The Ukranian Holocaust

[Drace]

I was reading Another View of Stalin which did a good job of defending the Ukrainian Holocaust.

But other sources give completely different views.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor


The Holodomor (Ukrainian (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_language): Голодомор; translation: death by starvation) refers to the famine of 1932–1933 in the Ukrainian SSR (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_Soviet_Socialist_Republic)Soviet Republics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_Republic) - enjoyed a bumper wheat crop in 1932.[1] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-britannica-0)[2] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-1) The Holodomor is considered one of the greatest calamities to affect the Ukrainian nation in modern history. Millions of inhabitants of Ukraine died of starvation in an unprecedented peacetime catastrophe.[1] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-britannica-0)[3] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Losses-2)[4] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Vallin2-3)[5] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Fawkes-4) Estimates on the total number of casualties within Soviet Ukraine range mostly from 2.6 million[6] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Vallin2005-5)[7] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Vallinbook-6) to 10 million.The during which millions of people starved to death as a result of Soviet economic and trade policies. There were no natural causes for starvation and in fact, Ukraine - unlike other other Soviet Republics (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_Republic) - enjoyed a bumper wheat crop in 1932.[1] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-britannica-0)[2] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-1) The Holodomor is considered one of the greatest calamities to affect the Ukrainian nation in modern history. Millions of inhabitants of Ukraine died of starvation in an unprecedented peacetime catastrophe.[1] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-britannica-0)[3] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Losses-2)[4] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Vallin2-3)[5] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Fawkes-4) Estimates on the total number of casualties within Soviet Ukraine range mostly from 2.6 million[6] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Vallin2005-5)[7] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-Vallinbook-6) to 10 million.[8] (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor#cite_note-EGCA-7)The text in red goes directly against what I read.

In the book, wheat production was said to have failed due to kulak repression, drought, epidemics and bad organization.

While this article says that there were no natural causes of it.

The book also listed sources of deaths going from one million to 15 million.

Any further reading I can do on this?

[bailey_187]

This deals with the weather problems

http://www.rationalrevolution.net/special/library/tottlefraud.pdf

[gorillafuck]

There was a Ukrainian famine, not a Ukrainian Holocaust. The Holocaust is a specific event in history.

[bailey_187]

About estimates of deaths ranging to 15million, well, maybe even the Bourgeois historians think 15 million Ukrainians dying out of 30 million is ridiculous

[bailey_187]

There was a Ukrainian famine, not a Ukrainian Holocaust. The Holocaust is a specific event in history.

indeed. Any attempts to compare the Famine to the industrial slaughter of 6 million Jews is offensive

[bailey_187]

Some more links:

http://www.as.wvu.edu/history/Faculty/Tauger/soviet.htm
http://eh.net/pipermail/eh.net-review/2004-November/000085.html

Neither of these sources are by Communists

Sorry for so many posts, will edit from now on

[Drace]

By Ukranian Holocaust, im referring to the Holodomor.

Well yes, there obviously was a famine, but the way Wikipedia portrays it is completely different. Its really the complete opposite and it also addresses some points that were not defended in Another View of Stalin.

For example, the book made it clear that there was a drought. Wikipedia also points out that the harvest was actually well?

[bailey_187]

By Ukranian Holocaust, im referring to the Holodomor.

Well yes, there obviously was a famine, but the way Wikipedia portrays it is completely different. Its really the complete opposite and it also addresses some points that were not defended in Another View of Stalin.

For example, the book made it clear that there was a drought. Wikipedia also points out that the harvest was actually well?

Another View of Stalin may be abit old in some places

Also, its clear that it will be the complete opposite. It seems likely that the person who maintains the Ukraine Famine page is likely to be a Ukrainian Nationalist

What is the source the the Wikipedia page uses?

[LOLseph Stalin]

There was a Ukrainian famine, not a Ukrainian Holocaust. The Holocaust is a specific event in history.

Bourgeois propaganda certainly calls it a holocaust. They just love the whole "zomg, Hitler and Stalin were the same!" nonsense. :rolleyes: The term holocaust just makes it sound like Stalin purposely killed off millions of Ukrainians.

[Paul Cockshott]

check out http://www.plp.org/cd_sup/ukfam1.html

[Drace]

What I'm interested to know is what motive would Stalin have to kill off Ukrainians?



What is the source the the Wikipedia page uses?

Wikipedia lists its sources.
Look it up

[bailey_187]

What I'm interested to know is what motive would Stalin have to kill off Ukrainians?

Stalin doesn't need a motive. He's just pure evil, that is all.

[CallMeSteve]

There was a lot of kulak resistance to collectivisation of farmland - many burnt their crops, killed their cattle etc.

Does anybody know to what extent this sabotage brought about the Ukrainian famine, ie - how much can we attribute to Stalin.

[Absolut]

Whats a bumper wheat crop?

[Paul Cockshott]

Prof Traugers papers show that there was not a bumper harvest, that it was a very low one. He attributes this not to weather but to the process of collectivisation.

[Hiero]

By Ukranian Holocaust, im referring to the Holodomor.

Well yes, there obviously was a famine, but the way Wikipedia portrays it is completely different. Its really the complete opposite and it also addresses some points that were not defended in Another View of Stalin.

For example, the book made it clear that there was a drought. Wikipedia also points out that the harvest was actually well?

Wikipedia is not canon. Wikipedia is the lazy alternative to real study. Wikipedia is at best a summary of other sources arranged into an aritcle. It is only a starting point to further investigation.

[bailey_187]

The Wikipedia article says not even Conquest believes the Famine was deliberate

[ComradeOm]

I address a few points on the supposed genocide in this post (http://www.revleft.com/vb/showpost.php?p=1356546&postcount=58). Earlier posts in the same thread may be of interest also

[chegitz guevara]

First of all, Stalin, Another View is a work of rank propaganda. I've never been able to read a piece of that book without being able to refute what I'm reading.

In any event, there was a famine, and approximately three million three hundred thousand people died above the numbers that would normally have been expected during the years 1932-34. In addition, less babies were born (but that isn't, in itself, a crime against humanity). The vast majority of those deaths occurred in Eastern Ukraine, as well as the part of Russia east of the Ukraine. What should be noted is that these areas are largely settled by Russians, not Ukrainians. About half of all the people who died in the Great Famine were Russians.

This regions of Russia/Ukraine suffers a poor harvest nearly once a decade. One happened ten years earlier, in 1922. It should be kept in mind that in the modern world, famines are the result of human agency, not nature. There is so much food available in the world that a poor harvest should not result in anyone dying. This was true in 1922, it was true in 1932, and it is still true today. A famine occurs because people cannot get food, not because there isn't any.

In 1922, the problem was the destruction of Russia from the civil war, and the complete disruption of the economy. In addition, shamefully, the Communists, in spite of a world wide relief effort to help the starving in Russia, Russia was selling grain on the world market. In their defense, they needed hard currency, but it looks real bad when millions in your country are starving to death, the world is donating food to you, and you're selling food for money. Consequently, the relief to Russia was cut off.

In 1932-34, again, the famine was man-made. Partly it was due to the disruption of collectivization. This was carried out in a typically ham-fisted bureaucratic method. In a year when the crops were good, this would have been overcome. In addition, because of the campaign against the Kulaks, the seed grain that the peasants saved in order to plant the following year was confiscated. Finally, Moscow ignored reports coming in from commissars in the field that there was a problem, and the policy of grain confiscation continued for nearly a year after the famine began. It wasn't until late 1933 that the grain confiscations stopped.

There is no evidence to support the idea that the famine was a deliberate policy of the USSR or Stalin. Nonetheless, as dictator, he is ultimately responsible. He instituted the policies that exacerbated a bad situation and did not act to institute relief until far too late. Those 3.3 million who died are on Stalin's hands (as well as many others).

[Kayser_Soso]

Demographic statistics, according to Tauger, show 2.2 million excess deaths for the famine year, throughout the Soviet Union. Something like 1-1.5 million died in Ukraine. Indeed, the Soviet government reacted slowly, but when they became aware, they did mobilize the country's resources to attempt to solve the problem. By contrast, there were famines in countries like Benin around the same time, and nothing was done to relieve the situation.

Bottom line is, that capitalist policies have been causing famine for DECADES, and yet it's always labeled as "unfortunate"; often blamed on the Africans, Asians, or Latin Americans themselves. Whereas a famine occurs in the Soviet Union; when that land had experienced consecutive famines in the past, and suddenly it's Stalin's fault- treated as if the guy rode around the countryside with a Tommygun, mowing people down.

Hold on a sec, let me get my phone..I'm calling bullshit.

[chegitz guevara]

What part of famines are man-made don't you understand? The USSR had access to enough food to feed those people. Instead of curtailing the grain confiscations and importing food into the region, they continued pulling food out of the region. That's why millions died. Not because of a bad harvest.

[PRC-UTE]

What part of famines are man-made don't you understand? The USSR had access to enough food to feed those people. Instead of curtailing the grain confiscations and importing food into the region, they continued pulling food out of the region. That's why millions died. Not because of a bad harvest.

Your post on the last page was very good, but I would add that there was tremendous class struggle going on. Defeating the peasants was seen as essential by many many communists. Which was understandable given that the peasants were accused of hoarding grain while urban workers starved during the civil war.

[Kayser_Soso]

What part of famines are man-made don't you understand? The USSR had access to enough food to feed those people. Instead of curtailing the grain confiscations and importing food into the region, they continued pulling food out of the region. That's why millions died. Not because of a bad harvest.


What part of "all the evidence shows that the primary causes were natural" don't you understand? Grain procurements continued because collectives initially overreported their harvest data(which has since been uncovered thanks to the opening of the archives by Dr. Mark Tauger), and general confusion as to whether enough grain was being produced or whether people were hoarding it. Indeed, this is partially the fault of the government, but at the same time when it became clear that there was a serious problem in 1932, the procurement was suddenly lowered to its lowest of the decade, grain was returned to many collectives, and exports were reduced. Granted, perhaps they could have done more, such as cut all exports temporarily, but they did far more than the British and French colonial regimes did in response to contemporary famines in their African colonies. Of course that's not saying much because incidentally they did- nothing.

[chegitz guevara]

What part of "all the evidence shows that the primary causes were natural" don't you understand?

Primary causes are always natural. The difference between a bad harvest and a famine, however, is man-made decisions. The famine from 1932-34 happened for political reasons, not because there was a bad harvest. The USSR and Russia have had bad harvests in that region every decade since, and millions did not die (though in WWII, it would be hard to notice if they had). In other decades, the Soviets send food to the affected region. That's how a bad harvest does not become a famine.

When you combine bad-harvests with bad decisions, that's when millions died. Moscow had information that there was a problem, and for whatever reason, they did not respond for over a year. Instead of buying food on the world market, or simply shipping food from other regions, they kept confiscating grain. So millions died.

[Kayser_Soso]

Primary causes are always natural. The difference between a bad harvest and a famine, however, is man-made decisions. The famine from 1932-34 happened for political reasons, not because there was a bad harvest. The USSR and Russia have had bad harvests in that region every decade since, and millions did not die (though in WWII, it would be hard to notice if they had). In other decades, the Soviets send food to the affected region. That's how a bad harvest does not become a famine.

When you combine bad-harvests with bad decisions, that's when millions died. Moscow had information that there was a problem, and for whatever reason, they did not respond for over a year. Instead of buying food on the world market, or simply shipping food from other regions, they kept confiscating grain. So millions died.

Sorry Robert Conquest, but actually about the same amount died of famine in 1921-22, and that was caused by the Civil War. The excess deaths for the whole USSR in that period were 2.2 million, with 1.5 million in Ukraine. Obviously not all of those were due to famine either.

[narcomprom]

The name holodomor consists of the ukrainian words "holod", "famine" and "moryti" "to exhaust someone to death". The word means "exhausting to death with hunger" and an elderly Ukrainian woman I spoke to affirmed that the word was quite right. They actually went around, collecting forcibly the grain. They were starved deliberately, she claimes, it was a holodomor.

At the same time, like many people who survived fascist occupation, the woman was a staunch Stalinist. What she claimed in his defense was that he wasn't informed, and once he got the clue, he immediately punished the responsible local bureaucrats.

To me it's not that relevant wether the mistake was done in central or local authority. Back in 1934 it was nescessary to defend the first one as infallible but how is it relevant now?

[Kayser_Soso]

The name holodomor consists of the ukrainian words "holod", "famine" and "moryti" "to exhaust someone to death". The word means "exhausting to death with hunger" and an elderly Ukrainian woman I spoke to affirmed that the word was quite right. They actually went around, collecting forcibly the grain. They were starved deliberately, she claimes, it was a holodomor.

Nonsense. Of course the state procured grain, this was part of the system. The problem is that there was a market in agriculture and many peasants were attempting to speculate on grain. In other words, they were willing to starve the urban population because they wanted more money.



At the same time, like many people who survived fascist occupation, the woman was a staunch Stalinist. What she claimed in his defense was that he wasn't informed, and once he got the clue, he immediately punished the responsible local bureaucrats.

To me it's not that relevant wether the mistake was done in central or local authority. Back in 1934 it was nescessary to defend the first one as infallible but how is it relevant now?

Agreed.

[narcomprom]

Nonsense. Of course the state procured grain, this was part of the system. The problem is that there was a market in agriculture and many peasants were attempting to speculate on grain. In other words, they were willing to starve the urban population because they wanted more money.
That is another sombre part of soviet history, the liquidation of the kulaks as a class. I see now you believe it was the right thing to do, after all they were "willing to starve the urban population because they wanted more money".

Not even the Stalinist lady i knew would subscribe to that myth. They were a scapegoat and unlike with the peasants nobody would claim the liquidation was a natural reason.

You could claim it was a nescessesity but bluntly reiterating the witchhunter propaganda spouted through Pravda now is creepy, to say the least. Nobody was supposed to believe it even back then. It was there to intimidate.

[Woland]

That is another sombre part of soviet history, the liquidation of the kulaks as a class. I see now you believe it was the right thing to do, after all they were "willing to starve the urban population because they wanted more money".

Not even the Stalinist lady i knew would subscribe to that myth. They were a scapegoat and unlike with the peasants nobody would claim the liquidation was a natural reason.

You could claim it was a nescessesity but bluntly reiterating the witchhunter propaganda spouted through Pravda now is creepy, to say the least. Nobody was supposed to believe it even back then. It was there to intimidate.

http://www.masterandmargarita.eu/images/09context/kolchoze.jpg

We, kolkhoz workers, liquidate the kulak as a class.

[narcomprom]

http://www.masterandmargarita.eu/images/09context/kolchoze.jpg

We, kolkhoz workers, liquidate the kulak as a class.
There's something about Stalin in the middle you left out.

Other than that, creepy. :)

[Woland]

There's something about Stalin in the middle you left out.

Other than that, creepy. :)

Nothing about Stalin. It says ''on the basis of complete collectivization''.

Class struggle during the collectivization period was extremely vicious; hundreds of people, such as kolkhoz chairmen, were murdered by kulaks.

[Bright Banana Beard]

It doesn't look like Stalin to me. He too young to be Stalin.

[narcomprom]

Nothing about Stalin. It says ''on the basis of complete collectivization''.
i don't know that s-oy word. what does it say?

Class struggle during the collectivization period was extremely vicious; hundreds of people, such as kolkhoz chairmen, were murdered by kulaks.
there was a famous boy viciously killed by a gang of ruthless kulaks. what was his name again?

[Woland]

i don't know that s-oy word. what does it say?

Sploshnoy (сплошной). It means ''complete'', ''total'', or ''solid''.


there was a famous boy viciously killed by a gang of ruthless kulaks. what was his name again?

Pavlik Morozov.

[KC]

Pavlik Morozov.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d2/Pavel_Morozov.jpg/180px-Pavel_Morozov.jpg

God damn that is a freaky looking head.

[ComradeOm]

The USSR had access to enough food to feed those peopleSource?


Instead of curtailing the grain confiscations and importing food into the region, they continued pulling food out of the regionYou are surprised? The Ukraine was a designated Producer Region and was traditionally a net exporter of grain. If the grain collections in that region ceased then how would the Consumer Regions (net importers of grain) be fed?


It should be kept in mind that in the modern world, famines are the result of human agency, not natureIf by the "modern world" you mean industrial societies. Or at least peasant societies that are no longer reliant on subsistence farming. Neither of which accurately describes the Ukraine, or indeed wider Russia, during the early decades of the 20th C. Which is exactly why the famine was so devastating

[The Author]

The famine was due mainly to drought and hoarding by the kulak class. Also, at about the same time, the Dust Bowl was taking place in the United States. There was a global pattern of dry weather and poor growth seasons at the time.

[Ismail]

One of the main reasons the famine occurred was due to the lack of info the Soviets had on the actual conditions in the area. For example, Stalin's letters show him basically saying "What's the matter? Why aren't X regions producing grain?" Molotov's memoirs note that he did not hear about famines while in the Ukraine.




The Political Bureau believes that shortage of seed grain in Ukraine is many times worse than what was described in comrade Kosior’s telegram; therefore, the Political Bureau recommends the Central Committee of the Communist party of Ukraine to take all measures within its reach to prevent the threat of failing to sow [field crops] in Ukraine.

Signed: Secretary of the Central Committee – J. STALIN



There are also isolated cases of starvation, and even whole villages [starving]; however, this is only the result of bungling on the local level, deviations [from the party line], especially in regard of kolkhozes. All rumours about “famine” in Ukraine must be unconditionally rejected. The crucial help that was provided for Ukraine will give us the opportunity to eradicate all such outbreaks [of starvation].




Comrade Kosior!

You must read attached summaries. Judging by this information, it looks like the Soviet authority has ceased to exist in some areas of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Can this be true? Is the situation invillages in Ukraine this bad? Where are the operatives of the OGPU [Joint Main Political Directorate], what are they doing?

Could you verify this information and inform the Central Committee of
the All-Union Communist party about taken measures.

Sincerely, J. Stalin




[…] in his conversations with collective farmers, comrade Budyenny said: “Your predicament is that the authorities do not know that you have no bread, your “Ukrainian” and local leaders are to blame, they over-promised [to the Central authorities] all these ‘self-imposed extensions’ of quotas for grain procurement, and took your grain, and left you without bread”.

Etc. There's plenty more. The source is "Famine in the USSR: 1929-1934: New Documentary Evidence" (http://www.russianembassy.org.za/special/famine.html) Basically, its point is to note that the famine was unintentional and due to both natural and "man-made" (pressures, etc.) reasons. The latter being done due to lack of sufficient knowledge of the region.

[Wakizashi the Bolshevik]

Famine had 4 reasons:

1) The civil war that was going on on the countryside, following the collectivisation of agriculture, and especially after the counteroffensive of the kulaks. The kulaks burned their crops and fields, razed farms to the ground and slaughtered cattle.
According to Frederick Schuman, a tourist who travelled through Ukraine at the time, the amount of horses went down from 30 million in 1928 to less than 15 million in 1933, from 31 million cows to 20 million cows in 1933, from 147 goats and sheep to 50 million and from 20 million pigs to 12 million in 1933.

2) A massive drought that hit the Ukraine in 1930, 1931 and 1932. Michael Hroesjevski, one of the most important right-wing, nationalist Ukrainian writers, admitted that "a new year of drought hit just at the time when there was chaos on the countryside"

3) A typhus epidemic, this epidemic striked so hard that the man who came up wth the absurd number of 13 million Holodomor deaths, Horsley Gantt, even admitted that he wasn't sure what costed the most lifes: the hunger or typhus.

4) The fourth reason was the chaos on the contryside, caused by roerganisation of agriculture, mistakes that were made by lower cadres, extreme measures taken by fanatics, and violent reaction from the kulaks

The famine lasted about a year, no more. It costed about 1-2 million lifes.
And by the way, to claim it was aimed to destroy the Ukrainian people is absurd, as there was also famine in the Caucasus ad other parts of Russia itself.
And not to forget there was a massive and far greater famine everywhere in the capitalist world!

[Nolan]

Why was grain confiscated from the peasants and when was that stopped?

[Proletarian Ultra]

1. Stalin's policy was to extract surplus from the peasants to pay for a military-industrial complex ("if we don't do this, we shall be crushed"). This had been worked out by party intelligentsia in advance as "socialist primitive accumulation".

2. Collectivization made it easier to monitor and crush resistance to said surplus extraction. It also built support for the policy among the party left and some sections of the poorer peasantry.

3. Given the bad weather conditions and the inevitable transition costs of moving to collective farming, the USSR should have been importing, not exporting grain. But that would have defeated point #1.

4. Stalin was a big believer in the broken eggs and omelette theory. And if most of those eggs happened to be west Ukrainians of questionable loyalty - well, what a shame.

5. Look up a map of the old Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. If you plot out Stalin and Hitler's atrocities, the vast bulk of them fall within that territory. I'm not trying to draw a facile equivalence here - the point is there was a very peculiar caste-based feudal structure prevalent in that area, and breaking it into the logic of modern states came at a very high human cost.

[Wakizashi the Bolshevik]

There was a famine, but never a Ukrainian "holocaust" or planned extermination of Ukrainians. During the Collectivization there was in essence a war goin on between the peasants and the kulaks. The kulaks burned crops and collective farms, destroyed wheat fields, massacred cattle and killed collective farm peasants.

In "Another View of Stalin" there is also a very useful sorce given, being the diary of an American journalist in Kiev who read reports of the famine in the very newspaper he was working for (which was not written by hem, though he was responsible for news from Ukraine), and wrote a letter to his newspaper that he was in the very city where a famine was supposed to be happening, while it wasn't anymore.
The famine lasted for about a month or two.

[comradesvs]

Read Fraud, Famine, and Fascism by Douglas Tottle. You can get it for free in pdf at progressbooks.ca but the site seems to be down for the moment... I'd imagine it will be back up shortly.

[ComradeOm]

Just noticed that this is a necro thread. Well I've already written the post so I'll publish and be damned


It should be kept in mind that in the modern world, famines are the result of human agency, not nature. There is so much food available in the world that a poor harvest should not result in anyone dying. This was true in 1922, it was true in 1932, and it is still true today. A famine occurs because people cannot get food, not because there isn't anyNo. This may apply to a modern industrial society but it certainly does not when considering pre-capitalist peasant formations


In addition, shamefully, the Communists, in spite of a world wide relief effort to help the starving in Russia, Russia was selling grain on the world marketThe total number of Soviet exports in 1921 was 20 million gold roubles. The amount of grain alone that exported in 1913 was 529 million gold roubles. Together with other food products this comes to almost 1200 million gold roubles worth of food exported by the Tsardom in 1913 alone. For the sake of completeness, total Soviet exports in 1920 amounted to no more than 1.5 million gold roubles. (All figures from Davies et al, The Economic Transformation of the Soviet Union)

Clearly there was no great tide of food flowing from the country in 1921. At the very maximum food exports would have comprised no more than 1.6% of the pre-war amount. In addition, we know (from Simon Liberman's autobiography Building Lenin's Russia) that the first years of Soviet exports were dominated by the timber trade, not agricultural production. So I see no basis for the claim that the Communists were seizing grain from starving peasants simply for export on the world market

And if food wasn't destined for abroad then where could it be going? The famines that blighted Russian cities, and their immensely devastating impact on the country's proletariat, are probably sufficiently well known as not to need any elaboration from me