LETTERS TO THE EDITOR (03/12/06)

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

'Wormwood Forest' and nuclear energy

Dear Editor:

Nuclear energy, its proponents like to tell us, is "clean" energy. In the case of Ukraine, proponents also push the idea that building more atomic energy stations will "save" Ukraine from being dependent on Russian oil. They don't like to talk about Three-Mile Island or Chornobyl. They don't like to talk about the fact that it is impossible to expect someone never to make a mistake at work (e.g., nuclear power plant operators). They don't like to talk about seismic activity under power plants (e.g., California). And they really don't like to talk about the problem of disposing of nuclear waste.

Nuclear power barons in the U.S., including members of Congress, want very much to build more nuclear power stations both in the U.S. and in Ukraine. The upcoming 20th anniversary of the world's worst nuclear disaster on April 26, therefore, is a public relations problem for these magnates, and they must want very much to suppress these unhappy memories to help smooth the way for doing business in both countries.

Coincidentally, Mary Mycio's "Wormwood Forest: A Natural History of Chernobyl" has come along and seems to put a best foot forward for nuclear energy. The animals in the zone are fine, and it seems that Chornobyl today even has three bars in the area! There are professional-looking tables showing the health effects on the liquidators. There is no mention, however, that the original liquidators of Chornobyl were not all volunteers. There is no mention of the macabre, Soviet-era nickname "chemists," given to those unfortunate religious and human rights dissidents who were forced to help clean up Chornobyl as punishment. But there is an assurance that the health effects of the liquidators are being carefully monitored. How the current administration is doing this is not explained.

Some other things not found in this allegedly authoritative work are footnotes. When queried on this point at her recent appearance in Washington, the author noted that the book's publisher, Joseph Henry Press, deleted Ms. Mycio's citations in her original manuscript because "the public doesn't like footnotes." Apparently neither the Joseph Henry Press nor the author has heard about such editorial amenities as endnotes.

No mention is made at all of the International Atomic Energy Agency and its infamous study that attempted to gloss over Chornobyl's aftereffects on human health and to popularize the idea that they were merely the population's radiophobia.

It's a sad thing if Ms. Mycio has allowed herself to become the handmaiden of the nuclear power industry, but it seems to be a definite agenda here. Joseph Henry Press is an imprint of the National Academies Press, the publishing arm of the National Academy of Sciences, which operates under a charter from the U.S. Congress.

Natalka Gawdiak
Columbia, Md.

Thanks for article on Tbilisi school

Dear Editor:

Please accept my thanks for publishing the article "A look at the Mykhailo Hrushevsky Ukrainian School in Tbilisi" by Yuriy Diakunchak in your January 22 edition.

Arising from the article, we have received a generous check from Mr. and Mrs. A. Traska of Keedysville, Md. As I am leaving for Tbilisi, Georgia, on February 13, I will hand-deliver the check to the school administrator, Anna Matvieva. The funds will help to keep the students warm and the needy fed.

I call upon the generosity of the Ukrainian Americans to join the Traskas to ensure that the Ukrainian diaspora, in general, and the Mykhailo Hrushevsky Ukrainian School, in particular, remain a permanent future of Georgian society.

Walter M. Kudryk
Toronto

The letter-writer is Georgia's honorary consul in Canada.

More on the term "nationalism"

Dear Editor:

Regarding the terms "nationalism" and "nationalists," as brought out in the article by your correspondent, Zenon Zawada, "Yevhen Stakhiv returns ..." (July 10, 2005) and in R.B. Worobec's "Pejorative meaning of nationalists" (December 11, 2005), permit me to offer some comments.

Messrs. Zawada, Stakhiv and Worobec are entitled to their views, as are all of us. However, when serious allegations of wrongdoing, and statements trivializing concepts, ideas and even ideals - long respected not only by fair-minded and patriotic Ukrainians, but by civilized people of the world - then that constitutes another issue.

It becomes particularly hurtful when scurrilous or denigrating remarks, in form of sweeping, generalizing statements, in the guise of some kind of assessment, without the presentation of valid specifics, are voiced by Ukrainians who have a role within the Ukrainian community. It seems that Mr. Worobec is greatly concerned with the "pejorative connotation" of anything nationalistic; also, that the freedom fighters during World War II (who, as is well-known, were sustained by the very idea of nationalism and the ideology emanating from it) cannot be so designated (i.e., nationalists), for the reason that it would be "too simplistic." Undoubtedly, a novel way of thinking.

What may be in vogue in the present-day press, which largely lowered its values and standards (look no further than The New York Times), brings no credit to this otherwise respected field and profession. How easy it is now to ignore historical facts, or to speak about them out of ignorance. Reliable source materials are accessible. A starting point may be a good, English-language dictionary, where one finds a comprehensive definition of nationalism.

Orest Subtelny, in his work "Ukraine, a History," devoted a substantial number of pages to nationalism as an ideology, which propelled the resistance forces of the various Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) formations.

Mr. Zawada would have significantly enhanced his article had he elaborated upon some pronouncements by Mr. Stakhiv, about whom he wrote. In particular, the latter's equating nationalism with totalitarianism must be noted.

Perhaps some facts of common knowledge merit mentioning here, to aid in clarifying this issue. As Ukraine, in the exceedingly difficult circumstances, was searching for ways to defend itself from Stalin's regime and then from Hitler's, as well as other neighboring enemies, nationalism was clearly a building force of resistance, obviously not one of siding or emulating any totalitarian entity. Should specific references to abuses in organizational control be cited (and they were not, in the mentioned articles), these did not and could not have diminished the value of nationalism as a concept and as an ideological movement, carried on so valiantly and for so long. Otherwise, the readers of Mr. Zawada's article understood that there is only one meaning and/or interpretation of the term, as formulated by Mr. Stakhiw.

It is regrettable that Ukrainian scholars, perhaps missing the above-mentioned articles, have kept silent. Their input as to the historical accuracy and objectivity in them would have been appreciated. Yet, memoirs and researched documentation exist and are available. In such situations, when terms are bandied about loosely, truth becomes the primary victim, and it ought to be illuminated with all the relevant evidence. An excellent example of this is the achievements of Dr. Taras Hunczak, as reflected in his many works, and recently in his article "Metropolitan Sheptytsky ..." (January 29).

I believe that the numbers of Ukrainian nationalists (in the true sense of the word, and those that were subsequently in the organized movement) who were annihilated by all the enemies of Ukraine, following the destruction of the Ukrainian National Republic and up to the fall of the Soviet Union, can be only estimated.

Yet if the "doubters" and the "deniers" of nationalism would ponder and visualize only one event out of that horrific period, this could possibly lead them to a "spiritual renewal." I have in mind a vision of a solitary man, the distinguished poet, scholar and nationalist leader Oleh Olzhych, chained to a cement floor, dying in a pool of blood after tortures in the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in 1944. He did not betray either his country or his Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, or his comrades-in-arms. Some of us respect such figures of our time, and the ideology for which they stood, to the end.

On a personal note: as a 5-year-old youngster I was keenly aware of events around me; during the war we grew up too fast. Tossed among my memories are images of soldiers of both occupiers, the Bolsheviks and the Germans, the young faces of the Ukrainian resistance organization in Volyn, and one funeral. It was a close person, my young and handsome uncle-to-be. With a number of comrades he fell in battle, defending a village from vicious and persistent attacks by an enemy underground force. No one told those thousands of young men and women - the "tsvit Ukrainy" of that time - that nationalism was somehow "bad."

Lest the ultimate sacrifice of many of them will have been in vain, may we remember them with reverence and respect, and leave the rewriting of history to the totalitarian minds.

Oksana Bakum
Highland, N.Y.

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