Lecture evening on 8 May 2023

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A new change of perspective: The war of 1941-1945 as seen from 2022

Evening lecture and discussion with Prof. Dr Dieter Pohl (University of Klagenfurt) on 8 May 2023 at the Museum Berlin-Karlshorst

Russia’s attack on Ukraine has not only shaken international security policy to its foundations, but also the perception of Russia, Ukraine and its history. From a German perspective, all of these issues are overshadowed by the memory of the German-Soviet War of 1941-1945. This was based on certain beliefs, but on closer inspection these memories were never uniform and have changed over the decades. To a certain extent, this also applied to Soviet memories of the war. After the end of the Soviet Union, very different discourses developed in Eastern Europe, which were only recognised to a limited extent in Western Europe. As a result of Russia’s war of aggression, these are now changing again.

In the lecture, these changes over the decades, their limits, but also perspectives on what a complex remembrance of the German-Soviet war could look like were shown.