The calendar for 2023 was created jointly by the teachers of the Department of Historical Local Studies of LNU. I. Franka and the Department of Communications and Internal Policy of the OVA.
The calendar presents the chronology of the confrontation between Kyiv and Moscow since the comprehensive invasion of the Russian Federation troops on the territory of Ukraine on February 24, 2022. The illustrations symbolize significant facts and achievements of the Ukrainian resistance. In particular, the Kharkiv counteroffensive, the liberation of Kherson, the neutralization of the Russian cruiser “Moskva”, etc.
As Andrii Godyk, the first deputy head of the Lviv OVA, said, now the circulation of the calendar is 1,000 copies, part of which will be given to the military at the front. You can also download the electronic version on the OVA website (https://bit.ly/3iQ8sEA).
“We had an idea to immortalize the achievements of 2022 – the achievements of each of us, the Armed Forces of Ukraine, which showed that the Ukrainian people are indomitable – on the pages of the “Road to Victory” calendar, because we are sincerely convinced that victory will be ours. Events in the calendar are displayed chronologically by month of the previous year.
Flipping through this calendar, planning our next steps for our joint victory, the events and victories of 2022 that made us proud of our defenders will be pleasing to the eye. We will remember at what price these victories were given to us. I sincerely thank the authors and editors,” Andrii Godyk said.
One of the co-authors of the calendar, doctor of historical sciences, head of the department of historical regional studies of LNU named after Viktor Golubko, I. Franka, emphasized that when creating the calendar, they chose an unusual way of presenting information – a comic, in order to present the war to the general public in an optimistic, and not exclusively tragic, spirit and that Ukraine will win in it.
“We presented Ukrainian heroes as people who live among us, but at the same time can convince that every person can find heroism in himself. The calendar is a good way to add optimism to the general public, to establish in society the spirit of victory and faith in our Armed Forces.
War is a tragedy, mountains, tears, bloodshed, it is difficult to show it in the calendar. And in order to win, there must be two factors – the armed factor (army and equipment) and the moral factor, when there is a will to win. It is formed by various methods, including visual ones, to which the calendar actually belongs,” Viktor Golubko added.
Our confrontation with our eastern neighbor has long roots. This is due, in particular, to the fact that he stole not only our name from us, transforming the Kyivan-Russian ethnonym into his name “Russia”, but also our ethnic roots, explains Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor of the Department of Historical Local Studies of LNU named after I. Franka Vasyl Chura.
“Being a native of the Finno-Hungarian environment that stretched across the Urals and Siberia, he (the eastern neighbor, Russia – ed.) considers it not exemplary, obviously because it has no models of statehood. Thus, dragging our Ukrainian history onto himself, he proves both to the world and to himself that he has the right to dominate Eastern Europe. This will never happen and in 2023 we will prove it definitively,” Vasyl Chura added.
We will remind you that last year, on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the creation of the UPA, the Department of Communications and Internal Policy of the Lviv OVA developed the “Generals of the UPA” calendar.