Geen más mentiras: mi abuelo era nazi

Mientras crecía en Chicago during the Free War, mis padres my enseñaron a come to me herencia lituana. We sing Lithuanian songs and recite poems Lithuanian; the sábados, after the Lithuanian school, papia’s tortilla in the Lithuanian style.

My abbot, Jonas Noreika, was a very important part of my family’s history: he was in charge of a revolt against the Soviet Union in 1945-1946 and executed it. Have a photo taken in military uniform in our hall. Today, is not a single hero in my family: he has calls, places and a school with his name. If the condition is Cruz de Vytis, the Mayor, honorary Postalumo de Lituania.

In his deathbed, in the year 2000, my mother told me to write a book about her father. Accepted with enthusiasm. But while rebuscaba between the material, found a 1941 document with his company and all changes. The history of my life was much darker than what I saw.

I was told that the man I considered a savior and that I was very likely to be rescued by the Jews during the Second World War In reality, it has been ordered that all the Jews of its region in Lithuania be reunited and that they be sent to a ghetto where there will be riots, food alterations, tortures, violets and assassinations. More than 95 per cent of the Lithuanian Jews will die during the Second World War, many of them will be assisted by the enthusiastic collaboration of their neighbors.

Of course, I have no idea who I was in, what Lithuania was and how I found my own history in everything. How can the truth be reconciled? Is Jonas Noreika a monster who massacred thousands of Jews or a hero who tried to save his countrymen?

These questions indicate a path that will help me to understand the power of memory policy and importance of making a correct collection, including a un gran costo personal. I came to the conclusion that I have been living with a man of paradise, as well as Lithuania, a first-class prisoner of war between the Nazi and Communist occupations during the Second World War and a trampled city through the Iron Curtain for the next 50 years.

In this sense, Lithuanian quizzes are like many other countries that pass 50 years before the Soviet occupation. During this time, the world is conquering: Lithuanians only have the right to have citizenship soviets fueron assesinados durante la Segunda Guerra Mundial. References to the Jewish victims were carried out by the occupiers. I like to think that, If Lithuania wants to be a free and independent nation of the Second World War, it will be able to reconsider its proposal in the Holocaust.

Correcting historical memory results in pain. When the official history of the life of my father was publicly questioned, he was supported by the Lithuanian community of Chicago and Lithuania. I am an agent of the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin. Lithuanian leaders believe that the identity of their country depends on access your heroes, at the expense of the world.

Jonas Noreika’s short stories will hicieron more easily obscure him malo al accentuar lo bueno. Prohibition of probes, hubo many negative things.

In 1933, when he was a young soldier of the Lithuanian court, he wrote: “Lift up your head Lithuanian” (Levanta la cabeza, lituano), the equivalent lituano of “Mi lucha”, which encourages the judiciary to address the issue of Lithuania’s problems. In June 1941 he directed a levation against the Soviets although collaborating with the Nazis. In July, he ordered assigned to the 2,000 Plunge Jews, the city of the one who directed the levantamiento. In August, the Germans welcome the welcome as new jefe de distrito de la region de Siauliai y ese mismo mes firmo ordnes para enviar a miles de judíos a su muerte. Bajo su mando fueron assesinados casi 8.000 judíos.

In the version of the story that now celebrates the Lithuanians, I now and others like it were obliged by the Germans to sign their documents. Geen hindernis, cuando indagué más, my enteré de que convert in jefe de distrito the proportion to the best case of the region, approximately 1000 ryksmerke to me and a job for me abuela. So is my sonaba more to the temptation than the coaxion.

If he goes to the Nazis, not to salvage Jews, he is to treat the recruits for the SS. In March 1943, he was sent to a Nazi concentration camp. Released in early 1945 and recruited by the Red Army. It is the same as the commencement of the Revolution against the Soviets., which took place to be the liberators of Lithuania to its occupiers. The Soviets will capture him in March next. Fue executed in February 1947 at the age of 36 years.

Transform into a Nazi collaborator in a national hero requires four steps of manipulation. The first step is echar toda la culpa a los nazis although I abuelo, like many Lithuanians, participated voluntarily in the matanza de judíos. The second step is create a narrative narrative that the question of how a court judge could have been sent to a Nazi concentration camp. The third step consists in discredit the counterfeiting narcotics drugs communist propaganda tactics related to state estates. The last step is refuse to accept that the values ​​of apartheid contradictory can coexist: Noreika luchó valientemente contra los communistas y participates freely in the assessment of judges.

Tras investigates his life during the last 20 years, my hy atrevido to llamar nazi a mi abuelo a pesar de nunca se afilió officialmente al partido. Work with the Nazis, act like them, receive pagos from them, obey the judges as they are, also like them, facilitate torture and assassination.

Where are the Lithuanian civil servants going to propose to the world because they are going to die? Is there an authentic negotiation in a democracy devoted to fraud in order to bring its own history? Thank you, I was not treated alone by me. He is a microcosms of all national history, and has its eco-national history in all of Europe of the East.

The passage of time has created the space to explore the world, but also increased the urgency of hacerlo antes that the remaining remnants are devanerated and failing another generation. The analysis of a passing injury is always traumatic. Pero we will never forget the clarity and curation we base our history on mentions. Although the posterior generations do not know the details, they will continue to experience the emotional pain transmitted from fathers to their children.

Hy hecho las tempo con mi abuelo. I have compromised to reveal his crimes in the testimony of the world and I have compromised to intend to correct the Lithuanian memory of the Holocaust, in part because it retains the honors that the concierge. You can drive to the reconciliation between Lithuanians and Jews, we will know what we are going to do and learn from them to ensure that we do not have to worry about it. It is the reconciliation of this world that allows Lithuanians to have a more national identity and an organ for our poetry, our language, our comedy, but not for our obscure past.

Silvia Foti is a secondary school teacher, periodical and author of the future book “The Neat of the Nazis: It was as if I was a war criminal”.

© The New York Times 2021

SEGUIR LEYENDO:

Did not form part of the Navy SEAL elite corps in the turbo that the United States Capitol called: “Fue necesario, no me disculpo”

Anthony Fauci reveals details of his difficult relationship with Trump: the arrangements with his family and a white powder that he built on opening a sober

It’s unbelievable that they’re deceived, but before the bars needed the lower schools