Soviet era, dropping from 5,400 planes in 1991 to 115 in 1996. In 1995, Boris Berezovsky played a key role in a management reshuffle that led to Nikolai Glushkov becoming CFO of the company. The two were later accused of embezzling $ 700 million from the airline, laundering the money through two Swiss companies, Forus and Andava. In 2010, CHF51 million in frozen assets in Swiss bank accounts were returned to Aeroflot. In
31284-427: The pronunciation of ultra-short or reduced /ŭ/ , /ĭ/ . Because of many technical restrictions in computing and also because of the unavailability of Cyrillic keyboards abroad, Russian is often transliterated using the Latin alphabet. For example, мороз ('frost') is transliterated moroz , and мышь ('mouse'), mysh or myš' . Once commonly used by the majority of those living outside Russia, transliteration
31482-414: The proper pronunciation of uncommon words or names. Russian is an East Slavic language of the wider Indo-European family . It is a descendant of Old East Slavic , a language used in Kievan Rus' , which was a loose conglomerate of East Slavic tribes from the late 9th to the mid-13th centuries. From the point of view of spoken language , its closest relatives are Ukrainian , Belarusian , and Rusyn ,
31680-408: The purpose of civil aviation planning in the Soviet Union. As a result of the commission's plans, Glavvozdukhflot (Russian: Главвоздухфлот (Главное управление воздушного флота) , Chief Administration of the Civil Air Fleet) was established, and it began mail and passenger flights on the Moscow- Oryol - Kursk - Kharkov route on 1 May 1921 using Sikorsky Ilya Muromets aircraft. This was followed by
31878-507: The relationship with Sabre in 2010. On 29 July 2004, a new corporate slogan was adopted: "Sincerely Yours. Aeroflot". In April 2006, Aeroflot became the tenth airline to join SkyTeam , and the first air carrier in the former Soviet Union to do so. The company announced plans to increase cargo operations. It registered the Aeroflot-Cargo trademark in 2006. Aeroflot became the sole shareholder of Donavia —a domestic airline then-named Aeroflot-Don—in December 2006, when it boosted its stake in
32076-491: The respondents), while according to the 2002 census – 142.6 million people (99.2% of the respondents). In Ukraine , Russian is a significant minority language. According to estimates from Demoskop Weekly, in 2004 there were 14,400,000 native speakers of Russian in the country, and 29 million active speakers. 65% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 38% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. On 5 September 2017, Ukraine's Parliament passed
32274-479: The right to use a plane from its fleet. Within a year, capital expanded from 2 million rubles to 5 million rubles. The airline primarily used aircraft made by Junkers . Regular flights by Dobrolyot from Moscow to Nizhniy Novgorod commenced on 15 July 1923. In 1923, an agreement was signed establishing a subdivision of Dobrolyot based in Tashkent , operating to points in Soviet Central Asia . Services between Tashkent and Alma Ata began on 27 April 1924, and by
32472-455: The route network covered 349,200 kilometres (217,000 mi), and the airline carried 8,231,500 passengers, and 445,600 tons of mail and freight, with fifteen percent of all-Union services being operated by jet aircraft. Aeroflot introduced the Antonov An-10 and Ilyushin Il-18 in 1959, and together with its existing jet aircraft, the airline was able to extend services on modern aircraft to twenty one cities by 1960. The Tupolev Tu-114 , then
32670-435: The same time as the Il-12, and was operated on routes from Moscow to Yakutsk , Khabarovsk , Vladivostok, Alma Ata, Tashkent, Sochi , Mineralnye Vody and Tbilisi. By 1950, the Il-18 was withdrawn from service, replaced by Il-12s. MVL and general aviation services received a boost in March 1948, when the first Antonov An-2s were delivered and entered service in Central Russia . Development of MVL services over latter years
32868-403: The six official languages of the United Nations , as well as the fourth most widely used language on the Internet . Russian is written using the Russian alphabet of the Cyrillic script ; it distinguishes between consonant phonemes with palatal secondary articulation and those without—the so-called "soft" and "hard" sounds. Almost every consonant has a hard or soft counterpart, and
33066-483: The strategic air transport reserve, ready to provide immediate airlift support to the armed forces. Short-range aircraft and helicopters were available for appropriate military support missions. After the Dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, service expanded significantly. Up until that time, Aeroflot had been the only establishment providing air services throughout the Soviet Union, but with its breakup Aeroflot branches of these countries began their own services, and
33264-469: The struggle for dominance was expressed via indirect means such as psychological warfare , propaganda campaigns, espionage , far-reaching embargoes , rivalry at sports events and technological competitions such as the Space Race . Constitutionally, the USSR was a federation of constituent Union Republics, which were either unitary states, such as Ukraine or Byelorussia (SSRs), or federations, such as Russia or Transcaucasia (SFSRs), all four being
33462-626: The survey carried out by RATING in August 2023 in the territory controlled by Ukraine and among the refugees, almost 60% of the polled usually speak Ukrainian at home, about 30% – Ukrainian and Russian, only 9% – Russian. Since March 2022, the use of Russian in everyday life has been noticeably decreasing. For 82% of respondents, Ukrainian is their mother tongue, and for 16%, Russian is their mother tongue. IDPs and refugees living abroad are more likely to use both languages for communication or speak Russian. Nevertheless, more than 70% of IDPs and refugees consider Ukrainian to be their native language. In
33660-459: The syntax of Russian dialects." After 1917, Marxist linguists had no interest in the multiplicity of peasant dialects and regarded their language as a relic of the rapidly disappearing past that was not worthy of scholarly attention. Nakhimovsky quotes the Soviet academicians A.M Ivanov and L.P Yakubinsky, writing in 1930: The language of peasants has a motley diversity inherited from feudalism. On its way to becoming proletariat peasantry brings to
33858-530: The territory occupied by the Red Army , forming satellite states , and undertook rapid economic development which cemented its status as a superpower . Geopolitical tensions with the US led to the Cold War . The American-led Western Bloc coalesced into NATO in 1949, prompting the Soviet Union to form its own military alliance, the Warsaw Pact , in 1955. Neither side engaged in direct military confrontation, and instead fought on an ideological basis and through proxy wars . In 1953, following Stalin's death ,
34056-579: The transportation of passengers, but monopolised all civil aviation activities within the Soviet Union . Apart from passenger transportation that covered a domestic network of over 3,600 villages, towns and cities, activities undertaken by the airline that were labelled as "non-transport tasks" included air ambulance ; aerial application ; heavy lifting for the Soviet Space Agency ; offshore oil platform support; exploration and aeromagnetic survey for natural resources; support for construction projects; transport of military troops and supplies (as an adjunct to
34254-492: The truth". Human rights in the Soviet Union were severely limited. The Soviet Union was a totalitarian state from 1927 until 1953 and a one-party state until 1990. Freedom of speech was suppressed and dissent was punished. Independent political activities were not tolerated, whether these involved participation in free labour unions , private corporations , independent churches or opposition political parties . The freedom of movement within and especially outside
34452-615: The two. Others divide the language into three groupings, Northern , Central (or Middle), and Southern , with Moscow lying in the Central region. The Northern Russian dialects and those spoken along the Volga River typically pronounce unstressed /o/ clearly, a phenomenon called okanye ( оканье ). Besides the absence of vowel reduction, some dialects have high or diphthongal /e⁓i̯ɛ/ in place of Proto-Slavic * ě and /o⁓u̯ɔ/ in stressed closed syllables (as in Ukrainian) instead of Standard Russian /e/ and /o/ , respectively. Another Northern dialectal morphological feature
34650-454: The use of the language has some presence in certain areas. A large part of the population, especially the older generations, can speak Russian as a foreign language. However, English has replaced Russian as lingua franca in Lithuania and around 80% of young people speak English as their first foreign language. In contrast to the other two Baltic states, Lithuania has a relatively small Russian-speaking minority (5.0% as of 2008). According to
34848-409: The world . In 1992, following the dissolution of the Soviet Union , Aeroflot was divided into approximately 400 regional airlines informally known as Babyflots and was restructured into an open joint-stock company . It has a market share in Russia of approximately 39%. Including subsidiaries , the company carried 47.3 million passengers in 2023. Aeroflot also owns Rossiya Airlines and Pobeda ,
35046-420: The world's largest airliner, entered service with the Soviet carrier on 24 April 1961 on the Moscow- Khabarovsk route; covering a distance of 6,980 kilometres (4,340 mi) in 8 hours 20 minutes. The expansion of the Aeroflot fleet saw services with modern aircraft being extended to forty one cities in 1961, with fifty percent of all-Union services being operated by these aircraft. This fleet expansion also saw
35244-403: The world's longest border , measuring over 60,000 kilometres (37,000 mi), or 1 + 1 ⁄ 2 circumferences of Earth. Two-thirds of it was a coastline . The country bordered Afghanistan , the People's Republic of China , Czechoslovakia , Finland , Hungary , Iran , Mongolia , North Korea , Norway , Poland , Romania , and Turkey from 1945 to 1991. The Bering Strait separated
35442-417: Was Moscow . The Soviet Union's roots lay in the October Revolution of 1917. The new government, led by Vladimir Lenin , established the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), the world's first constitutionally socialist state . The revolution was not accepted by all within the Russian Republic , resulting in the Russian Civil War . The RSFSR and its subordinate republics were merged into
35640-642: Was 35,000 kilometres (22,000 mi) in length out of a total network of 93,300 kilometres (58,000 mi). The agreement between the Soviet Union and Germany relating to Deruluft expired on 1 January 1937 and wasn't renewed, which saw the joint venture carrier ceasing operations on 1 April 1937. On that date Aeroflot began operations on the Moscow to Stockholm route, and began operating the ex-Deruluft route from Leningrad to Riga utilising Douglas DC-3s and Tupolev ANT-35s (PS-35s). Flights from Moscow to Berlin, via Königsberg, were suspended until 1940, when they were restarted by Aeroflot and Deutsche Luft Hansa as
35838-428: Was adopted by its subsidiary Rossiya. In September 2015, Aeroflot agreed to acquire 75% of Transaero Airlines for the symbolic price of ₽1, but abandoned the plan after failing to come to terms on a takeover. Aeroflot instead took over several of Transaero's aircraft by assuming its leases after Transaero ceased operations in December 2015, introducing the Boeing 747 and Boeing 777 to the Aeroflot fleet and allowing
36036-408: Was also the industrial center of the Soviet Union. Historian Matthew White wrote that it was an open secret that the country's federal structure was 'window dressing' for Russian dominance. For that reason, the people of the USSR were usually called 'Russians', not 'Soviets', since 'everyone knew who really ran the show'. Under the Military Law of September 1925, the Soviet Armed Forces consisted of
36234-400: Was attributed to the An-2, which was operated by Aeroflot in all areas of the Soviet Union. Aeroflot's route network had extended to 295,400 kilometres (183,600 mi) by 1950, and it carried 1,603,700 passengers, 151,070 tonnes (333,050,000 lb) of freight and 30,580 tonnes (67,420,000 lb) of mail that year. Night flights began in the same year, and the fifth five-year plan, covering
36432-419: Was carried out within the terms of the Soviet Civil Code. Some Soviet legal scholars even said that "criminal repression" may be applied in the absence of guilt. Martin Latsis , chief of Soviet Ukraine 's secret police explained: "Do not look in the file of incriminating evidence to see whether or not the accused rose up against the Soviets with arms or words. Ask him instead to which class he belongs, what
36630-404: Was dissolved, resulting in its constituent republics of Armenia , Georgia and Azerbaijan being elevated to Union Republics, while Kazakhstan and Kirghizia were split off from the Russian SFSR, resulting in the same status. In August 1940, Moldavia was formed from parts of Ukraine and Soviet-occupied Bessarabia , and Ukrainian SSR. Estonia , Latvia and Lithuania were also annexed by
36828-405: Was first introduced in North America when Russian explorers voyaged into Alaska and claimed it for Russia during the 18th century. Although most Russian colonists left after the United States bought the land in 1867, a handful stayed and preserved the Russian language in this region to this day, although only a few elderly speakers of this unique dialect are left. In Nikolaevsk, Alaska , Russian
37026-421: Was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 19% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. According to the 2014 Moldovan census , Russians accounted for 4.1% of Moldova's population, 9.4% of the population declared Russian as their native language, and 14.5% said they usually spoke Russian. According to the 2010 census in Russia , Russian language skills were indicated by 138 million people (99.4% of
37224-399: Was formed in imitation of the Russian Merchant Navy Volunteer Fleet, Dobroflot , formed in 1878. According to its charter, it was formed "for the development of the civil air fleet within the USSR by organizing air lines for the transportation of passengers, mail and cargo, aerial photography and other areas of air fleet application based on the domestic aviation industry". The idea to create
37422-408: Was founded on 8 March 1923. In February and March 1923, resolutions of the Council of Labour and Defence and the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union created civil aviation services in the Soviet Union , including the formation of 3 airlines: Dobrolyot in March 1923, Ukrvozdukhput in April 1923, based in Kharkov , and Zakavia in May 1923, based in Tiflis . Dobrolyot
37620-434: Was instrumental in the Red Terror and Great Purge , but was brought under strict party control after Stalin's death. Under Yuri Andropov , the KGB engaged in the suppression of political dissent and maintained an extensive network of informers, reasserting itself as a political actor to some extent independent of the party-state structure, culminating in the anti-corruption campaign targeting high-ranking party officials in
37818-424: Was no large-scale fighting directly between the two superpowers , but they each supported major regional conflicts known as proxy wars . The conflict was based around the ideological and geopolitical struggle for global influence by these two superpowers, following their temporary alliance and victory against Nazi Germany in 1945. Aside from the nuclear arsenal development and conventional military deployment,
38016-450: Was not independent of the other branches of government. The Supreme Court supervised the lower courts ( People's Court ) and applied the law as established by the constitution or as interpreted by the Supreme Soviet. The Constitutional Oversight Committee reviewed the constitutionality of laws and acts. The Soviet Union used the inquisitorial system of Roman law , where the judge, procurator , and defence attorney collaborate to "establish
38214-459: Was only 54% of that of the United States, this means that the Soviet Union generated 1.5 times more pollution than the United States per unit of GNP. The Soviet Chernobyl disaster in 1986 was the first major accident at a civilian nuclear power plant . Unparalleled in the world, it resulted in a large number of radioactive isotopes being released into the atmosphere. Radioactive doses were scattered relatively far. Although long-term effects of
38412-457: Was registered as a joint-stock company and the government sold off 49% of its stake to Aeroflot employees. In the 1990s, Aeroflot was primarily focused on international flights from Moscow. However, by the end of the decade Aeroflot started an expansion in the domestic market. In 2000, the company name was changed to Aeroflot – Russian Airlines to reflect the change in the company strategy. The Aeroflot fleet shrank dramatically in
38610-477: Was repeatedly postponed. Formal recognition came when the new Labour Party came to power in 1924. All the other countries followed suit in opening trade relations. Henry Ford opened large-scale business relations with the Soviets in the late 1920s, hoping that it would lead to long-term peace. Finally, in 1933, the United States officially recognized the USSR, a decision backed by the public opinion and especially by US business interests that expected an opening of
38808-482: Was that "the Constitution was written not for you, but for American Negroes, so that they know how happy the lives of Soviet citizens are". Crime was determined not as the infraction of law, instead, it was determined as any action which could threaten the Soviet state and society. For example, a desire to make a profit could be interpreted as a counter-revolutionary activity punishable by death. The liquidation and deportation of millions of peasants in 1928–31
39006-506: Was the Russian responsibility to assist them. The Comintern was the weapon of choice. A few revolutions did break out, but they were quickly suppressed (the longest lasting one was in Hungary)—the Hungarian Soviet Republic —lasted only from 21 March 1919 to 1 August 1919. The Russian Bolsheviks were in no position to give any help. By 1921, Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin realized that capitalism had stabilized itself in Europe and there would not be any widespread revolutions anytime soon. It became
39204-402: Was the sixth-most used language on the top 1,000 sites, behind English, Chinese, French, German, and Japanese. Despite leveling after 1900, especially in matters of vocabulary and phonetics, a number of dialects still exist in Russia. Some linguists divide the dialects of Russian into two primary regional groupings, "Northern" and "Southern", with Moscow lying on the zone of transition between
#154845