Giggling at V-Day

Josefina Lundblad, a poet and writer from Gothenburg, Sweden, and a student at the Omsk State Pedagogical University, wrote an op-ed in the Moscow Times today:

It's easy to laugh at Russia and the Russians when it comes to history. What other than a giggle can a country expect when it acknowledges only the sweeter bits from the cupboard of the past? How is an educated foreigner expected to swallow amusement when a state prefers legend to fact?

I have chuckled at everything from Poltava to perestroika in my Russian life, and I shamelessly laughed out loud at their Victory Day for more than a year. On May 9, Russia celebrates a Communist victory over fascism and the end of the Great Patriotic War, what those further west call World War II and consider to have ended on May 8, 1945.

Giggling about how stupid Russians celebrate their Victory Day is a personal problem of Josefina. She might probably laughs like mad looking at Jews commemorating Holocaust but why was it necessary to share the fun with thousands of MT readers, more than half of them Russians? Josefina at least could check some facts before writing. Great Patriotic War is a part of World War II and we mean by the name only the war between Germany and the USSR. Germany signed the Instrument of Surrender at midnight May, 8, 1945 when it was already May, 9 in Moscow. World War II ended September, 2, 1945 with the surrender of Japan. May, 9 is not a “Communist victory” over fascism. It is a victory of the USSR over Nazi Germany.

But Victory Day is not simply a day. Victory Day is a concept, an occasion that seems more like a national or maybe state brand. Its influence and force in everyday reality can easily be measured by taking a walk through any average-size Russian town, where the image of Victory Day meets you everywhere. Here in Omsk, the new Metro Bridge was renamed the "60 Years of Victory Bridge" when it opened last fall, partly because there is as of yet no existing metro. The biggest park is called Victory Park, and there are Victory Streets and countless Victory memorials that all in one way or another honor the triumph in the war.

It was at this hysteria that I giggled heartlessly for almost an entire year, until I realized why this day has the overly tense feel that it has. The Soviet Union left very little behind that inspires joy, pride and patriotism, and maybe, maybe out of 70 years, all that remains is one good day.

Needless to say – for every Russian Josefina’s words are blasphemous. I’m not going to start rants about 20 millions people who died fighting German Nazism. I can only add that the fact that these words are written by a Swede make then even more blasphemous.

Swedish schoolchildren today are taught that Swedish criminal “neutrality” during the WWII was not a shame but a good thing that helped so many Swedes not to be killed or wounded. Swedes valued their precious lives so much that they behaved as cowardly whores: letting German troops through their territory, selling them iron, signing anti-Jewish laws. Swedish government even censored press – all anti-German remarks were banned. They could anger Hitler. But the moment Sweden realized that Germany is loosing the war it started wagging its tail, licking hands of the Allies and barking at Germans. I imagine Josefina’s grandparents giggling and laughing in 1945. “We are so smart! Those silly Americans, Brits and Soviets lost so many people but we survived and even made a lot of money. He-he-he.” Ласковый теленок двух маток сосет.