Replaying the Second World War: Soviet Parallels and Inspirations for Russian Atrocities in the Russo-Ukrainian War, 2014-25(303 Soviet and Post-Soviet Politics and Society)

Oleksa Drachewych argues that Russia’s instrumentalization of its memory of WWII has played a significant role in leading Russian forces to commit similar atrocities in its war against Ukraine. This connection between Soviet actions during and after the Second World War and Russian actions in its escalation against Ukraine plays out in many ways. Parallels exist in the atrocities and war crimes committed during each war, such as in the perceived motivations of perpetrators and the potential consequences of these acts. Implicit inspirations exist where the Russian government likely draws on the Soviet past through policies undertaken by Soviet predecessors. Finally, explicit cases are evident where the Russian government has directly referenced Soviet actions during and after the Second World War, connecting them to its actions against Ukraine. To make his argument, Drachewych explores a variety of categories: the rhetoric of denazification and related propaganda, sexual violence, mass murder and torture, the forcible deportation of people and theft of goods, and the weaponization of food. Russia’s instrumentalization of the history of the Second World War is more than propaganda, leading to violent consequences. The history takes on new meaning in Ukrainian memory politics as Ukrainians reinterpret these events, too. Intersecting history, political science, memory studies, and genocide studies, Replaying the Second World War details the many possible connections, while also highlighting limitations, in comparing the Soviet past to the Russian present, in order to provide answers as to why Russian forces have committed extensive atrocities against Ukrainians and why the Russian government has instituted some of the policies that it has during this war.

About the Author :
Dr. Oleksa Drachewych is an Assistant Professor of History at Western University, and a Lecturer in the Department of History at King’s University College, both in London, Ontario, Canada. He specializes in the histories of the Soviet Union, modern European international relations, and international communism. Drachewych is the author of The Communist International, Anti-Imperialism and Racial Equality in British Dominions (Routledge 2018) and co-editor of Left Transnationalism: The Communist International and the National, Colonial, and Racial Questions (McGill-Queen’s University Press 2020). Andreas Umland, M.Phil. (Oxford), Dr.Phil. (FU Berlin), Ph.D. (Cambridge), Research Fellow at the Swedish Institute of International Affairs in Stockholm, Senior Expert at the Ukrainian Institute for the Future in Kyiv, and Associate Professor at the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy.