easier to lay all the blame for the pogroms on Petliura and the Ukrainians
rather than on Denikin and his Russian generals. (Orest Subtelny, Ukraine: A
History, 1994, pp. 363-364).
The Jewish accusation against Petliura is that maybe he could have done more to prevent the
pogroms. Well, maybe and maybe not. In any case, it is not fair for 60 Minutes to describe a
man who implemented vigorous measures to protect Jewish interests and to stop the pogroms - but
maybe could have done more - as "the man who slaughtered 60,000 Jews." Further insight into
Symon Petliura's attitudes may be gleaned from the Petliura page on the Ukrainian Archive.
(16) Blessing the SS. Mr. Safer informs us that "for this reunion [of Galicia Division veterans
in Lviv recently], Cardinal Lubachivsky, head of the Ukrainian Catholic Church, gave his
blessing, just as a predecessor did to the SS more than 50 years ago." The blessing of this predecessor was likely the blessing of Bishop Kotsylovskyi and was a blessing of the Galicia
Division, which as we have seen above was not quite the same thing as the German SS.
(17) The immaturity of blaming others. Mr. Safer tells us that "Western Ukraine also has a
long, dark history of blaming its poverty, its troubles, on others." Of course, no evidence of
any unusual tendency to blame others is provided - but then the sharing of hatred such as Mr.
Safer's is not an evidentiary matter, but is rather the warm feeling you get when you pass along
a stereotype and your partners in hatred accept the stereotype without asking for evidence.
But we may ask Mr. Safer just what it was that he might have had in mind. Perhaps it was the
Ukrainian Holocaust that Ukraine should accept as its own fault and stop blaming others for?
Perhaps it was the devastation wrought during the Second World War that Ukraine should start
accepting as its own fault? Or maybe it was the eight decades of Moscow's strangulation of
Ukraine's economy that Ukraine has really no one to blame for but itself? Ukraine has so many
such calamities to choose from that it is impossible to guess - perhaps Mr. Safer would be kind
enough to simply tell us precisely which of them he thinks it is that Ukraine should be mature
enough to accept responsibility for having brought upon itself.
(18) Dividing Ukraine. 60 Minutes gave the impression that its story focussed solely on Western
Ukraine, when in fact a portion of it came from Central Ukraine. Rabbi Bleich's full title, for
example, is not "Chief Rabbi for the Ukraine," but rather "Rabbi of Kiev and Ukraine," (where
Kiev is in central Ukraine) and although 60 Minutes gave the impression that he was interviewed
in Lviv, he was in reality interviewed in Kiev. Similarly, while Mr. Safer was in the middle of
interviewing representatives of the Ukrainian Catholic church in Lviv and was saying "The
Cardinal's deputy, Monsignor Dacko, denies traditional anti-Semitism in the Ukraine....", the
viewer was being shown St. Volodymyr's cathedral which unlike Monsignor Dacko was in Kiev and
which unlike Monsignor Dacko is Orthodox rather than Catholic. I suppose that 60 Minutes
committed itself to the scene-setting introduction "... and the West, where we go tonight ...",
and then suppressed the Kiev origin of some of its material so as to give the story the
appearance of having a consistent locale; and perhaps as well 60 Minutes wished to restrict its
smearing to Western Ukrainians so as to promote divisions within the country.
(19) Freedom from slavery is too much freedom (for Ukrainians, anyway). The title of the 60
Minutes broadcast, "The Ugly Face of Freedom" is puzzling. The freedom being referred to must
be the freedom from Russian rule, and so the title suggests that Ukraine would be better off
back within the Russian empire.
But Morley Safer's suggestion is inappropriate for three reasons. First, anti-Semitism is
strong in Russia and weak in Ukraine (Ukraine has no counterpart of either Pamyat or
Zhirinovksy), and so it is unclear how falling back under Russian rule would assist Ukraine in
avoiding anti-Semitism. Second, Ukraine's current problems are more rationally seen as being
the result not of too much freedom, but of too little - specifically, Ukraine's problems are the
result of continuing to be ruled by the old Communist nomenklatura that had originally been
appointed from Moscow and that presently is robbing the country blind while obstructing economic