Russia acts against 'false' history
By James Rodgers
BBC News

What is worrying Russia? Why is the country convinced that it is the victim
of a campaign to make it look bad?
President Dmitry Medvedev recently announced the setting up of a commission
to counter the falsification of history. He said this was becoming
increasingly "severe, evil, and aggressive".
"This is absolute poppycock," says Robert Service, professor of Russian
History at Oxford University. "History is all about argument. There is no
absolute historical truth about anything big in history."
Mr Service dismisses the Russian leader's suggestion that his country is
facing some kind of academic aggression.
Instead, he sees a desire to dominate, worthy of the most repressive
totalitarian regimes of fiction.
"President Medvedev, following in the path of his predecessor President
[Vladimir] Putin, wants to control history," he says.
"And he wants to control history as a means of controlling the present. This
is the classic George Orwell scenario."
'Hysterical reaction'
Many Russians, though, agree with their president.
Natalia Narochnitskaya, a former deputy in the Russian parliament and now a
member of the new Historical Truth Commission, says that she is surprised by
what she terms the "almost hysterical reaction" in the West.
"In the Western media especially, there is a certain prejudice against
Russia and Russian history," she says.
"They always feel that Russia since, you know, Ivan the Terrible, is a
certain country which is off the European civilisation."
" In August there will be such a yelling about the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact,
saying that that was the step that led to the Second World War "
Natalia Narochnitskaya, member of the Historical Truth Commission
Ask a few more questions, though, and these two apparently separate views
begin to converge.
At least, they agree on what the key issue is - World War II. And here lies
the clue as to the real reason for the establishment of the new commission.
This is what appears to anger today's Russian historical establishment:
accounts of Red Army crimes on the march to Berlin; assertions by the Baltic
countries and others in Eastern Europe that Soviet forces came as occupiers
as much as liberators; any suggestion that Stalin's Soviet Union and Nazi
Germany were anything but complete opposites and bitter enemies.
Here, perhaps, there is a clue as to the timing of the commission's
founding.
Next month sees the 70th anniversary of the non-aggression pact between the
USSR and Hitler's Germany, something Ms Narochnitskaya expects the West to
make a lot of noise about.
"In August there will be such a yelling about the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact,
saying that that was the step that led to the Second World War, and that
Germany and the Soviet Union were two equal, disgusting, totalitarian
monsters."
Nationalist sentiment
Why does this matter today? Do these arguments have any great importance
beyond the walls of universities? In Russia, the answer is yes.
" So many people are speaking about strong, Orthodox Russia, military
power... The commission is partly a response to this atmosphere "
Tamara Eidelman Moscow history teacher
The country sees its victory over Hitler's forces as the greatest moment of
the 20th Century.
The war is sometimes discussed in the news media as if it were a recent
event, not increasingly distant history.
Any attempt to tarnish the glory of that triumph is seen as a deliberate
attempt to make Russia look bad.
Russia's past haunts its present. Recognising that, the authorities want to
rule the version of the past which dominates today.
Tamara Eidelman, who teaches history at a Moscow High School, feels
surrounded by nationalist sentiment.
"So many people are speaking about strong, Orthodox Russia, military power,"
she says.
"It is something that is very strong in historical tradition and in popular
opinion. This commission is partly a response to this atmosphere."
The creation of this commission seems to go to the heart of what troubles
modern Russia.
The chaos which followed the collapse of communism left many Russians deeply
distrustful of politics and officialdom.
President Medvedev has complained of the corruption and "legal nihilism"
which plague his country.
Russia's leaders today know that they need this shining, sacred, memory of
victory to give their people something to believe in.
In the near future, it may even be backed up in law.
The Russian parliament is on its summer break at the moment, but legislation
is being considered - legislation that would make it a criminal offence to
"infringe on historical memory in relation to events which took place in the
Second World War".
James Rodgers was formerly the BBC's Moscow correspondent.
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/8166020.stm

Published: 2009/07/24 08:55:00 GMT

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