On Thursday, February 9, the Young Initiative hosted journalist and author Katie Stallard for Weaponizing History.
A Senior Editor for China and Global Affairs at the New Statesman and author of Dancing on Bones: How Past Wars Shape the Present in Russia, China, and North Korea, Katie Stallard spoke about how the autocratic regimes of the three countries have exploited historical narratives to advance their agendas.
Stallard first discussed how history was distorted in 2014 during Russia’s annexation of Crimea. She described how militia volunteers professed hatred of the Ukrainian government, claiming it was full of “barbarians and fascists.” There are parallels between this rhetoric and the claims made by Russia to justify the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, where Putin is claiming to be leading a campaign of “demilitarization and denazification”. Stallard went on to describe the use of Victory Day commemorating the Great Patriotic War by the Kremlin to call back to Russia’s strength in the past.
On China, Stallard spoke about how the history of the Second Sino-Japanese War has been altered by the CCP, changing details such as the start date and place (July 1937 at the Marco Polo Bridge to now September 1931 in Shenyang as of 2017). It was noted that Xi Jinping firmly believed that part of the reason for the downfall of the USSR was that they allowed too much historical scrutiny, weakening the Union. Consequently, the CCP put a heavy focus on the Communist revolution as well as the erasure of Chiang Kai-shek as a leader of China. In schools, Chinese students are taught a history of China that focuses on the suffering of its people.
To conclude, Stallard recounted her trip to North Korea and the key myths that are promoted by the Kim regime. First, Kim Il-Sung liberated Korean Peninsula from Japan in 1945 single-handedly. The reality is that Kim Il-Sung was not in Korea at this time but in Russia. Second, the United States (and South Korea) started the Korean War, but Kim II Sung defeated them despite the reality that North Korea invaded the south first. The Kim family is portrayed as keeping North Korea safe from Western harm. Stallard finished the talk with a Q&A with students, which brought up how the United States is witnessing this control of historical narratives firsthand with the attacks on education from Ron DeSantis in Florida. This serves as a reminder that attacks on history and control of historical narratives are not at all limited to authoritarian governments.
