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OP-ED By Peter Borisow,
President, Hollywood Trident Foundation
President, Genocide Awareness Foundation, New York, New York
UKRAINE REPORT 2003, No. 81, Saturday, August 9, 2003
[RE: Statement by Russia's Ambassador to Ukraine Viktor Chernomyrdin
on Wednesday, August 6, 2003 about the Stalin-era famine]
No one should be really surprised by Chernomyrdin's denial of genocide in
Ukraine. After all, it was essentially just one, albeit horrific, phase in
a centuries old (and still ongoing) effort to extinguish the Ukrainian
nation and replace it with a Russian identity. This is a story that started
with the emergence of the Russian Empire as a wannabe world power under
Peter the First (I'll not call him "Great", thank you). The so called "fall
of the Russian Empire" at the end of WW I, was only a change in players.
New leaders emerged and a whole new and very radical marketing strategy
called communism was imposed on the same old empire. The USSR was
just a new box for the same old cereal.
The leadership of the USSR was as resolutely Russian in its identity as were
the tsars. Except for the occasional tactical respite, Russian remained the
only acceptable language. Russocentric history, culture, and religion (when
tolerated) were the pillars of society and any deviation was prosecuted.
Anything Ukrainian was prosecuted. After the wanton slaughter of Ukrainians
in 1932 - 33, huge areas of Ukraine were re-populated by Russian settlers,
to a large extent accounting for some of the Russophilic strongholds in
Eastern Ukraine today.
When the USSR collapsed, it was abandoned like a snake abandons a skin
that no longer fits. But, the snake is still the same. Today it's wearing
its new skin, as just plain Russia, an emerging market economy. But, it's
trying very hard to grow back into the old skin of the Russian Empire.
Peter and Catherine both knew there could be no Russian Empire without
Ukraine. Stalin and Gorbachev both knew there could be no USSR without
Ukraine. When Ukraine pulled out, the USSR collapsed like a house of cards.
Does anyone out there really believe Messrs Putin & Co. do not know this?
With a never properly accounted for $100 plus billion dollars of mostly USA
guaranteed money in its coffers, Russia came back from chaos. Now, further
invigorated by oil money, mostly from remote parts of the former empire,
Russia is seeking to reconstitute its old self. Putin is struggling to
consolidate his position as de-facto tsar. Chernomyrdin, his chief vassal
in Ukraine, is there to persuade, bully and buy key bits of Ukraine for
Russia and Russian interests.
Why, they'll even send grain to Ukraine, to help out their "brothers" in
their time of need. How kind and generous, this new Russia! How shameless
to do this on the 70th Anniversary of the Holodomor. But, it's good
strategy and great public relations. The operating theory is: if you can
temper the opposition, neutralize foreign policy and effectively control the
economy, then the administrative details can be sorted out later -- quietly,
in the dark of night when no one is watching.
Under these circumstances, it is clearly impossible for Russia to
acknowledge responsibility for genocide. We need to expect all forms of
slight of hand by these masters of genocide denial. During the genocide
Ukrainians were also killed outside of Ukraine, in parts of Russia,
especially in the Northern Caucasus and the Lower Volga. That's a fact.
And, we should expect Russia to spin it by passing these Ukrainians off as
Russians and then arguing how Russians also suffered.
But, Ukrainians remember 1932-33. We remember all those places along the
border where there was no food on the Ukrainian side, plenty of food on the
Russian side and armed guards in between, with orders to shoot to kill. We
remember how travelers were searched for food and even a single loaf of
bread, was seized at the border and the "smugglers" punished. We remember
what it was like to be in a place where the mere possession of tiny bits of
food by "enemies of the people" was against the law and punishable by death.
If you had no food, you would starve to death. If you had food, you would
be shot. We remember how the entire country was turned into a concentration
camp. We remember the orders coming from Moscow and the trainloads of
soldiers they sent to quell even the slightest opposition. We remember the
minions who ran this hell on earth for their masters in Moscow. This we
will never forget. This we will teach our children and our children's
children.
In order to understand the position of Russia on the Ukrainian genocide, and
the difficulties faced by Ukrainians in telling their story, we need to
parallel the careers of the 20th century's master killers - Hitler's Germany
and Stalin's Russia. Their similarities are obvious for all to see. But,
we rarely focus on the one huge fundamental difference between the two.
Hitler lost the war. Stalin won the war. To understand the impact of that
difference on Ukrainians and world perceptions of Ukrainian history, ask
yourself what the world would look like today if Churchill had succumbed to
Hitler's overtures and they had signed a peace treaty before the U.S.
entered the war and, if Hitler, with Britain's help, had reached a truce
with Stalin.
Ask yourself how the story of the Holocaust would be told today if Europe
was now the German Empire, run without apology by descendents of Hitler,
Himmler and Goebbels, and if there was no Israel. By now, the extermination
camps would have been shut down long ago as they completed their cursed
tasks. The spin-meisters would be telling a very different history, about
well intentioned attempts to help Jews, Ukrainians, gypsies and others who
were gathered by the benevolent state to protect them from angry masses.
Gee, some even died from allergic reactions to some of the gasses in the
delousing facilities. This kind of pornographic history is what Ukrainians
had to endure for sixty years. History is and always will be written by the
strong, by the victors. Russia won the war. They wrote history the way
they wanted.
Now, seventy years after the worst part of the genocide, and ten years into
liberation, Ukrainians are still struggling to tell their story. In the
west, the story is starting to emerge in academic and official circles. The
story has yet to reach the general public. We've made some good progress
in the past ten years but still have a long and hard way to go.
Russia will oppose us every step of the way, publicly and through its
massive and well financed secret services and their western shills. Russia
is actively attempting to rewrite history once again for its own purposes.
Already, there are calls in Russia to remove troublesome writings by authors
like Pasternak and to replace them in school curricula with much more
Russophilic authors like Tolstoy, recalling the splendor of Imperial Russia
instead of the murky bits about Soviet Russia. Fancy tour groups are
dazzled by the stolen treasures of the Hermitage, oblivious to the memory of
some hundred thousand Ukrainians (mostly Cossacks) who died there
digging its canals.
The party line that Ukrainians suffered only because everyone was suffering
is just one more in a long history of BIG LIES. No one is better at this
than the Soviet propagandists, now back to wearing their original uniforms
as enforcers for the Russian Empire. It's Chernomyrdin's job to sell the
party line. I think it's a safe bet that nowhere in his marching orders will
you find the word, "truth".
Let's not worry too much about what Chernomyrdin says. He's an old
apparatchik and we will not persuade him otherwise. Rather, we must focus
on what his job is and how to counter it. We can only counter it through
the voice of world opinion. That's our job. We must never forget the truth
of what happened in Ukraine. We must never miss an opportunity to tell
anyone and everyone our story until the world finally understands the truth.
If Chernomyrdin does not apologize, one of his successors will.
NEVER FORGET THE HOLODOMOR - THE UKRAINIAN GENOCIDE.
NOTE: Peter Borisow is President of the Hollywood Trident Foundation, a
group of professionals in the entertainment and media industries who are
either Ukrainian or have a special interest in Ukrainian film and media,
past, present and future. Borisow is also President of the Genocide
Awareness Foundation, a newly formed multi-ethnic group with broad interests
in genocide, including genocide recognition, education, rehabilitation and
prevention.
OP-ED By Peter Borisow, President, Hollywood Trident Foundation
President, Genocide Awareness Foundation, New York, New York
UKRAINE REPORT 2003, No. 81, Saturday, August 9, 2003
FOR PERSONAL AND ACADEMIC USE ONLY
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