PERSPECTIVES: The May 9 "provokatsiya" (05/19/02)

PERSPECTIVES

by Andrew Fedynsky

The May 9 "provokatsiya"

"Provokatsiya": it's a word you often hear in Ukraine. It has hostile overtones, referring to underhanded actions designed to elicit a response to get somebody in trouble. It goes back to Soviet days, when society was permeated with conspiracy. A "provokator" would drop some seditious comment just to test people: to see who would agree, who would ignore it and who would turn him in. "Provokatsiyi" made people uncomfortable. At a minimum they could lead to unpleasant conversations with very mean people: "Why didn't you report Leonid Ivanovich after he spoke critically of Comrade Stalin?" A bright light shines in your eyes.

Citizens developed a keen sense of what to avoid, so as not to put others in an awkward situation. Something we consider benign - handing a colleague a printed invitation to a child's christening - would have been an act of madness or a "provokatsiya."

This Soviet-era concept still exists in the minds of many Ukrainians today, only the rules have changed. Now there's freedom of speech and assembly. Instead of one political party and one point of view, there are more than 30 parties and as many opinions as there are citizens. As for Soviet-era symbols, they've been scrapped. A Ukrainian Rip van Winkle, awakening after 20 years of sleep, would see tridents instead of hammers and sickles, blue-and-yellow flags instead of the red banner, and hear the Ukrainian national anthem instead of the Internationale.

As a result, the Ukrainian political landscape is littered with landmines. One such mine exploded in Kharkiv on May 9, the anniversary of the Allied victory over Nazi Germany, when a group of about a hundred Red Army veterans heckled during the moment of silence at the monument to fallen Ukrainians.

Why the heckling? The veterans didn't approve of the Ukrainian national anthem at the ceremony. That wasn't the melody they had marched to when the Red Army entered Berlin in 1945, and they didn't like it. So they interrupted the most solemn moment to create an incident. Indeed, it got them written up on the worldwide web. Kharkiv Oblast Chairman Yevhen Kushnariov promptly labeled it a "provokatsiya."

By creating an outrage, the hecklers hoped to use their status as veterans of the war against Hitler to protest the symbols of the Ukrainian state. If Mr. Kushnariov had been operating under the rules that prevailed in Kharkiv in the 1930s and 1940s, he would have ordered them arrested, tortured and shot. Instead, he deftly sidestepped the landmine. "Voicing grievances at such a time is inappropriate," he said, "particularly at such a sacred place. We need to look for ways to unite the country. As for those who do not respect the national flag, they are the ones responsible for this 'provokatsiya.' "

Ukraine's role in World War II was very complicated, with an astonishing number of casualties. According to AP/Yahoo, 8.5 million Ukrainians were killed in the war - 60 percent of them civilians. To put that into perspective, 259,000 Americans fell in World War II. On average, that many Ukrainians were killed every six weeks throughout the four years of the war. Another 2 million were sent to Nazi concentration camps or became slaves. Kharkiv, the scene of major battles, suffered enormously.

During the Soviet era, there was only one permissible way to view the conflict: it was the Great Patriotic War and Stalin (regardless of whatever faults he might have had) was the great leader who got the Soviet people through the ordeal.

That's the line the group of veterans in Kharkiv accept. But not everyone has the same memories they do. Many remember that Hitler and Stalin were collaborators in launching World War II, when both dictators invaded Poland in September 1939. That's also when the Soviet Union annexed western Ukraine and the secret police arrested hundreds of thousands, either killing them or deporting them to Central Asia. Nearly every family suffered.

When the Nazis invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, Ukrainians viewed it as a godsend. Those in the West were traumatized by the 21 months of Soviet occupation, while those in the East had still-fresh memories of the Terror-Famine. Besides, ever since Stalin approved the non-aggression pact with Germany, Soviet propaganda had been trumpeting Hitler as a good guy.

It didn't take long, of course, for Ukrainians to learn that the Nazis were lunatics who matched Stalin, atrocity for atrocity. Within a year, self-defense forces in western Ukraine began to organize, forming the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) to fight Hitler's forces. As for eastern Ukraine, people rallied around the Soviet government, which had made a strategic concession to Ukrainian patriotism, albeit in a Soviet form. Poets were allowed to rhapsodize about Ukraine and ancient Kozak heroes were invoked. The Supreme Soviet also created puppet ministries of foreign affairs and defense for Ukraine and the front was organized along national lines - units operating on the "Ukrainian Front" helped to push the Nazis toward Berlin. A Ukrainian Division liberated Auschwitz.

In 1943 and 1944, UPA and the Red Army overlapped, fighting a war within a war. It continued into the 1950s, long after the defeat of Nazi Germany. In what was really a civil war with Ukrainians on both sides, the Red Army defeated the UPA and for the next 30 years Soviet propaganda did all it could to falsify its record and blacken its image.

Now, 57 years after the defeat of Nazi Germany, the small number of Red Army veterans who created the "provokatsiya" in Kharkiv were dismayed to see blue-and-yellow banners and hear the national anthem of Ukraine. Who won the war, they're asking? From their perspective, it was Stalin and the Soviet Union, but in reality the UPA was the ultimate winner, although its warriors have yet to receive the recognition they deserve. That's another landmine for Ukraine's politicians.

Kharkiv Oblast Chairman Kushniarov appears to be a savvy young leader who knows you have to pay tribute to the heroes and victims of the second world war, but ultimately he'll be judged on how well he delivers for the future - above all in economic development. He's working on it. Recently, he led a trade delegation to the United States, where he met with officials in Washington. He also signed a protocol on cooperation with Ohio Gov. Bob Taft.

As for Kharkiv, the city survived the May 9 "provokatsiya." There were some bruised feelings, but that's about it. Now that Ukraine has dismantled the accouterments of the police state that the veterans miss so much, "provokatsiyi" just aren't what they used to be.

| Home Page |