WORLD WORLDWIDE EUROPE UK - news journal UPDATE - (en) UK, ACG: Makhno in the service of the Ukrainian war effort (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

 The state often makes use of its former opponents once they are safely

dead and no longer the threat they were in life. The Ukrainian state and
its media have done this with the legendary anarchist communist Nestor
Makhno. ---- Makhno, a native of Huliaipole in the Zaporizhzhia region
of Ukraine, was a lifelong anarchist revolutionary. The son of poor
peasants, he joined his local anarchist communist group in 1906,
subsequently spending nine years in prison for his involvement with the
killing of a district police officer. Whilst in prison he developed his
politics and when liberated by the Provisional Government in 1917, he
returned to his home town and was elected chair of the local carpenters
and metal workers union and the local Soviet of Peasants and Workers
Deputies and threw himself into the maelstrom of the Russian revolution
in Ukraine. He has become most well known for leading the Revolutionary
Insurgent Army, also known as the Black Army. This politico-military
force combatted the White counter-revolutionary armies and, eventually
the Red Army. But it also vigorously fought Ukrainian Nationalists, a
faction of whom had murdered Makhno's brother, Omelian. Makhno was no
friend of any sort of nationalism - neither Ukrainian or Russian. The
'Makhnovist' movement attempted to create free territory based on
self-managed communes. The largest of these was named after Rosa
Luxemburg, the Polish Marxist of Jewish descent. Hardly the actions of
Ukrainian nationalists!

But that hasn't stopped Makhno being claimed as a Ukrainian patriot,
despite all the evidence to the contrary. Whilst this started before the
Russian invasion, it has increased during the war with many fighters
claiming to be in the tradition of Makhno and with nationalists using
imagery associated with the Makhnovists. This took an interesting turn
with the destruction of the Huliaipole Museum on August 23rd this year,
following a Russian missile attack. This local museum centres
Huliaipole's most famous son and the movement associated with his name,
with displays and permanent exhibitions. The exhibits, however, were
moved into central State storage facilities for safekeeping away from
the frontline town the day before the attack.

The destruction of the museum, seen as a direct attack upon Ukrainian
and Zaporozhzian culture, has been used to whip up patriotic sentiment
and Makhno's memory, reimagined as a national hero - a sort of national
anarchist - has been used to mobilise support for war at a time when
resistance to conscription is its highest point since the beginning of
the conflict.

Added to this, the Huliaipole's statue of Makhno, which was partially
destroyed by a Russian attack on May 23rd, has recently been replaced
with fanfare with the addition of a Ukrainian national flag in the hand
of a man who never would have held it in real life. The replacement has
hoped to raise morale in a town where the only civic building still
fully functioning was the museum. Since May 2023 no ATMs, no doctors,
with only 1 shop open 2 hours per day accepting only cash, and only 600
civilians remaining from a pre-war 14,000.

Odessa based historian, Vyacheslav Azarov gives some background to
attempts to co-opt Makhno to the nationalist cause:
"The first campaign to privatise Makhnovism by nationalists began during
the "orange" demonstrations of 2004 and the subsequent rule of Victor
Yushchenko. The organizers of the first Maidan tried to compare their
political technology events with the people's liberation of Huliaipole,
and the patriotic grant activists led by Oles Doniy actively called for
the "posthumous Ukrainisation" of Makhno. They did not hide the fact
that the appropriation of Makhnovist heritage was necessary for the
purpose of promoting nationalist ideology in the territories of the
South-East, which was hostile to the Banderist movement. The peak of
this campaign was the ceremonial installation of the monument to the
Batko in Huliaipole, which was organized by the then Minister of
Internal Affairs Yuriy Lutsenko with the financial support of a
well-known oligarch from Zaporozhye. The monument is certainly good -
but the fact that the police minister stood behind it, who then dropped
the phrase: "if you want, call me a racist!", gave the events an absurd
character. This political privatisation has been seen at the
Independence Day with Makhno festival, which was held in Huliaipole for
several years in a row under the patronage of the same Lutsenko.
Banderist flags were flying over the concert venue, anti-Semitic and
xenophobic slogans were heard from the stage, the organizers forbade
performing Russian-language songs and generally speaking Russian on
stage - the native language for the absolute majority of Huliaipole
residents. Uncommitted guests of the Makhnofest noted the dominance of
nationalists and reactionary rhetoric - suffice it to say that the cult
Odessa Nazi Maxim Chayka took part in it. And all this completely
contradicted the ideas and views of the outstanding Ukrainian anarchist."

Sad and bitter days in the birthplace of Makhno.

https://www.anarchistcommunism.org/2024/09/25/makhno-in-the-service-of-the-ukrainian-war-effort
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