Sep 01 2009
Credit where credit is due
Here’s a surprise–in the ongoing Russian preoccupation with falsification of history, it’s the supposedly liberal Dmitrii Medvedev who’s been complaining about falsifiers, and the supposedly authoritarian Vladimir Putin who’s said quite sensible things. Writing in the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza during his visit to Poland, Putin made a number of points which seem to me wholly correct: no country can claim clean hands in the 1930s. We must all learn from history, but “exploiting memory, anatomizing history and seeking pretexts for mutual complaints and resentment causes a lot of harm and proves lack of responsibility. . . . The canvas of history is not a third-rate copy which can be roughly retouched or, following customer’s orders, modified by the addition of bright of dark tints.”
He specifically complains about those who attempt to whitewash Nazi accomplices (certainly a fair point), and argues that the road to World War II was a complicated one, beginning with the Treaty of Versailles and continuing through a host of events, including both Munich and the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. He’s correct to mention, though his Polish audience may not have appreciated it, Polish cooperation with Nazi Germany in the partition of Czechoslovakia.
In sum, a remarkably sober and even-handed appraisal of the need for an honest look at history. Let us hope Putin’s audience back in Russia pays attention.
UPDATE: Zbigniew Brzezinski likes the article, too. THAT is striking.
I’m not so sure Putin’s article can be taken at face value — rather, it looked to me like one instance of using true statements to back off from true responsibility or true acknowledgment of the good and bad sides of history. In other words, it looks as though he was claiming “we were not worse than anybody else, and maybe we were a little better” — a claim I would not think can really be supported.
Asehpe, there are some other colors besides white and black in history… in Russia we say “If you live among wolves you have to howl like a wolf.”
True responsibility for what? can you please finish the statement?
[...] wartime record, that it quite striking. It is part of a pattern, though: it was likewise Putin who took the high road on the origins of the Second World War. Today as then, the irony is striking. It’s Putin, the [...]