One of the neuralgic points of Ukrainian resistance to anything Russian grows out of the dark events of the early twentieth century—e.g. Stalin’s famine.
When we look at history from a greater distance, it may appear as a continuous chain of interconnected events that imprint themselves on the collective memory of nations, influencing the mutual dynamics of the actors for many decades. Yet, some events are so traumatizing that they can never truly heal in the hearts of nations. The Great Famine in Ukraine at the start of the 20th century is undoubtedly one such “turning point” that still affects the broad reaches of Eastern Europe today.
The Ukrainian famine of 1932–1933 was an artificially induced famine in the territory of the Ukrainian SSR, caused by industrialization, compulsory grain requisitions, and collectivization in the agricultural regions of the USSR. It left deep social and psychological scars on the Ukrainian population, marks that persist to this day. Ukrainians perceive this famine as genocide committed by the Soviet regime, led by Stalin, and this tragic moment remains vivid in Ukraine’s historical memory. It led many Ukrainians to welcome Hitler’s armies in 1941 as liberators from communist tyranny. This, as we now know, was a tragic mistake, but it illustrates the depth of despair and hatred that Stalin’s deliberate, murderous actions left within the Ukrainian nation. And, incidentally, it remains one of the roots of present-day Ukrainian resistance to Russia.
The exact number of famine victims cannot be determined due to unreliable and incomplete official records, but credible estimates range from 3 to 5 million people.
However, the Ukrainian famine did not fall from the sky. Let’s first take a brief look at the general context of the region (for simplicity, I’ll mention only a short extract from relatively recent history, though it’s important to note that Ukraine and Russia have a long history of conflicts and rivalries dating back to the Middle Ages).
The Great War and the Bloody End of the Old Order
For nearly 150 years (from the late 18th century to the early 20th century), and even during the Great War (i.e., World War I), what is now Ukraine was divided between Austria-Hungary and the Russian Empire. The inhabitants of this region became victims of the largest bloodshed on the Eastern Front. They endured the inhumanity of both Russian and Austrian commanders, as well as the destruction of towns and villages and the massacre of civilians. Although numerous Ukrainian soldiers fought and died for both empires, neither acknowledged their national interests. On the contrary, both strove with all their might to destroy the Ukrainian national movement.
By early 1917, the Great War’s combatants stood on the brink of collapse. This included Austria-Hungary and Germany, and it was especially true for the ailing Russian Empire, where non-Russian nations were also striving for the right to control their own destiny. Ukraine was no exception; in 1917, the Ukrainian National Revolution erupted, only to be drowned in years of bloody civil war with the Bolshevik Red Army. In Ukraine alone, World War I, followed by civil war, claimed over 1.5 million lives.
The Famine
Allow me to draw on some more extensive quotations from a very important work on this subject—Bloodlands by the American historian Timothy Snyder:
The mass famine of 1933 was the result of Stalin’s first Five-Year Plan, implemented between 1928 and 1932. During this period, Stalin took full control of the party leadership, enforced policies of industrialization and collectivization, and emerged as a terrifying patriarch to the oppressed populace. He replaced the market with planning, turned peasants into slaves, and transformed the wastes of Siberia and northern Kazakhstan into a network of concentration camps. Tens of thousands were executed, hundreds of thousands perished from exhaustion, and millions hovered on the brink of starvation as a result of his policies.
Collectivization led to a fundamental confrontation between the numerous peasantry and the Soviet state and its police, then known as the OGPU. Stalin foresaw this clash and in 1929 ordered the largest mobilization of state power in the history of the USSR. The task of building socialism, he declared, would resemble “the rising of an ocean.” In December of that year, he announced that “kulaks” (the Russian term for middle to wealthy peasants) would be “eliminated as a class.” In the first four months of 1930, 113,637 people labeled as kulaks were violently deported from Soviet Ukraine.
By the autumn of 1931, it was evident that the first collective harvest was a failure. Many causes converged: bad weather, crop damage by pests, reduced draft animal power due to peasants slaughtering or selling off their livestock, tractor production failing to meet planned targets, and the process of collectivization itself disrupting sowing and harvesting. With peasants stripped of their land, they saw no reason to work hard. Many collective farms could only meet their grain requisition quotas by handing over seed reserved for the following year. By late 1931, many villagers were already beginning to starve. With no land of their own and no way to resist requisitions, they had no means to feed their families. And by the spring of 1932, they had no seeds left to produce a harvest later that year.
The famine in Ukraine lasted 17 long months, from April 1932 to November 1933. It claimed at least 3 million lives, though more likely around 5 million. Countless villages died out within a matter of months, as Soviet authorities looked on in silence. In some areas, people, in their desperation, resorted even to cannibalism.
Children suffered the most; they constituted a third of the famine’s victims. From January 1933 onward, the territories of Soviet Ukraine and the Kuban region, where Ukrainians formed a majority, were encircled by military units to prevent peasants from fleeing to other parts of the Soviet Union in search of food. Ukrainians were prohibited from purchasing train tickets. Roads were blocked by special police units and local activists. Entry into the region was permitted only with special permission. Violating these regulations was punishable by execution.
Why did this happen?
In short, the Bolshevik regime decided to bring the Ukrainian nation to its knees through starvation and to force it to begin building “communism” upon the graves of millions of the dead.
Today it’s clear that the famine was created by a decree of the Soviet government, known popularly as the “Law of Five Ears of Grain,” which banned all forms of trade in rural areas. The supply of foodstuffs to villages was halted, and any use of grain, even to pay for labor in areas that failed to meet grain requisition quotas, was punished by the Gulag, 10 years in prison, or death by shooting. This plan was derived from the unusually high 1930 harvest, and Ukraine was asked for a disproportionately large share: while Ukraine produced about 27% of the USSR’s grain, it was required to deliver 38% of the total Soviet grain quotas. Initially, the Soviet leadership set that Ukraine must hand over more than six million tons of grain to the state. Eventually, however, Molotov’s commission sought to seize everything to break Ukrainian resistance to collectivization. When there was nowhere left to take from, even next year’s seed grain was confiscated. The result was millions dead and unimaginable suffering for those who survived.
Consequences of the Famine
When Adolf Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa against the Soviet Union in 1941 and conquered the southern territories of Russia up to the Volga, some people greeted the German troops with enthusiasm as liberators from communist tyranny. Some historians consider the Soviet famine of 1932–1933 and the Ukrainian famine specifically as one reason why many Ukrainians became allies of Nazi Germany in the fight against the Soviet Union.
However, it must be added that millions of Ukrainians simultaneously fought in the Red Army against Nazi Germany, and some Soviet commanders of Ukrainian origin—such as Timoshenko, Voroshilov, Grechko, Malinovsky, and Yeremenko—served at high levels.
And in USSR? Stalin’s close associate and Ukrainian-born Lazar Kaganovich was found by a Ukrainian court to be jointly responsible for the Ukrainian famine. (Not Stalin himself, of course).
Even today, the famine is remembered as a pillar of Ukrainian resistance to Russia.
Recognition as an Act of Genocide
Ukraine has officially declared the 1932–1933 famine to be an act of genocide. In addition to Ukraine, the following states consider the Ukrainian famine to be genocide: Australia, Brazil, the Czech Republic, Ecuador, Estonia, Georgia, Canada, Colombia, Ireland, Lithuania, Latvia, Hungary, Mexico, Moldova, Germany, the Netherlands, Paraguay, Peru, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, the USA, and the Vatican. The European Union recognized the Ukrainian famine as genocide on December 15, 2022. The Czech Republic recognized this famine as an act of genocide against the Ukrainian nation on April 6, 2022.
Every year, on the last Saturday in November, Ukraine commemorates the innocent victims of the famine. Millions of candles are lit across the country to honor the memory of the innocent victims of this artificially induced famine.
Links
If you’re interested in more information from my “Russian” series, go here: Gulag camps: The Soviet death machine of slave labor.
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