The world will not forget or forgive

Bodies of men shot by Russian soldiers in Bucha.

The New York Times published an extraordinary story today about the massacre by Russian soldiers of eight Ukrainian men in the Kyiv suburb of Bucha on March 4.  Using video footage from a CCTV camera and a video taken by a homeowner nearby, the Times recreated the killings in excruciating detail.  The video footage does not show the men being shot, but it shows the men being led by Russian soldiers to a courtyard next to a building being used as a makeshift headquarters and hospital by Russian paratroopers.  Drone footage shot the day after the massacre shows the bodies lying in the courtyard with Russian soldiers standing next to them.  The bodies would remain where they lay for the next several weeks.

Russian military vehicles shown in the drone footage clearly indicate that the building was being used by Russian soldiers.  Weeks later, after the Russians had pulled out of Bucha, the Times recovered several documents indicating that soldiers from two Russian paratroop regiments had occupied the building.  Times reporters and photographers also documented blood, bullet holes and bullet casings from the area where the Ukrainian men were shot.  The casings were from two kinds of weapons carried by Russian paratroopers.

As reported by the BBC, the mayor of Bucha and other local authorities have said that as many as 1000 bodies of civilians were recovered from the area around Bucha after the Russians withdrew in early April.  According to the BBC, although some civilians died from artillery shrapnel and other violent causes, more than 650 were shot and killed by Russian soldiers.

There is photographic evidence of the corpses of civilians with their hands tied behind their backs shot at close range.  Some were shot in the back of the head, execution-style.  The Bucha mayor has told Ukrainian authorities that 260 bodies were recovered from mass graves in the town.

Russian authorities have claimed that the bodies are evidence of a so-called false-flag operation conducted by Ukrainians to stage killings and blame Russian soldiers for the dead civilians.  Drone and satellite footage, however, shows evidence of bodies lying along streets and in ditches dug for the purpose of burying the bodies at the time the Russians occupied the town of Bucha.

Atrocities are committed in every war.  Memorials and evidence of the horrors of Nazi occupation are everywhere in Europe, including in Ukraine.  Soldiers in our own army committed the murders of at least 350 civilians in the village of My Lai, Vietnam in March of 1968.  More than 8000 men and boys were massacred by the Bosian Serb army around the town of Srebrenica during the Bosnian war.  Nothing excuses the atrocities committed by Nazis or the massacre of civilians in My Lai by American soldiers or any other war crime for that matter.  Why these horrible massacres are carried out by ordinary people serving as soldiers is as much a mystery as why wars are fought in the first place.

Why Vladimir Putin made the decision to send his army into the country next door to Russia and use its military might to destroy its cities and kill thousands of its civilian citizens is a mystery that will necessarily be left to history.  What is not a mystery is that by doing what they have done to their neighbors, Russia has shown the world who they are and what they are capable of. 

The world will not forget what has happened in Ukraine, and the world will not forgive Russia for what it has done.  The next 50 years are going to be grim for Russia and its citizens.  Russia has turned itself into a pariah country.  They will not field their sports teams in soccer stadiums or in Olympic competitions, nor will Russian professional athletes be allowed to compete in other countries.  People will no longer line up to see the Bolshoi Ballet or listen to Russian orchestras play the music of Tchaikovsky.  Nobody is going to want to buy Russian products.  The people of Russia will not be welcome to travel to the countries of the great majority of the civilized world. 

Ukraine will be rebuilt and take its place as a healthy citizen in the community of nations, but Russia will not.  They have sentenced themselves to decades of international opprobrium.  Putin will die but Russia’s reputation as an outlaw country will not.