This year on May 8-9, the 65th anniversary of the Great Victory over nazism is celebrated all over the world.
But in Russia's calendar of memorable dates, the 9th of May occupies a special place. Just one mention of the Victory Day causes the heart of each Russian to be wrung.
This is not only because our country contributed to the victory most of all by defeating the greatest number of the nazi forces, but also because you will hardly find a single family in Russia which had not lost at least a single member in that war. The grievous ordeals that fell to the lot of the peoples of the Soviet Union revealed the greatness of the human spirit and manifested numerous examples of heroism, personal feat and true patriotism. That is why this war has gone down in the history of our country as the Great Patriotic War and Russians celebrate the victory with the tears in their eyes.
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| A famous picture that shows a Red Army soldier during World War II |
And there also remain the lessons which the world community drew from the events of more than half a century ago, but which have not lost their relevance today. It is no coincidence that ahead of the 65th anniversary of the Victory a hot debate on this theme has unfolded in many countries. More often than not, it is not merely an argument about how to interpret this or that event of the war period, but entirely opposite moral assessments of its outcome that have a direct relationship to the present-day European and world politics. For history is politics looking into the past.
That is why, in discussing this theme, we also bear considerable moral responsibility to those who paid with their lives for the defeat of Nazism and to new generations learning about the war from the textbooks and films. It is our responsibility for not only upholding the historical truth about the war, but also for fixing firmly in public consciousness a correct understanding of its lessons from the vantage point of contemporary world development.
World War II was indeed an epochal event. It was not only a global battle that exceeded in scale all the previous armed conflicts in world history. There collided in it not merely the different interests of states and even not so much the different ideologies, but the diametrically opposed, irreconcilable approaches to the very bases of mankind's existence.
For the first time in history, the stake in this struggle was the preservation of the life of whole peoples. The gas chambers and crematoria of Oswiecim, Buchenwald, Salaspils and other death camps have demonstrated what fascism carried with it, what future its so-called "new order" had in store for the world. And those who in some countries today question both the significance of the Victory and the role of our country in it are forgetting that without it these countries might not have been on the map.
The essence of the attempts to distort the war history lies in a bid to assign the winners' laurels to the Western democracies and to belittle the role of the Soviet Union, while at the same time putting the blame on it for Hitler's unleashing of the Second World War.
As to the history of the prewar period, there should be no forgetting about the policy of appeasement of fascist Germany pursued by Britain and the US, that aimed at warding off aggression from themselves, directing it to the East, against the USSR. The crown of this policy was the Munich agreement of 1938.
The assertions about an "exaggeration of the Soviet contribution to the cause of Victory" do not stand up to criticism. In 1944 the length of the Soviet-German front was four times greater than that of all the fronts where the USSR's allies, put together, fought. At the same period up to 201 enemy divisions fought on the eastern front, whereas only two to 21 divisions faced the American-British troops in the very same months.
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| Russian and Ukrainian troops practise for a parade in Kiev to mark the 65th anniversary of the victory over Nazis. Reuters |
Even after the opening by the West of the second front the allies had 1.5 million men in Western Europe, while the Germans 560,000. At the same time there were amassed 4.5 million German troops on the Soviet-German front, against whom 6.5 million Soviet soldiers fought. The Hitlerite forces sustained their major losses in the battles against the Red Army: losing 70 percent of their manpower and 75 percent of all their military equipment -- tanks, guns, aircraft.
As Winston Churchill wrote: "It was the Russian army who tore the guts out of the German war machine." Recently George Bush echoed him, noting at the celebration of the 65th anniversary of the allies' landing on Normandy: "If not Russia, none of this would have happened."
We did not divide the Victory into percentages in 1945, nor do we divide it now. Together with our allies we marked the 65th anniversary of the opening of the second front, together we shall celebrate the Jubilee of victory in Moscow. All the allies of the anti-Hitler coalition won the Second World War. It was our common victory. But no one has the right to detract from the price which our country and our people paid in the course of the war, play down the enormity of the Nazis' crimes and even less so heroize them.
The main outcome of the war is not just the victory of one coalition of states against the other. In essence, it is the victory of the forces of construction and civilization over the forces of destruction and barbarity, the victory of life over death. The war turned into the greatest tragedy for the peoples of Europe and the world, regardless of whose side their states fought on. Not a single family, not a single life story was untouched by its consequences. It is the duty of historians to tell the truth about this tragedy, but it should not serve as an object of political speculation. In the assessments of the war's outcome, no shift in moral guidelines should be allowed. Speaking in Oswiecim on January 27, 2005, President Vladimir Putin called deeply immoral the attempts to rewrite the history of the war, to equate the rights of the victims and the hangmen, of the liberators and the occupiers.
The experience of the international brotherhood in arms during the war years is assuming particular significance in the conditions when a global challenge has again been thrown down to humanity, this time by international terrorism, which is no less dangerous and cunning than fascism. And no less merciless: thousands of innocent people have already become its victims. The foundations of civilization have again turned out to be in jeopardy. Like fascism, terrorism has nothing to offer the world, but violence and scorn for human life, its preparedness to trample upon any, the most elementary norms of human morality for the achievement of its maniacal aims.
To cope with this kind of threat, just as 65 years ago, is only possible on the basis of solidarity and mutual trust. "Double standards" with regard to terrorists are as inadmissible as attempts to rehabilitate the fascists' accomplices. Giving terrorists a public platform for stating their man-hating views is as immoral and unnatural for contemporary Europe as the parades of former SS men in the countries claiming adherence to democratic values.
The approaching anniversary of the Victory is above all a tribute of memory and the profoundest gratitude to those who upheld our Fatherland's independence and brought the long-awaited liberation to the peoples of Europe enslaved by fascism. The anniversary commemorations must serve as a reminder of the enormous inner spiritual potential Russia and the Russian people possess.
(Extracts from an article sent by the Russian Embassy in Colombo)
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