In Western European countries, 8 May 1945, the day of the ‘unconditional surrender’ of Nazi Germany, stands for the end of the Second World War in Europe as a ‘Day of Liberation’. In the USSR and in some post-Soviet countries, however, Victory Day was celebrated on 9 May, marking the signing of the declaration of surrender. The Soviet Union declared it a public holiday in 1965 to commemorate the ‘victory over fascism’ in the ‘Great Patriotic War’ of 1941-1945.
The holiday in Ukraine after the declaration of independence
Even after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the declaration of independence in 1991, the 9 May celebrations initially continued in Ukraine in the tradition of the Soviet ‘Victory Day’. It was celebrated with state-organised mass events and parades, in some places accompanied by demonstrations of military equipment and marches by war veterans. Some political parties used Victory Day to mobilise their electorates and display their party symbols. War victims were also commemorated on this day. According to a survey conducted by the Razumkov Centre in 2011, 70 percent of respondents considered Victory Day to be a ‘major holiday’. For a number of historical reasons, the commemoration day was less popular in western Ukraine.
From veneration of war heroes to a commemoration of all war victims
Since the Russian annexation of Crimea and the beginning of the war in eastern Ukraine in 2014, the culture of remembrance in Ukraine has changed. Since then, the day has been observed in commemoration of all war victims and no longer only those who died in the heroic struggle of the ‘Patriotic War’. Since 2015, the end of the war has been celebrated on 8 May, the ‘Day of Remembrance and Reconciliation’ (‘День пам’яті та примирення’), as in Western Europe, while 9 May remains a national holiday while having been renamed ‘Victory Day over National Socialism in the Second World War’ (‘День перемоги над нацизмом у Другій світовій війні’). The symbol of both days of remembrance is the poppy flower, and the message is: ‘1939-1945. We will prevail’ and ‘Never again’.
Remembrance in Kharkiv
What do these remembrance practices look like in the regions close to the border with Russia? Let’s have a look at Kharkiv, in eastern Ukraine. There, too, the aesthetics of the celebrations changed with Ukraine’s independence, though not quite as fundamentally as in the west of the country. The celebrations were organised by the local authorities, and the focus remained on honouring war veterans, etc. In essence, the population and local officials continued to celebrate the holiday according to the ‘traditional’ Soviet way – for the last time in 2013.
When the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine began in 2014, the atmosphere in the city became tense. In the years that followed, the focus of the celebrations gradually shifted from commemorating the soldiers of the Red Army who died in the Second World War to the victims of the war as a whole. And, of course, the symbolism also changed after the war began. The St George’s ribbon and other Soviet or Russian symbols were banned and replaced by the poppy. Since 2017, there has no longer been a guard of honour at the Glory to Ukraine monument; instead, crowds of people gather there with posters and pictures of their family members who died or were killed in the war. This is also a sign of the gradual shift in focus from the military to a more individual and familial remembrance of the war.
Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine makes shared practices of remembrance impossible
In 2022, 9 May was for the first time a working day due to the declaration of martial law in Kharkiv and throughout Ukraine. In previous years, it had still been celebrated on a grand scale despite the shifts in focus described above. That became impossible in 2022. The main venue for the celebrations, the Glory to Ukraine Monument, had been badly damaged in the Russian attacks ongoing since the start of the invasion in February. In addition, Ihor Terekhov, the mayor of the city, publicly called on the citizens to visit the monument again in the future: ‘As soon as we are victorious, we will gather there again to honour the people who defended Ukraine in the past war against the fascist occupation and now against the Russians.’
However, this is not the last word on the celebrations of 8 and 9 May in Ukraine. This is confirmed by the results of a sociological survey conducted by the Rating Group, according to which 80 per cent of Ukrainians surveyed regard 9 May as ‘Remembrance Day’, with only 15 per cent continuing to regard it as ‘Victory Day’. The culture of remembrance is not only in a state of flux, but will change radically in the near future, as Russia’s current war against Ukraine makes shared commemorative events impossible.
