Mykhailo Stepanovych Buda had spent the years of World War II in forced labor in Germany. Once he helped prisoners of war to escape. As a result, he was sent for ten months to Auschwitz, then for one month to Mauthausen, and later for 18 months to the Evenich death camp. Mykhailo Hut was confined in a ghetto in Vinnytsia oblast together with his parents at the age of five. He was selected to be shot three times. Last Wednesday, according to tradition they paid tribute to the memory of the prisoners of Nazism murdered together with others. The victims of Nazism gathered together at the monument in the territory of the former Syrets death camp and laid flowers at the Babyn Yar memorial.
Thus tribute was paid to the victims of Nazism once more. The event has left an unpleasant aftertaste. The veterans, of course, have nothing to do with it. For those who perhaps live constantly with the memory of those times coming to the monument precisely on this day fixed in the official calendar as the Day of Memory is an indispensable right. For others, as it unfortunately seemed, it was no more than an official duty. The whole thing looked like a thoroughly scheduled protocol event: the ceremony was held hurriedly, the veterans hastily pushed into the buses and taken to the next point for laying wreaths.
What can we do to give such dates some meaning? How can we make memory less official? Did society do everything possible to heal the wounds of the former prisoners of the war?
The Day invited Ph. D. in history, Professor Yury SHAPOVAL to ponder on these questions.
“Of course we should long have thought about serious social guarantees for these people. Such an act of the government would, first, stress our respect for their heroism and appreciation of their sacrifice. This has not been done for thousands of reasons, which are important only in the state’s view. Social guarantees shouldn’t look like the dish of porridge and hundred grams of vodka they give the veterans on every date of commemoration! Another issue I’d like to touch upon is the different perception of World War II, different approach to such memory days in Europe and Ukraine. I recall coming once to a square dedicated to the forcibly displaced Jews in Hamburg, Germany. I was impressed with their presentation of complete information on what this nation had gone through and how it all happened. Anyone can go there, bring his children, find out about those events, and they do so not only on the dates of official commemorations. It seems that our situation hasn’t changed in this respect: for our officials, dates and memorials are no more than a reason to show off. Those in power don’t have what can be called a strategy for the past. Besides, it didn’t single out any priorities. If you look at it closely, our whole history and, consequently, calendar consists of anniversaries. We still have Soviet monuments in our cities. Since there is no strategy, the formalistic approach dominates.
“The latter problem raises another question: how can we make the younger generation understand the tragedy of these events? Let me give you one more example: the unique Braunschweig Museum of Nazism where one can study the Nazi machine’s symbols and mechanism. I also was to such museums as Maidanek. As they say, no comment: visiting a former death factory can change your whole consciousness, influencing your perception of these events. It seems to me that after all these years it would be right to support memory precisely by such graphic visual examples. This is a concrete form of work in bringing up new generations — and new generations of officials for that matter.
“In 2002, marking the sixtieth anniversary of the Warsaw ghetto uprising, renowned film director Roman Polanski shoot The Pianist, a stunning film telling the stories of concrete people. In my view, the film’s educational effect is invaluable. In Ukraine, they shoot films with erotic scenes and those telling about the new bourgeoisie’s life, but there are no films about war that shape a new view on violence and the victims. This is why, in addition to giving considerable social aid to the prisoners of the Nazi regime, we should find money for such projects to preserve and form our historical memory.
“The problem with our one-sided movement is in that deputies and convocations change, and the regime remains the same. And this means not only that we are ruled by former Party nomenklatura members who influence key decisions. For me, the regime is old in spite of the presence of many young people in it. The latter take on the bad habits and stereotypes of the Soviet establishment quite quickly. This is how people appear who aren’t too shy to misappropriate the ostarbeiters’ money. When a society has no brakes in the form of moral imperatives and historical memory, anything is permissible.”
