Language Matters | Why Molotov cocktails in Russia-Ukraine war have been given new names
- Also known as petrol bombs, bottle bombs and poor man’s grenades, Molotov cocktails were named after Russia’s foreign minister amid the first Russo-Finnish war
- New wars bring new words, and Ukrainians are shunning the Soviet reference for two new names better suited for their resistance efforts
Not shaken nor stirred, but hurled in warfare or civil unrest, Molotov cocktails – makeshift incendiary devices usually comprising a bottle filled with flammable liquid, with a rag as a fuse – have been the weapon of choice of protesters and revolutionaries worldwide.
Also called petrol or bottle bombs or the poor man’s grenade, these devices were probably first used during the Spanish civil war (1936-39).
The name by which they are best known, though, has its origin in the first Russo-Finnish war (1939-40) – the Winter War – following the signing of the German-Soviet Nonaggression Pact.
At the start of the Soviet campaign in Finland, Russian foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov – molotov is Russian for “hammer” – gave assurances in radio broadcasts that it was humanitarian food aid that his country was dropping for the starving Finns, not bombs. Finnish dark humour satirically dubbed the Soviet-made bomb dispenser Molotovin leipäkori, “Molotov’s breadbasket”.
When the Finnish army subsequently wielded hand-thrown bottle bombs against Soviet tanks, with even the state-owned alcohol company mass-producing them, they framed these as “a drink to go with the food” – Molotovin koktaili, “Molotov’s cocktails”.