russian uniform and head gear......

[David DeWeese]

Hi,

A friend found these items recently, stuffed in a box beside a dumpster here in Plano, Texas.
He wants to sell them to me, but not quite sure of their value.

Any thoughts?

Thanks, David

[Private_collector]

David,

Since the end of the cold war, Russia has been virtually and almost literally selling anything not nailed down, to us westerners. I have seen some bizarre stuff offered, from relics of the soviet space program, to clothing of the rank & file military. One of the best sellers is apparently tunics/uniforms of high ranking military officers or KGB items. There is a great fascination for KGB.

And here lies the problem. With such an enormous market outside the iron curtain, it wasn't long before the fakes started appearing. If the range of items being sold is to be believed, the Russians were the most careful race on the planet, because most of the stuff for sale is in absolutely mint condition, showing no sign of ageing or wear at all. That makes me very suspicous! There is a tremendous black market in counterfeit medals, documents and assorted memorabilia, and EVERYTHING needs to be viewed as a potential scam.

To put a value on any particular item would require extremely close scrutiny to ensure authenticity. Because Russia was virtually a 'closed shop' until the late 90s, we had little to compare the fakes with, and now the fakes are so numerous that these are being taken as the real thing. They have embraced the capitalist ways and run with them.

Be very careful with attributing value to anything of this origin. There must have been a reason why those bits you speak about were desposed of in the manner your friend indicated! What did the previous owner know that made the items worthy of discarding, as opposed to being offered for sale?

Look at them closely under a magnifying device and look for obvious small flaws and signs of hasty production. On the other side of the coin, the soviet block countries didn't really show great attention to detail when producing genuine items anyway. Very tricky situation you have there. Good luck!

P.S: Nice friend that wants to 'sell' you stuff they found in a skip! Scottish perhaps? I say that in jest..................or did I?

It reminds me of a story I heard of an Australian soldier in New Guinea, WWII. He had come across several 'genuine' Japanese flags in the course of fighting, and offered them for sale at reasonable cost to the men in his batallion. Whe the guys got together later, they realised the seller must have stumbled across a massive amount of those flags, because every second soldier seemed to have bought one. The story took a nasty turn when it became known that back home he had worked in his family business............A flag manufacturing Co.!!! Yep, thats right, he was having them made in Australia and shipped over to him

That's not as bad as an infantry soldier that went around collecting donations for the 'widow of the unknown soldier'. That scam didn't go long and ended badly when the collector suffered a moderate thrashing from his targets

You can't trust those Australians!!!

[David DeWeese]

Thanks, Tony.
I didn't know they made fake Russian military stuff. Certainly is an angle to consider....

The tankers helmet did raise my eyebrows as it appears un-issued, and all the medals look kind of generic to me....

I'll offer my dumpster-diving "friend" enough for him and his wife to buy a nice dinner, and leave it at that.

Thanks again,
David

[malcolm erik bogaert]

as a long term collector of warsaw pact kit and vehicles I should say the items are genuine.....we do see a lot of it in SCOTLAND and with the amount thats comming in its still quite cheap to source..you have to remeber the soviet and warsaw pact forces were very large in the good old days..now with this present uk goverment our best regiments are being slashed..oh for the good old days of the cold war!!!regards malcolm