I'm going to let you in on a secret. This is a diary that's been percolating in my brain for almost a year. I know, Bush just now went to the Baltic states, but follow me for just a minute and you'll understand.
As I mentioned in my last diary, my girlfriend is from Krakow, Poland. She's old enough to remember the height of the Soviet influence in her country and its fall. (Notice how I'm not giving away her age!) She doesn't remember being invaded or occupied by Germany - that was her mothers' generation. Her mother was orphaned at age 7, living in Warsaw and sleeping in the streets through the war. Her recently deceased Uncle was shot in the head but survived with a serious deformation that haunted him until he passed away this year.
We had an interesting discussion about Iraq about a year ago. She saw the US as the great liberators, freeing the oppressed Iraqis from the terrible evil of Saddam. She said, almost under her breath, "You don't know what it's like to live under such oppression." In her mind Saddam was an oppressor like the Soviets in her home country.
This started me thinking about the history of Eastern Europe and just who was the victor, the victim and the vanquished. Later we revisited our Iraq discussion and I think I convinced her that she was right, but off by an era. Now Bush has gone and made my argument for me.
The Soviets saw themselves as the liberator and benefactor. In the same way the US sees itself as the liberator and savior of Iraq. When we were in Warsaw we stayed in the Europejski hotel. Across the street was an old building with a façade pock-marked and chipped. I was drawn to this old building and took several pictures. Later we learned that the building is a national monument - on of the few in that section of Poland that survived the war. The façade was pock-marked with bullet and shell holes. The building's upper floors are unrepaired as a reminder of the scars inflicted during that terrible era. Old Town in Warsaw was completely demolished - and rebuilt brick by brick.
Rightly so, the Soviets pointed to these and thousands of other projects that they helped fund and man. Across Eastern Europe a huge undertaking of rebuilding lasted from 1945 until 1965. In every way the USSR was as proud of this rebuilding as we were of the Marshall Plan. Remember two of every 3 deaths in European theater took place between Moscow and Berlin. By comparison the Western Front was a cake-walk. The Marshall plan's rebuilding was dwarfed by the undertaking in the east.
The Poles, Lithuanians and Latvians (Estonians, Ukrainians....) saw the Soviets as occupiers. They resented being annexed outright or forced into satellite state status. They had nothing but hatred of the Nazi's but had no love for the Soviets, either. They wanted to have their own country. They wanted to be free to pursue their own best interest; to control their own destiny. They resented the Russians with the very fiber of their national being. So much so that today, the pain of the Nazi occupation is faded and the resentment of the Soviet era still smolders.
I heard Bush say that the Soviets were the oppressors and that their occupation of the Baltic was wrong. But Bush missed the bigger point. To the Iraqis Saddam would be the Nazis. We would then be the Soviets. And that makes us guilty of the same crimes that Bush now charges Russia.
The Iraqis are glad to have Saddam removed. Very few Iraqis wanted him in power. But the joy of liberation has long faded. Today the burning resentment of being occupied has taken over. Were once Saddam might have been the evil dictator the pain of Saddam has faded and the burning resentment of occupation fuels the daily bombings, attacks and fear. Two years later Iraq still has less electricity than the eve of the invasion. Our rebuilding has fallen far short of that the Soviets did in Eastern Europe, yet in the US we delude ourselves by believing how wonderful we are. We have purple-fingered congressmen pointing out how wonderful we are by staging an election in ravaged Iraq. We delude ourselves into believing in our own altruism. At least the Soviets were pursuing an evil invading force through Eastern Europe. We invaded on false pretenses.
President Bush, you should learn your own lesson. A liberating army can turn into an occupation in a matter of weeks, months or years. Despite all the very good and very tangible things the Soviets did for Eastern Europe they were still an occupation force. They were unwanted. Just like the US in Iraq. Too bad you are too blind to history to learn from it.