Coming to terms with the past is always a messy business. But in few countries is the debate over history as fraught – and as consequential – as it is in Ukraine. This has much to do with the complex history of a nation that was caught for much of the twentieth century between two totalitarian powers that sought its destruction. Nor does it help that the successor of one of those powers – Vladimir Putin’s aggressive and chauvinistic Russia – is cynically exploiting the most controversial elements of Ukraine’s history as part of its war against Kyiv. Increasingly, however, some of the responsibility must lie with Kyiv itself.
Of particular issue is the historical interpretation of a radical nationalist party that sought to carve out an independent Ukraine around the time of the Second World War – the diehard “Bandera faction” of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN-B). The dilemma is that, while many of the OUN-B’s leaders and ordinary members gave up their lives in Ukraine’s fight for independence, most were also virulent nationalists, to the point of outright xenophobia. Some were even complicit in the Holocaust and other mass crimes against civilians. As a result, though, the group enjoys considerable sympathy among Ukraine’s governing class and large parts of the intellectual elite, it is highly controversial among the country’s Russian-leaning population, its Jews, its liberal intelligentsia, and its foreign partners. The question of how Ukrainians should interpret this wartime history requires nuance and restraint.
