Black Ribbon Day (BRD): Canada’s top Cold War propaganda export Canada’s leftwing Polish groups. president of Ukrainian Canadian Congress- When 55,000 Poles with “a strong Toronto. It was hosting a meeting the next day aversion to Communism” entered Ca- of the World Congress of Free Ukrainians nada (1945-52), he said, they “invig- (WCFU). Hess spoke there and got their “vote orated” the CPC, “transformed the of support” for BRD.8 The WCFU, now the Polish-Canadian community” and Ukrainian World Congress, leads the global dia- “lobbied the Canadian government to spora that reveres WWII fascist leader Stepan oppose Communism in Poland.”3 As Bandera with cult-like adoration. By joining the Zophia de Witt, longtime CPC-Mani- BRD committee Sokolyk threw the weight of toba president said: “Being communist this worldwide movement behind the cause. is the worst sin that you could commit.”4 Bandera’s faction of Ukrainian nation- Not surprisingly, the CPC has received alists is still the strongest of Canada’s govern- $988,000 in government grants, and three of ment-supported East European émigré groups. he global Black Ribbon Day (BRD) cru- its member groups received $510,000 in 2018.5 By the 1980s, Banderites had long been a lead- sade was spawned in 1985 by East Eur- BRD was the creation of Markus Hess, ing force in the fight against socialists in their Topean émigré groups in Toronto whose a Canadian of German-Estonian heritage. His communities, and in support of Canada’s US/ founders and leaders included Nazi collabora- preface to Soltys’ book details how he began NATO-led, antiSoviet foreign policies. Domi- tors and Holocaust perpetrators. BRD propa- BRD in 1985 by pitching his idea to Canada’s nated by those who had welcomed the Nazis as ganda continues to smear the USSR with a Nazi Toronto-based Estonian Central Council liberators in WWII, these émigré groups em- brush by spreading disinformation about the So- (ECC). Neither Hess nor Soltys mention that braced Hess plan and were its driving force. viet-German nonaggression treaty of August 23, the ECC was founded and led by Nazi collabo- “With their collaboration,” says Soltys, “Hess 1939. By exploiting the West’s ongoing Cold rators including former officers of Estonia’s idea moved forward with lightning speed.”9 War phobias, BRD portrays Nazism and com- Waffen SS. Nei- Source: ABN Correspondence, May-Jun. 1987. munism as diabolical twins. As BRD founder ther did they re- (ABN = Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations) Markus Hess said in 1986, this treaty was “the veal the many high point in the evil of these two tyrannical other fascist- regimes.”1 This narrative even goes so far as links to émigré bit.ly/ABN-BRD to claim that Nazism and communism must take groups behind equal blame for causing WWII. BRD’s success. The émigré groups that spread BRD The Hess across Canada and the globe were linked to pro- plan was to unite fascist networks like the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc all “Captive Na- of Nations, the World AntiCommunist League tions” groups by and the CIA-funded “Captive Nations” move- using an annual ment. Their efforts were soon joined by far- protest to focus right lobby groups, mainstream politicians at public attention all levels of government, and their likeminded on antiSoviet fears and the Cold War loathing Besides “collaboration” from the groups mass media allies who eagerly joined the fray. of communism. As a symbol, he picked the cited above, Soltys notes many others that were BRD has now spread globally and Au- black ribbon of mourning. Once elected to the key to pushed the BRD cause. These included: gust 23 is has been officially memorialized in ECC’s board, Hess presented his plan to the • Canadian Slovak League and Slovak World the US, Australia and Europe. In 2009, Cana- group’s annual meeting which gave BRD its Congress (pp.40-43) dian MPs unanimously affirmed BRD. Intro- full blessing and support.6 • Czechoslovak National Assoc. of Canada and duced by then-Liberal leader Bob Rae, the mo- As chair of ECC’s BRD committee, Council of Free Czechoslovakia (pp.44-45) tion was co-authored by Estonian-Canadian Hess “extend[ed]... the protest to all other en- • Estonian Central Council Canada (pp.28-31) Marcus Kolga of the Central and Eastern Eu- slaved [Soviet] peoples”7 by attending the Jan.- • Estonian World Council (pp.32-33) ropean Council.2 Since then, BRD laws— 1986 meeting of Canada’s Cttee. of Captive Eu- • Latvian National Federation Canada (pp.38-39) falsely equating the world’s most avidly-op- ropean Nations. There he met leaders of three • World Fed. of Free Latvians (WFFL) (p.39) posed, mortal enemies—have been passed in groups linked to Nazi collaborators: the ECC, • Lithuanian Canadian Community and the Bulgaria, Croatia, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, the Lithuanian Canadian Community and the Lithuanian World Community (pp.34-37) Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Slovenia. Latvian National Federation in Canada (LNAK) Each of Canada’s so-called Captive-Na- Black Ribbon Day (2014), published by (pp. 34-37 and 38-39.) Wanting to fuel protest tions groups supplied volunteers to the BRD the Research Institute of the Canadian Polish and animosity against their Soviet enemy, the cause. Soltys details how these groups used Congress (CPC), heaps sycophantic praise on Captive Nations Cttee. embraced Hess’ plan. their member lists, publications, radio and TV the far-right movement that built this fervently Their alliance, aka the Group of Seven (G7), shows, meetings, public events and contacts anticommunist campaign. The book’s author, united far-right East Europeans from Czecho- with government, media and financiers to push Edward Soltys, was the Institute’s president slovakia (Czechs and Slovaks), Estonia, Hun- the BRD agenda. They also sent delegates to (1995-2011) and a CPC director (1997-2002). gary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine. BRD meetings. As a result, the G7 soon dis- Calling the CPC “the most noteworthy The BRD crusade got its next big break banded and was replaced by the BRD commit- Polish Canadian antiCommunist bloc,” Polish- after Hess met Yaroslav Sokolyk at an ECC- tee which took lead of Canada’s Captive Na- Canadian historian Patryk Polec says it opposed Toronto event in Feb. 1986. Sokolyk was then tions movement. LNAK’s president, Linard 24 Press for Conversion! Issue # 70 Spring 2021 Lukks, who had led the G7, became secretary- The late Cold War context of the BRD crusade 10 treasurer of the International BRD Committee. lack Ribbon Day (BRD) arose in the Brzezinski, “The Spirit of the Time” Hess notes that at the first BRD meet- heyday of President Ronald Reagan, a and the Canadian Polish Congress ing, delegates from G7 émigré groups decided Bformer B-movie actor who had been While Reagan is most closely associated with to “reach outside of our communities.” To the smiling PR frontman for nuclear-weapons arming Afghan and contra terrorists, it was achieve this they used the National Citizens’ maker GE (1954-62) and for the CIA’s antiRed Democrat president Jimmy Carter who began Coalition (NCC). With 40,000 members, it was “Crusade for Freedom” propaganda campaign their CIA funding. Carter’s strategy was engi- one of Canada’s most formidable, far-right forc- administered by Radio Free Europe (1950-60). neered by Zbigniew Brzezinski, a Polish Amer- es. (Stephen Harper later became its president, In his role as America’s “Great Com- ican from Warsaw who grew up in Montréal. 1998-2002.) Hess arranged to meet NCC vice municator,” Reagan followed his script in 1983 His father, Tadeusz Brzezinski, a veteran of president David Somerville, and he became to brand the USSR as the “evil empire.” Us- Poland’s antiSoviet War (1919-20), was a dip- what Hess called his “brother in arms.” Somer- ing his hokey, homespun style to spread vile lomat in Poland’s anticommunist/anti-semitic ville contributed what Hess called his “knowl- hate speech against socialism, he was a vibrant government (1921-45) and its consul general edge, ... vision and strategies,” and the “NCC’s symbol of the West’s most aggressive anti- in Montréal during WWII. After the war, when generosity with regards to office space and as- Soviet policies. Reagan was, for example, in- communists came to power in Poland, the sistance.” This support spread BRD beyond its famous for arming rightwing paramilitaries. hardcore East European base. When Somerville Brzezinskis—like 55,000 other antiSoviet But in Cold War parlance, these terrorists were Poles—made Canada their home. In Montréal, suggested that August 23 be the BRD’s focal “freedom fighters” struggling to stop the Third point, Hess says he made “an immediate exec- Tadeusz became president of the far-right Ca- World spread of communism. Subsidized by 1 11 nadian Polish Congress, CPC (1952-62). utive decision and agreed.” In his introduc- smuggling cocaine and heroin, these CIA tion to Soltys’ book, Somerville explains that His son Zbigniew, with a BA (1949) and proxy armies killed thousands of innocents in MA (1950)2 from McGill, replaced Henry Kis- before his meeting with Hess he had covert US wars that crushed fledgling leftwing a revelation ... to use the public’s preexist- singer as US National Security Advisor (1977- governments from Nicaragua to Afghanistan. ing revulsion for the Nazis to get them to 81) and spearheaded Carter’s use of terrorists feel similarly toward the Soviet Commu- Reagan’s anticommunist thugs were to promote US interests. In July 1979, Brze- nists.... [I]n condemning both regimes simul- glorified by East European émigré groups that zinski began the Carter CIA’s multibillion dol- taneously, it would be impossible for critics had long revered their own “freedom fight- lar funding of Afghan mujahideen. After six to attack us as right wing extremists or pos- ing” predecessors who allied with the Nazis months of their attacks on the Afghan socialist sible Nazi sympathizers.12 (Emphasis added) in WWII. In 1986, as the Iran-contra affair hit government, the USSR agreed to defend Af- To spread public “revulsion” against the the news, speakers for the Afghan mujahideen ghans from CIA-backed terrorists. Brzezinski Soviets, Hess and Somerville began an “organi- and Nicaraguan contras attended a global con- also pushed US funding of Nicaragua’s contras, zational campaign” tour to the UK, Germany, ference of the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations Jonas Savimbi’s UNITA terrorists (fighting An- Austria, France, Sweden and the Netherlands. (ABN) in Toronto. These and other CIA- gola’s Marxist government), and far-right, anti- This tour, says Hess, was funded by Stefan Ro- backed “freedom fighters” were on the front- Soviet “dissidents” in Eastern Europe. More man.13 As Canada’s “Uranium King” billion- line of the West’s Cold War crusade. recently, he backed the Prague Declaration. aire, Roman was a lead force in the Canadian Brzezinski inspired a new generation Slovak League and the Slovak World Congress, which had lost 27 million citizens to defeat Nazi which glorified Slovakia’s Nazi puppet regime. Germany, issued an all-but-ignored media re- .... continued on the next page During their tour, Hess and Somerville were lease titled “Hate Propaganda Day Sullies Ca- nada,” Oral History Forum, 35, 2015, p.5. welcomed by such leading profascists as Slava nada.” It correctly denounced BRD as “a bla- bit.ly/CPCsin Stetsko, who met them at the Anti-Bolshevik tantly dishonest anti-Soviet propaganda exer- 5. Public Accounts Canada (1995, ‘97, ‘98, ‘04). Bloc of Nations’ (ABN) global HQ in Munich.14 cise.” As mainstream journalist John Best re- Plus, three CPC member groups in Alberta (Po- (See photo, opposite.) Stetsko led the ABN, was ported: “From all indications, not least the out- lish-Canadian Society, Polish Veterans Society and Polish Combatants Assoc. #6, Edm.) received an executive of the World AntiCommunist raged response from the Soviets, Black Rib- 16 $510,000 in 2018. (Figures adjusted for inflation) League and headed the Banderite Organization bon Day was a huge success in its first year.” 6. Markus Hess, “Some Memories,” in Edward of Ukrainian Nationalists. While in Munich, The swift realization of Hess’ BRD Soltys, Black Ribbon Day, 2014, pp.16-29. Hess and Somerville also broadcast “interviews dream proves that myth building can be “a huge 7. Markus Hess, “Black Ribbon Day Memories,” at Radio Free Europe [RFE] into the Soviet Un- success” if, as a tool for pushing official narra- Culture & Life, Sum. 2011. (trans) bit.ly/HessBRD ion regarding Black Ribbon Day.”15 (RFE was tives, it is supported by politicians, the mass 8. Soltys, op. cit., pp. pp.19-20. the CIA’s largest Cold War propaganda mill.) media and state-supported groups—even if they 9. Ibid., pp.116-17. In 1986, the once-tiny BRD project include those with close organizational and ide- 10. Ibid., p.19. Lukks was G7 pres. (late ‘70s-early spread wildly with “anti-Soviet rallies in the ologicalconnections to Nazi collaborators. ‘80s); LNAK pres. (‘70s-‘80s); Baltic Federa- tion of Canada’s vice pres. (mid ‘70s); and World US, Australia, Sweden, France and Britain,” Federation of Free Latvians pres. (late ‘80s.) and in “at least nine Canadian cities.” At To- References and notes 1. “Right-wing group to protest insidious takeover 11. Ibid., pp.20-21. ronto’s rally, thousands were addressed by Con- by Soviets, Red Deer Advocate, Aug.7, 1986, p.3. 12. David Somerville, “Truths we must relearn,” servative MP and former Mayor David Crom- bit.ly/BRDevil Soltys, ibid., p.32. bie. Canada’s BRD protests also had govern- 2. Adu Raudkivi, “Introducing the Central and East 13. Hess 2014, ibid., pp.23. ment support through PM Brian Mulroney European Council,” Eesti Elu (Estonian Life), 14. ABN Correspondence, May-Jun. 1987, p.3. whose warm greetings were read out to the anti- Dec. 30, 2009. bit.ly/CEEC2009 bit.ly/ABN--BRD [See photo, at left, with bust of Soviet protesters across Canada. That year, the 3. Patryk Polec, “The Polish Canadian Communist Nazi collaborator, Roman Shukhevych (p.51)] BRD group also produced $40,000 worth of Movement, 1918-1948,” 2014, pp.17, 180. 15. Hess 2014, op. cit. bit.ly/PPolec 16. John Best, “Black Ribbon Day likely to be per- TV ads (i.e., $83,000 in 2020) to equate the 4. Chris Clements, “Voluntary Ethnic Groups and manent fixture,” Star Phoenix, Sep. 3, 1986, p.4. Soviets with Nazism. In response, the USSR, the Cdn. Polish Congress’ Role in Cold War Ca- bit.ly/ABN-86 Spring 2021 Issue # 70 Press for Conversion! 25