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From: orb@whuxl.UUCP (SEVENER)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: What did Kruschev really say? A correction
Message-ID: <564@whuxl.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 1-Apr-85 08:11:59 EST
Article-I.D.: whuxl.564
Posted: Mon Apr  1 08:11:59 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 2-Apr-85 05:51:09 EST
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> Don Black
> 
> "We shall bury you...As God is my witness...."
> --Nikita S. Krushchev

This is an oft-repeated mistranslation of what Krushchev really said.
I was listening to a show on Americans lack of knowledge of foreign
languages by an expert on foreign language study.  He pointed out
that our lack of knowledge of foreign languages has hurt us greatly
in international trade and also in foreign policy.
He also pointed out that mistranslations can greatly distort foreign
relations and for that reason can be dangerous.  Specifically he
said that the translation of Krushchev's statement "We will bury you..."
was wrong.  In fact, what Krushchev said was "We will survive you..."
which has a much different meaning.  Krushchev also said that after
a nuclear war "...the living would envy the dead..."
There are several ways to interpret the statement: "We will survive you"
One is that the Russians would survive a nuclear war.  At the time
the statement was made the level of nuclear arms was lower and the bad
effects of fallout were not as well known.  But given Krushchev's other
statement "...the living would envy the dead..." after a nuclear war
that seems unlikely.  The other interpretation is that capitalism would
collapse of its own contradictions-the Soviet Union would survive that
eventual economic collapse and emerge as the economic world power.
 
Where you get the tag line "As God is my witness" is anybody's guess.
The same place you found out that the Holocaust by the Nazis was really
just a hoax?  A dedicated Soviet Communist is *extremely unlikely* to
make any such reference to God.
            tim sevener   whuxl!orb
d