Stalin Bust Statement
07 December 2009
The Ukrainian Congress Committee of America (UCCA), the representative organization of the 1.5 million Americans of Ukrainian descent, is outraged that the bust of Soviet dictator Josef Stalin will be included at the National D-Day Memorial in Bedford, Virginia.
To include this brutal Communist dictator in the pantheon of WWII heroes, side by side with such leaders as FDR and Winston Churchill is not only morally reprehensible, but historically inaccurate. The response that Stalin secured the eastern front for the Allies is nonsense. Stalin's attempt to expand and consolidate his empire is hardly the equivalent of the Allies' liberation of Western Europe. Doubtless, the Foundation is aware of the fact that it was Stalin and Hitler who started the Second World War and that comrade Stalin played no role whatsoever in the Normandy invasion and D-Day; furthermore, between 1939 and 1941 the Soviet Union was allied with Nazi Germany and Hitler under the Molotov-Ribbentropp treaty, and together these dictators had designs to conquer the world. More importantly, the decision to include Stalin, a tyrant who sought to physically destroy those non-Russian forces who actually fought the Nazi invaders, is incomprehensible.
The claim that the inclusion of Stalin in the Memorial is to preserve the "the narrative thread" of D-Day is an argument, which is at best disingenuous. Rather, it appears that the Foundation seeks to preserve the "narrative thread" of current extremists in Russia who look to rehabilitate Stalin in the hopes of reasserting Russia's imperialist drive. The shock of civilized society at Russia's attempts to rehabilitate this murderer pales with the anguish felt at the Foundation's shameful plans to include his bust in a sacred place of honor in the United States. This country, which has served as a beacon of hope and liberty for generations sent its sons and daughters to defend those ideals. The Ukrainian American community sent its sons and daughters to defend those ideals in the ranks of the Allied forces. Unlike Comrade Stalin, the Ukrainian American community lost children on that fateful day in Normandy. Further, our community suffered first hand the horrors instituted by Stalin. UCCA membership consists not only US veterans, but also veterans of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army who fought against both of the Twentieth century's most devastating war machines, the Nazis and the Soviets. Our membership also consists of those who survived the Holodomor, Ukraine’s Genocide of 1932-33 in which 10 million people, 3 million of whom were children were brutally starved to death by Stalin to suppress their opposition to his regime. Mass murder is Stalin's legacy and Genocide is Stalin's true "narrative thread."
Memorials are monuments to fallen heroes, individuals who our children can emulate and admire. Even contemplating the inclusion of one of the preeminent monsters in human history in a memorial designed to reflect the ideals of the "Greatest Generation" is not only indecent, but it dishonors the fallen, rejects their principles and regrettably, exposes the moral and ethical bankruptcy of the Foundation.
December 7, 2009
