Pagac, lokshe, halpuki (holubtsi), pierogi, and halukšy. In the early 20th century my family brought recipes for these foods back from Modrý Kameň, a town in southern Slovakia on the Hungarian border. Although I would love to see the place where many of my ancestors learned to make these traditional Slovakian foods, it is extremely dangerous there, and will likely be for a long time. That is because in February of 2022, Russia invaded Ukraine after hundreds of years of political and ethnic conflicts.
Slovakia, only 15 hours away by car from Ukraine, has shown support for the warring country since the war began. “Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico voiced doubts about Ukraine’s ability to negotiate from a position of strength and said that the EU’s summit statement should call for immediate ceasefire,” said The Kyiv Independent in an article regarding Slovakia and Hungary’s political involvement with the Russo-Ukrainian War, “Slovakia has also provided energy support amid Russian attacks against Ukraine’s power grid,” they continued.
My family’s first-hand experiences with the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia during the 20th century have been passed down through letters only. After World War II, Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin annexed most of Eastern Europe and started his reign of terror. People, including my family, in Modrý Kameň were jailed by Soviet occupiers because their chickens could not produce enough eggs for everyone. Their crops were stolen as well. However, jailing and thievery were not the worst punishments annexed countries received from the Soviet Union.
Stalin’s USSR set the precedent for their treatment of non-Russian Soviet states. His “Great Purges” in the 1930’s included everyone from political adversaries to Ukrainian peasants. “[The Great Purges] implicated even more victims until Stalin himself reduced the terror, though he never abandoned it. Stalin’s political victims were numbered in tens of millions. His main motive was, presumably, to maximize his personal power,” stated writer Ronald Francis Hingley in Britannica.
However, the USSR was not the beginning nor the end of Russian influence in Eastern Europe. As early as the 1500s, the Grand Principality of Moscow engaged in decades-long conflicts with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of Poland in the Muscovite–Lithuanian War. Furthermore, during World War II, the Soviets annexed Poland. Of course, these tensions have carried over into modern politics. In an article published by Reuters, the historic relationship between Russia and its neighboring countries is highlighted by one former President of Russia: “We will treat [Poland] precisely as a historical enemy…If there is no hope for reconciliation with the enemy, Russia should have only one and a very tough attitude regarding its fate,” said Dmitry Medvedev, the current deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council.
Russia’s nationalist ideology has continued to shape Russia’s foreign policy long after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Regarding Ukraine, Reuters notes, “The Kremlin misrepresents the region’s history in order to legitimize the idea that Ukraine and Belarus are part of Russia’s ‘natural’ sphere of influence. Yet both countries have stronger European roots than the Kremlin cares to admit.”
In 2014, Russia invaded the Crimean Peninsula, which was part of Ukraine, after claiming that Crimea was historically theirs. “Crimea has been in Russian hands for only a fraction of its history. If unchallenged, the Kremlin’s [the Russian government’s] fiction that Crimea willingly and legitimately ‘rejoined’ Russia risks further undermining Ukraine’s territorial integrity and encouraging other expansionist powers,” notes Chatham House, a British international affairs think tank.
Ukraine is at the crossroads of Europe, an access point for full European domination, and a land rich in natural resources. During the Cold War, it was the second most powerful republic in the USSR and produced significant agricultural resources, weaponry, and military force. After gaining independence, Ukraine remained divided over whether it should integrate with Western Europe or stay close to Russia.
In 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion of the rest of Ukraine.
As of Feb. 22, 2025, more than 100,000 soldiers have been confirmed killed on both the Russian and Ukrainian sides of the conflict, many of whom were volunteers, according to the BBC. Neither side has disclosed true death tolls for either militants or civilians, and some estimate the death toll to be in the millions. However, it is widely agreed that Russia has suffered higher death tolls than Ukraine, which isn’t surprising to since these Russian soldiers, from the age of 18 onwards, are enlisted against their will and have no reason to defend the system they suffer under. In June 2023, the Wagner Group, a Russian military company, attempted an uprising against the Russian government with no success.
In times like these, it is hard for people like me who have a history with the area to remain optimistic. I have little hope for President Putin showing any grace towards Ukraine, or the rest of Eastern Europe. I remind myself that since the inception of Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, various traditions, values, and foods carried by innumerable ethnic groups have woven Ukraine and the greater Eastern European region into the rich cultural tapestry that it is today–one that I have experienced myself. Many American Slavs, including myself, share overlapping history from different nations that make us especially sympathetic to Ukraine’s plight.
No cultural conflict is worth millions of lives. For me, something I once was so proud of has become bittersweet. I still love sharing and celebrating my Slavic heritage with others, and I love cooking Ukrainian, Slovak, and Polish dishes every holiday season. I often find myself wondering how my relatives still in Slovakia are doing, and if they will remain unharmed by the war. However, I believe I am lucky to have grown up in the United States. While girls my age across the world in Ukraine worry about when the next air raid will sound, I only have to worry about my grades.
“We are still disappointed hoping for a better future, but whatever burden God gave us, we will carry,” my relative Margita Silacka said in a letter sent to my great grandmother in 1949 after she witnessed the violent deportation of Hungarians in Modrý Kameň, and jailing of her husband by Soviets.
While I’ll always cherish my Slavic heritage, I cannot ignore the painful reality that so many who share my ancestry are living through unimaginable hardships. In times of conflict, the beauty of culture is in its ability to unite, not in its potential to divide.
