I’ve been hearing my whole life that Ukrainians preferred nazi rule over Soviet rule so nazi collaboration was fully justified. Of course this completely ignores the fact that there was huge (majority?) Ukrainian resistance to nazi occupation, but apparently Ukraine’s antisemitic landlord class are the only people that count. Of course western opinion makers completely ignore the class character of nazi collaboration because having that discussion would reveal why the bourgeoisie, regardless of nationality, will tend towards fascism.
Anyway, my point is that in the US I’ve lived through several decades of efforts to normalize and promote Ukrainian naziism. It’s just part of the ambient background noise at this point so it just seems natural that our allies appear as nazis. My own father, married to a Ukrainian jew, has fallen for this shit. Last time he brought up Ukrainians welcoming nazi occupation I asked if he thought that applied to the Ukrainian jews as well or if it was just a particular class of Ukrainians. I think that slightly pierced the veil, but he’s still an NYT lib, and both my parents are incurable anti-Russian racists (although, curiously, they did have me learn Russian as a child, and on my mom’s side it is one of our ancestral languages (they referred to themselves as Russian)).
Ukrainians preferred nazi rule over Soviet rule so nazi collaboration was fully justified
7 million Ukrainians fought in the Red Army, hundreds of thousands fought as partisans. The highest scoring Allied ace was Ukrainian! The most successful Soviet partisan leader was Ukrainian! A quarter of Soviet Marshals were Ukrainian! The collaborators never were a significant percent of the population.
7 million Ukrainians fought in the Red Army, hundreds of thousands fought as partisans.
“Uhhh clearly that’s because the evil Bolsheviks FORCED them to at GUNPOINT, otherwise they’d get sent to the GULAG! This was a display of Stalinist authoritarianism and the fact that they didn’t respect the will of the Ukrainian people to let the Nazis set up Reichskommissariat Ukraine is proof that the Ruzzian ORCS deserved Generalplan Ost.”
I was hedging because I didn’t want to look up the numbers. Imagine if there was a nation that was majority violent antisemitic landlords! It would make Iran reconsider their aversion to nuclear weapons.
I’ve been hearing my whole life that Ukrainians preferred nazi rule over Soviet rule so nazi collaboration was fully justified. Of course this completely ignores the fact that there was huge (majority?) Ukrainian resistance to nazi occupation, but apparently Ukraine’s antisemitic landlord class are the only people that count. Of course western opinion makers completely ignore the class character of nazi collaboration because having that discussion would reveal why the bourgeoisie, regardless of nationality, will tend towards fascism.
Anyway, my point is that in the US I’ve lived through several decades of efforts to normalize and promote Ukrainian naziism. It’s just part of the ambient background noise at this point so it just seems natural that our allies appear as nazis. My own father, married to a Ukrainian jew, has fallen for this shit. Last time he brought up Ukrainians welcoming nazi occupation I asked if he thought that applied to the Ukrainian jews as well or if it was just a particular class of Ukrainians. I think that slightly pierced the veil, but he’s still an NYT lib, and both my parents are incurable anti-Russian racists (although, curiously, they did have me learn Russian as a child, and on my mom’s side it is one of our ancestral languages (they referred to themselves as Russian)).
7 million Ukrainians fought in the Red Army, hundreds of thousands fought as partisans. The highest scoring Allied ace was Ukrainian! The most successful Soviet partisan leader was Ukrainian! A quarter of Soviet Marshals were Ukrainian! The collaborators never were a significant percent of the population.
That’s telling. These are the people running the actual combat operations against nzi occupation.
I was hedging because I didn’t want to look up the numbers. Imagine if there was a nation that was majority violent antisemitic landlords! It would make Iran reconsider their aversion to nuclear weapons.
Don’t forget Lyudmila “Lady Death” Pavlichenko! Sniper with over 300 Nazi kills.