Remembering Babi Yar

FIFTY YEARS AGO, thousands of Jews were slaughtered by the Nazis in a ravine in the Ukraine at a place called Babi Yar. Until last week, there was no commemoration of their deaths and no marking of their mass grave. After decades of being ignored by the Soviet government, the newly independent Ukraine erected a memorial to those who were murdered at Babi Yar.

This belated recognition of the Nazi atrocity is more than another voice in the cry of "never again" invoked to warn the world against future horrors of fascism and genocide. It is also an important step towards democratization and ethnic tolerance for the fledgling nation of the Ukraine.

UNDER Soviet rule, the only recognition of the deaths at Babi Yar was a memorial erected in 1974 to Soviet resistance fighters that is a mile away from the ravine where the Jews were killed. The Soviet government refused to admit what happened at Babi Yar because it didn't fit into its state-mandated history.

Communist ideology did not recognize the existence of religious groups, and suppressed religious history. Because Jews were the only victims at Babi Yar, the event was ex-cluded from Soviet history books. So those who died at Babi Yar were symbolized by a non-specific Soviet resistance fighter in the distant memorial.

But while the Soviets refused to acknowledge the genocide on their soil, the massacre was a terrifying addition to the history of the Holocaust as recognized by the West. In 1961, Soviet poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko wrote a poem to memorialize those who died at Babi Yar. Family members of the victims kept their pictures, and last week they were finally able to mourn at the grave of their relatives.

No one but the Soviets forgot what happened at Babi Yar. And the lack of a proper memorial became another symbol of totalitarian oppression--this time the Soviet repression of ethnic minorities.

That is why this long-awaited recognition is so important for the Ukraine and for the former communist world. It is a remembrance of a true history rather than a convenient history or a propagandized history. Like the Vietnam Memorial, erected after years of denial and marginalization of the veterans of that war, the monument at Babi Yar is an important part of a history that many don't want to admit.

RECOGNITION OF THE atrocities of the Holocaust, however, is an important part of insuring that world does not fall back into the fascism experienced during World War II. "Never again" has become the rallying cry of Jews fighting the rising tide of anti-Semitism all over the world.

The philosophy behind the slogan is that if we remember what happened to Jews during the Holocaust, no people will have to suffer like that in the future. This philosophy could be especially helpful in the newly independent Soviet republics, where ethnic intolerance has been lingering since the time of the czars.

For Jews, this remembrance is not a new process. The Jewish religion is full of both comemorations of past tragedies and celebrations for having survived them all--slavery in Egypt, destruction of the Temples, expulsions from all the European countries, pogroms in Russia and the Holocaust.

Each generation not only recalls the tragedies but also tries to relive the experiences as if they were a personal occurence. By remembering in such a vivid way, we adopt the strength of the previous generation, and we are able to build and survive no matter what obstacles ob-struct our path.

Remembering the Holocaust is different for Eastern European non-Jews than it is for Jews. It means in part admitting guilt--ad-mitting that something as horrible as the Holocaust happened in the Ukraine. And while citizens of the Ukraine may not be oppressors today, their ancestors stood by while Jews were being led off.

The situation is similar to the United States' coping with its past treatment of Native Americans, African Americans and Japanese Americans. Not every American today is directly guilty of mistreating these peoples, but we all assume the guilt of American history. As this history shows, it takes a long time for a country to admit it was wrong in the past. And it takes a long time to make up for past abuses.

COMING TO TERMS with history is important because we can learn from our mistakes. In order for any lessons to take hold, though, we first have to admit that we made the mistakes. The people of the former Soviet Republics, for instance, will only cease their ethnic fighting once they realize that their long-standing intolerance is pointless. Otherwise, they will continue to fight until they destroy each other.

The best thing that the Ukrainian government could do to separate itself from the control of the Soviet regime and the current ethnic unrest is to acknowledge the horrors of the past, and remember them so that they never happen again.

By building a memorial to those who were murdered at Babi Yar, the Ukraine is taking an important first step towards a responsible historicism and a bold new democratic society.

Over Babi Yar, there are no memorials. The steep hillside like a rough inscription. I am frightened. Today I am as old as the Jewish race. I seem to myself a Jew at this moment. I, wandering in Egypt. I, crucified. I perishing.

From the poem by Yevgeny Yevtushenko