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The Fraternal Kiss - Behind the Famous Photo

Credit: AP Photo / Helmuth Lohmann / Corbis

Men locking lips in public is a rare site today in Putin’s homophobic Russia. But, it was once a gesture that symbolised the height of fraternal friendship. The socialist fraternal kiss was a special form of greeting between the leaders of Communist countries. The act demonstrated the special connection that exists between socialist countries, consisting of an embrace and a mutual kiss to the cheeks or in rarer cases to the mouth. 

Close attention was paid as to whether the fraternal embrace occurred in meetings between Communist leaders. Its omission indicated a lower level of relations between two countries. After the Sino-Soviet split in the 1960s, Chinese officials refused to embrace their Soviet counterparts. Even when relations were normalised more than two decades later, Chinese protocol still insisted on “handshake, no embrace”. Chinese officials would refuse the fraternal embrace when greeting Soviet leaders, even as they exchanged it with leaders from other Communist countries. 

Credit: AP Photo / Helmuth Lohmann / Corbis

The Famous Kiss

The socialist fraternal kiss gained worldwide attention in 1979 when Erich Honecker and Leonid Brezhnev, the leaders of the German Democratic Republic of East Germany and the USSR were photographed embracing for the 30th anniversary of founding of the East German Republic. Photographer Regis Bossu photographed the moment both leaders kissed on the lips. That picture became known as “The Kiss” by press and magazines around the world. Happy Valentine's Day comrades! Browse a few of my favourite love themed posters below.

Between Greed & Love | East Germany | 1966£450.00
List of all posters

Further Reading

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East vs West: A Comparison of Soviet & American Cold War Posters

As the dust of WWII settled, the uneasy peace between the Western superpowers and the USSR was faltering. Tensions escalated as both sides built ever bigger nuclear arsenals. But, artists weren’t confined to the sidelines. They were fighting an ideological war, using propaganda to win the hearts of their own people and to sway opinions beyond their borders.

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The Buran: The Soviet Response to NASAs Space Shuttle

On November 15, 1988, the Soviet Union's first reusable space shuttle, the Buran, launched in what is now present-day Kazakhstan. This little-known chapter in the Cold War space race saw the Soviets build their own version of NASA's Space Shuttle to challenge the USA for space supremacy. The Buran, Russian for "blizzard", was once the future of the Soviet space program. But, its first flight was also its last. A year after its launch, the Berlin Wall fell and the USSR collapsed. The space shuttle program was suspended. In 1993, it was canceled altogether.

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Not Lovin' It: The Rise and Fall of McDonald's Diplomacy

On a chilly winter’s morning in January 1990, hundreds of Russians lined up as early as 4am to try a McDonald's hamburger. At 10am, the first McDonald's restaurant in the Soviet Union opened its doors in Moscow's Pushkin Square. 32 years later, McDonald's closed all of its 847 stores in Russia and left for good. It was the end of an era and the death of Hamburger Diplomacy.

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