Slavenka Drakulic: We all have to choose between good and evil
There is a verdict by the Ukrainian court on Russian soldier who has killed a civilian in Sumy. What is such practice of immediate justice like in the world? Is it widespread? Would such approach be useful so criminals could not hide from justice? – I am not an expert in law practice in the time of war, but from what I read this does not happen often. Very probably because the circumstances in the country at war make trials difficult. However, the aim of such trials is above all a symbolic one. The message is very clear: your crime will be punished now! It is meant to frighten the enemy but it is hard to say how effective it is. For me, that trial of Vadim Shishimarin was very interesting from another point of view. It demonstrates the role that circumstances play in becoming a war criminal. He was running away with his companions in the stolen car. They saw an elderly man on the bicycle, phoning. They panicked and Vadim got an order to shoot him. At first he refused but the superior commander insisted. Nervous and afraid of his superior, he shot the man. At the trial he admitted his crime and expressed regret to the man’s wife. – In your book «They Would Never Hurt A Fly: War Criminals on Trial in The Hague» you describe the events that took place in the era when the Internet was not so popular yet. To what extent does access to information affect the actions of the military? Can videos of war prevent the desire to take part in it, or on the contrary, do they inflame hatred even more? We often see the Russian soldiers openly humiliate Ukrainians in social networks, without even hiding that their goal is the genocide of Ukrainians.
Internet, like any technology, is not positive or negative per se. It depends who is using it and how. Social networks are for sure playing a big role today, they are themselves a space for war, especially because of anonymity of the participants. But I think that something else influenced the war: war propaganda. Russia needed to prepare their country and the soldiers for the occupation of Ukraine. They were told that the soldiers, in a brief, limited military action, would save Russian speaking people in Ukraine from the Nazi government there. Not only soldiers, but the entire Russian people were told that. Apparently, majority believed , at least at the beginning. To evoke Nazis is a very strong and dangerous symbolism and association. – Recently, there was a scandal in Ukraine related to the publication emphasizing that the Ukrainian ombudswoman make up some sexual crimes commited by Russians. How do you perceive this information? Is these information timely? How might such article
Affect the ajudication of sexual assault cases with the international court? – We have to monitor every information through the looking glass of propaganda and ask ourselves: who benefits from this information? Inventing crimes is nothing new on either side, victim side is inventing cases to make her country even bigger victim. Lies and disinformation are often part of war propaganda, but at the end they are harmful because they diminish the credibility of the source and of the side placing those lies. – What are the main differences between the Russian-Ukrainian war and a conflict in Yugoslavia, apart from the absence of a religious component in the case of Ukraine? How did the international political community resolve the conflict? How did they do it then and now?
There are some similarities. For example, Putin is using the same justification for the aggression as Slobodan Milošević: “saving” Russian, that is Serbian people in the other state. They are using similar vocabulary as well, almost Orwellian: lie is truth, defeat is victory etc. But the differences between wars (1991.-1995.) in former Yugoslavia are bigger. No one in the EU was afraid of what they saw as small wars in their backyard, they were not dangerous for Europe. Besides, there was no unity in supporting countries fighting the Serbian aggression, like now for Ukraine. No wonder. Ukraine is a big country and Russia the enemy with nuclear armament directly threatening the EU.
-Did the annexation of Crimea free Putin’s hands? How should the world have acted? – The fact that there was no strong reaction, apart from verbal ones, surely helped him. – What are the signs that Putin is an international war criminal? How do you asses his behavior in public? What motivates him – a desire to be a tyrant or a desire to bring back Ukraine to the hands of the USSR? Will Putin survive the trial in The Hague? How soon will this happen? How do you envisage it? – It is not up to me or to any individual person, except qualified judges of a legal court of law, to pass such a judgment. on any perosn There is a procedure and an institution has to start investigation into war crimes – it is usually long and not easy to prepare ta case for prosecution because it includes witnesses, documents, proofs of involvement ,etc… At the moment there is no international court willing to accuse Putin. In other words, it is useless to speculate what would happen if Putin would end on trial. To answer your other question, I am not in favor of the type of a political analysis that focuses on a personality of one man, Putin, his psychological profile, health etc. I don’t think it tells us much about the war and where is it going. – Is peace between Ukrainians and Russians possible? How many
Years (generations) are needed for this? What does Balkan’s experience say about this?
Of course it is possible, if it was possible between Germany and France or the Great Britain after the World War II. These two countries, Russia and Ukraine, will remain to exist next to each other, they are not going away. We don’t know if majority of Russians, although not actively expressing their protest against the war, are supporting it. I suppose that people there are afraid, media can not even use word “war” in their news… Peace is a slow process, for sure it will take time and effort. It is never easy to begin reconciliation – but judging from my experience, people on both sides will start to communicate and visit each other much before their governments formally do the same. The war destroys connections between people, but not all of them, not all old friendships and familly relations are gone. – Do you see the disintegration of Russia into several independent national states? Under what circumstances and when could this happen?
I could only guess, I would need to have much better insight than I have in order to predict that. But for any political change to happen, a critical mass of citizens is needed. It is not clear if such mass exists when it comes to dissent of various nation-states there. – Do you support the opinion that the war is the common guilt of Russians? What mistakes did they make? How will the topping of the president of Russia affect the imperial ambitions of this country?
If Russia would be a fully-fledged democracy, than its’ citizens would be responsible. Democracy gives citizens power to decide, to support or not a leader who wants a war. I am afraid that Russia is not such a country, many political patterns are inherited from the previous regime. It means that its citizens are used to fear that makes them collaborate with the autocratic regime there. Therefore, the question is how much could citizen really decide and influence politics? How free are they to express their political views? – What crimes committed during the Ukrainian-Russian war have stuck you the most with their brutality?
Killing civilians, like in Bucha. Or raping women. Civilians are victims of terrible brutalities in all wars. From that point of view, wars are the same. A crying mother with a child in her arms is an iconic photo that you will see regardless if it is Ukraine, Bosnia, Afganistan, Somalia or any other country at war. – In your book, you mention that one of the Balkan soldiers did not want to participate in the executions, but did not stop after the first shot. During the Bucha and Irpen massacres, Russian soldiers
Received commands to exterminate the civilians from their commanders. How is the transformation of a person into a killer viewed from the point of psychology? Can a person return to normal life after that without showing aggression?
Well, I had to write a whole book in order to show how that happens. In a few sentences, I do not think that there is an inborn predisposition, that certain people are destined to become murderers and criminals and others not. We all have in us a possibility to choose, we know difference between good and evil. There are two factors that determine what your choice will be: one is war propaganda, the other is a set of circumstances. When war propaganda tells a soldier that the enemy should be killed, he has to believe that he is facing the enemy and he is not going to be persecuted for killing him. As I mentioned before, the force of circumstances and coincidences in becoming a war criminal is well demonstrated in the case of the first sentenced Russian soldier, Vadim Shishimarin.