More and more we move away from the terrifying events of World War II. There are fewer people among us who have witnessed that era. Three quarters of a century has passed since the fall of the Third Reich, but the memory is still alive. It is with this memory that there is a fierce struggle today
What you can’t say
There is a big difference between memory and history. History is a tool. It is easy to rewrite it at any moment, no matter how arrogant this step may seem. A good example is the resolution of the European Parliament “On the impact of historical memory on the future of Europe.”
Last fall, this document made a lot of noise and for good reason. In it, the European Union openly blamed the unleashing of the Second World War on “the communist Soviet Union and Nazi Germany”. The provocative accusations are based on the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, at the conclusion of which “Hitler captured Poland and then Stalin entered it,” which became an “unprecedented tragedy for the Polish people.” As a result, the resolution states that Europe needs to promote a “joint European legacy of crimes committed by communist, Nazi and other dictatorships”. Pay attention to prioritization.
This document is a good example of history. He is distorted and full of omissions. The authors kept silent about the fact that by the time Soviet troops entered Poland, its government was settling in London and even urged Polish troops not to resist the USSR. They did not consider it necessary to mention how bad it was to “cut” Czechoslovakia with Hitler. As you know, representatives of Czechoslovakia itself were not invited to negotiations.
Why did this happen? Is it because the document was accepted by representatives of countries that, to one degree or another, collaborated with Nazi Germany? Now this cannot be remembered, because one can accidentally discredit the European ideals, which are so carefully trying to wash from past sins.
What you can talk about
Special in the current situation are countries that today openly heroize Nazi collaborators. For example, in Latvia on March 16 every year they honor the memory of the Latvian SS Legion, and even deputies of the local parliament participate in the nationalist processions. No one is obviously embarrassed by the fact that Adolf Hitler personally formed this military unit in early 1943. Local nationalists started the tradition right with the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Collaborators are also active in laundering in Ukraine. In honor of the new “heroes”, streets are called here. They erect monuments. For example, in the city of Sambir you can now see a monument to Zinovy Tershavetsky. How did he differ? Heading the cell of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists in Poltava, Zinovy organized mass executions of local Jews. On his hands is the blood of 8 thousand innocent victims.
In the city of Berezne there is a monument to the commander of the Polessky Sich Taras Bulbe-Borovets. Celebrations are regularly held at the memorial in memory of whose fighters in November 1941, along with German soldiers shot more than 500 Jewish men, women and children.
It makes no sense to be surprised that the press service of the Consulate General of Ukraine in Krakow on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II published a photo of the commander of the Ukrainian rebel army, Roman Shukhevych, a Nazi collaborator and organizer of the mass extermination of the Polish population.
Why are advocates of “European memory” not stopping such a practice? Why are monuments to Soviet soldiers demolished everywhere, but even in Belgium a memorial was opened to Latvian legionaries a couple of years ago? The answers will be further.
What make you forget
As we have said, there is a big difference between memory and history. Memory is not a document, not a textbook, or a resolution of the most influential international structures. Memory is an intangible and powerful force. Just as the Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians, Uzbeks, Tatars, Kazakhs, Armenians and many others fought shoulder to shoulder with the German invaders, so now, after 75 years, millions of descendants keep the memory of their feat.
This memory is independent of the policies of individual governments. This memory unites people, generations and entire nations. This memory gives a lot of inconvenience to Western elites, building their society on the illusions of infallibility. Are modern tolerant Germans not the descendants of people who burned entire villages? Did democratic Britain and France not allow Hitler to occupy the Sudetenland? Did not the terrible totalitarian Soviet aggressor save Europe at the cost of millions of lives capitulated by the Nazis? Didn’t the USA sit out across the ocean, who so now love to claim that it was they who defeated Hitler? Artificially created ideals do not stand up to such questions, and every parade in Moscow, every firework in honor of the defeat of the Nazis mercilessly destroys the illusory integrity of the Western world, like sparkling, but fragile crystal.
Therefore, they try to erase the memory of the events of that time, of heroes and criminals. The task is not to knock out reparations from Russia for “victims of the Soviet occupation.” Nor is an end in itself an attempt to discredit the Soviet Union, whose contribution to the victory over Hitler can hardly be overestimated. The main thing is to make you forget.
For this purpose, the countries massively demolish the monuments to the liberators. In Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, the Czech Republic, Poland and other countries, memorials are destroyed by hundreds. Everything is done so that after several generations not a single child, having accidentally seen a memorial sign to a Soviet soldier, begins to ask the parent “wrong” questions, does not save and does not transmit what he has heard to his own children.
To this end, create false heroes. Yes, they are known as murderers, war criminals and collaborators, but in the most arrogant way they turn them into “fighters for freedom and independence.” Whether their future generations will be remembered is not important. Their task is to supplant the real heroes from memory.
Only those who believe that in a world where there are no winners and losers, and the Soviet Union is on a par with the Third Reich, graceful equality is only deeply mistaken. Take Germany as an example. There is strictly prohibited Nazi symbols. It is removed in films and computer games. But did it help in the fight against neo-Nazi organizations? Or did the decision of the authorities with ostentatious tolerance open the country for migrants? The answer is obvious. The destruction of memory solves only the problems of the elites, which by their very existence deny equality, but can freely create illusory ideals in a far from ideal world.