How the toys of the country destroy
Photo by the press service of the government of the Tula region.
Originally from childhood
We all come from childhood. Many are still from the Soviet. The same when the boys dreamed of becoming cosmonauts, sailors, pilots, geologists - but you never know what they dreamed of becoming. The main thing is they dreamed.
And in many respects these dreams appeared thanks to toys that were sold in the Detsky Mir store and which we very often, almost crying, asked our mothers and fathers to buy.
Among these toys were special ones, from the sight of the boxes of which the child's heart began to beat at a frantic speed. And having persuaded your parents, you got at your disposal the battleship Potemkin (with which you flopped in the bath, and for a long time they could not take you out of there) or the T-34 tank (which you proudly showed to your stunned friends in the yard) or an airplane, but not just a plane, and a Tu-134 or MiG-21.
There were also bags. Ordinary nondescript bags in which lay: toy plastic prefabricated aircraft "Frontline fighter" or "F-415 aircraft construction kit". For these (and many other bags, and sometimes boxes) there was literally a hunt. After all, they had models of military aircraft, and besides, they were very realistic.
Explosion in bench simulation in the USSR
The appearance of the FROG / NOVO models on sale can be compared to the explosion in bench modeling in the USSR. This "explosion" in its action and consequences can only be compared with "nuclear".
The adult "uncles" in the then "high" offices, who made the decision to start production of FROG / NOVO models, could not help but understand what their distribution in the USSR would ultimately lead to. Because an adult, educated and informed person cannot fail to realize simple truths: childhood impressions and memories are the core on which the personality of an adult is held.
Hatred of the USSR as a bonus
Yes, with the advent of FROG / NOVO products, the range of children's educational toys has increased, this is a fact. Frog's models developed in the child the ability to work with the head and hands, and this is true. But as a "free" bonus, these same children also received dislike for the Motherland. And very often in the form of disgust and contempt for their own country and for everything Soviet. There were more than enough examples.
Having collected a certain number of models, and at the same time having matured, now the young man saw that the aircraft models that he had happily acquired by that time were mainly combat aircraft of Western countries. Albeit WW II period, but from the West. And he (already having the experience of "hunting" for these same toys, and at the same time buying firmsоof boxes and parts from the farmers) often, along with this experience, he had a formed and very impartial opinion about the country in which he was born and grew up. About the state, about power and much more about something else. Which was very successfully promoted by the same shortage of these very models and the numerous problems associated with bringing them to mind.
Thus, by the middle of the 80s, the USSR received a significant part of young people who are big-headed, handy, educated, but not patriotic, with snob disgust for their country and their people.
This was not spoken about out loud then. But many people felt it. At least according to the general admiration for everything Western. And by the crackling statics of disgust for everything Soviet. And when “cooperators”, “merchants” appeared, and behind them there were “racketeers”, it became simply impossible to hide it.
Toy propaganda
They will object to me: where is the propaganda, and where is the "toy plastic team" the plane "front fighter"?
Close. And even closer than it seems. A typical picture for those times: on a bookshelf or under the ceiling in a room, there are very picturesquely located models of aircraft from the USA, Great Britain, and France. Lockheed P-38, Hawker Sea Fury, Hawker Hunter, or the same Dassault Mirage III. Beautiful planes, no words. What is not a reason for admiration? And they admired. Achievements of the aviation industry of the West. But not the USSR.
It's hard to admire something that isn't there. And if there is, it is executed in the style of obstructionism and minimalism at the same time. I'm talking about the same "models" MiG-15 and MiG-17 from NPO Vector.
Therefore, is it any wonder that when Mr. Gorby and his comrades appeared, he was so warmly received at first by the same youth. After all, he spoke of socialism with a "human face". And it was understood like this:
“We will live like theirs. And everything else will be like ours. "
Many people still remember how Gorbachev's demagogy ended. And now the 80s were rebuilt, the 90s were reformed, the 2000s are being digitized successfully. The state has changed and the country has changed.
Modeler's paradise
Like mushrooms after rain, shops for modelers have sprung up across the country. And with the advent of the Internet and their e-version. The counters are full of models-copies of technology of all times and peoples. Various sorts and kinds of additions to them: decals, paints, varnishes and others.
Everything. Paradise has come for modelers. Indeed, in many ways it is.
But with all the abundance and diversity, this very model "paradise" is somehow one-sided. I'm talking about the assortment of what is sold in the vast majority of these stores.
Today not only FROG / NOVO is on sale (although it is still alive). True, in other packages. Everything that an 80s modeler could dream of is on sale. But only cooler. In all scales, modifications and colors. Models for sale are copies of military and civil aircraft. But most of its Western technology. This "self-assembled tablecloth" from Western technology from a Western manufacturer catches the eye even with a cursory glance at any shop window.
As they say, is there a demand? Get an offer.
Self-assembled advertising tablecloth
And there is demand. Because, over the past years, this most Western technique has become like our own. Suffice it to recall which planes our citizens fly in the same Antalya.
The US films ("Pretty Woman Memphis", "Pilots from Tuskegee", Top Gun, "Firebird", a series of films Great planes - for some reason released by the studio "Wings of Russia") are known to many. The advertisement is engine of the trade.
Here are just our models (copies of Soviet technology, a domestic developer and manufacturer), as in the 80s - clearly watery. In a word, cabbage soup and porridge are our food.
In 2019, VO published the article “Large-scale modeling of the Country of Soviets. Part 1". It mentions the magazine TM No. 8 for 1984. In this issue, an article was published on the problems of bench modeling in the USSR. I read it when I was a child. But here's the curious thing. Little has changed in the past nearly forty years.
If we go back and draw parallels with today, then, from my point of view, everything has changed only for the worse.
Grandiose but non-existent
ANT-25 is a record aircraft on which V.P. Chkalov first in the USSR flew over the North Pole. I-16 - first in the world fighter monoplane with retractable landing gear. La-5 is the world's only large-scale solid-wood fighter of the WWII period.
Yak-15, MiG-9 - first serial jet fighters in the USSR. MiG-15 - first large-scale jet fighter in the USSR with a swept wing. MiG-19 - first in the USSR, a large-scale supersonic fighter. MiG-23 - first in the USSR, a large-scale supersonic fighter with a variable geometry wing.
IL-28 - first in the USSR, a large-scale jet bomber.
A wide range of models - copies of these aircraft have not been available for almost 40 years, so there are still no copies.
And where do they come from, if even the MiG-15 or MiG-17 still do not even have adequate drawings?
And then there are helicopters.
But the sea of Messerschmitts
At the same time, only a lazy manufacturer of model products does not release the notorious Messerschmitt Bf.109 (even Zvezda was noted in this field). Or North American P-51 Mustang. They are produced in all scales and modifications.
They may object to me: open your eyes, everything that you mentioned is sold at very affordable prices.
Yes, this is so, but if there are models of the aircraft I named, then (as a rule) these are developments of the 90s. Or already "killed" molds, as in the case of the I-16 from ICM, or the Yak-1, Yak-15, MiG-9 from Amodel (I am already silent about the fact that Amodel is an LND). I will only add that ICM and Amodel are Ukrainian manufacturers - that is, foreign ones.
The firm "" generally "pleased" with the repack of the "Frankenstein" MiG-15, MiG-17 from Dragon. And this is China. The modeler does the same, but from the Hobby Boss.
They will again object to me: this is, they say, normal practice.
But I would like to draw your attention to the fact that we are talking about domestic aircraft and their foreign developers and manufacturers. And such examples are dark.
Bridge to descendants
In fact, the current state gave into the hands of someone else's uncle (for foreign understanding and discretion) the achievements of our ancestors, our pride and our history... And the history of the people and the country is a bridge to the future for our descendants.
Well, there is also (I think) no need to talk about how things are with history today for “them” (and also for “us”).
One "intellectual" from the Yeltsin Center (by the way, the director of science) declares that the time has come to raise the question of the rehabilitation of the Vlasovites, because they, too, fought under the communist regime? And in St. Petersburg, the former Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation, with emotion on his face, opens a memorial plaque in honor of the General of the Tsarist army Mannerheim? After such statements, for some reason, you are not at all surprised that the museum aviation The USSR no longer exists in Monino. And with the models in our country for almost forty years, somehow, somehow.
Over the years, TWO generations of modellers have grown, for whom the current state of affairs is the norm. As a result, if you look at the Internet forums, you can see quite an ordinary picture.
NATO feast
A holiday for connoisseurs of Luftwaffe aircraft, pilots and aircraft of the Allies in World War II, experts in NATO aircraft. At the same time, everything is decorously distributed over the years, firms, etc. etc.
For the sake of fairness, it must be said that the aviation of the USSR was not forgotten. But now I'm talking about the ratio of those and ours. And it is not in favor of the history of aviation in the USSR. And a similar situation can be observed in the models of "tankers" and "motorists".
By no means am I calling for condemnation, closure and attraction. In the end, the "genie from the bottle" has already been released. And it will lead to the opposite result. Already banned and imprisoned. I mean the absence of the state (as such) in this market, in general.
I mean that in our country for decades, a situation has been developing when patriotism does not develop further than leavened and state-owned.
Is the ideological war lost?
I mean that the USSR, having lost in the Cold War, initially lost in the ideological one. And one of the kinds weapons of this ideological war there were these very "bags" with aircraft models.
I mean that they were shooting at totalitarianism and the Communist Party. But we got to the country. And the one who shot knew his job perfectly. Methods and methods of "mutually beneficial economic and cultural cooperation" by that time had already been very well worked out in the same Latin America. For us, there is a fresh example - Ukraine. Over the past years, it has been clearly demonstrated how you can turn the brains of a completely adequate people to one side. And there are also Armenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan. I'm not talking about the Baltics. So Belarus is on its way.
Look how many young people in Belarus are among the protesters. But first they fill up the shops with foreign-made goods. And some 15-20 years later, puffing out their cheeks, they genuinely wonder:
“And where did this fifth column come from? Would it be wrong? "
The lot of the Russian Maya?
Today we have all the prospects to stand on a par with the Maya. Or with the Aztecs and Incas.
The whole world will admire our culture. Our works of art. They will adorn the world's best museums and private collections.
But we, as a people, as a country, will no longer be here, on the sixth part of the land.
Do you still think that it doesn't matter which model of airplane your son makes?
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