Second World War memory as an instrument of counter-revolution in Putin’s Russia

ABSTRACT

Following the pro-Russian president of Ukraine Viktor Ianukovych’s (Yanukovych’s) removal from power at the end of the Euromaidan, the European Parliament endorsed Ukraine’s right to apply for European Union membership provided it upheld the organization’s principles of democracy, fundamental freedoms, and human rights. Shortly thereafter, the Putin regime launched a propaganda campaign in Western media that portrayed Ukraine as a fascist, antisemitic state, often referencing Soviet Second World War-era anti-fascism and Russia’s ongoing commitment to postwar moral-political imperatives. This campaign escalated with Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, which Putin declared necessary to “denazify” the state. Drawing on recent Kremlin discourse concerning Ukraine, this paper argues that the Putin regime’s memory politics constitute a tool of counter-revolution for their assault on the memory politics of the European Union. To this end, the study investigates Russia’s invocation of transnational memories of the Second World War and the postwar period in its war against Ukraine since 2014, focusing in particular on Russian accusations of Ukrainian antisemitism and Holocaust denial and narratives of Russian victimhood, or “Russophobia.”

RÉSUMÉ

Après la destitution du président ukrainien pro-russe Viktor Ânukovič en 2014, le Parlement européen a approuvé le droit de l’Ukraine à demander son adhésion à l’Union européenne à condition qu’elle respecte les principes de la démocratie, les libertés fondamentales et les droits humains. Peu de temps après, le régime de Putin a lancé une campagne de propagande dans les médias occidentaux afin de présenter l’Ukraine comme un État fasciste et antisémite, en référence à des aspects clés de la politique mémorielle de la Russie, tels que l’antifascisme soviétique de la Seconde Guerre mondiale. Cette campagne s’est intensifiée avec l’invasion de l’Ukraine par la Russie en 2022, que Putin a déclarée nécessaire pour « dénazifier » l’État. Cette étude avance que la politique mémorielle du régime de Putin constitue un outil contre-révolutionnaire à l’encontre de la politique mémorielle de l’Union européenne. À cette fin, l’étude examine l’invocation par la Russie des mémoires transnationales de la Seconde Guerre mondiale et de l’après-guerre dans le contexte de sa lutte contre l’Ukraine depuis 2014, en se concentrant en particulier sur les accusations russes d’antisémitisme et de négationnisme en Ukraine, ainsi que de « russophobie ».

KEYWORDS:

• Russia
• Ukraine
• European Union
• memory politics
• counter-revolution

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Krivade, “Ukraine.”

2. Magocsi and Petrovsky-Shtern, Jews and Ukrainians, 276.

3. Putin, “Obrashchenie Prezidenta Rossiiskogo Federatsii.”

4. See, for example, Edele, “Fighting Russia’s History Wars,” 90; Hoffmann, “Introduction,” 2; and Koposov, Memory Laws, Memory Wars, 280.

5. For an overview of the connection between the post-Euromaidan Ukrainian interest in European integration, Russian counter-revolution, and memory, see Snyder, “Integration and Disintegration.”

6. Budraitskis, Dissidents among Dissidents, 36.

7. Paul and Matthews, “Russian ‘Firehose of Falsehood’.”

8. Törnquist-Plewa, “Cosmopolitan Memory,” 144–45.

9. Weiss-Wendt, “Holocaust Discourse,” 291.

10. Sierp, History, Memory, 123.

11. Levy and Sznaider, “Memory Unbound,” 100.

12. Judt, Postwar, 803.

13. “Treaty of Lisbon.”

14. Koposov, “2014 Russian Memory Law,” 196.

15. See, for example, López Fuentes, “Forgetting for Everyone?” 127; Santora, “Poland’s Holocaust Law Weakened”; and Wróbel, “Poland Retreats on Controversial.”

16. Judt, Postwar, 803.

17. “Romania Holds First Holocaust.”

18. Stryjek, “Ukraine between the European,” 255.

19. Koposov, “2014 Russian Memory Law,” 200.

20. On the place of the Holocaust and narratives of national victimhood in Poland’s memory politics under the right-wing populist and national-conservative Prawo i Sprawiedliwość (Law and Justice) party, see Kończal, “Politics of Innocence”; and “Une loi polonaise.”

21. Assmann, “Europe’s Divided Memory,” 27; Kończal, “Politics of Innocence,” 250. Timothy Snyder has gone so far as to argue that ”[t]he legend [that the EU’s] members learned from World War II [. …] is not really the case. Had experience of the war’s horrors translated into a desire for some kind of liberal peace, then it would have been Jews, Belarusians, Ukrainians, Russians, and Poles, the people who suffered most, who would have drawn such conclusions.” Snyder, “Integration and Disintegration,” 700.

22. Assmann, “Europe’s Divided Memory,” 27. For an overview of competing memories of the Second World War and the postwar period in Europe, see Himka and Michlic, “Introduction.”

23. Judt, “Past Is Another Country,” 157, 159.

24. Ibid., 160.

25. Ibid., 161.

26. Tumarkin, Living and the Dead, 61.

27. Ibid., 101. Emphasis original.

28. Wyłegala and Głowacka-Grajper, “Introduction,” 3, note 14.

29. Chebotarova, “Collective Memory,” 183.

30. Himka, “Reception of the Holocaust,” 626. While famine affected all of the grain-growing regions of the Soviet Union, Himka notes that “excess mortality was the most intensive in Ukraine and in the Ukrainian-inhabited regions of the Kuban” (626). Moreover, both Himka and Liudmyla Hrynevych have written that the Holodomor was Stalin’s response to the reluctance of local officials to comply with increased grain requisitions, which he perceived as nationalist resistance. Hrynevych argues that forced collectivization politicized Ukrainian society, which led Stalin to resort to “terror through hunger” to subdue national movements in Ukraine; see Hrynevych, “Stalins′ka ‘revoliutsiia zhory’.”

31. “Polozhennia pro Ukraïns′kyi instytut.”

32. Ibid.

33. Chebotarova, “Collective Memory,” 183; Himka, “Reception of the Holocaust,” 627–32.

34. Smith, Mythmaking in the New, 86–87.

35. Ibid., 89.

36. Ibid., 90.

37. Hoffmann, “Introduction,” 2.

38. Weiss-Wendt, “Holocaust Discourse,” 278.

39. Feferman, “Russia as a Bulwark,” 90.

40. Weiss-Wendt, “Holocaust Discourse,” 281–83.

41. Ibid., 282.

42. Putin, “Annual Address.” The quotations in this remainder of this paragraph come from the same speech.

43. Burkle, Goniewicz, and Khorram-Manesh, “Bastardizing Peacekeeping,” 148.

44. Koposov, Memory Laws, Memory Wars, 177; Roberts and Moshes, “Eurasian Economic Union,” 552, 556; Marples, “Russia’s War Goals,” 211. For Putin’s stance on Eurasian integration, see Putin, “Novyi integratsionnyi proekt,” 10–14.

45. Roberts and Moshes, “Eurasian Economic Union,” 543.

46. Ibid., 545.

47. Ibid., 556.

48. Koposov, “Populism and Memory,” 284.

49. The Prague Declaration called for the “recognition that many crimes committed in the name of Communism should be assessed as crimes against humanity […] in the same way as Nazi crimes [had been] assessed by the Nuremberg Tribunal.” Koposov, “Populism and Memory,” 284.

50. Koposov, Memory Laws, Memory Wars, 178.

51. Putin, “Address by President,” 18 March 2014.

52. Ibid.

53. Ibid.

54. “Given Russia’s tense relations with the West, emphasis on the need to combat antisemitism appears to be an important tool in attempting to break through the present isolation.” Feferman, “Russia as a Bulwark,” 95.

55. Edele, “Fighting Russia’s History Wars,” 91. See also Himka, Ukrainian Nationalists.

56. Ibid.

57. Feferman, “Russia as a Bulwark,” 97.

58. Putin, “Address by President,” 18 March 2014.

59. Magocsi and Petrovsky-Shtern, Jews and Ukrainians, 276; “Chief Russian Rabbi”; Frum, “Ukraine’s Phantom.”

60. “Open Letter.”

61. “Putin’s Anti-Semitic Claims ‘Ridiculous’.”

62. “V evreiskom komitete zaiavili.”

63. Allison, “Russian Revisionism,” 992.

64. Weiss-Wendt, “Holocaust Discourse,” 284–85.

65. UN General Assembly, “Glorification of Nazism”; Weiss-Wendt, 284.

66. Koposov, “Populism and Memory,” 284.

67. Skripunov, “Otritsanie kholokosta.”

68. Ibid.

69. Ibid.

70. Ibid.

71. Ibid.

72. Ibid.

73. McMahon, Enemies of the Enlightenment, 14, 51.

74. Putin, “On the Historical Unity.”

75. Ibid.

76. Ibid.

77. Meyers, “Ironies of History.”

78. Rykovtseva, “On prezident-natsist.”

79. Putin, “75th Anniversary,” 28.

80. Ibid., 39.

81. Ibid., 42.

82. Paul and Matthews, “Russian ‘Firehose of Falsehood’.”

83. “Human Rights Situation.”

84. Feferman, “Russia as a Bulwark,” 97.

85. “Human Rights Situation.”

86. Putin, “Meeting of Pobeda (Victory).”

87. See Dyczok and Chung, “Zelens′kyi Uses His Communication,” 153–54.

88. See, for example, Freund, “President Zelensky”; Veidlinger, “What Zelensky Gets Wrong”; and Cohen, “Zelenskyy Invoking the Holocaust.”

89. “Times of Israel.”

90. Darczewska and Żochowski, Russophobia, 10–11.

91. Putin, “Address by President,” 18 March 2014.

92. Ibid.

93. Ibid.

94. Darczewska and Żochowski, Russophobia, 16.

95. Tyushka, “Weaponizing Narratives,” 130.

96. Ibid., 130–31.

97. Putin, “75th Anniversary,” 7–11.

98. Ibid., 26.

99. Feferman, “Russia as a Bulwark,” 96.

100. Darczewska and Żochowski, Russophobia, 16; Putin, “Press Statement and Answers.”

101. Putin, “On the Historical Unity.”

102. Ibid.

103. Ibid.

104. Laruelle, Is Russia Fascist? 157.

105. Putin, “Address by the President,” 24 February 2022.

106. Ibid.

107. Putin, “Address by the President,” 21 September 2022.

108. “Lavrov schitaet.”

109. Shakirov, “Lavrov sprognoziroval otnosheniia.”

110. “Zhertvami rusofobii”; “Kosachev.”

111. “Moskal′kova.”

112. Laruelle, Is Russia Fascist? 161.

113. Koposov, Memory Laws, Memory Wars, 177.

114. See Krapfl, “Discursive Constitution of Revolution.”

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Notes on contributors

Sydney Shiller

Sydney Shiller is an MA student at the University of Toronto’s Centre for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies. She holds a BA in History and Russian Studies from McGill University. In the summer of 2023, she interned at the Leibniz Institute for East and Southeast European Studies in Regensburg, Germany. Her research on the political history of Austrian Galicia is being funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.