In the first episode of a special NIOD Rewind series called Flash, Anne van Mourik speaks with historian Dr. Anne-Lise Bobeldijk (NIOD) about how president Trump and president Putin are exploiting World War II history to support their current political strategies. In this short 10-minute episode, we explore how the past is being reshaped to influence the present, from Trump’s comments on US-Soviet cooperation to Putin’s manipulation of history to justify his war in Ukraine.

Photo: 2nd Lt. William Robertson and Lt. Alexander Sylvashko, Red Army, shown in front of sign [East Meets West] symbolizing the historic meeting of the Soviet and American Armies, near Torgau, Germany on Elbe Day, the day Soviet and American troops met at the Elbe River (April 1945). Wikimedia Commons.

NIOD Rewind Flash Episode 41 - History at stake: Trump, Putin and the War in Ukraine

Exactly eighty years ago, in the midst of the liberation’s chaos, the NIOD (then the RIOD) was founded with a clear mission: to document Dutch experiences of the Second World War. In this special anniversary episode, Anne van Mourik speaks with Jaap Cohen, Eveline Buchheim, Uğur Üngör, and Arvid de Raaij about eighty years of collecting memories, experiences, and stories. They reflect on NIOD’s urgent beginnings, its expansion to collect information about conflicts such as Indonesia’s War of Independence and the Yugoslav wars, and the ideas and challenges of documenting more recent atrocities, from Syria’s civil war to the Yezidi genocide. Why is collecting testimonies of war and genocide so vital? Why does it still matter just as much today? And how to collect digital sources about war and violence, such as the X-posts on the Ajax-Maccabi riots in Amsterdam in 2024?

Image: Loe de Jong, 1950 (NIOD archive)

NIOD Rewind Episode 42 - 80 Years of Collecting War

Anne talks with Farabi Fakih about the Indonesian national identity during the revolutionary period in Indonesia (1946-1948). Farabi is a lecturer at the History Department, Universitas Gadjah Mada. His main research interests are on urban history, the history of the Indonesian state and the intellectual history of Indonesia. In the background you hear the noise of life at UGM, where the interview was taken.

Further reading:
K’tut Tantri, Revolt in Paradise (1989).
 
Music:
-       Indonesia Raya
-       NonaRia performed at Jakarta International Java Jazz Festival (JJF) at JI Expo, Kemayoran, Central Jakarta, Indonesia on March 2nd, 2018 (by Senang0906)
-       Amiina
-       Rosemary and Garlic

NIOD REWIND Episode 5 Farabi Fakih

NIOD Rewind Podcast on War & Violence

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