01.06.05 Wednesday N 20 2005

Lessons in History and Tolerance from the Great Patriotic War

Cultural gaps can be funny or tragic. In any case, most of them make for a good story. You can share your cultural experience too - send your stories or observations to gap@mn.ru. (To jump to Jerome's comments, click here)

Carla, the Netherlands
Being in Moscow for the first time a few years ago, of course we had a traditional excursion to the monuments on Poklonnaya gora, dedicated to WWII, or as Russians say, the Great Patriotic War. The German friend of mine was virtually speechless, due to its beauty and loftiness. She was so impressed and exclaimed with all her emotion: "Oh, how great the monuments are!! I wish we could have some monuments of the same kind, beauty and scale in Germany. Why don't we?"
She was just twenty, so it's probably an excuse for such a weird and naive question. But this exclamation was followed with a pretty boorish answer by a Russian man who heard this. "Because you were fascists, and you lost," he said. Well, I'm glad the German girl was clever enough not to make a fuss about that statement, though it's evident that she had no connection to what the fascists had done to millions of victims of WWII. But since that moment the German seemed to be much more shy in her expressions and behavior. And I felt sorry for that Russian guy. If your parents were winners in that horrific war, what are your reasons to disgrace another person? Moreover, the war was a rather complicated political affair, with grave consequences, so we can't judge: say, could he have thought that due to the "winners", families were separated for a long time in Eastern in Western Germany? I do believe all misunderstandings of that period are over, and now Russia, Germany and other European countries can be just friends, but some people should keep their mouths shut.

Marco, Italy
I would like to observe the difference between the attitude to history which Russians and Italians have. Everybody knows that billions of people were killed by dictators. But if in Germany and Italy you can hardly find anything reminding you of Hitler or Mussolini, except for the very fact of knowledge that they were born or died or stayed for a while somewhere - no sign, no nameplates, no monuments, no tombs, nothing - in Russia you see that people still remember Stalin, who was the ideologist of concentration camps for the citizens of his own country! I was totally surprised to see his grave and monument near the Kremlin wall on the Red Square! I could never imagine that! So many say that he was the one who killed the best people of Russia of that epoch, with the hands and guns of his officers, that he was mad, and meanwhile, as I heard there're people who have a project for a new monument of Stalin nowadays! Is it fair to erect a monument for the one blamed by so many? For the one who, in my and some historians (Russian historians) opinion, was also guilty of enormous tolls Russia and other Soviet republics had to face? I know he was kind of a legitimated ruler, but times have changed, communism is not a dogma any more? The attitude towards Stalin in Russia is the biggest shock I experienced here.
Well, on the other hand, may be it has some good aspects. Seems that Russians just take their history into account (don't they?) but they do not want to concentrate on it, and they wish their past will be past, and they look into the future positively. Like - "yes, we had communists, we survived Stalin, we can leave dead buried in their tombs (and their portraits around us), and we should go on by ourselves". I guess this means they do not feel guilty for their parents' and grandparents' past, and that's a nice stimulus to move ahead.

Dear Carla and Marco,
WWII in Russia is a very touchy subject. 60 years after the armistice, many foreigners discover a different history once in Russia. We may have the same past, not necessarily the same history.

Several reasons may explain that. The first lies indeed in the consequences of the Cold War. USSR was closed from the world, living with its own reality. Only an open-border society can compare facts and myths of a joint history, and balance its meaning.

Second, we should not forget the role of the soviet people during the war (hence, the great monuments). It is called here the "Great Patriotic War" because it was not only a soldiers' war, but a giant partisans' battle. Each family here lost a relative in the war; everyone in age of fighting was mobilized to fight, nurse or build weaponry.

If historians know the sacrifice of the soviet population during the war (about 25 mil. died, compared with 400.000 Americans), foreigners may not have the full picture.

Third, Stalin was not a "legitimated ruler"; he was a genuine dictator, keeping the whole nation in silence. Who could dare to go against the only truth disseminated every day at school, on TV or in books? Surely not the millions killed or sent to camps after the war, only guilty of living on an occupied territory.
Communism was very effective in managing a country in a war environment. Naturally, when the war ended, and for decades, the population lived in an atmosphere embedded with suspicion of the West, weaponry building and secrecy. The catalyst for this system was the memory of the glorious past. Stalin, thus, was synonymous of this past and for many he remains.

Finally, the current state of Russia explains the over-sized commemoration of the war. May 9th is the day of the Veterans, seniors so often left aside in today's Russia. The state does not give them decent living conditions or health care, but once a year, the whole country thanks them. It is maybe as simple as that.

There will be a time of reconciliation of the Histories, we just need time.

Comment by Jerome Dumetz, teaching cross-cultural communication at the REA Plekhanov in Moscow, and independent consultant.