Vladimir Putin tries to re-write history by downplaying 1939 Nazi-Soviet pact while blaming the West for appeasing Hitler

  • Vladimir Putin tried to downplay Nazi-Soviet pact made before the start of WWII
  • Russian president also blamed Poland for start of conflict that saw Nazi invasion
  • Kremlin officials have suggested Western appeasement of Hitler led to conflict
  • Poland and Lithuania hit back at Russia's bid to minimise Soviet responsibility

Vladimir Putin has been accused of trying to re-write history by playing down Russia's WWII pact with the Nazis and blaming Western powers for appeasing Hitler before the outbreak of war.

The Russian president has made repeated comments in recent weeks blaming Poland for having a role in sparking the conflict, which saw Nazi forces invade its border.

Putin has also tried to blame Western governments for appeasing Hitler, rather than the Soviet non-aggression pact with Adolf Hitler as paving the way for the start of the Second World War and a calve-up of Eastern Europe.

Other top Russian officials have also sought to stress Polish anti-Semitism as a trigger for the conflict.

Historians in the West say the Russian claims are baseless.

The debate flared last month when Putin rejected Western criticism of the 1939 Soviet pact with Nazi Germany, arguing that the Allied powers, not the Soviet Union, were responsible for trying to appease Hitler.

A Russian propaganda poster showing the Red Army destroying the Nazi monster, made by Russia circa 1943 to 1945. Poland considers the views expressed by Putin and other Russian leaders as amounting to 'Stalinist' and 'propaganda of a totalitarian state'

A Russian propaganda poster showing the Red Army destroying the Nazi monster, made by Russia circa 1943 to 1945. Poland considers the views expressed by Putin and other Russian leaders as amounting to 'Stalinist' and 'propaganda of a totalitarian state'

Russian President Vladimir Putin signing a guest book as he visits the State Museum of Defence and the Siege of Leningrad in Saint Petersburg, Russia, yesterday

Russian President Vladimir Putin signing a guest book as he visits the State Museum of Defence and the Siege of Leningrad in Saint Petersburg, Russia, yesterday 

Poland and Lithuania this week defended themselves against a Russian historical offensive that seeks to minimise Soviet responsibility for the outbreak of World War II, their foreign ministers said.

Linas Linkevicius of Lithuania and Jacek Czaputowicz of Poland described recent Russian statements that put part of the blame on Poland for start of World War II as disinformation that they perceive as a threat to their nations.

'We will not let the Kremlin manipulate history so easily and spread lies,' Linkevicius said after meeting Czaputowicz in Vilnius, the Lithuanian capital.

Last month Putin suggested that Poland shared responsibility for the war because it connived in Nazi German plans in 1938 to dismember Czechoslovakia. 

The speaker of the Russian parliament has called for Poland to apologise for starting the war.

EU Justice Commissioner Vera Jourova in response told the European Parliament said it was the pact between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, signed by foreign ministers Joachim von Ribbentrop and Vyacheslav Molotov on August 23, 1939, that paved the way for war.

Poland's president said earlier this month that he will not attend a commemoration in Israel to mark the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp because he was not asked to speak at the forum along with world leaders who include the presidents of Russia and Germany.

President Andrzej Duda was not among the foreign dignitaries named as speakers for the World Holocaust Forum in media releases sent out for the event at Jerusalem's Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial on on January 23.  

A propaganda poster by Boris Prorokov saying, 'The anti-fascist front will triumph', made in by USSR in 1938. Dual occupation of Poland by the Soviets and Nazis came days after the two totalitarian states signed a pact with a secret protocol to carve up Poland, the Baltic states and Finland

A propaganda poster by Boris Prorokov saying, 'The anti-fascist front will triumph', made in by USSR in 1938. Dual occupation of Poland by the Soviets and Nazis came days after the two totalitarian states signed a pact with a secret protocol to carve up Poland, the Baltic states and Finland

Russian President Vladimir Putin visiting a 3D panorama 'Memory speaks. The road through the war' in St. Petersburg, Russia, yesterday

Russian President Vladimir Putin visiting a 3D panorama 'Memory speaks. The road through the war' in St. Petersburg, Russia, yesterday

Putin and German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, whose countries invaded Poland at the start of World War II, are listed along with French President Emmanuel Macron and Britain's Prince Charles.

Duda called Putin's comments a 'sort of post-Stalinist revisionism' that tries to shift blame to Poland.

Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki also accused the Russian president of 'repeated lies' over the history of the conflict in a statement last month.

He wrote: 'President Putin has lied about Poland on numerous occasions, and he has always done it deliberately. 

'It usually happens in a situation when the authorities in Moscow feel international pressure caused by its actions. And this pressure is not on the historical stage but on the modern geopolitical scene.'

As a result of the war of words, the Russian ambassador to Poland was summoned by the Polish Foreign Ministry to discuss Putin's comments. 

Ambassador Sergey Andreev said Poland considers the views expressed by Putin and other Russian leaders as amounting to the 'Stalinist historical narrative' and 'propaganda of a totalitarian state'. 

Polish President Andrzej Duda speaks during the New Year's meeting. He called President Putin's comments about the start of WWII a 'sort of post-Stalinist revisionism' that tries to shift blame to Poland

Polish President Andrzej Duda speaks during the New Year's meeting. He called President Putin's comments about the start of WWII a 'sort of post-Stalinist revisionism' that tries to shift blame to Poland

Duda said he will not attend a commemoration in Israel to mark the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp (pictured) because he was not asked to speak at the forum along with world leaders who include the presidents of Russia and Germany

Duda said he will not attend a commemoration in Israel to mark the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp (pictured) because he was not asked to speak at the forum along with world leaders who include the presidents of Russia and Germany

A similar meeting took place between the Polish ambassador to Moscow in November when a graphic was used by Polish state television included the words 'Achtung Russia!' with the Nazi 'SS' letters were used in the spelling of 'Russia', and Putin pictured as part of the Nazi death's head symbol. 

World War II began in 1939 when Poland was invaded first by Nazi Germany, then by the Soviet Union two weeks later. 

Right away, the Soviet troops arrested some 22,000 Polish officers who were executed the following year on the orders of Soviet leader Josef Stalin. 

The dual occupation came days after the two totalitarian states signed a pact with a secret protocol to carve up Poland, the Baltic states and Finland.

Russian President Vladimir Putin at a wreath laying commemoration ceremony for the 76th anniversary since the Leningrad siege being lifted

Russian President Vladimir Putin at a wreath laying commemoration ceremony for the 76th anniversary since the Leningrad siege being lifted

Fighting broke out days after Adolf Hitler and Soviet dictator Josef Stalin agreed to carve up Poland and the Baltic states based on a secret protocol in the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact they signed on August, 23, 1939.

Putin cited a 1938 agreement reached by Germany, Britain, France and Italy that allowed Hitler to annex Czechoslovakia as an example of Western leaders' alleged 'collusion' with Hitler.

The Russian president has been lashing out in recent days against a resolution adopted by the European Parliament that says that the Soviet Union bears responsibility for World War II. Putin has called that 'sheer nonsense'.

'They try to revive an image of Stalin as some sort of a good guy and also justify the Molotov- Ribbentrop pact,' Linkevicius said. 'We will not allow this to happen.'

Czaputowicz added: 'We have agreed that our experts would cooperate closely in the area of disinformation so that we can resist those threats together.'

Jourova also said she 'rejects any false claim' that paints Poland as a perpetrator instead of a victim of the 1939 to 1945 war and that she 'will not tolerate these attacks on Poland.'

In another disputed Russian claim, Vyacheslav Volodin, the speaker of Russia's lower house of parliament, the Duma, said this week that Nazi Germany's location of many of its extermination camps in occupied Poland was 'facilitated' by pre-war anti-Semitism.

That is an old anti-Polish stereotype that was debunked by historians long ago.

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki accused the Russian president of 'repeated lies' over the history of WWII. He is pictured with Austria's Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (left) and Czech Republic's Prime Minister Andrej Babis at an energy, transport and defence last Friday

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki accused the Russian president of 'repeated lies' over the history of WWII. He is pictured with Austria's Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (left) and Czech Republic's Prime Minister Andrej Babis at an energy, transport and defence last Friday

While anti-Semitism was rampant in pre-war Poland among nationalists and those on the right, there were also Poles who opposed it. 

Furthermore, historians say the reason that so many death camps were operated on occupied Polish soil is because that is where most European Jews - who were marked for destruction by Hitler's regime - were living. Half of the six million citizens that Poland lost in the war were Jewish.

The Auschwitz-Birkenau state museum, the custodian of the site of the most notorious German death camp, recommended that Volodin take its online lessons about Auschwitz's complicated history. 

'Facts can help us to defend ourselves against & prevent shameful falsifying and distortion of history,' the museum said last Wednesday.

Warsaw considers both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union to have been aggressors who unleashed suffering and death.

Russia focuses on the Soviet sacrifices that came after Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, which brought the Soviets into the war on the side of the Allies. Some 27 million Soviet citizens died in the fight to free Europe from Nazi terror. 

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