The Long Shadow of Stalinism
The Soviet Memorial in Treptower Park
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
The largest Soviet war memorial in Berlin, the memorial in Treptower Park, is an architecturally and aesthetically outstanding monument of late Stalinism. Above all, the Stalin quotations at the memorial site, which to this day dominate this public space without any historical context, convey a worldview in which truths about Nazi barbarism and lies about the Soviet system merge. Stalin’s claim that the Soviet Union saved “European civilisation” and was the torchbearer of enlightenment, civilization, and pacification obscures the mass violence and terror perpetrated in the name of Soviet rule. Late Stalinist discourse has experienced a renaissance under President Putin and provides a starting point for the memorial’s misuse. Its Stalinist context and the back-ground of the Stalin quotations on the sarcophagi, as well as their impact up to the present day, should be presented and explained.
(Osteuropa 4/2025, pp. 33–50)