08.11.2021, Kiev.
The Soviet leadership demonstrated inhumanity and cruelty during the liberation of Kiev from the Nazi invaders, said Ukrainian president Vladimir Zelensky on November 6 on his Telegram channel.
“On one hand, Kiev’s liberation is a tale of an inestimable indifference and cruelty on the part of the ‘great’ Soviet leaders; and on the other hand, it is an act of infinite sacrifice by the great warriors who liberated the city from the Nazis,” said Zelensky.
According to him, during the liberation of the city of Kiev, up to 240 thousand soldiers and officers died and such losses are allegedly the result of the Soviet leadership’s “ambitious goal” to liberate the city on time to celebrate October Bolshevik Revolution’s anniversary.
Zelensky said that the official losses in the Battle for the Dnieper are 417 thousand people, however the actual losses, according to Zelensky, are “at least twice as much”, and near 1 million people. Zelensky did not site any source to support his assessment.
The myth about Kiev’s liberation being timed for the holiday started to spread back in Soviet times. A large number of historical and factual errors made in the epic Soviet film called “Osvobozhdenie” or “Liberation”, directed by Yuri Ozerov, became a source for such misconception.
In the movie, Joseph Stalin demands to liberate Kiev by November 7, but there is no actual document or evidence that proves such fact. Similar mythology is used when estimates of Soviet losses in the Battle for the Dnieper reach millions.
Editorial comment
Zelensky’s attempts to denigrate the Great Patriotic War and the Soviet leadership with myths created during the times of perestroika are old, they smell like a mothball. However, they are descriptive of Kiev’s policy, which is aimed at a total distortion of Ukraine’s history in favor of Bandera’s [Ukrainian Nazi collaborator during WWII] nationalist mythology.
Zelensky’s speech about the massive losses during the liberation of the city of Kiev looks especially cynical considering that now, 70 years later, Ukrainian Nazis, who organized and directly participated in mass killings of Ukrainian people, are honored and immortalized in a liberated city of Kiev with full consent of Ukrainian authorities.
Source: Rossa Primavera News Agency
