Despite that the independent country of Ukraine has been mercilessly attacked and bombarded daily by Russian military forces for almost a year, most people around the world are unsure as to why this has occurred. It is the largest outbreak of war since WW2, and yet we are mostly confused as to the reasons. The validation announced by Vladimir Putin are spurious, not the real reasons, and yet they are fine-tuned enough to cast doubt. Yes there is strong hatred of Russia within the Ukrainian population. Yes the so-called Azov brigade was founded on extreme right wing beliefs. Yet that is still not the real reason.
Putin is on record announcing his belief that in his opinion, the single greatest catastrophe of the 20th century was the collapse of the Soviet Union. For him, and his shadowy organization the CHEKA, Ukraine is theirs. Russia does not lack territory – it is the largest country on the planet. But Ukraine was an essential brick in the wall of defence, the historical buffer between Russia and the always mistrusted West. With the collapse of the soviet union, those countries bordering Russia:- with East Germany rejoined West Germany, Poland, the Baltic countries, in the south, all of the Caucasian vassal states formed their own governments. Ukraine as well.
Lets go back to the time of the second world war. As war swept over the countries of Eastern Europe, the activities of the NKVD throughout the region expanded exponentially. They carried out systematic programs of mass extermination in these adjoining countries for the whole duration of the war. Seizing the military conflict as a cover – the ‘fog of war’ – this elimination within these territories of the military and civil leadership served the long-term interest of the Cheka. Historical footnote: Putins’ father served here as a NKVD officer.
This terror campaign was carried out with unequalled ferocity throughout the Ukraine, a country not at war with the Soviet Union - indeed it was at the time a large part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
The bodies of untold numbers of so-called political prisoners executed by the NKVD were taken into the pine forests outside the village of Bykivnia and buried there. This vast burial site is in an area that spanned 161,500 square feet (15,000 m2). Polish and Ukrainian archaeologists working at the site have so far identified 210 separate mass graves. During the Soviet retreat in the early stages of the Wehrmacht’s Operation Barbarossa, the retreating Soviet troops levelled the village to the ground. This mass grave-site was discovered by the Germans along with many other such sites throughout the Soviet Union. It is a cruel irony that the Nazi propaganda machine made shameless use of this and other Ukrainian discoveries – then they uncovered the site of the Katyn massacre,(Poland) which they then found to be even more useful to them.
After the Soviet recapture of the area this mass burial site at Bykivnia was described by the NKVD as a site of Nazi atrocity. In the 1950s the village was reconstructed as a suburb of Kiev. In a further attempt to ‘lose’ this site, the Soviet authorities planned to construct a large bus station on the mass grave-site, but due to local opposition the plan was abandoned. It was also suspected by the Polish researchers that apart from the Soviet victims of the Great Terror, the site might also be the final resting place of 3,435 missing Polish officers captured by the NKVD.
The Polish authorities have up until now not been able to gain satisfactory information from the Russian authorities, who to this day continue to deny NKVD complicity. It has even been difficult to confirm that the victims of the purges were buried there. And this, despite the supposed abolishing of the Cheka organization. Dem'ianiv Laz is known as another mass burial site of victims of NKVD executions committed in the wake of the German occupation of Ivano-Frankivsk, Ukraine in 1941. This site was well hidden and has been kept secret for many years. But eventually the truth will come out.
In 1970 Following a Radio Liberty broadcast about Dem'ianiv Laz, the site's landscape was actually disguised by the Soviet authorities using heavy machinery to hinder any future attempts to excavate it.
Despite these efforts, in 1989 remains of more than 500 men, women and children were uncovered during excavation performed by a local branch of the Memorial society. The memorial complex ‘Dem'ianiv Laz’ was opened near the excavation site in 1998.
It was not until the 1990s that the authorities of the newly independent Ukraine actually confirmed the burial of thousands at Bykivnia. On April 30, 1994, a large memorial to the victims of the Soviet regime was opened in Bykivnia. Around the same time archaeological works started, with both Ukrainian and Polish scientists taking part. Even the the then pro-Russian Ukrainian government of Viktor Yanukovich was forced to proclaim the intention to create in the Bykivnia woods a memorial to the Graves of Bykivnia. It was however not until 2006 that the memorial was dedicated by president Viktor Yushchenko as a step toward uncovering this dark part of Ukraine's history.
As the first democratically elected Ukrainian president Viktor Yushchenko also took part in the annual Day of Remembrance ceremony on May 21 to honor the estimated 100,000 people buried in the mass grave on the outskirts of Kiev. In his speech the president spoke for all Ukrainians as he said:-
"We must know the truth. Why did our nation lose more than 10 million people without a war?"
(we remember Yushchenko as the Ukrainian president poisoned by Russian agents. A strong man, he survived, despite the dreadful chlor-acne which destroyed his face.)
Numerous Ukrainian massacre sites still appear to be under some government suppression of the full facts. It is known for example that many were shot by the NKVD at Sambor, at Simferopol, and Yalta. Just outside the city of Kharkiv some eight thousand people, including many interned Polish officers, were also shot and buried – In the grounds of a NKVD summer hostel. So perhaps in this brief summary lies some of the reasons for the Ukrainian fierce withstanding of Putin’s forced re-union.
Comments