Provided we reject the destructive habit of wishful thinking and seeing what one wants to see rather than what really exists, we should recognize that biblical images of the eternal peace predicted by prophet Isaiah who passionately called on people to “beat their swords into plowshares,” of the state when the lamb, the wolf, and the lion will lie down quietly next to each other without causing any harm to anyone – these images are, unfortunately, very far from realization in our cruel world. The ability to fight off the aggressor is and will remain for the foreseeable future the main guarantee of free development for every people and every nation. Vladimir Putin’s actions prove it excellently, with all due endless respect for pacifist ideas. Unfortunately, such are the ways of the world. This is evidenced by the whole history of Ukraine, from Kyivan Rus’ and the Cossack age to the present days which President Petro Poroshenko called the days of the Ukrainian Patriotic War. In the age of battles fought to repel Pecheneg and Cuman raids just as in the years of the 17th century Liberation Revolution, in 1917-21, when the Central Rada and the Ukrainian People’s Republic fought for an independent and unified Ukraine and in 1939-56, when the soldiers of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) waged their heroic freedom fight – throughout centuries, it was the heroic willingness to make the ultimate sacrifice for Ukraine that saved our people. It saved us not only from the direct occupation of our land by foreign enemies, but also from spiritual surrender, inner disarmament in the face of invaders (it was in this sense that the OUN-UPA won, at the infinitely high price of enormous losses, in the mid-20th century, and this fact is their claim to our eternal gratitude). Themistocles’s immortal 5th century BC saying “We the Greeks would have perished if we did not die in battles” inspired Volodymyr Monomakh and Ivan Bohun, the Sich Riflemen, Petro Bolbochan, Vsevolod Petriv, Vasyl Tiutiunnyk, Roman Shukhevych, and Oleh Olzhych. Some of them might not have even heard of the ancient Greek, but it was the essence of these words which mattered. Similarly, those words inspired now, before our eyes, the heroes of today: the “cyborgs” from the Donetsk Airport, both living and fallen, Myroslav Hai, General Serhii Kulchytsky, Taras Seniuk... On October 14, the feast day of Virgin Mary’s Intercession, which doubles as the Ukrainian Cossack Day (which is significant in and of itself, for it shows the continuity of our heroic military tradition), the country will mark the Defender of Ukraine Day, for the first time officially as the national holiday.
If Ukraine stays independent forever (and it will!), this holiday will stay with us. It will be the occasion to commemorate the heroes of the UPA, founded on that day back in 1942, as well as members of the Heavenly Hundred, for the ongoing Ukrainian Patriotic War (not to be confused with the anti-terrorist operation!) began not in the Donbas in the spring of past year, but in Independence Square on February 20, 2014. And, as our leaders rightly assert, that war is far from its end.
Of course, any war ends sooner or later, and ends in peace. However, peace comes in many forms. There is the defeatist peace, concluded on the terms of the aggressor, and the victorious peace, gained not only by the blood of heroes, but by strong efforts of the entire society as well. Which peace Ukraine should strive for? Which peace would be worthy of the memory of those who died for the fatherland and for us (and such an approach is not a case of “populism,” as alleged by pro-government MPs, experts, and bloggers, but rather a look into the eye of the harsh truth)? Is the “International Anti-Putinist Coalition,” much praised for its power by our rulers, really “as firm as reinforced concrete” and indestructible? Do not we sometimes forget that no coalition can, want, and should do for us what is our own sacred duty – to liberate the occupied Crimea and Donbas, thus restoring Ukraine in its recognized borders?
I beg your pardon, dear readers, for stepping forward with these brief and not very festive reflections. The time requires it. The author of these lines thinks that there should be as little fanfare as possible. It is better to silently remember those who remained loyal to the last breath to the slogan “Attain the Ukrainian state or die in battle for it!”
