Dmitrii Medvedev's Commission Against the Falsification of History: Why Was It Created and What Did It Achieve? A Reassessment

In spring 2009, three initiatives were taken in Moscow to control public presentation of Russian history: two bills were prepared for the Duma that would criminalize ‘the rehabilitation of Nazism’ and shortly afterwards President Dmitrii Medvedev established a commission, mandated to ‘counteract attempts to falsify history to the detriment of the interests of Russia.’ The article examines why President Medvedev felt it necessary to establish such a commission, how the commission was composed and worked, and what it achieved. While the Duma bills and the commission have usually been treated as initiatives that pulled in the same direction, I argue that they were fundamentally at odds with each other. In my interpretation, the commission was intended not to promote but to obstruct the passing of the new laws