by Marco Imarisio
A large traveling exhibition celebrates the stories of yesterday’s and today’s heroes
«This exhibition is dedicated to our heroes of the past and present». The exhibition consists of 48 panels. At the side of each is a photo of a fallen Russian in Ukraine and his story. On the other hand, a soldier who fell during the Great Patriotic War, that is, World War II. “Over the thousand years of Russia’s existence, there have been many attempts to subjugate and dismantle our state. But our ancestors knew how to fend off the attackers.”
The transition from the Special Military Operation, a supposedly quick and not too painful intervention in a distant country, to a patriotic war no different from that waged against the invaders Napoleon and Hitler, began a few months ago. The photo exhibition “Heroes with Forever Russian Hearts”, created by the Military Historical Society with the support of the Ministry of Defense, opened in mid-September, in the days when Kherson was going badly, and toured the country during those months. It was made in Smolensk, in Simferopol in Crimea, in Stavropol, in Rostov-on-Don, in Ulianovsk, the birthplace of Lenin, in the Yekaterinburg region, in the Republic of Buryatia in Siberia, one of the main reservoirs of conscripts, in Pskov. In short, everywhere.
Because the message that needs to be passed on is this. A complete overlap between the wars against the western invaders and the war in Ukraine. Also crucial for the future of Russia. “Could anyone imagine that in heroic Donbass, eight decades later, Nazism would still be fought to the death? During the Great Patriotic War, thousands of Red Army soldiers were awarded the title of Heroes of the Soviet Union for their courage and bravery in the liberation of Donbass. Today, the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of the winning generation must once again defend the same truth and right to speak the Russian language, suppressed historical memory, their country and loved ones.”
In Moscow, the exhibition is installed in three different city parks. From the Museon, opposite Gorky Park, where the old Soviet monuments are gathered, one can also see the roof of the Ministry of Defense, where some batteries of anti-aircraft missile systems have also been exhibited and installed for a week, as well as other buildings in the capital and nearby the residence of Vladimir Putin. After days of hypotheses and speculation, the statement from the ministry itself has arrived. An air defense exercise conducted to protect vital infrastructure in the event of an air attack. It is a clarification that does not remove the essential doubts. Why now? Why stoke the notion of Moscow’s potential vulnerability, which the emergence of missiles, tanks and armed soldiers inevitably entails?
Perhaps the answer lies in the now almost final transition from a special military operation for a few to a war for all for the survival of Russian living space. “Borrell recalled that our country defeated Napoleon and Hitler,” writes Dmitry Medvedev on his social networks. «This means that the Ukronazis and Western Europe are the direct heirs of those who fought against Russia. The war against them is the new Patriotic War. Victory will be ours, like 1812 and 1945.”
The words of Putin’s ex-staff should always be taken with a pinch of salt, but they are at least helpful in understanding which way the Kremlin winds are blowing. Towards final conflict, without negotiations or qualms, with the invasion of Ukraine turning into a defensive struggle against the western enemy. The litmus test of the narrative that Putin wants is always Vladimir Solovyov, one of the forerunners of government propaganda. “Your fathers set an example for you,” he told the Russian military during a visit to the front. He called them krasnoarmejtsy several times, like the fighters of the Great Patriotic War who were part of the Krasnaya Armija, the Red Army.
«Today the citizens of the Russian Federation, the Donetsk and Lugansk republics took up the fight against European Nazism, which raised its head. (…) True heroes of our time, they fight for peace and the future of our great and beloved homeland». This is how the introductory text of the exhibition ends.
January 21, 2023 (change January 21, 2023 | 22:28)
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