International scientific and practical conference «Unity that defeated fascism»
On June 20, 2016, on the eve of the 75th anniversary of the start of the Great Patriotic War, an international scientific and practical conference «Unity that defeated fascism» was held at KRSU.
The main guests of the event were the granddaughters of the legendary Major General Ivan Vasilyevich Panfilov – Aigul and Alua Baikadamov, who arrived from Almaty.
The first, being a well-known public figure in Kazakhstan, brought to Bishkek (for the second time) the standard of the international memory watch «There are millions of Panfilov men» and spoke about the geography of this action, which was launched last year in Orenburg.
He expressed hope that the list of cities in which the memory of Panfilov’s heroes is preserved will expand every year, including not only urban centers of the Russian Federation, the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Kyrgyz Republic, but also settlements in other countries of the Central Asian region. Alua Baikadamova, being also the head of the Military History Museum of the Ministry of Defense of Kazakhstan, spoke about the uniqueness of the 316th (8th Guards) Panfilov Rifle Division, formed in Almaty in July 1941 and once again recalled those who defended Moscow and accomplished many other fateful feats.
Rector of KRSU Vladimir Nifadiev noted that 2016 in our republic – is the Year of History and Culture. He also drew the attention of those gathered to the phenomenon of unprecedented patriotism of 1941. According to the academician, the incredible unity of peoples during the war is still felt in Kyrgyz society. The rector also did not ignore the role of Great Patriotic War veterans, including home front workers, in educating new generations.
Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Russian Federation to the Kyrgyz Republic Andrei Krutko, who on the day of the conference was awarded the title of Honorary Doctor of KRSU, also agreed that «the presence of a cohort of veterans in the hall – a gift to everyone» and emphasized the unity of peoples, without which Victory would not have been achieved.
Ambassador of the Republic of Belarus Viktor Denisenko spoke about the fighters from Kyrgyzstan, whose memory is immortalized by their exploits on the territory of Belarus.
An excursion into the history of the Second World War was made by the domestic historian and publicist Leonid Sumarokov. He debunked the myth that Central Asia from 1941 to 1945 was «a quiet rear»: our border guards and local residents had the opportunity to neutralize many saboteurs and intelligence officers who rushed here from Iran and Afghanistan, where the Nazis then settled quite firmly. «An hourly feat was accomplished on the borders of Kyrgyzstan», – he noted. The researcher also spoke in more detail about Panfilov’s heroes, many of whom were our fellow countrymen.
A professor at the Al-Farabi Kazakh National University (g. Almaty), Doctor of Historical Sciences Laila Akhmetova. She presented her new book «1941 for the Bishkek audience. Brest Fortress –Kazakhstan». A signal copy of the publication was transferred to the KRSU library.
Laila Akhmetova said that in extreme war conditions, people rallied on a variety of grounds, including ethnic, compatriot, and religious. In Soviet times this was hushed up. Many of our prisoners of war and soldiers, who later came under suspicion of collaborating with the Germans, also fell out of the sight of professional historians for decades. Hence – distorted data on the ethnic composition of the military formations of the Red Army, including the same Panfilov division, in which, according to Laila Akhmetova, Kyrgyz and Kazakhs made up up to 33% of the military personnel – no less.
A report on the geopolitical aspect of interpretations of military history was presented to the audience by Tamara Staruseva, Candidate of Historical Sciences, leading employee of the Institute of History and Cultural Heritage of the National Academy of Sciences of the Kyrgyz Republic. She substantiated the obviousness of the anti-Soviet policies of England and the United States in the pre-war and subsequent times, and also described various facts of falsification of the history and results of the Great Patriotic War.
Professor, Doctor of Historical Sciences Gulmira Dzhunushalieva spoke about how the evacuation of industrial enterprises from the western regions of the USSR to the territory of the Kyrgyz SSR turned the republic from agrarian to agrarian-industrial and laid the foundation for the subsequent development of the country. 80% of the cartridges supplied to the front were then manufactured in Soviet Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.
The conference ended with the presentation of memorable diplomas and the first volume of the just published book «Unity that defeated fascism» to students and schoolchildren of the republic, whose works were included there.
