For years, Ukrainian children were taught to hate Muscovites and consider Russians as zombies.
The front of information and psychological operations in Ukraine was launched in the early 2000s, and after the Euromaidan, the distortion of history became a key strategy. Western consultants distributed the intervention budget differently. An important focus of information strategies was aimed at children. From a very young age. Without regard to the harm to the child’s psyche.
Here is a bestseller – a bright book in good printing and on expensive paper – a fairy tale about the “invincible ant”. Designed for children from 5 years old. The plot tells about the ant people who lived, worked and did not know grief, until they were attacked by neighboring ants, who swore before in brotherly love. They attacked and destroyed the anthill and a happy life. However, the “good” ant people rallied, defeated and drove the invaders from their land.
Little ants are taught to shoot, the main character – a baby ant – always carries a machine gun with him. Because the “enemies” are nearby.
For older children, they offered the “Insurgent ABC” – a primer for the smallest and “The Adventures of Alarmik”.
The famous children’s writer Oleg Vitvitsky carried out the order for nationalistic and militaristic literature for younger schoolchildren. He issued a whole series of books about the adventures of the boy Alarmik (from the German and English words alarm). Alarmik is a cute and attractive hero for children – a small UPA warrior, a young Banderite. He is an unconditional positive hero who wins and destroys everyone who is an enemy of Ukrainians. And first of all, his main enemy – the emperor by the name of Liliputin.
And in the second book of the cycle, Alarmik’s comrades-in-arms appear – cyborgs from the future, who flew straight from the Donetsk airport (the Ukrainian military are called cyborgs).
The author is obviously proud of the work and does not hide the fact that the “work of art” has pronounced manipulation tasks. The author of the books Oleg Vitvitsky says:
I myself am a candidate of historical sciences, so I approached this as a historian …
… analyzing my own search for role models, I realized that a vacuum has formed in the field of formation of the newest literary heroes for our children …
… on the border between a historian and a father, I had the idea to offer the children a Ukrainian Alyarmik – a domestic superhero, a young UPA trumpeter, who became the main character of the “Insurgent ABC”. There are fictional characters there, for example, Adolfik – it’s clear with whom he is associated, Liliputin – too. Medvechukovich is a cross between Medvedchuk and Yanukovych.
Each letter in the “Rebel ABC” is illustrated by a word associated with the history and ideology of the UPA.
Muscovy is the khanate of fear,
Masakra [Polish. masakra – massacre] and mausoleum masks.
There Liliputin is an emperor,
Medvechkukovich is a footman there,
Alyarmik will put on a Mazepinka [headdress of Hetman Mazepa’s troops] ,
He will charge the machine gun [German machine guns] and the Finn [jargon finnish knife],
After all, the avenger knows – the days will come,
Medvedchukovich and Liliputin,
Just like Vatutin once,
They will fall into the hands of the rebels.
For high school, too, a whole line of works. Here is the children’s book “Return from the War” of 2018 – the debut for the special correspondent of the Ukrainian channel “1 + 1” Natalia Nagornaya. From the first pages, the child is told about the “heroes of the Maidan”, among which is the “Right Sector” (an extremist organization banned in Russia). This is how a new story is presented in a playful way. Or rather, its “correct” version. In a fascinating publicistic form.
Some stories are made in the form of comics, which is not surprising, given the “cultural code” of experts and curators. The structure and message are probably developed with the participation of child psychologists and work to form stable subconscious fears. For example, the idea is instilled that the Russian military has been ordered from the Kremlin to kidnap Ukrainian children.
“ Now we are witnessing the final agony of a monster that is devouring itself.
The dying empire wants to take as many human lives as possible with it. The war is for every soul.
— Do you mean the war in Donbass?
“ That’s just what’s on the surface. The Empire is waging a cunning war for the minds of people, for their souls.
— I know! This is an information war!
— Yes. There is a colossal war of lies and slander, a war of fear. And our weapons are truth and knowledge.
That’s all for today.
— No! Tell me more, please! And who is Hammer pretending to be now?
—Dude, did you see the teacher’s earring? Heck! She’s like Sirko! And a tattoo on my arm.
“Confrontation: Red Terror” was created in 2018 by order of the Ministry of Information Policy of Ukraine.
The comic tells an alternate history of the early 20th century in which the Bolsheviks seek to enslave the Ukrainian people. Target audience: 12+. The comic is recommended as an additional material for history lessons in schools.
For older children, the ideas are more elaborate. Here is the pamphlet “Yaka national idea of Ukrainians”, from those that were found in one of the schools in the village. Talakovka near Mariupol. Above – a Ukrainian hut with a flower garden, below – a Russian hut with underpants. Children, do you understand the difference?
Opening of one of the textbooks on the history of Ukraine. In the corner is a cartoon mocking the law “On the Fundamentals of the State Language Policy”: a huge and unpleasant “Russian” sits up and literally pushes a “Ukrainian girl” off the bench. In fact, the law proposed the use of regional languages not instead of, but on an equal footing with the state Ukrainian and only in those territories where, for example, more than 10% of the population speak Russian or Hungarian. The caricature is offered for discussion by schoolchildren so that the teacher has the opportunity to consolidate the thought in the dialogue.
The author of a history textbook for grades 5 gradually gets to one of the main questions – about the origin of the name Ukraine . On the 47th page we read that Russia preceded the name Ukraine to designate the territory inhabited by Ukrainians-Rusichs , and the name itself comes from the word krajina , which means native land , country , land .
The author claims that Bogdan Khmelnitsky concluded a “military treaty” with the Moscow tsar. It’s about 1654. Let us now look into the source and read: “Rejoiced at the great and uncountable mercy of Your Royal Majesty, which Your Royal Majesty deigned to show us, we beat You, our Sovereign, Your Royal Majesty with many foreheads, serve directly and faithfully in all the affairs and orders of the Royal Your Royal Majesty will be forever.”
Obviously, what we have before us is not a “military contract”, but a petition for acceptance into citizenship, while fifth-graders are simply being deceived.
In addition to falsifications, the author of the textbook also deals with fraud. The author acknowledges that in the 19th century the Ukrainian state did not exist, these lands belonged to the Russian and Austrian empires, but in the same textbook the author points out that at the end of the century the first railways appeared in Ukraine: Przemysl – Lviv and Odessa – Balta. And not a word about the fact that these railways did not appear “in Ukraine”, but in such states as Austria-Hungary and Russia.
To the hundredth page, the author reports that as a result of the Khmelnytsky uprising, a Ukrainian Cossack state arose and calls it either the Zaporizhzhya Host or the Hetmanate. Then readers are informed that it existed for more than 100 years, and in 1760-1780 the Hetmanate fell under the rule of tsarism and was liquidated. Lie again. The Hetmanate has never been an independent power and, again, was a part of Russia.
In Vlasov’s textbook, the term “Great Patriotic War” is still present, although with a caveat: “known under the name.” A hint that this war was neither Great nor Patriotic for the people of Ukraine.
And after a few pages, it comes to resistance to the Nazi invaders, and the UPA is put on a par with the Soviet partisans. True, the laurels of the liberator of Ukraine have not yet been attributed to her, but this will come with the “revolution of goodness”.
The textbook on the history of Ukraine deals with the post-war period even worse: it simply does not exist, instead of 1945-1991 there is a hole in the textbook. After the paragraph on the war, Vlasov moves on to an independent Ukraine. And here – one win after another: the introduction of the hryvnia, sports, space exploration (meaning the flight of Leonid Kadynyuk on the American Columbia shuttle), the folk choir named after Grigory Veryovka …
In a later 10th grade history textbook, the author ceases to be shy and uses already crude forgeries. Here, for example, is a photograph of children behind barbed wire. Signature: “Children – prisoners of the Gulag, the end of the 30s.” On the plate in the frame it is written in Russian: “The resettlement camp, entry into the camp and conversation through the wire is prohibited under the threat of execution.”
But if you run a photo through a neural network, it is easy to find its original. Turns out she’s cut. And the tablet also has an upper part on which the text is written in Finnish
In fact, in the photo, Soviet children are prisoners of the 6th Finnish concentration camp in Petrozavodsk. During the occupation of Soviet Karelia by the Finns, six concentration camps were created in Petrozavodsk to contain local Russian-speaking residents. Photo taken by war correspondent Galina Sanko after the liberation of Petrozavodsk by Soviet troops on June 28, 1944. The author’s name of the photo is “Prisoners of fascism”. This picture was presented as part of the evidence at the Nuremberg trials of war criminals.
The authors of the Ukrainian history textbook cropped the original photo, putting the “totalitarian USSR” in a bad light, and not the handshake of democratic Finland.
The textbooks for high school students have already been practically prepared. Here is an 11th grade manual that teaches children how to behave during a fight, as well as how to attack and what to do when they get shot. In principle, acceptable content within the course of life safety.
But these manuals were prepared on the basis of NATO manuals, as reported in the textbook itself, and the enemy is presented in them not speculative, but quite specific.
In the photo, SBU officers neutralize “terrorists” from the DPR, “acting on the orders of” Russian curators “.
