It took Soviet Russia five decades to come clean about Katyn.
EPA/Wojciech Pacewicz
Soviet Russia had a policy of denying its responsibility for war crimes. It looks as if Putin’s Russia may be following suit.
Canadian parliamentarians and guests give Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy a standing ovation as he.
addresses Parliament on March 15, 2022 in Ottawa.
THE CANADIAN PRESS/Adrian Wyld
Canada is arming and supporting Ukraine in the face of the Russian invasion. At various points in its history, it’s been everything from an invader to an arms supplier to invaders, not defenders.
Russian soldiers celebrating the annual Victory Day parade in Moscow in June 2020.
EPA-EFE/Dumitru Doru
There are reports of very low morale among Russian troops in Ukraine.
A Ukrainian police officer is overwhelmed by emotion after comforting people evacuated from Irpin on the outskirts of Kyiv on March 26, 2022. History shows that wars launched for nebulous reasons generally backfire on those who launch them.
(AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)
It’s difficult for regimes to galvanize public opinion or maintain people’s willingness to accept the sacrifices associated with a war waged for questionable reasons.
TT News Agency | Alamy Stock Photo
The Russian embassy in Vilnius now sits on Ukrainian Heroes’ Street (Ukrainos Didvyrių g.), a direct response to the war.
Cardiff Philharmonic came under fire for removing the Russian composer Tchaikovsky from its performance schedule, in response to the Ukraine war.
IanDagnall Computing | Alamy Stock Photo
Russian citizens in the west are being targeted in much the same way Germans, Italians, and Japanese were during the second world war.
Jonathan Markovitch, the chief rabbi of Kyiv, Ukraine, arrives with his grandchild at Ben Gurion Airport in Israel.
AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo
A Kyivan Jewish scholar explains the long history of Jews in Kyiv and how they thrived, despite hostilities. They were forced to flee from the city many times – but always came back.
The historic centre of Lviv has been listed as a Unesco world heritage site since 1998.
AlexelA | Alamy Stock Photo
The west Ukrainian city has long been both a symbol of Ukrainian identity and an effevescent, multicultural hub.
Australian War Memorial
Australian defence force bands only formally welcomed women in the 1980s – but during the second world war, women often performed with the RAAF bands.
A resident sits outside a destroyed apartment building after it was hit by artillery shelling in Kyiv, Ukraine, on March 14, 2022.
(AP Photo/Felipe Dana)
Military behaviour usually becomes more restrained when troops feel securely in control of a city. That means Ukrainian civilians may bear the brunt of growing Russian military frustration.
Penicillin ushered in the antibiotics revolution, with amazing results during war and peace.
Science & Society Picture Library/SSPL via Getty Images
Albert Alexander was the first known person treated with penicillin. While his ultimately fatal case is well known in medical histories, the cause of his illness has been misattributed for decades.
Ukraine could use war bonds to tap into the broad international outrage over Russia’s invasion.
AP Photo/Leo La Valle
A historian explains how the US has used war bonds to both fund its wars and inspire patriotism among Americans.
A woman pays homage at the memorial to victims of the 1941 Nazi massacre of Jews in Babi Yar in Kyiv, Ukraine.
AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky
Over two days in September 1941, more than 33,000 Jews were murdered by Nazi forces and their Ukrainian collaborators in Babi Yar.
The Volodymyr the Great monument, erected in 1853, in Kyiv. Volodymyr was a warlord who became the first Russian ruler to convert to Christianity in the late 900s. A similar statue was erected in Moscow in 2016 as a counter to Ukraine’s.
(Shutterstock)
As an independent country, Ukraine has suffered from corruption, poverty and violent periods, but Vladimir Putin’s view of Ukrainian history in Ukraine is deeply, perhaps deliberately flawed.
Since 2020, Belarus and Russia have accelerated moves towards integration.
Pictorial Press Ltd | Alamy Stock Photo
By allowing Russian military presence in Belarus, president Aliaksandr Lukashenka has forfeited his country’s sovereignty.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, left, and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz sit far apart during talks in the Kremlin in Moscow a week before Russia invaded Ukraine.
(Mikhail Klimentyev, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)
Just because deep-rooted Russian fears might not seem reasonable doesn’t mean they aren’t real in Vladimir Putin’s mind.
Emilio Morenatti/AP/AAP
In the space of one week, some of the old certainties about Europe have been thrown out the window.
Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch Kirill, center, attends a ceremony consecrating the Cathedral of Russian Armed Forces outside Moscow.
Andrey Rusov, Defense Ministry Press Service via AP
To understand Russia’s war in Ukraine, look to the blend of religious and militaristic nationalism under Putin – on full display in the Church of the Russian Armed Forces.
EPA-EFE/Marcin Gadomsky
History tells us that neutrality rarely works as a mechanism for preventing conflict.
NATO has struggled to remain unified in recent years.
NATO via Flickr
Existing alliances arose in the wake of World War II, when global politics were very different and today’s challenges were yet unimagined.