The Legacy of World War II for Putin's Russia

Reese finds that the Great Patriotic War once stood unchallenged as the greatest accomplishment of the Russian-led Soviet Union and its legacy formed the basis of a positive common identity. But now this interpretation is contested on the political right in the form of: Skin-heads adopting Nazi wardrobe, symbols, and slogans, openly expressed anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim sentiments with Nazi racial undertones, and the national socialist political movement. Also on the right, the Russian Orthodox Church has its own take on the legacy that challenges the supremacy of the state in the victory. On the left, the legacy is challenged by pro-democracy, anti-communist, anti-Stalinist, anti-Putin liberals. Further to the left, communists want to fully rehabilitate Stalin as a great wartime leader and savior of the nation as though that absolves him of all his misdeeds. The legacy is disputed from abroad with Europe and the Baltic States equating the Nazis and Soviets as equals in oppression. The greater part of the post-Soviet generation of Russians is simply not invested in the legacy of the war. Their parents are wearied by it. In sum, Putin is failing in his efforts to use the legacy of the war as a unifying shibboleth for today's Russia.