In a May 10 discussion with Prof. Glenn Diesen, Dmitry Polyanskiy, Russia’s First Deputy Permanent Representative to the United Nations, observed: “There was a bitter joke in the Russian press recently: If Hitler’s suicide had happened today, the headlines would read, ‘Bloody dictator Stalin causes democratically elected leader of united Europe to commit suicide.’ It’s not funny, but it captures the absurdity of how history is rewritten.”
He observed that “it’s extremely important now to have an undistorted picture of what happened 80, 85, 90 years ago, because it’s important for all of us to understand how we got there. For European countries, especially Germany, it’s important to learn the lessons of the past—because Hitler was elected democratically and enjoyed overwhelming support in his country and in some other countries. There were pro-Hitler marches in Europe, the U.K., and the U.S. It was considered normal. Now, Europe is trying to cut important corners of its own history and shift the blame on to Russia…. So they distort history to fit their political agenda. This is dangerous not only for Europe but for the U.S. as well.”
In a particularly telling exchange, Diesen asked number two at Russia’s UN mission: “At this year’s Victory Day celebration, it was interesting to see who attended. A few years ago, we saw Western leaders. Now we saw leaders like Robert Fico of Slovakia, who was under great pressure not to attend, and of course, China’s participation. Does this reflect Russia’s new path, or is that reading too much into it?”
