Histories and Lies: The Russian Commission

Truth commissions, bodies set up by governments to examine contentious narratives of the past, apart from being tasked with establishing transitional justice, can also help political leaders uphold historical narratives most favorable to power consolidation. They have proliferated since 1974, with at least 36 established in 32 countries.

For example, the creation of truth commissions in Eastern Europe aimed to increase the legitimacy and popularity of the politicians who established them. The German commission was established by the Bundestag in 1992, and political parties nominated its members instead of selecting politically independent experts. In 1989, Solidarity in Poland gained political capital by establishing a truth commission purporting that it would restore historic justice. All of these commissions interviewed victims and perpetrators and opened up archives to reveal information suppressed by previous regimes.

While the politicization of such commissions is nothing new, the Russian variant is unique on many levels. Established by President Dmitry Medvedev’s decree in May 2009, the Russian "Commission to counter the attempts of falsification of history to the detriment of the interests of Russia," is a permanent body, as opposed to the temporary, ad hoc commissions of other post-Soviet states.

Most importantly, instead of revealing new factual information about the past, the Commission is hoping to challenge prevailing Eastern European narratives about World War II and whitewash or justify crimes committed by the Soviet state, the Communist Party and internal security services, from the Cheka (Lenin's Soviet secret police) to the KGB. The goal of the Russian state's ideological apparatus is to prevent the emergence of any historical narratives that would belittle the image and role of the former Soviet Union, which is the legal predecessor of a resurgent, assertive 'new Russia.' This proud, imperialistic state is heir not only to the Soviet Union but to the Russian czardom, including the Romanov Empire.  

Battleground for historic truths

Russian elites are searching for an instrument to prevent the embrace of officially sanctioned historical narratives, especially in neighboring states, that may compete with the official 'party line' and expose Soviet atrocities. They hope to use the Commission as an instrument for winning this information war; the Commission could help provide an outlet for acknowledgment and purgation of Soviet crimes – or it could bury them even deeper.

Questions still haunt 20th century Russian history: Why were there no prosecutions for atrocities in the Gulag camps? Was 'Holodomor' (death by starvation resulting from Soviet forced labor) genocide against Ukrainians? Are there going to be reparations for families of the Polish officers who perished in the Katyn massacre?

For the last five years, the Ukrainian government has endeavored to persuade the UN to recognize the 1932-1933 Holodomor tragedy as the genocide of ethnic Ukrainians. According to different estimates, 2.6 to 10 million people were starved to death because of the Soviet policy of forced farm collectivization. Fundamental questions about those events remain: Was there a deliberate policy in place, rising to the level of genocide, to ethnically cleanse Ukrainians? Or was this famine a result of barbaric economic policies that affected other nationalities as well?

Documents that can shed light on the Soviet leadership's intentions are locked in Russian archives. The Ukrainian government has promoted the narrative that Holodomor was a genocide of Ukrainians. The Russian story, in contrast, describes the starvation deaths of ethnic Russians, Kazakhs and representatives of other nationalities in large numbers during the early 1930s.

In March 2005, the Polish Sejm (the lower house of parliament) demanded that Russia recognize the mass shootings of Polish citizens in the Katyn Forest in 1940 as genocide. Anywhere from 14,700 to 22,000 Polish military officers, policemen and intellectuals were murdered by Stalin’s public and secret police force (the Soviet NKVD) throughout Russia, Ukraine and other locations. The resolution issued by NKVD Commissar Lavrentiy Beria to execute all members of the Polish officer corps was signed by the entire Soviet Politburo – including Stalin himself – on 5 March 1940.

Descendants of those killed have fought in vain to recognize the dead as victims of political repression. Military prosecutors classified the names of the perpetrators, claiming that relevant case documents contained 'state secrets.' Currently, the relatives of the victims continue to fight in Russian courts to reopen the investigation of the Katyn massacre and to recognize their murdered relatives as victims of political repression. After recourse to the Russian legal system is exhausted, the families are more likely to achieve their goals in the European Court of Human Rights in Strasburg.

Ideological underpinnings

The Commission's ideological underpinnings reflect the Eurasianist philosophy popular in the Russian halls of power today. Indeed, fascist and expansionist ideas have penetrated the minds of Russian elites, with former Nazi sympathizers likeexternal pageAlexandr Dugincall_made and the now deceased political philosopher external pageIvan Ilyincall_made among the most popular authors read in political circles. Dugin, who has strong ties to the Kremlin and Russian military, is currently one of the most prominent ideologues of Russian nationalism and expansionism. He champions Eurasianism, which provides an ideological foundation for post-Soviet imperialism, having called to "recreate a mighty Eurasian sovereign state," which would include all of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), whose members are the majority of the external pageformer Soviet Republicscall_made.

Dugin regards war as a means to achieve the geopolitical goal of Russian dominance over Eurasia, but not necessarily the primary means. He delineates other tactics, such as subversion, destabilization and manipulation of information. Such moves have long been used by Russian secret services and reinforced by Russia’s use of natural resources as expansionist leverage with other countries. Dugin also proposes using the Russian Orthodox Church as an implementing agent of the Russian geopolitical agenda.

The Commission could be yet another bureaucratic tool of information manipulation and promoter of imperialist and Eurasianist ideology, in violation of Article 13 of the Russian Constitution, which states that "[n]o ideology may be instituted as state-sponsored or mandatory." In such a political climate, any Commission findings which conclude that Russia should apologize to its former 'colonies' for Soviet totalitarian atrocities would clearly run counter to a government agenda driven by expansionist ideology; any recommendations for such a mea culpa would appear to dishonor the homeland.

Scope and power

The Commission will compile and analyze information on the falsification of historical facts and events and prepare relevant reports for the president. Then it will develop a strategy and measures to "counter the attempts" of falsification to neutralize possible negative effects. The language of countering an attempt foresees pre-emptive action. Does this mean that if the Commission’s 28 members think that historical facts in an article are false, it would be able to ban its publication, thereby preventing any debate of the issue?

In an ominous sign of events to come, one of the first acts of the Commission was a chilling letter issued by the Russian Academy of Sciences and addressed to all directors of research centers in Russia. The letter requested information of all researchers involved in interpreting any historical event that goes against Russia’s national interests (i.e. 'falsifying' history).

Specifically, it requests "an annotated list of historical-cultural falsifications in areas of the institute’s primary concentration (including primary sources and authors that form and disseminate falsifications, the potential danger to Russia’s interests of those falsifications, and preliminary suggestions for ways to academically repudiate the falsifications)." This letter, straight out of the Stalinist playbook, which led to the execution of scholars and scientists in the 1930s through the 1950s, is an obvious threat to historians and a blatant attack on academic freedom inside and out of Russia. This move takes Russia toward an Orwellian-like thought control, which can be only comparable to the toxic fallout caused by scientific communism and dialectical materialism of the previous generation.

Out of 28 members of the Commission, only four are historians. Powerful members include the head of the federal security service (FSB, the successor to the KGB), the head of the foreign intelligence, the deputy secretary of the security council, the first deputy minister of defense, and the secretary of the interdepartmental commission for the protection of state secrets. The chairman of the Commission is the head of the presidential administration, which gives it a high profile and bureaucratic clout. First deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on CIS Affairs and Relations with Compatriots is also a member of the Commission. This ensemble also includes heads of the federal agencies on education, youth, print, science and the head of archives.

The Commission currently has only consultative functions and no legal ones. But that could change. An amendment has been proposed to an article of the criminal code on Nazi rehabilitation, which would criminalize speech or actions challenging or criticizing activities committed by members "of the anti-Hitler coalition" during World War II. Publicly stated opinions could be punished by three-to-five years imprisonment or a $10,000 fine. This amendment comes on the heels of a bill that could extend application of this criminal code beyond the borders of the Russian Federation.  

Conclusions

Contemporary Russia regards the Soviet government as legitimate, and it has not undergone an historic lustration. The Commission is unlikely to help facilitate this process. Instead, Russian political leaders are likely to use the Commission to promote their nationalist and expansionist objectives.

At the same time, national identities formed in neighboring states are based largely on antagonism toward Russia. This antagonism, however, remains more attractive to Russia than admission of the past, acknowledgment of culpability and a redress of grievances – the way Germany addressed similar issues.

Regional powers could help pave the way for Russia’s historic purification. In a recent external pageresolutioncall_made, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) condemned Nazism and Soviet-era Stalinism alike; Russia would be wise to follow suit. The EU and Russia’s European partners could also pressure Russia to open up its archives and to make documents broadly available to historians. European countries should develop curricula for schools and universities that encompass 20th century historic narratives built on evidence discovered after the fall of the Soviet Union. They also should encourage Russia to do the same, through use of development aid and educational programs that engage Russian students and scholars in the debate of historic events.

Without a broad and transparent process of recognizing Soviet culpability in some of European history’s darkest pages, the Russian Truth Commission is likely to become a tool of historic obfuscation and repression. Those who do not learn from their past are doomed to repeat it.

Recommended sources:

Andrews, M. “The Politics of Forgiveness” International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society, Vol. 13, No. 1 (Fall 1999), pp. 107-124. Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.jstor.org/stable/20020008call_made on 08 July 2009.

Dugin, A. "Foundations of Geopolitics," Moscow, Arktogeya, (2000). Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.arctogaia.com/public/osnovygeo/call_made on 24 July 2009. (in Russian)

Dugin, A. “Eurasian Way as National Idea”, Moscow (2002). Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.evrazia.info/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=860call_madeon 24 July 2009. (in Russian)

Dunlop, J. “Aleksandr Dugin’s Foundations of Geopolitics,” Working Paper Series on Russia and the Former Soviet States, Lichtenstein Institute of Self-Determination at Princeton University, (August 2003). Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.princeton.edu/~lisd/publications/wp_russiaseries.htmlcall_madeon 24 July 2009.

Grodsky, B. “Producing Truth: The Politics of Investigating Past Human Rights Violations in Post-Communist States,” World Affairs, Vol. 169, No. 3, (Winter 2007), pp. 125-133. Retrieved from external pagehttp://proxyau.wrlc.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=mth&AN=25891916&site=ehost-livecall_madeon 08 July 2009.

Stan, L. “Truth Commissions in Post-Communism: The Overlooked Solution?”, The Open Political Science Journal, (2009), 2, pp. 1-13. Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.bentham.org/open/topolisj/openaccess2.htmcall_made on 08 July 2009.

Tepperman, J. “Truth and Consequences.” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 81, No. 2 (Mar. - Apr., 2002), pp. 128-145. Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.jstor.org/stable/20033089call_made on 8 July 2009.

“Truth, Justice and Reparation: Establishing an Effective Truth Commission”, Amnesty International, (11 June 2007). Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.amnesty.org/en/library/info/POL30/009/2007call_made on 12 July 2009.

Decree by the President of Russia on “Commission to counter the attempts of falsification of history to the detriment of interests of Russia” Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.kremlin.ru/articles/216485.shtmlcall_made on 8 July 2009. (in Russian)

Online registration card for the bill № 197582-5: On Amending the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (on the issue of establishing criminal responsibility for the offense of the historical memory of events that occurred during the Second World War). Retrieved from external pagehttp://asozd2.duma.gov.ru/main.nsf/(Spravka)?OpenAgent&RN=197582-5&1d3call_madeon 8 July 2009.(in Russian)

Project: The Federal Law “On counteraction to the rehabilitation of Nazi, Nazi criminals and their supporters in the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union”. Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.regnum.ru/news/1153517.htmlcall_made on 8 July 2009. (in Russian)

A letter sent on June 22, 2009 by the Russian Academy of Sciences to directors of research centers in Russia requesting close cooperation on countering historical “falsifications” deemed damaging to Russia’s interest, Retrieved from external pagehttp://csis.org/node/20821call_made on 4 August 2009.

Statement by the “Memorial” society on the new Commission subjected to the President of the Russian Federation. Retrieved from external pagehttp://www.memo.ru/2009/05/22/komissia.htmcall_made on 8 July 2009. (in Russian)