Ukraine Famine Was Genocide, Research Paper Example

Introduction

The assertion put forward is that the “Artificial Famine/Genocide (Holodomor) in the Ukraine in 1932-33 was in fact an act of genocide by an oppressive Stalinist regime. The acts of this oppression resulted in the deaths of some 10 million people mainly of Ukrainian descent. The accused are Joseph Stalin and his famed henchman Lazar Kaganovich. ” The main goal of this artificial famine/genocide was to break the spirit of the Ukrainian farmer/peasant and to force them into collectivization and was used as an effective tool to break the renaissance of Ukrainian culture that was occurring under approval of the communist government in Ukraine. Moscow perceived this as a threat to a Russo-Centric Soviet rule and therefore acted to crush this cultural renaissance in a most brutal sadistic manner. The resulting goal of this artificial famine/genocide was to “ethnically cleanse” Ukrainians from vast territories.” (Infoukes 2009)

Evidence is put forward that demonstrates that this was an act of ethnic cleansing in 132-33. On November 26th 2006 a large number of nations have formally accepted and acknowledged that the artificial famine (Holodomor) was in fact an act of premeditated mass murder (genocide).

” Other countries have made a Holodomor declaration and they include Argentina, Czech Republic, Chile, Slovak Republic, Spain, Balearic Islands (Spain) and the Vatican. Russia is in complete denial and is exercising political influence to deny that this event occurred and that it was a deliberate act. In fact in Russia it was made illegal to commemorate this event.

The success of using food as a weapon to control/punish/eliminate a people was first used by the Soviet Communists. Since then this has become a standard tool in the arsenal of communist regimes to control/punish/eliminate people, and has been used by such regimes such as China, North Korea, Ethiopia, Cambodia, Zimbabwe amongst others.” (Infoukes 2009)

This paper will in addition examine the counterarguments of the fact that the event never actually occurred ( the Russian viewpoint) and equally look at other regimes in recent history that have conducted similar measures to either punish or eradicate people.

The Ukranian Commission recently banned screening of films about the Jewish holocaust because of the sensitivities and comparisons to the Holodomor.. ” Tyagnybok was ousted from the mainstream “Our Ukraine” political bloc in 2004 when he praised members of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army, a World War II force that combated Russians and Germans and targeted Jews. He had commended the army for having fought against the Russians, the Germans and “the kikes and other filth who wanted to take from us our Ukrainian state.” (Commission 2009)

One of the main defenders of the denial of the Holodomor is contained within the works of Douglas Tottle’s book Fraud, Famine and Fascism.  This will be examined as a central exhibit for the arguments supporting the cause of the denial.  Other contributors in the denial category will include the Ukranian historian Mykhailo Hrushevsky.

Having made the case for the proposed genocide option and the counter argument or denial of the event, the paper will analyse the fact and produce a summary that balances out both weights of evidence. This will enable a determination in order tom present a valid argument for support or denial of the case.

The buildup leading to the artificial famine was instigated by the Stalinist regime in Russia.  The intention was to demoralize the largely peasant workforce  and as such push them into collectivization. This would essentially destroy the Ukrainian culture  and place them under the direct rule of the Centralist Stalin government.  The Stalinist Government had long perceived the large population of unsettled peasants as threat to Russia-Centric  soviet rule.  The final and ultimate objective being that of “ethnic cleansing” over a vast region.

During 1932 the Soviet regime was responsible for increasing the grain purchase quota by some 44%.  They understood that such a high tariff would result in the Ukrainian people being unable to feed themselves as a result of a grain shortage.  The Soviets even went further by invoking  secret police units into the community and arresting any people hiding grain stock piles.  The police further instigated an internal passport system that prevented freedom of movement around the country. All stock piles of grain were strictly guarded by the Russian military under a virtual martial law situation.

Argument in Support of Genocide Concept

It is asserted that the acts of the Stalinist regime in 132-33 created an artificial famine (Holodomor) and in fact this was a brutal act of genocide against the Ukrainian people.  The main protagonists being that of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin and his assassin Lazar Kaganovich.  The two figures in question deliberately planned the act of ethnic cleansing in order to prevent an insurrection by the Ukrainian peasants. A pre-emptive strike to stave off a threat to Russian Soviet Centric rule.

The following evidence is cited in support of this argument:

• The increase of the Grain quota to 44% in 1932.  The Soviets were fully aware that this would create an acute shortage of supply and lead to a widespread famine in the region.  The soviet legal system passing a law that no grain would be distributed to the peasants until the full quotas had been met.  This supported by military enforcement was a direct attack on the Ukrainian populace.
• Those people that opposed the regime were swiftly dealt with by the Soviet authorities and removed from the scene .. ” “Hundreds of thousands of the recalcitrant’s were transported to Siberia to work in the forest or mines. … Others starved during the famine which swept Ukraine in the early 1930’s particularly in 1932.” (Ivan 1950)
• The concept of “Collectivization” was aimed at wiping out the affluent element of the peasant class, the so termed Kurkas. This accounted for only a small minority, estimated at some 5% of the population.  The Stalinist regime perceived them as a direct threat to communism and plotted a way to eradicate them… ” “… Largely as a result of the forcible collectivization of agriculture, a famine developed in Ukraine. Starvation and all it accompanying diseases stalked unchecked through the richest agricultural region in the Soviet Union, and within the space of a few months hundreds of thousands if not millions of people died in unimaginable misery.”  (Vernadsky 1944)

The concept of invoking martial law around the grain stocks and restricting freedom of movement resulted in widespread starvation.  The military also invoked punitive measures around this and swiftly despatched offenders to an unknown fate in Siberia.  A somewhat similar comparison being the Nazis ethnically cleansing the Jewish population by sending them to forced labour and death camps..   “In 1932 the State decreed the death penalty for stealing a bit of coal or grain from a freight train. Then the death penalty was provided for the collectivized farmer who might steal from the fields some of the product of his “collective labour;” then for the wilful slaughter of his own cattle; then for letting “cattle die by neglect.” “In March 1933, thirty-five officials of the Commissariat of Agriculture were executed after being ‘tried’ … for having ‘wilfully permitted noxious weeds to grow in the fields.”  (Wolfe 1957)

• The famine itself was not caused by the restriction of grain distribution but the actual denial of food stocks to the population by the Russian grain collectors backed up by the military.  They collected potatoes, beets and bread from the villagers.  This act of deprivation must have been approved by the central regime and as such a deliberate and pre-meditated act of murder.. ” “But among the ghastly fruits of the campaign for collectivization was the ‘man-made famine’ of 1931-32 in the Ukraine and the northern Caucasus, where it had been resisted most fiercely and where the fields had lain almost totally neglected. There were millions of deaths from starvation in these regions.”  (Charques 1959)
• Joseph Stalin himself in 1933 essentially made an admission of guilt when he referred to the famine as a series of blunders.  The adoption of a covert policy to eliminate protagonists would have best been dealt with by open warfare.  ” In the first fortnight of January (1933) … Stalin made a speech ‘What is wrong,’ Stalin asked in effect, ‘on the agrarian front? We are wrong, my comrades — we, not the peasants nor the weather, nor class enemies, but we Communists, who have the greatest power and authority the world ever saw, yet have made a series of blunders … We miscalculated the new tactics of hostile forces of boring from within, instead of engaging in open warfare.'”  (Durranty 1944)
• It was estimated that some 32 million Ukrainian people actually died during the 1932-33 famine; other estimates put the figure closer to 10 million.( put into context some 6 million Jewish people were estimated to have been killed by the Nazi regime ).  The Russian Government kept actual recorded figures secret. ( source: United States Senate Document (No. 122 of 1958). Many eye witness accounts of the period were documented in the book by Andrew Gregorovich ” Black Famine in Ukraine 1932-33 – A struggle for existence.  Some of these accounts have since been disputed but they put forward a compelling argument of events at this time.
• The act of denial – the Russian state authorities firmly denied that a deliberate plan of starvation was taking place in the Ukraine. In fact they went out of their way to cover this up and impose a level of secrecy and classification over it ” the Soviet Union steadfastly denied the famine and a state-engineered cover up was executed. The regime even went so far as to forbid people from naming the cause they were dying from. The Moscow press corps stationed in the USSR consisted of western journalists sympathetic to the cause of the Russian Revolution. When word began leaking into Moscow from foreign engineers and technicians returning from Soviet Ukraine, their reports were discounted by most. Some Western journalists were taken on guided tours. Moscow strictly controlled where they went and only allowed journalists who were known to be communist sympathisers ‘to visit collective farms and the countryside”  (Luhovy 2003)

The Ukrainian farmers did at first resist the Russians and those spreading the word of communism and support for Stalin amongst the local villages.  They actually reclaimed their tools and took back livestock from the collectives. There were even accounts of loyal soviet authorities being murdered.  This led the way to direct confrontation with Moscow and a strengthening of their resolve to put down what they viewed as internal rebellion against communism.

“In Moscow, Stalin responded to their unyielding defiance by dictating a policy that would deliberately cause mass starvation and result in the deaths of millions.

By mid 1932, nearly 75 percent of the farms in the Ukraine had been forcibly collectivized. On Stalin’s orders, mandatory quotas of foodstuffs to be shipped out to the Soviet Union were drastically increased in August, October and again in January 1933, until there was simply no food remaining to feed the people of the Ukraine. ”  (Anon 2000)

Compelling Evidence

Historic records show a very substantial portfolio of witness accounts, narrated historical records, subsequent admissions by the Soviet regime and recorded facts to support the argument that this was a deliberate act of genocide committed by a brutal regime bent on the ethnic cleansing of a dominated country by a superior regime. Ultimately history deals with the interpretation of facts and undoubtedly the evidence put forward overwhelmingly supports the genocide case.  Recent events of ethnic cleansing in the Balkans War are a chilling reminder that these events are not just moments in time but indeed history can repeat itself.

The two key components here are the terms “ethnic cleansing” and that of “genocide”, they are not necessarily mutually exclusive but great care has to be taken in the use of the words. Whether one term is more powerful than the other is debatable.  The defense would say that “ethnic cleansing” has certain legitimate values and is justifiable under certain circumstances. Genocide is a far more powerful term indicating deliberate mass murder and cannot be justified under any humanitarian circumstances.  This evidence points towards the Ukrainian Famine as an act of Genocide with the ultimate responsibility at the hands of an oppressive Stalinist regime using the enforcement of communism as an excuse for personal political gains.

Argument Against the Genocide Concept

Despite the overwhelming amount of evidence supporting the genocide concept, there was a considerable body putting forward the counter argument of denial.  The concept is now examined from this stand point.

• In August of 1942 the Prime Minister of Great Britain ( Sir Winston Churchill) paid a visit to Joseph Stalin in Moscow.  During this visit he was known to have asked Stalin about the pressures  and strains of the war with Germany ( Second World War) and the pressures of the policies of the Collective Farms.  Stalin was said to confess ” Oh No! .. the collective farm was a terrible struggle.. Ten Millions, he said, holding up his hands. It was fearful. Four years it lasted but it was absolutely necessary”  (Vernadsky 1944).  Stalin went on to describe how most of the peasant had indeed collaborated with them  but the bulk ( some 10 million) were less so and were exterminated by the laborers.  A direct denial of Soviet responsibility and a claim that this was an internal Ukraine struggle with domestic responsibility for the deaths of those who did not comply with Soviet rule.

In Khrushchev’s 1956 speech he made reference to the great famine but he never once criticized the Stalin regime. Instead he diverted the argument to consider the number of loyal communist comrades that suffered under Stalin’s regime.  He did mention that Stalin had considered “deporting” the entire population of the Ukraine but they avoided that tragedy simply because there was no place for them to go.

Professor Grover Furr of Montclair University maintains a communist website link that denies the genocide concept by the Bolsheviks.  The claim is asserted that the deaths were in fact perpetrated by a large part of the population  that supported the rise of Nazi fascist power and that the Bolsheviks were made the  scapegoats “The `Stalin Question’ is one of the most vital issues of our time, I think, because stories about the `horrors of Stalinism’ are used to demoralize millions of people who are otherwise fed up with capitalist exploitation and are looking for an alternative. The `anti-Stalinists’ basically tell us there is no alternative! So serious research on the USSR during the period of Stalin’s leadership is vital in helping us understand what the Bolsheviks did that was right, and what they did was wrong, led away from communism and egalitarism, and what we must learn from their heroic experiences”  (Furr 1987)

• Another assertion relates to the journalism and photographic reporting of the period. It is argued that many of the journalistic reports and photographs  were false and fabricated. Essentially the desire of the west to put the communist regime in a bad light. One of the most important pieces of evidence cited was the film called the “Harvest of Despair”  which led to the book by Robert Conquest called ” Harvest of Sorrow: Soviet Collectivization and the Terror” .

“But the story they tell is not true! Nor is it anything like the truth. In order to concoct a fairy tale in which Ukrainian nationalists are the heroes and working- class communists the villains, Conquest’s book – like the film reviewed in the last article –must ignore all the best research on this period done by bourgeois scholars. A lie can be told in a sentence; to refute the lie adequately takes many pages. This essay examines Conquest’s evidence and shows where and how he is guilty of lying. Future essays will discuss the political motives behind these falsehoods; what really happened in the USSR during the 1930s; and what are the correct lessons to be drawn from the events of the 1930s in the USSR.”  (Party 1947)

• William Henry Chamberlain asserted that the Great Famine was primarily attributed to a very bad harvest in 1932 and this was the trigger for social unrest amongst the peasant class in the Ukraine.  This led them into a course of rebellion and the communist regime viewed this potential uprising as both sabotage and counter revolution.  They recognized the disastrous consequences that starvation would bring but they stood back and let this play out in order to teach the Ukrainians a lesson.  Actual food and relief was eventually distributed in the collective farms but due to inefficiencies most of it arrived too late and at that time the damage was done with countless lives already lost.  The soviets also viewed the famine as a legitimate act of war and as such this was no different a tactic to that which had been used many times before.  Famine is used to break down the strength and resistance of insurgents thus placing into a manageable position.
• It’s all about Western political spin –  The Putin Government denial in essence points at the Western democracies as trying to woo over the former soviet states that border Russia for their own purposes.  Part of this is to convert nations like Georgia and the Ukraine away from the new Russia in order to extend the defense capabilities of Europe and North America.  Hence the assertion of genocide in the Ukraine is a political spin and does not reflect actual reality of the historical event.  Despite Russia’s move towards a democratic society this argument is still being used by the West to fuel bad relations between Russia and her former allies .. ” Russian Foreign Ministry accused “certain political circles” in Ukraine of insulting the memory of non-Ukrainian famine victims. Since then, the pro-government Russian press has published dozens of articles assailing Ukraine’s stance on the Holodomor as an insidious anti-Russian ploy. This year, President Dmitry Medvedev declined an invitation to Holodomor Remembrance Day ceremonies in Kiev in a petulant letter that dismissed “talk of the so-called Holodomor” as an “immoral” attempt to give a shared tragedy a nationalist spin and also took a swipe at Ukraine’s desire to join NATO.”  (Russophobe 2008)
• The Squeeze – The other modern day assertion by the Russians is that the West uses such arguments as the holodomor as a means  of military strategy. By convincing the Ukrainians to break away from Russia they will be able to convince them to join Nato. In so doing they lay claim to the port of Sevastopol and as such deny Russia an access port to the Black Sea and the Mediterranean.   This would be totally unacceptable to Russia as they would lose a major military strategic advantage.
• Early Official denials by the Kremlin –  Amongst the most significant early official denials issued by the Kremlin was that of former Soviet President Mikhael Kalinen:   ” Soviet President Mikhail Kalinin responded to Western offers of food by telling of “political cheats who offer to help the starving Ukraine,” and commented that, “only the most decadent classes are capable of producing such cynical elements.” In his letter, Skvirsky stated that the idea that the Soviet government was “deliberately killing the population of the Ukraine” “wholly grotesque.” He claimed that the Ukrainian population was increasing at an annual rate of 2 percent during the preceding five years. He asserted that the death rate in Ukraine “was the lowest of that of any of the constituent republics composing the Soviet Union,” concluding that it “was about 35 percent lower than the pre-war death rate of tsarist days.” (Anon, Holodomor denial 2007)
• President Leonid Kravchuk the first President of the Ukraine describes horrific counts of complicity in his early days of Office. Amongst these tales is the story of the report to the then Soviet Secretary on the results of the famine.. ” The selected materials and photographs (one and half thousand, I believe) were passed on to the first secretary. Ivashko telephoned me soon thereafter. His voice was trembling: ‘This can’t be so!’ He refused to believe and I understood why. He ordered a publication ban until such time that evidence was found that the famine was not artificial. Ivashko ordered me to see if there were droughts in Ukraine in those years. I sent a request to the republican state hydrological center but they did not keep those kinds of records. I sent requests to appropriate services in Moscow and they provided very detailed information. It showed that rainfall levels for those years were not lower than acceptable norms. This was a very serious argument and Ivashko decided to raise the issue at a meeting of the politburo. The discussion was not easy, but thanks to the principled nature of the first secretary, the book’s publication was approved. Many were understandably displeased with the decision. However, the most terrifying photographs were not approved for print, and their number was reduced from 1,500 to around 350.”  (Kravchuk 2008)

In summary the case for denial is based upon the following:

• It was a necessary act in order to put down a potential revolt against the communist state
• The Ukrainians essentially brought this act upon themselves and they were complicit in the early causes of death. They themselves were heavily involved in the putting down of the rebellious elements
• Unfortunately some of the Ukrainians developed early sympathies with the Nazi regime and developed fascist policies that were inflicted upon their own people
• The Soviets were worried about the spread of anti-communist revolution and did not meddle in internal domestic Ukrainian affairs but waited to watch the situation play out. By the time the aid did arrive to the communities it was too late and millions had already perished of starvation
• A lot of the early reports, photographs and journalistic evidence had been falsified by the West in order to portray the communist Stalin government in a bad light
• The west were playing a political spin on this for strategic and military purposes. The historical account is very different to the modern day perspective being put forward by the Western democracies.
• There was a great deal of inefficiencies and poor communications during the famine period and the Soviet machine was not directly responsible in the deaths that subsequently occurred.

Conclusions

Without a doubt the Soviet regime of Joseph Stalin was both a brutal and murderous era of Russian History.  The Ukraine Famine was particularly tragic because of the horrific loss of life, surely in excess of 10 million people killed by starvation.  During the Stalin regime it is believed some 20 million people were killed ( there are no precise records to substantiate this figure, so it based upon a correlation of records amassed from historical archives).  Adolf Hitler was purported to be responsible for the death of some 6 million Jews during the Second World War.  The Khmer Rouge of Pol Pot’s regime was reported to be responsible for the genocide of some 2.5 million Cambodians. More recently in 1994 the Tutsi’s of Rwanda were reported as murdering as many as 1 million Rwandans.  One of the horrors of genocide is that when you talk of such huge numbers they start to lose their significance, hence the leap of imagination from 6 million to 10 million is so horrific it is hard to begin to conceptualize.

Legality has to be taken into consideration here when determining the historical facts. Mass murder or genocide from a guilty verdict means that it was pre-meditated and that you were complicit in the act taking place.  The crime of Genocide has two key components to it : “The crime of genocide has two elements: intent and action. “Intentional” means purposeful. Intent can be proven directly from statements or orders. But more often, it must be inferred from a systematic pattern of coordinated acts.”  (Genocide. 1948)

So if we examine each of these components in turn.  Did the Stalin regime have “Intent” to brutally murder the people of the Ukraine.  The answer must be yes as the Stalin regime wanted to teach the Ukrainian people a severe lesson and put down any chance of insurrection or revolution against the communist regime.  As such they were complicit in the action taking place whether directly or indirectly responsible.  The military controlled the distribution of food to the villages and deliberately withheld food ( not just the grain) and thereby were complicit in starving the people to death.  The Soviet military are controlled by the Kremlin and Stalin’s regime.  Secondly were the Stalin regime directly involved in an action that was resulting in genocide.  The answer to this must equally be yes.  If you take political considerations aside there is overwhelming evidence to support the fact that direct actions were taken by the Soviet regime in order to allow an act of genocide to take place.  Without putting forward a complete legal case the research demonstrates :

• Sufficient eye witness, material and photographic evidence to support Soviet involvement in the starvation of the people during this time;
• Stalin himself admitted the solution was necessary to prevent insurrection and teach the people a lesson;
• Written testimonials of people who were moved to Soviet gulags ( forced labour internment camps);
• The actions of the Soviet military against the people under the direct orders of the Kremlin

Works Cited

Anon. Holodomor denial. 2007. http://wikibin.org/articles/holodomor-denial.html (accessed 10 19, 2009).

Anon. “Stalins Forced Famine 132-33 : 7 million deaths.” The History Place, 2000: 2.

Charques, Richard. “A Short History of Russia.” In A Short History of Russia, by Richard Charques, 245. London: English Universities Press, 1959.

Durranty, Walter. “USSR: The Story of Soviet Russia,.” In USSR: The Story of Soviet Russia,, by Walter Durranty, 195. New York: Waldo Specthrie Press, 1944.

Furr, Grover Prof. The Hoax of the Man-Made Ukraine Famine of 1932-33. 2 25, 1987. http://www.plp.org/cd_sup/ukfam1.html (accessed 10 19, 2009).

Genocide., Articles II and III of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of. Prevention of Genocide International. 1948. http://www.preventgenocide.org/genocide/officialtext.htm (accessed 10 18, 2009).

Ivan, Spector. “Russian History and Culture.” In Russian History and Culture, by Spector Ivan. New Yoork: D.Van Nostrand, 1950.

Kravchuk, Leonid. Criminality of holdomor denial. 5 13, 2008. http://kyivscoop.blogspot.com/2008/05/criminality-of-holodomor-denial.html (accessed 10 19, 2009).

Luhovy, Artem Yaroslav. “The 1932-33 Famine-Genocide in Soviet Ukraine .” 2003 Writing Competition, 2003.

Party, Progressive Labour. “Conquest Book Lies About 1932-33 Ukraine Famine.” Challenge-Desafio, 1947: 10-13.

Russophobe. Russia’s Barbaric Denial on Holodomor. 12 8, 2008. http://larussophobe.wordpress.com/2008/12/08/russias-barbaric-denial-on-holodomor/ (accessed 10 12, 2009).

Vernadsky, George. “A history of Russia.” In A history of Russia, by George Vernadsky, 337. Philadelphia: Blakiston, 1944.

Wolfe, Bertram D. “Khrushchev and Stalin’s Ghost.” In Khrushchev and Stalin’s Ghost, by Bertram D Wolfe, 165. New York: Praeger, 1957.

>>> insert at end in citations

Commission, Ukraine. Ukraine commission bans Holocaust film in schools. May 22, 2009. http://jta.org/news/article/2009/05/22/1005354/ukraine-commission-bans-holocaust-film-in-schools (accessed October 18, 2009).

Infoukes. The Artificial Famine/Genocide: InfoUkes. April 26, 2009. http://www.infoukes.com/history/famine/ (accessed 10 18, 2009).