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Split Thread Canadian Parliament Honours Former Nazi Fighter

TurkeysGhost

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TurkeysGhost
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The first 29 posts of this thread were originally posted in the Russian Invasion of Ukraine thread, but it is clearly a separate, albeit related, topic. It is possible that in splitting the thread, some posts that should have been moved were not, and some posts were moved that should not have been. Please report any posts that you consider fall into either of those categories.
Posted By: Agatha




Whoops

Speaker of Canada's House of Commons Anthony Rota on Sunday apologized for paying tribute to a man who fought for a Nazi military unit during World War II.

The bungle occurred shortly after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressed the House of Commons on Friday. Canadian lawmakers then gave 98-year-old Yaroslav Hunka a standing ovation when Speaker Anthony Rota called attention to him.

Rota introduced Hunka as a war hero who fought with the First Ukrainian Division. This division was also known as the SS 14th Waffen Division, a voluntary unit that was under the command of the Nazis.
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https://www.dw.com/en/canada-house-speaker-apologizes-for-honoring-nazi-veteran/a-66912302

Part of a longer trend, which goes back well before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, of certain elements of the Canadian political establishment engaging in apologism and historical revisionism on behalf of the Ukrainian Waffen-SS division.

Canada (in concert with a broader British effort) famously offered refuge to some 2,000 members of the Ukrainian SS unit in the 1950s, who presumably were in fear of being rightly prosecuted as Nazi collaborators after the war by the USSR.

All SS units were declared criminal organizations in the Nuremberg trials.

Canadian MPs are tripping over themselves to distance themselves from the elderly Nazi they just honored.

The Speaker has made it clear that he was responsible for inviting this individual to the House. The government played no role. It did not know he would be there. The PM did not meet him. I am deeply troubled this happened. I urge MPs to avoid politicizing this incident.
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https://twitter.com/karinagould/status/1706059696400892330
 
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TurkeysGhost said:
It was included as part of an address by the current Ukrainian president, so, ya know, directly related to the war effort.

I agree with the implication of your point that Russia's "denazification" claims concerning Ukraine are entirely spurious and cynical. Probably would be better for Ukraine supporters to not pal around with literal nazis if they want to effectively counter this propaganda. It's really not that hard avoid doing Nazi revisionism, most people manage it every day without even thinking about it.
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are you inferring that Zelensky was involved in inviting that person to Canadian parliament?
 
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ginjawarrior said:
are you inferring that Zelinsky was involved in inviting that person to Canadian parliament?
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I'm saying whoever invited them thinks that the current Ukraine war and honoring literal members of the Waffen SS are related topics and was quite effective in making it seem like this was the official position of the Canadian state.

I agree though, there should be a thorough investigation to find out exactly who knew what before this shameful debacle. Either members of the Canadian Parliament are Nazi sympathizers or they have been deceived and made to look quite foolish by Nazi sympathizers, either seems like a scandal worth unraveling. Heads should roll.
 
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TurkeysGhost said:
I'm saying whoever invited them thinks that the current Ukraine war and honoring literal members of the Waffen SS are related topics and was quite effective in making it seem like this was the official position of the Canadian state.

I agree though, there should be a thorough investigation to find out exactly who knew what before this shameful debacle. Either members of the Canadian Parliament are Nazi sympathizers or they have been deceived and made to look quite foolish by Nazi sympathizers, either seems like a scandal worth unraveling. Heads should roll.
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I think that's a question for the Canadian parliament thread?

Unless of course you're transparently trying to smear Zelensky
 
ginjawarrior said:
I think that's a question for the Canadian parliament thread?

Unless of course you're transparently trying to smear Zelensky
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He's been smeared by appearing at this debacle, whether with his knowledge or not. Presumably he's also embarrassed by this massive screw up.
 
TurkeysGhost said:
He's been smeared by appearing at this debacle, whether with his knowledge or not. Presumably he's also embarrassed by this massive screw up.
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Pretty sure he's only got any responsibility for anything inside of Ukraine

What happens in a country he's a guest in is not his responsibility

At least to any honest and intelligent person
 
ginjawarrior said:
Pretty sure he's only got any responsibility for anything inside of Ukraine

What happens in a country he's a guest in is not his responsibility

At least to any honest and intelligent person
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Unfortunately, this is being used by dishonest people to influence non intelligent persons … :(
 
Flo said:
Unfortunately, this is being used by dishonest people to influence non intelligent persons … :(
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Yes, people tend to notice when a parliament honors a Nazi, and it does generally raise questions from people who think Nazism is bad.

Fortunately it seems the Canadian government isn't pretending this is not an embarrassing scandal, and they're in double time to try to minimize how bad this looks by openly admitting this was a massive screw up and making it clear they don't want to be seen as ambivalent on whether naziism is bad.

You understand that pretending this isn't a huge screw up is worse, right? People can smell a rat and anything but an unequivocal admission of error would be seen as highly questionable. Thank god they don't have their heads buried in the sand like some here seem to be advocating.
 
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TurkeysGhost said:
Fortunately it seems the Canadian government isn't pretending this is not an embarrassing scandal, and they're in double time to try to minimize how bad this looks by openly admitting this was a massive screw up and making it clear they don't want to be seen as ambivalent on whether naziism is bad.
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There seems to be a complete absence of any mention of the Canadian parliament's retraction/apology among Russian supporters online. I doubt it is reported at all on Russian TV. The fact that the guy was invited in the first place just keeps getting hammered on over and over and over again.
 
crescent said:
There seems to be a complete absence of any mention of the Canadian parliament's retraction/apology among Russian supporters online. I doubt it is reported at all on Russian TV. The fact that the guy was invited in the first place just keeps getting hammered on over and over and over again.
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That is how propaganda works. I'm sure footage of Zelensky enthusiastically cheering on a literal Waffen SS member will be a permanent addition to their canon, any correction or apology be damned.

I don't really buy the whole "whoopsie" argument. Someone(s) involved with this debacle knew better (though I am sympathetic to those truly caught unawares in the moment, that sucks). "Fought against the Russians in WWII" should be the kind of thing that leads to some rather obvious questions, even for people who aren't history buffs.

Hopefully whoever these Nazi sympathizers are get discovered and drummed out of Canadian government in disgrace forever. Considering Canada's more questionable approach to this issue broadly (a history going back well before the current war), I have my doubts.
 
I don't think it's fair to tar the foreign Waffen-SS troops as ideological Nazis. Ukraine was caught between them and the Communists. Only a tankie has trouble with the idea that maybe the Nazis were the lesser of two evils at the time. Even Finland switched sides a couple times, as their battle for existence progressed between two all-consuming fires.
 
theprestige said:
I don't think it's fair to tar the foreign Waffen-SS troops as ideological Nazis. Ukraine was caught between them and the Communists. Only a tankie has trouble with the idea that maybe the Nazis were the lesser of two evils at the time. Even Finland switched sides a couple times, as their battle for existence progressed between two all-consuming fires.
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I'm perfectly happy admitting the nuance exists and perhaps the morality exists somewhere closer to the middle, but "honor a literal SS soldier in the Canadian parliament" is not nuance and there's no good reason for it to ever happen other than being a nazi sympathizer.
 
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theprestige said:
I don't think it's fair to tar the foreign Waffen-SS troops as ideological Nazis. Ukraine was caught between them and the Communists. Only a tankie has trouble with the idea that maybe the Nazis were the lesser of two evils at the time. Even Finland switched sides a couple times, as their battle for existence progressed between two all-consuming fires.
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No, there's a difference between fighting alongside and joining the ******* SS.

**** the lot of them.
 
Andy_Ross said:
No, there's a difference between fighting alongside and joining the ******* SS.

**** the lot of them.
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Yeah Finland only joined Germany in war against the USSR they did not deport Jews and they did not support Germany in its war against the West.

Now is it possible this Canadian/Ukrainian guy only joined the Waffen SS out of a desire to fight back against the USSR? And had nothing to do with the atrocities committed by the SS? Sure. But the optics of this are so ******* terrible like... what the actual **** Trudeau.

Edited by Agatha: 
Edited to remove material pertaining to a different thread
 
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lobosrul5 said:
Now is it possible this Canadian/Ukrainian guy only joined the Waffen SS out of a desire to fight back against the USSR? And had nothing to do with the atrocities committed by the SS? Sure. But the optics of this are so ******* terrible like... what the actual **** Trudeau.
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Seems to me the appropriate way to thank a nation like Canada from saving you from being turned into mulch by the Soviets after the war is to stop reminding everyone how much you loved being a Nazi collaborator and politely pretend it never happened, but I suppose not everyone believes in common courtesy.

If this were a one-off you could maybe think it was an embarrassing oversight, but there is a longer history in Canada of trying to rehabilitate this Ukrainian SS unit
 
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Andy_Ross said:
No, there's a difference between fighting alongside and joining the ******* SS.
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If there's a different nation to fight for, yes. But AIUI German law forbade anyone not German (according to whatever twisted definition of "German" the Nazis were using at any given time) from serving in the Army, so the Waffen SS was the only organisation that people could fight in alongside the Germans if they weren't citizens of a nation allied to Germany. Not that that excuses them, of course, but for Ukrainians there wasn't actually a difference.

Dave
 
Andy_Ross said:
No, there's a difference between fighting alongside and joining the ******* SS.

**** the lot of them.
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The foreign Waffen-SS troops weren't cut from the same cloth as the German SS formations. The "SS" was a branding move, not a seal of authenticity.

---

ETA: Yes, yes, we know. Canadia is full of crypto-nazis, and the only genocidal fascists in Ukraine answer to Volodymyr Zelenskyy. /s
 
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crescent said:
There seems to be a complete absence of any mention of the Canadian parliament's retraction/apology among Russian supporters online. I doubt it is reported at all on Russian TV. The fact that the guy was invited in the first place just keeps getting hammered on over and over and over again.
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That is to be expected, and the idiots who have invited the guy should have known it. One wonders at how deliberate it was !

theprestige said:
I don't think it's fair to tar the foreign Waffen-SS troops as ideological Nazis. Ukraine was caught between them and the Communists. Only a tankie has trouble with the idea that maybe the Nazis were the lesser of two evils at the time. Even Finland switched sides a couple times, as their battle for existence progressed between two all-consuming fires.
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It is not only tankies who are ignorant of what the Ukrainian population had suffered at the hands of the soviets (holomodor …), which made the nazis' exactions feel benign by comparison. It however doesn't make the Ukrainian waffenSS innocent patriots.
We regularly have the same kind of conversation in France concerning the Alsatian "malgré nous" (loosely translated : unwillingly conscripted) who also joined the WaffenSS and would like to be considered innocent of all crimes (think Oradour)

TurkeysGhost said:
I'm perfectly happy admitting the nuance exists and perhaps the morality exists somewhere closer to the middle, but "honor a literal SS soldier in the Canadian parliament" is not nuance and there's no good reason for it to ever happen other than being a nazi sympathizer.
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Or a Russian sympathiser who saw a great occasion to discredit Zelenski and to undermine the case for supporting Ukraine …
 
Flo said:
Or a Russian sympathiser who saw a great occasion to discredit Zelenski and to undermine the case for supporting Ukraine …
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Are you suggesting this was a false flag attack perpetrated by someone with the power to bend the ear of Canadian members of parliament?
 
The "it looks bad" argument doesn't impress me, since it always only looks bad to people who have already decided to see Ukraine in a bad light.

It does make me wonder, though, about people who adopt the pose of "I understand what's going on, and I don't have a problem with it, but I worry that somebody else will have a problem with it."
 
theprestige said:
The "it looks bad" argument doesn't impress me, since it always only looks bad to people who have already decided to see Ukraine in a bad light.

It does make me wonder, though, about people who adopt the pose of "I understand what's going on, and I don't have a problem with it, but I worry that somebody else will have a problem with it."
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You mean like the many many millions of Americans whose knowledge of WW2 is mainly from the History Channel documentaries that they've watched? Who believe the clean Wehrmacht myth and only consider the SS as the bad guys. Who haver never even heard of the Holodomor. Who do not make any distinction between the Waffen-SS and the foreign Waffen-SS units. And who see Zelensky applauding a guy who they see "SS" associated with?

Am I worried this will give Russian propaganda some ammunition, that there will be many thousands of bots on social media spreading it, and it might erode support for Ukraine in the United States? Are you ******* serious?

ETA: I have developed a very low opinion of the average American when it comes to things like historical knowledge, context, and nuance. Maybe you haven't gotten there yet.
 
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lobosrul5 said:
You mean like the many many millions of Americans whose knowledge of WW2 is mainly from the History Channel documentaries that they've watched? Who believe the clean Wehrmacht myth and only consider the SS as the bad guys. Who haver never even heard of the Holodomor. Who do not make any distinction between the Waffen-SS and the foreign Waffen-SS units. And who see Zelensky applauding a guy who they see "SS" associated with?

Am I worried this will give Russian propaganda some ammunition, that there will be many thousands of bots on social media spreading it, and it might erode support for Ukraine in the United States? Are you ******* serious?

ETA: I have developed a very low opinion of the average American when it comes to things like historical knowledge, context, and nuance. Maybe you haven't gotten there yet.
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Are you suggesting that a member of the Ukrainian SS being honored at the Canadian parliament should not be widely considered an embarrassing scandal?

The "double genocide" version of history is a relatively modern form of historical revisionism and is considered a form of soft Holocaust denial. Am I misunderstanding you here?

The "Double Genocide" movement is a relatively recent initiative (though rooted in older apologetics regarding the Holocaust) that seeks to create a moral equivalence between Soviet atrocities committed against the Baltic region and the Holocaust in European history. Katz noted that the "Double Genocide" debate has garnered political traction/currency since the Baltic States joined the European Union in 2004. Since joining the EU, the Baltic States have attempted to downplay their nations' massive collaboration with the Nazis and to enlist the West in revising history in the direction of Double Genocide thinking. An important part of that effort has been for lawmakers to highlight the crimes committed by Soviets in the Baltic region during and after World War II. In 2008, lawmakers from the Baltic States, , among other new-accession European Union states, played a pivotal role in a January 2008 conference in Tallinn, Estonia, and then in June, 2008, in proclamation of the "Prague Declaration" which attracted wider support.

A major criticism of this movement is that Soviet crimes, while terrible, should not be equated to the crimes Nazi Germany inflicted throughout Europe, particularly genocide. Critics of the "Double Genocide" theory argue that its supporters are obfuscating (and downgrading)the Holocaust, without necessarily denying a single death. Conversely, those who subscribe to the idea of "Double Genocide" perceive their critics as sympathetic to Soviet rule, culturally pro-Russian, or soft on Communism.
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https://www.wilsoncenter.org/event/holocaust-revisionism-ultranationalism-and-the-nazisoviet-double-genocide-debate-eastern

I humbly suggest that you don't have to, and shouldn't, parrot Nazi nonsense in order to support modern Ukraine.
 
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Poland may seek to extradite the honored SS member for suspected war crimes committed by the unit.

A Polish government minister has launched a bid to extradite Yaroslav Hunka, the 98-year-old Ukrainian-Canadian man who fought in a German-Nazi division during World War Two and last week received a standing ovation in Canada’s parliament.

“In view of the scandalous events in the Canadian parliament, which involved honouring, in the presence of President Zelensky, a member of the criminal Nazi SS Galizien formation, I have taken steps towards the possible extradition of this man to Poland,” announced education minister Przemysław Czarnek.

...


Soldiers from the Ukrainian SS division that Hunka belonged to were involved in the massacres of around 850 ethnic Poles in the village of Huta Pieniacka – which before the war was part of Poland but now lies within Ukraine – according to the IPN.

Hunka himself was among around 600 members of the division who were allowed to settle in Canada after the war. He is now a dual Ukrainian-Canadian citizen.

In the 1980s, a Canadian commission of inquiry found that “charges of war crimes” against the Ukrainian SS division had “never” been substantiated

In 2017, Polish IPN prosecutors requested the extradition from the United States of another member of the Ukrainian SS division, Michael Karkoc, who had settled in Minnesota after the war. However, he passed away in 2019 aged 100 before the process could be completed.
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https://notesfrompoland.com/2023/09/26/poland-may-seek-extradition-of-ukrainian-nazi-ww2-veteran-hunka-from-canada/
 
TurkeysGhost said:
Are you suggesting that a member of the Ukrainian SS being honored at the Canadian parliament should not be widely considered an embarrassing scandal?

The "double genocide" version of history is a relatively modern form of historical revisionism and is considered a form of soft Holocaust denial. Am I misunderstanding you here?
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A scandal within Canadian politics... sure I guess. A legitimate reason to no longer support Ukraine against Russia? NO! But Russia will use it as propaganda and the weak minded will fall for it.


https://www.wilsoncenter.org/event/holocaust-revisionism-ultranationalism-and-the-nazisoviet-double-genocide-debate-eastern

I humbly suggest that you don't have to, and shouldn't, parrot Nazi nonsense in order to support modern Ukraine.
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I'm not even sure what to think about this. Separating fascism from Nazism is just as legit as separating communism from Stalinism. But, we should do a better job of recognizing other genocidal events actually happened, and this is completely separate and does not necessary "downplay" the Holocaust. Besides the Holodomor the Armenian genocide is another quasi-forgotten one that comes to mind.
 
lobosrul5 said:
A scandal within Canadian politics... sure I guess. A legitimate reason to no longer support Ukraine against Russia? NO!
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The Speaker of the House has just resigned.

It's world news. His resignation has made it onto CNN. It's a calamity, but it should in no way allow Russia to be empowered. This is a mistake, not an invasion tied to warcrimes. There's no comparison.
 
TurkeysGhost said:
Yes, people tend to notice when a parliament honors a Nazi, and it does generally raise questions from people who think Nazism is bad.

Fortunately it seems the Canadian government isn't pretending this is not an embarrassing scandal, and they're in double time to try to minimize how bad this looks by openly admitting this was a massive screw up and making it clear they don't want to be seen as ambivalent on whether naziism is bad.

You understand that pretending this isn't a huge screw up is worse, right? People can smell a rat and anything but an unequivocal admission of error would be seen as highly questionable. Thank god they don't have their heads buried in the sand like some here seem to be advocating.
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I note you have becoming more equivocal about US support for Ukraine in the past few months.
I am not surprised, supporting any war no matter how jusjtified just goes against the DNA of some on the left.
who benefits by making this a huge deal? Putin.
 
Jimbo07 said:
The Speaker of the House has just resigned.

It's world news. His resignation has made it onto CNN. It's a calamity, but it should in no way allow Russia to be empowered. This is a mistake, not an invasion tied to warcrimes. There's no comparison.
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Seems to be the best possible course of action to minimize how much propaganda harm is done by this blunder. I'm not really concerned about how Russia spins things, they're already committed to this war and will find a way to justify it regardless, but having Ukraine's backers seemingly play right into the narrative that supporting Ukraine means supporting neo-fascism was a terrible misstep.

Hopefully the head-rolling will be interpreted as a sincere correcting of the record.
 
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