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V-E Day Coverage Reveals Western Ignorance

Deena Stryker, May 12

4564565555If RT’s coverage of the 71st anniversary of the end of World War II in Moscow shows anything beyond tens of thousands marching enthusiastically, it’s the abysmal ignorance of the American people vis a vis a major 20th century event.

RT’s reporters went out onto the streets of Washington and New York and asked random passers-by who won the second world war: most responded with ‘US, Great Britain, France’, some mentioned Canada or Australia, others didn’t realize Germany was the aggressor, and almost none mentioned the Soviet Union, whose losses were more than fifty times greater than those of the US.

At a time when NATO has moved troops and weapons right up to Russia’s borders, the energy of the crowds carrying on high portraits of relatives lost during World War II was an unmistakable message: “We will do it again if we have to.” The fact that President Putin marched among the crowd carrying his grandfather’s portrait should not be dismissed as a publicity stunt, even if those around him were probably security officials. The most American presidents can manage is to step our of their limousine and take a few steps in the middle of a street while crowds line the sidewalk after inauguration.

I’m not aware of any positive comments about the Russian President in the Western press or in recently published books; in fact, everything Putin does is given a negative spin. Most recently, a concert in the ruins of ancient Palmyra by the Marianski Theatre orchestra under the baton of a world-famous conductor, Valery Gergiev, was described as a cheap publicity stunt.

This brings me to my point: “Stalinism” still casts a shadow over the West’s perception of Russia, blocking awareness of the once-famous Russian soul as well as its desire to be recognized by the West. In the country with the longest ‘Communist’ government and its labor camps, relations with ‘fraternal countries’ always emphasized ‘culture’. During the Soviet era, whatever may have been the fate of writers, (and I’m not making light of censorship), the countries of Eastern Europe generously subsidized music, dance and cinema – not that of the overseer, but their own. The concert in Palmyra was no one-off publicity stunt, but the reflection of a hundred year policy of “bringing art to the people”. And it is just as sincere as the idea of people marching with portraits of their ancestors who fought in the Great Patriotic War.

The only message that could come from a nation in which virtually every family suffered losses to foreign aggression is: we did it once and we can do it again if we have to, but we’d rather build peace.

P.S. On RT today, a documentary about a group of Russian civilians who have made it their business to track down and recover the remains of soldiers lost in the Great Patriotic War.

Deena Stryker is an international expert, author and journalist that has been at the forefront of international politics for over thirty years, exlusively for the online journal “New Eastern Outlook.”