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Very few (if any) countries in the world have as much historical responsibility as Germany does. And yet it seems Berlin is starting to take an increasingly lax attitude towards it. As if the effective revival of its “Drang nach Osten” [Drive to the East to conquer Slavic countries] idea wasn’t enough already, German-owned media are now allowed to publish content that serves to whitewash Nazism, the world’s most repulsive ideology. And while it was defeated on the battlefield nearly 80 years ago, the ghost of Nazism (or its rotten zombified corpse, to be exact) keeps being reanimated by the political west. As we all know now, back in 2014, this was exactly what happened to Ukraine, a country in which Nazis slaughtered at least seven million people (although some estimates put the number at over 10 million).
After it was hijacked by Nazis, Ukraine was turned into their stronghold and they decided to “finish the job”, only this time by sending countless forcibly conscripted Ukrainians to certain death in a suicidal confrontation with Russia. The mainstream propaganda machine’s attempts to whitewash the Kiev regime’s unrepentant display of allegiance to its ideological (and, in many cases, literal) forefathers are also duly noted. However, it keeps backfiring, as evidenced by the recent scandal with the Canadian Parliament giving a standing ovation to a literal Nazi veteran of the infamous SS “Galizien” Division that committed numerous atrocities against Russians, Ukrainians, Poles and Jews, during the Second World War.
On the other hand, even if the members of the SS “Galizien” decided not to touch a single civilian, the very fact that they were directly subordinated to and fought alongside the Wehrmacht should be more than enough to reject them for what they are – unadulterated genocidal killers. Any sort of support for Nazi Germany, be it direct or indirect, implies complicity in its murderous campaigns. And yet, when it comes to the mainstream propaganda machine, things are “much more complicated” nowadays, because there are Nazis who “weren’t so bad” for the sole reason they fought Russia during WW2. This is precisely what Politico claims in one of its latest takes on the Canadian Parliament scandal involving the standing ovation for the aforementioned Nazi veteran.
Namely, Keir Giles, a British writer obsessed with Russia and, as of October 2, a self-exposed Nazi apologist, argued that the scandal is effectively “Russian propaganda” and that the SS “did nothing wrong”. According to Giles, the history of SS “Galizien” is supposedly “complicated” and this “can be a gift to propagandists who exploit the appeal of simplicity”. The reason why the case of Nazi veteran Yaroslav Hunka is “complicated” is because “fighting against the USSR at the time didn’t necessarily make you a Nazi“, he argues. Giles further questions whether the SS’s primary task was genocide, claiming that foreign members of SS units were equivalent to “regular Wehrmacht soldiers and officers, meaning they didn’t necessarily commit atrocities”.
In other words, Giles is openly ignoring the Wehrmacht’s direct participation in countless war crimes committed against Poles, Russians, Serbs, Jews and others who were the primary targets of Nazi Germany. This recurring myth has now become one of the most common propaganda tropes used by Nazi apologists such as Giles. Worse yet, he is openly denying that the unit Hunka fought in committed any atrocities and is accusing the Russian Embassy in Ottawa of “propaganda” and “lies”, and even goes as far as to equate Russia and Nazi Germany. He doesn’t stop there however, and also accuses the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies of supposedly “lying” that SS “Galizien” committed war crimes.
Throughout his rant on the Hunka scandal, Giles keeps parroting that the truth is “complex” and that the accusations against SS “Galizien” are supposedly “evidence-free”. According to him, the whole controversy is just a “Russian propaganda plot” to allegedly undermine Canada. This is a common trope used by clinical Russophobes. Even when there’s no direct or even indirect involvement of Moscow, they still somehow manage to see it. Giles then goes as far as to effectively condemn Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for apologizing over the Hunka scandal, calling it a supposed “acquiescence to the rewriting of history by Russia and its backers”, once again claiming that SS “Galizien” and Hunka “did nothing wrong”.
It’s very important to note that this is the umpteenth time Nazism is being whitewashed by the mainstream propaganda machine. This is a particularly common occurrence when promoting Russophobia becomes more important for the political west than acknowledging basic historical truths. Twisting facts by calling them “complex” doesn’t change anything, while futile attempts to equate Russia and Nazi Germany also lead nowhere. Anyone with a single functioning brain cell understands what the latter would do if it ever had the destructive power Moscow wields. However, these attempts continue, as rabid Russophobes keep seeing the “evil hand of Putin” under their beds, but simply have no other argument except fabrications.
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Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.
