The Soviet Union at War: Contested Chronologies of World War Two

Dates of events might be considered objective facts, open to neither debate nor contestation.

Yet periodisation – that is, setting the start and end dates of a particular time period in history – is very much a matter of interpretation. Indeed, where the historian (or history teacher) chooses to begin or end a historical period can determine not just the length of the period in question, but also its meaning and significance.

This is made clear in the case of the Soviet Union’s Second World War by Mark Edele’s excellent 2021 overview, Stalinism at War.

Urbicide: (Re-)conceptualising Urban Annihilation through History

In September 1941, the German Wehrmacht put the Soviet city of Leningrad under siege. It would not be lifted for almost 900 days.

By that time, the toll on the city and its inhabitants had become immense. Shortly before the siege began, around 400,000 people, mostly children, were hurriedly evacuated. Those left behind were subjected to daily bombardment, starvation, and chronic fuel shortages.

By the end of the siege, in January 1944, some 800,000 people had died of starvation and up to 200,000 more had been killed by military attacks or in fighting to defend the city.

Death, Survival, Resistance: What can we tell of the Holocaust in the USSR?

A few months ago, I posted a poll on several Facebook teacher groups, asking whether teachers of Russian and Soviet History explicitly taught the Holocaust in their A-Level and GCSE classes.

The poll was highly unscientific, with a limited and self-selecting sample (and all the accompanying risks for reliability that entails). Yet it indicated a clear and remarkable trend.

Just under 10% of respondents reported teaching the Holocaust explicitly; a little over one-third partly; and over one-half said they didn’t teach it at all.

In fact, none of this came as much of a surprise. When I had begun teaching Russian and Soviet History at A-Level, I had not originally considered including the story of the Holocaust on Soviet soil.

Why should I?

It wasn’t part of our exam-board’s specification. Accordingly, it also wasn’t part of the textbook I had originally used to plan my lessons. And in any case, couldn’t I assume my students had already learned about the Holocaust in Year 8 or 9?