Vsevolod Bashkuev Research Fellow, Institute of Mongolian, Buddhist and Tibetan studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Siberian Division Ulan-Ude, E-mail: [email protected] Work in progress. Please do not quote. “Based Upon Deeply Rooted Hostile Views…” Anti-Soviet Sentiments and Resistance among the Special Settlers in Buryat-, 1940s-1950s

Introduction Buryat-Mongolia, nowadays officially known as the Republic of , is a large but thinly populated national autonomous subject of the Russian Federation situated east of at the crisscrossing of Eurasian historical pathways. In terms of political geography, this region is a part of Russia’s Siberian federal district, but unlike its predominantly Russian neighboring areas, Buryatia is national-territorial autonomy of , natives of Southeast . The contemporary Buryats are descendants of the Mongolian tribal alliance forming in the lands around Lake Baikal in the period from the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries. They speak dialects of the , practice Tibetan and share the nomadic traditional of the . Since the beginning of their national autonomy in May 1923, the Buryats formed distinct ethnic culture, intelligentsia, political elite and institutions creating a particular socio-cultural environment in the republic. This socio-cultural particularity is important in the context of this paper. In the 1940s – 1950s, the territory of Buryat-Mongolia became a place of exile for thousands of deportees from the western parts of the Soviet Union. Large contingents of exiles diluted the ethnic structure of the republic creating cultural and religious diversity. However, adaptation to an unusual geographical, climatic and cultural environment was a hard process. Not all deportees endured it. In some situations socio-cultural differences between their homelands and Buryat-Mongolia added bitterness to the exile experience through misunderstanding amplified manifold by the injustice of deportations, prejudice and trauma-induced non-conformism. The resulting denial of everything associated with Soviet reality frequently led people toward confrontation with the authorities. More often than not, such non-conformists ended up in prisons and GULAG labor camps. Yet in many more other cases national, cultural and religious differences smoothed out in the process of intercultural communication, which was a natural and integral component of survival strategy. The exiles learnt from the locals, received direct assistance as well as indirect support and sympathy that were often no less important than food or clothing. In the course of such intercultural contacts, the deportees developed their own peculiar perception of Soviet 2 reality in which the rank-and-file locals were often disassociated from communist practices of intimidation, suppression, brainwashing and control. As the title of this paper suggests, I will concentrate attention on the anti-Soviet sentiments, non-conformism and resistance among various deportees who lived in Buryat- Mongolia in the 1940s and 1950s. This part may form probably the richest chapter in a yet-to-be- written history of deportations in the USSR in general and Buryatia in particular. Thick volumes of the so-called “observation files” kept in the NKVD and party archives provide a solid proof of this viewpoint. It is only natural that resentment of the state policy formed such a profound part of deportee experience. They perceived deportations as, at the very least, unlawful acts of the Soviet dictatorship and expressed their discontent in a variety of common and uncommon ways. Those included escape, formation of underground cells and conspiring against the state, different “hostile comments”, boycotting of Soviet holidays, loan campaigns and other “rituals”, composing of anti-Soviet poems and songs, and many other less common manifestations. However, I should note that my goal is not in solely registering and interpreting the cases of such activities based on the archival documents, but also in attempting to delineate the anti- Soviet sentiments themselves. I would like to distinguish between cases where dissent only targeted communist practices, rituals and realities and instances when the deportees expressed negative judgments about the climate or geographical environment of Buryatia and, especially, xenophobic, nationalistic or racist views of the local population, traditions and religious practices. In doing so I will reconstruct images of the Soviet reality in the eyes of the deportees and images of Buryat-Mongolia and its peoples, compare them and determine whether and to which extent they overlapped. This reconstruction will assist in understanding the place and role of intercultural communication in the survival strategies of the deportees. The source base of this study mostly comprises archival documents unearthed during my work in the special funds group of the Information Center of Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Buryatia in 2001-2002 and National Archives of the Republic of Buryatia in 2002- 2010. Eyewitness accounts, interviews and questionnaires of surviving Lithuanian deportees currently residing in Buryatia are of special significance. They are specifically important when compared with the information from the MVD “observation files”. Both sources, excellent as they are, may display various personal biases. Cross-referencing these primary sources is an excellent opportunity to add objectivity to their critical analysis. Building up of the “special settler” population of Buryat-Mongolia, 1930s-1950s First large deportee contingents from the European part of the USSR arrived in Buryat- Mongolia during the collectivization period in the early 1930s. Victims of brutal dekulakization campaign, they received a status of “labor settlers”, lived in confined “labor settlements”, lacked 3 passports and freedom of movement and were essentially “second quality” people. In 1938, the total number of such deportees in the Buryat-Mongolian ASSR was 1.945 people. There were five “labor settlements” with the average population of 389 people each.1 During the war, the deportee population of the BMASSR sufficiently increased. On 28 August 1941, the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR sanctioned total deportation of the Soviet Germans. It was a “preventive” measure by which Stalin and his lieutenants sought to neutralize any possibility of collaboration of the Soviet Germans with the invading Wehrmacht. The Soviet Germans found themselves in every remote corner of the USSR: Central , Far East, Siberia, and the Arctic North. In 1942, there was a second wave of repressions against the already repressed Germans. Thousands of them were mobilized into the so-called “labor army”. The bulk of German deportees in Buryat-Mongolia were “trudarmeitsy”, or “labor army members”. In this status, they toiled at many enterprises in the republic, but most ended up at the tungsten plant than belonged to the NKVD system. So large was the number of forced laborers there that the NKVD organized a labor camp named Dzhidlag on site. As of 1 June 1944, the number of German labor army members in the camp was 1.652 people. In addition, there were 828 repatriated Germans. During the war, they either willingly or unwillingly turned up in foreign countries. Upon their return to the USSR, they were exiled as special settlers. 2 At this point, it is crucial to explain the term “special settlers”. Legally, it was a unique status existent only in Stalin’s USSR. In this or that form, it appeared since the mass kulak deportations of the early 1930s. However, finally it crystallized only on 8 January 1945 in the Decree of the Soviet of the People’s Commissars of the USSR # 35 entitled “On the legal status of special settlers”. According to this decree, special settlers retained all rights and privileges of citizens of the Soviet Union except freedom of movement. They had to live in special settlements, which they could not leave without a special permission of a local NKVD commandant’s office. Unauthorized leave qualified as escape and was a criminal offense. All adult able-bodied special settlers had to work at the specially assigned workplaces. Usually this meant unqualified hard labor in agriculture, construction, fishing, mining or timber industry. All changes in the marital status or family composition (death, birth of a child, escape) were to be immediately reported to an NKVD commandant. At the same time, special settlers, unlike GULAG inmates and “exile settlers”, retained full voting rights.3

1 V.N. Zemskov, Spetsposelentsy v SSSR, 1930-1960 (: Nauka, 2003), p. 33. 2 L.P. Saganova, Spetspereselentsy-nemtsy v Buryatii (1941-1956 gg.). Avtoreferat dissertatsii na soiskanie uchenoi stepeni kandidata istoricheskikh nauk (, 2001), p. 14. 3 V.N. Zemskov, Op. cit., p. 120-121. 4 The old legal status of German deportees and labor army members, labor settlers (former kulaks) and other categories of non-GULAG forced laborers quickly changed to “special settlers”. The same happened with the “punished peoples”: , Karachai, , , Ingush and Crimean totally deported to and Siberia in 1943-1944. In reality, however, the legal condition of each particular special settler contingent substantially differed from one another. In certain situations, the difference meant much more than just a juridical nuance. Later on, I will return to this issue and elaborate on it. Another special settler contingent arriving in Buryat-Mongolia in 1946 was “vlasovtsy”. Those were former soldiers and officers of the Russian Liberation Army headed by the renegade General Vlasov. “Vlasovtsy” were transferred from the NKVD filtration camps to special settlements in Kazakhstan, Buryat-Mongolia, Irkutsk, Krasnoyarsk, Kemerovo and other Siberian regions for a six-year term.4 In 1945-1952 fierce partisan warfare broke out in the newly Sovietized areas such as the Baltic republics, western and Belorussia, Bessarabia and Bukovina. Trainloads of uprooted Baltic, Ukrainian, and Moldavian peasants arrived in Buryat-Mongolia in 1948 and 1949. formed the largest contingent of special settlers in the republic. On 8 and 10 June 1948 4.109 men, women and children from Panevežys, Šiauliai, Plungė and Pasvalis districts of Lithuania arrived in the Zaigraevskii aimak (district) of Buryat-Mongolia.5 The Soviet government punished those Lithuanians for supporting nationalist partisans in the woods collectively known as the “forest brothers”. The ultimate goal of mass deportations at that point was the destruction of the support base of anti-Soviet resistance in Lithuanian countryside.6 In 1949, deportees from western Ukraine and Moldavia joined Lithuanians in the timber industry and agriculture of Buryat-Mongolia. Like Lithuanians, the and Moldavians went to exile on accusations of support to anti-Soviet resistance. In the MVD special settlement system all three deported nationalities were listed as separate special settler contingents under the following names: “litovtsy” (Lithuanians), “ounovtsy” (OUN-members, West Ukrainians), and “moldavane” (Moldavians). There was another composite special settler contingent, named “ukazniki” that requires detailed explanation. On N.S. Khrushchev’s initiative the Presidium of the Supreme Council of

4 Ibid., pp. 131-132. 5 In detail, the process of deportation from Lithuania in May 1948 is described in Chapter 2 of my monograph. See: V.Y. Bashkuev, Litovskie spetspposelentsy v Buryat-Mongolii (1948-1960) (Ulan-Ude, 2009), pp. 61-87. The original numbers come from: Act on the reception of Lithuanian special settlers arriving with echelon No. 97913 according to the attached list, 8 June 1948, Gruppa spetsfondov Informatsionnogo tsentra MVD Respubliki Buryatia (Group of Special Funds of the Information Center of the Ministry of the Interior of the Republic of Buryatia, GSF ITs MVD RB) f. 58l, o. 1, d. 199, l. 58; Report on the activities during convoy of special deportee echelon No. 97912, 16 June 1948, ibid., l. 218. 6 There is an excellent volume fully devoted to the history of the anti-Soviet resistance in the Baltics. See: The Anti- Soviet Resistance in the Baltic States. Arvydas Anušauskas (ed.), Vilnius, 1999. 5 the USSR passed a decree (ukaz) on 2 June 1948 according to which people avoiding labor activity and living “parasitic” way of life were to be deported to remote areas of the Soviet Union. The bulk of deportees listed as “ukazniki” were, in fact, kolkhozniki who failed to fulfill the prescribed minimum of labor days.7 In total, by 1 January 1950 there were 3.936 Lithuanians, 3.032 Germans, 2.671 Moldavians, 2.630 “vlasovtsy”, 1.037 “ounovtsy”, 55 “ukazniki” and 2 Kalmyks in Buryat- Mongolia.8 Most of them toiled in timber and mining industries, construction and agriculture making their contribution into the post-war reconstruction of the Soviet economy.9 The systematic release of special settlers was a complex process that deserves much more space and attention. Therefore, here I will only indicate that the “former kulaks”, “vlasovtsy” and Germans were being released from the late 1940s to 1952 and 1954-1956 respectively. By 1956, many of them left the BMASSR. The bulk of Lithuanians and Moldavians stayed in Buryat-Mongolia until 1957-1958. West Ukrainians (“ounovtsy”) and some Lithuanians who actually participated in the anti-Soviet armed resistance remained on special settlement until the beginning of the 1960s.10 A part of former special settlers decided to stay in Buryat-Mongolia. Some were married to the locals; others built good houses, accumulated some property and did not want to leave it; some categories of special settlers (for example Germans) simply had nowhere to return. The ’ autonomy did not exist anymore, their property was confiscated and relatives lost in the turmoil of World War II. Nowadays there are many descendants of the former special settlers in Buryatia. Aware of their ethnic origin, some of them claim cultural autonomy by establishing cultural centers and societies, such as the German cultural center and Lithuanian national-cultural society. Hardships and deprivation as the main reasons of dissent among the deportees The initial adaptation took quite a long period. As a rule, soon after the arrival the special settlers faced enormous difficulties. Despite the fact that, in most cases, local authorities prepared some accommodation for the deportees beforehand, there was a pronounced deficit of warm barracks and houses. As a result, many special settlers had to live in temporary shelters, like dugouts, wooden shacks, old railroad carriages and tents, unsuitable for a long stay. Those rudimentary accommodations had no stoves, window glass and frames, some of them lacked even roofs and doors.11 So difficult the situation with the lodging was that the MVD officers

7 V.N. Zemskov, Op. cit., pp. 156-157. 8 GSF Its MVD RB, f. 58L, o. 1, d. 5, t. 1, l. 222. 9 Precise numbers are provided in V.Y. Bashkuev, Litovskie spetspposelentsy v Buryat-Mongolii (1948-1960) (Ulan- Ude, 2009), pp. 273-274. 10 V.Y. Bashkuev, Op. cit., pp. 224-239. 11 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 199, l. 107, 136. 6 supervising the exiles expressed much concern about the matter in their reports. Usually, two or three families had to coexist in a tiny room of 16-18 sq meters and once a shocking case was reported when 9 families, or 27 people in total, were packed into a single room!12 Inadequate accommodation was not the only thing the deportees suffered from in their first years of exile. Generally, the living conditions were appalling. In some special settlements, there were no baths and disinfection chambers, so the very air in the barracks packed with people, their wet cloths, food, and wastes was thick and fetid.13 Infectious diseases and parasites quickly spread in such environment.14 In addition, very little medical help was available to the deportees and its quality was low.15 Very often, the only cure for illnesses was a prayer and a hope for better as in some settlements, neither doctors, nor medicines were available. Feeling desperate and abandoned, the special settlers gave unflattering characteristics to the local authorities and the Soviet life in general. For example, Lithuanians used to say, Here if you are healthy it is good, but once you get sick – that will be the end. They need you while you work, but when you are ill, nobody cares about you. Whatever illness you have they give you the same medicine for headache. They have no other medicines, but it’s all right, we die only once, not twice…16 …God save anybody from such fate, I would not wish even my enemy such life… Our Yanina is very sick. She has been in bed for a week already running 40 degrees temperature, losing weight, only bones left of her. There are no medicines here and nobody treats us. There are no doctors here…17 Harsh climate and living conditions took a heavy toll of lives. The children and the elderly were the weakest of all deportees and they died first. Petras Svilis, a former special settler who was only eleven years old at the time of deportation, remembered that the first summer in Buryat-Mongolia was too hot and dry for Lithuanians and many old people fell ill and died.18 Another former deportee Kazys Zaliauskas said that he remembered many funerals in the first years of exile. In his family, a 77-year old grandmother died of dysentery soon after the arrival in Buryat-Mongolia. Zaliauskas told that because deported Lithuanians did not have a priest, one of the deportees, Jonas Čeponis by name, conducted funeral rituals.19

12 GSF IC MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 91, l. 26-27. 13 National Archives of the Republic of Buryatia (heretofore NARB), f. 248S, o. 3, d. 238, l. 56, 89. 14 Ibid., l. 120. 15 Ibid., l. 56-57, also see: NARB, f. 767SCH, o.2, d. 16, l. 94. 16 NARB, f. 248S, o. 3, d. 278, l. 49. 17 Ibid. 18 Interview with Petras Svilis, a former special settler taken on 16.03.2005. Transcript is in the author’s archive. 19 Interview with Kazys Zaliauskas, a former special settler, taken on 20.02.2005. Transcript is in the author’s archive. 7 Another acute problem was a chronic shortage of normal food. In certain cases, the deportees were allowed to take some food with them from home. Usually it was smoked bacon and flour. However, soon this modest supply depleted and many families found themselves on the brink of starvation. Petras Svilis remembered that in autumn people went out to the fields looking for some leftovers of the harvest to pick up. He also said that many Lithuanians went looking for wild berries and there the Siberian nature helped the needy, who gathered lots of cowberry and made jam, boiling the berries without sugar.20 At the same time, the local authorities, as well as the administration of enterprises where the special settlers worked did nothing to regulate the food supply. Shortages of bread, cereals, and vegetables were common in special settlements. The deportees had to trade with the local population, exchanging personal belongings for milk, potatoes, grain, and other food. The locals liked well-made Western-style goods and it is during this trade that the first intercultural contacts were apparently established.21 Undernourishment, harsh living conditions, and a generally low living standard of a Siberian province produced a deeply depressing impression on many deportees. Observation files of the MVD teem with numerous statements showing despair, indignation and anger with which the special settlers perceived their new lot. One record quotes a statement of a Lithuanian woman named Stasya Alumaitene, who said, I am angry at this life and regime. We do not have any rights and will die here of hunger. It is all tricks of this damned government. It took away all our property and deported us to Siberia.22 Another characteristic statement belongs to Justinas Mačiulskis, who grimly noticed, “By the order of the Soviet government we were resettled from Lithuania to Siberia. They do not give us anything here and only demand from us. We were brought here on purpose that we should all die…”23 Moldavian special settler named N.D. Kichuk characterized the Soviet power in the following way, The Soviet power is based on deception, it was established by deception and now all income of the population goes to the benefit of MOPR to deceive the proletariat of other countries…24 Further, on, he lamented over the deportee fortune, saying, Our life is wasted, we will certainly not see better times. We were sent here to die like flies…

20 Interview with Petras Svilis, a former special settler, taken on 16.03.2005. Transcript is in the author’s archive. 21 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 10, l. 36-37. 22 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, l. 81. 23 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, vol. 1, l.77. 24 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 91. t. 1, l. 162. 8 Thinking over their difficult fate, the special settlers compared the deportation experience with life in their homeland. Sometimes it seemed as if that part of life had been lost forever while Siberia offered only a choice between hard labor and death. In this way, Juzefas Daukšas sadly stated, We lived well in Lithuania but it seems we will never live like that again. Here they created for us not life but heavy torture. You must work and work, no rest at all…25 Women perceived injustice and hardships of life in exile especially sharply. Not infrequently, secret agents reported some female special settlers say the words for which one could disappear without a trace in the vast GULAG slave labor empire. Special settler named Stefa Ubavičiute was reported to have angrily said to her girlfriends, What good do we see here? One may only die of hunger here! The Soviet government kills honest people by its laws. I would chop off the head of this central government long ago! I am saying these words with no fear…I am what I am!26 Such angry and desperate statements indicate that generally the deportees perceived their resettlement as a criminal act. Its purpose was to force them into submission through hunger and hard labor. The Soviet authorities viewed special settlers as punished enemies treating them as “second quality” people, frequently denying access to normal education and jobs. It is not surprising that in such circumstances many special settlers felt mistreated and saw no prospects of living a normal life in exile. According to their status, all able-bodied special settlers had to work at assigned places. Lithuanians, Moldavians and Ukrainians in Buryat-Mongolia worked in timber industry felling trees, preparing logs for transportation and loading them onto log trucks. Germans toiled at the Dzhida tungsten plant. Hard work required skill and energy that the inexperienced and underfed special settlers lacked. Working conditions were harsh, the equipment primitive and most operations were manual. Their previous work experience and qualifications were seldom useful in exile. For example, most Lithuanian deportees were farmers and, naturally, they hoped for employment in agriculture. Their assignment to timber enterprises of the “Burmongolles” trust came as a very unpleasant surprise. That is why for many special settlers such work was a torture. Even children worked in the woods helping their parents. Not surprisingly, the MVD observation files display numerous instances of “hostile statements” concerning work and work

25 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 91, l. 138. 26 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, l. 140. 9 conditions. For example, Stasys Mykaites, a deportee who worked at Eriiski timber enterprise, said, Yes, they always speak about the improvement of the living standards of workers and salary increases, but in reality the payment always goes down and norms of production go up…27 Some deportees openly expressed their unwillingness to work for a Soviet enterprise, stating that no matter how hard they worked, it would not change their salary or living conditions. In this way, Juozas Balčikonis, a worker at one of the “Burmongolles” enterprises, made an interesting statement. He commented on new limits of payment in the timber industry in the following manner, Why should we work hard? Anyway, we work for intelligentsia and I think that backbreaking work for such miserable salary is stupid. Let those who invented these new pay norms work for them, but we should just sit and spend our days. When the administration learns about how the plan is fulfilled it will start thinking about it… If we start working for these new norms they will cut them too.28 Angry at the appalling working conditions and low salaries the special settlers were surprised by the absence of any protest on the part of their local co-workers. Of course, strikes in the Soviet economic system were impossible, but for the deportees many of whom had worked abroad such submissiveness seemed unusual. Worker named Kazys Latakas commented on this situation in the following way, When we load logs on a train we are paid 13 kopecks a log, which makes 13 Roubles a day. Why do not we go on strike? If all workers went on strike, they would surely increase the payment, but here the workers are afraid to do that for some reason…29 Another side of Soviet administrative-command economy that surprised the special settlers was omnipresent bribery. Very soon they understood that getting better jobs and assignments depended on how well one established relations with the local bosses – masters, supervisors, engineers, representatives of local administrations, and even the MVD officials. Soon they realized that one did not have to be a stakhanovite to get a better record. It sufficed to bribe a master, in most cases with vodka. Bribing those who had power to decide was a way towards a better life in exile and some special settlers used this chance to improve their living.

27 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 91, l. 258. 28 Ibid. 29 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, l. 118. 10 For those special settlers who could not get adapted to harsh conditions of exile escape seemed the only way out. It was a dangerous move, though, because punishment for escapes was severe. Some special settlers in Buryat-Mongolia, for example Lithuanians, were not subject to the ‘draconic’ decree of 26 November 1948, according to which escaped deportees automatically received twenty years of hard labor. Others, like Germans, fell under this decree. In general, a runaway from Buryat-Mongolia could get five years of labor camps. Yet, some special settlers were so determined to return home that they disregarded the consequences. For instance, Stephania Markevičiene, mother of three children, said, I am angry that we were deported to Buryat-Mongolia. If I get caught while escaping let them send me to prison, but I am not going to live like this anymore.30 Some of those who wanted to escape were young people. The MVD records show that they knew what awaited them in case they failed, but they were firm in the desire to leave “the damned Siberia”. An exemplary statement belongs to Vencas Vaičiulis, who wrote in a letter to his relatives, I am going to escape. I do not know what I will get for this, maybe prison, labor camp or the Far North were my youth will be ruined forever. My decision to escape is final, this is my last letter from town, in the evening I will be sitting in a train. Maybe it will work out well, probably they will catch me, but if the fate leads me, I must follow it like a little child.31 The MVD papers also indicate that some of the fugitives were captured and went to labor camps. As a rule, however, the fate was quite mild to them and many returned to the places of exile in the late 1950s after their serving their labor camps terms. Yet in most cases, industriousness and persistence of special settlers won over hardship and despair. Despite administrative obstacles and a label of punished “collaborators”, two or three years after the deportation many special settlers had better jobs than during the first year of exile. Groups of young special settlers were sent to driver schools, some deportees worked as postmen, salespersons, mechanics, etc.32 A few young men got a permission to leave the special settlements and go to Ulan-Ude and Irkutsk to receive higher education. Children, who went to local schools, learnt Russian and soon started to get ahead in their studies. Petras Svilis said that he came to Buryat-Mongolia after finishing four grades of school in Lithuania but because his Russian was bad he had to start with the third grade. He remembered that in his first school year in exile all his dictations teemed with mistakes. Yet at other subjects, such as mathematics, he

30 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 10. l. 30. 31 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, vol. 1, l. 75-76. 32 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, l. 37, 39, 43. 11 was quite good. Due to their discipline and industriousness, Lithuanian children quickly got used to a new school curriculum and just in one year became the best pupils at school. Petras Svilis finished the fourth grade with the Stalin honorary certificate that he still keeps as a memento of those days.33 Soviet reality, Communist propaganda, and special settlers’ resistance to them Like any other citizen of the USSR, the special settlers were exposed to all kinds of Soviet brainwashing. Punished for their alleged disloyalty, the deportees received an especially powerful load of Soviet propaganda aimed at their ideological correction. Some special settlers, like Moldavians or Lithuanians, born and brought up in relatively propaganda-free independent states clearly saw deep contradictions between Communist slogans and the reality of life in the Soviet province. Year by year they built up a “protective shield” in an effort to secure their children from the poisonous lies poured upon them by the Soviet brainwashing machine. , language, traditions, and culture were important elements of their resistance to the Soviet regime. Out of all deportees, Lithuanians and west Ukrainians earned a label of the least loyal contingents. The number of dissenters in their midst was consistently higher than among the Germans, “vlasovtsy” or former kulaks. The brightest examples of how the special settlers reacted to numerous Soviet propaganda campaigns were registered during the first years of exile. Remarks and judgments of Lithuanian women were most uncompromising. They carefully preserved the traditional way of life providing their children with proper upbringing and guarding them from a heavy ideological pressure at a Soviet school. Stark contrasts between what was said officially and what the deportees experienced in real life heated up their discontent. Having heard that a local schoolteacher was going to adopt an orphan from the war-torn Korea one woman angrily noticed, Why is she doing this? When the war goes in Korea all food is sent there, we get nothing. In the newspapers, they write that we have everything, why don’t they bring us anything? We don’t have even enough bread!34 Another woman, commenting on the Soviet literature said, What good can they now write about? Some rubbish about construction and kolkhozes? Today all writers have been reformed and no longer write anything worth reading…35 There were cases when women did not allow their children to enter the Young Pioneers’ organization, saying that the pioneers could teach them only bad things and nothing good at all.

33 Interview with Petras Svilis, a former special settler, taken on 16.03.2005. Transcript is in the author’s archive. 34 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d.91, l. 139. 35 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 91, t. 1, l. 257. 12 Most irritating were frequent state loan campaigns. The local administration’s approach to those campaigns was very serious. There were special “assistance committees” that included local communist activists. Members of those committees agitated everywhere: at work, in the streets, even at home. The special settlers were unwilling to give their hard-earned money for nothing, as the so-called “voluntary loans” in reality were not repaid. In return, the committees used administrative pressure to force them into submission. Pages of the MVD observation files are full of angry statements with which the Lithuanian special settlers characterized those campaigns. Here are some vivid examples. After a Lithuanian woman named Anizeta Vaičiulite had to subscribe to a state loan of 50 Roubles, she was forced to give 700 Roubles for an additional loan. Feeling offended and deceived, she said, In Lithuania, beggars who wander about with a sack do the same thing. If you give them an egg, they will beg for meat. The Soviet activists here come and beg as the beggars do in Lithuania.36 Some special settlers were angry at the fact that the agitators came even to the elderly asking to subscribe to a loan. A special settler named Kazys Tubutis expressed his indignation this way, Why are not they ashamed? They came to a barrack of an old woman and ask her to subscribe to 25 Roubles of loan. They are not the Communist party but simple swindlers!37 Women often felt sorry that they subscribed to a Soviet loan. A woman named Antanina Kuzmaite told friends who came to visit her, The Soviet Union feels that soon the war will start, that is why they increased the loan sum this year. I did not want to subscribe to a loan but they told me to come to the office of the timber plant where they kept me until 3 o’clock in the morning and finally made me subscribe for a three-week pay. And if it turns out that Americans beat the Soviet Union in the war, I will not be guilty that I subscribed to it; they made me do it and I am not afraid that Americans will be offended…38 Such statements were rather common among the deportees. Americans were portrayed as the only possible saviors of special settlers from the Soviets. All over the USSR millions of multiethnic deportees hoped that the war would break out and they would be free. For instance, Ukraininan Vladimir Osoba from the “ounovtsy” contingent said,

36 Ibid., l. 256. 37 Ibid. 38 Ibid. 13 Of course, there will be war because the Soviet Union does not fulfill its obligations that it promised America. The USSR was obliged to leave all nations where they were, open churches everywhere, not to force anyone to join the kolkhozes. However, she does not fulfill her obligations and America will not tolerate this…39 Ferment and resentment could not escape the attention of the special MVD detachments that monitored moods and talks among the special settlers. In a report about sentiments and talks among the special settlers in the Zaigraevo district the MVD officers indicated that, In the course of analysis of the materials… it is clear that a significant part of special settlers and exiles based on their hostile attitude to the Soviet order exercise anti-Soviet agitation, malign the Soviet reality, spread false rumors about the inevitability of war between the USSR and USA and the Soviet Union’s defeat in it, praise the American machinery and their way of life, cast aspersions on the Party leadership and their activities…40 Election campaigns were another source of irritation for the deportees. Pompous electoral slogans and portraits of candidates coupled with waves of brainwashing rhetoric produced a grim impression on them. The special settlers knew well that whoever was elected, their fate would not improve much. Yet they retained a right to vote and even a right to be elected. While the latter was possible only in theory, the local authorities carefully observed if all special settlers cast their ballots during numerous elections into local, republican, all Russian and other Soviets. Absence of familiar names in the ballots and lies about radiant future under Communism caused discontent among the deportees. During one election campaign one Lithuanian woman angrily said, Why should we vote for these candidates? Will they make our work easier or let us return to Lithuania? All candidates are , no Lithuanians among them. If all of us refused to vote they would do nothing to us, but if I alone did not vote, it would cause unnecessary suspicions.41 Other special settlers remembered well that the Soviet authorities exiled them to Siberia and refused to vote for Soviet candidates. A woman named Katrya Žukene said the following words, What kind of life it is, even though you do not want to vote you have to. If you do not go to vote they will come to your place with their ballot box, but how

39 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 119, l.19. 40 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, t. 1, l. 72. 41 Ibid., l. 106. 14 should I vote for those who deported us from Lithuania? In essence, they are our enemies!42 German special settler named A.A. Flat characterized the Soviet propaganda in the following way, All say that the bread delivery plans are fulfilled and exceeded. Why then the people, especially the kolkhozniks are glad to have a piece of bread? The people in the kolkhozes starve and this box (loudspeaker) shouts about rich life of the kolkhozniks… These and many other expressions of discontent clearly testify to the fact that the attitude towards the Soviet propaganda was quite negative. Many special settlers did not believe a single word of it and gave their own evaluations to the efforts of communist agitators to brainwash them. In the observation files, there are numerous examples of how the deportees saw life in the USSR and these expressions are invariably classified as “lies about the Soviet reality”, “hostile statements” and so on. The things that surprised the deportees, especially from the recently incorporated Baltic republics, were extreme poverty against the background of massive propaganda of a happy life in the USSR, cruelty and greed of the communist leadership, and weird twists of Communist ideology. For example, during a break when all workers smoked their cigarettes, a Lithuanian named Pranas Vaitelis took out a pack of “Kazbek” cigarettes and asked another worker to explain to him the meaning of a picture in front of the pack. Then he himself commented on the picture in the following way, There is a beggar with a sack on this pack. This is how the Soviet power proves that here the people live like beggars.43 Another Lithuanian special settler characterized the situation in the country like this, Russia as a state would be strong and mighty, but it is ruled by fools. There is a party in Russia and it is ruled by a man who knows nothing. He can only write his name.44 German special settler A.F. Kraus made a comment about life in the Soviet Union, Life in the Soviet Union is bitter for the nations. There is penal servitude and there are prisons. Only it is forbidden to talk about all this. Only a few communists are well-to-do today. For the rest there is only one fate – punishment and death by starvation…45

42 Ibid. 43 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 91, t. 2, l. 209. 44 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, l. 250. 45 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 119, l. 24. 15 To many special settlers Communism and its ideals seemed weird and alien. Some of them openly expressed their hatred to all that was associated with it. Vera Duliavičene, an ethnic Russian, once said to her interlocutor (who happened to be a stool pigeon), I am here for my son Leon, and you? Soon you will answer for your red motherland and your brother who works in the MVD. It only takes to return to Lithuania, but there will be no place for you …46 Another woman, whose two sons were “forest brothers” and the third was in GULAG once said, I am so happy that I have not a single communist in my family! I will not be on trial for this, but those who have will soon cry with blood…47 It seems that the very prospect of living under Communism was unbearable for some deportees. In a conversation with an undercover MVD agent about the future triumph of Communism a woman, named Paulina Poplauskaite dropped such a phrase, You are spoiling my mood with these words! If Communism happens, I will not live, I would better commit suicide. It is better to die than live under Communism.48 High degree to which this woman disliked the idea of triumphant world Communism is clearly visible. Most Lithuanian deportees were devoted Catholics and speaking about suicide, which is one of the mortal sins in was, by itself, an act of blasphemy. However, weighing prospects of eternal hell against the temptation of Communism the woman preferred the former. Of course, scholars should critically approach such angry emotional statements but the context and connotation of this particular one is obvious. In the eyes of some special settlers, Communism was evil. Others decided that they already were in hell, living on special settlement in Siberia. One Ukrainian special settler wrote in a letter to his friend, …some people say that there cannot be hell in this world. No, on the contrary, hell is only in this world and we are in it now…49 Sometimes in colorful comparisons, the communists were depicted as demons. For example, Ukrainian special settler V.A. Gutsul wrote in his letter, Soon we will return home. Do not worry about us, but better take care of yourselves so that you had enough strength to live through this grief. And our suffering is already coming to an end. Let our gentlemen celebrate, but they

46 GSF ITs MVD RB, f.58L, o.1, d. 10, l. 28. 47 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, t. 1, l. 78. 48 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 91, t. 2, l. 207. 49 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 19, l. 21. 16 will soon leave the road and their horns will start coming off together with their heads. Nowhere will they hide from us…50 Of course, not all such remarks remained unpunished. Stool pigeons of the MVD always reported on each expression like this. Some of the culprits went to the labor camps or prisons. In 1950, an underground anti-Soviet cell was exposed among the Lithuanians in the Zaigraevo district. Its three leaders “based on their hostile attitude to the Soviet power, conducted the organized anti-Soviet propaganda, spread defeatist insinuations for benefit of America and attacked the political order of the Soviet Union.”51 Until June 1951, another underground cell was active among the Moldavians. This one consisted of two circles and numbered over 20 people. Members of this cell apparently were Jehovah’s witnesses, who regularly gathered for common prayers and reading religious books. The leaders of these cells received long prison terms on the notorious 58th article of the USSR’s Penal Code. Yet even the exposure and destruction of underground cells did not prevent deportees from showing their discontent and protest. In several situations, intoxicated special settlers started quarrels and even fights over sensitive political matters. For example, on 12 October 1952 young Lithuanian named Jonas Blauzdis started a drunken brawl in the cafeteria of the Onokhoi timber plant. First, he began swearing at the staff, and then the conflict turned into a real fight with the police. During this brawl, the Lithuanian deliberately broke a spoon, crushed a plate and a glass and threw a bowl of soup into the cafeteria window. Perhaps, the special settler was dissatisfied with the quality of food or service and decided to show his discontent in such a way.52 Another special settler, Lithuanian named Povilas Juško, while intoxicated, disrupted a movie show in the club of special settlement Moiga. He broke the display case with Soviet newspapers and tore off two slogans from the walls of the club. Apparently, by doing so Jushko showed his disagreement with the movie.53 Criticizing Soviet movies was quite common among the Lithuanian deportees. For some reason, women commented on the movie films more often than men did. For instance, special settler Olga Vaitelite commented on the movie “The Tempered People” which she saw the day before. She said, In the movie, they showed how the Russians defeated the armed to the teeth Germans. It is not true that the Russians defeated the Germans. In general, they show lie in the movies. By doing this they only fool people…54

50 Ibid., l. 20. 51 Ibid., l. 12. 52 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 93, t. 2, l. 53 V.Y. Bashkuev, Op. cit., p.185. 54 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 91, t. 2, l. 210. 17 Recognizing the lies pouring upon them from the movie screens and loudspeakers, the special settlers clung to the pillars of their identity – religion, traditions and language. Among the special settlers, Lithuanians most stubbornly adhered to their rituals, observed religious holidays, gathered together for prayers, funerals, and weddings. Until the mid-1950s, they did not have a Catholic priest and the elders performed all religious ceremonies. In 1955, Father Petras Jasas came to Buryat-Mongolia and the religious life of Lithuanians changed to better. This man did much to consolidate Lithuanians and strengthen their spirit. According to Kazys Zaliauskas, Catholic masses held in the place named Halsan gathered several hundred Lithuanians from the neighboring settlements. Despite the fact that such religious gatherings seemed suspicious to the MVD officers they did not attempt to prohibit them. Such prohibition would only spark more discontent among the Lithuanian deportees and no authorities needed that. Instead, they chose to register father Jasas officially and allowed him to perform religious ceremonies openly, warning the local authorities against placing obstacles.55 Other contingents of special settlers also gathered together for prayers and reading of religious literature. There were many Jehovah witnesses among the Moldavians and Greek Catholics among the Ukrainians. Like Lithuanians, they formed clandestine groups, received religious literature from Moldavia and Ukraine and prayed together. The MVD agents closely observed such groups and some of them were exposed. Their leaders went to prisons and labor camps. However, Lithuanians and other special settlers continued exercising their religious rituals and, at a certain point, the Soviet authorities decided that legally sanctioned religious service was far better than clandestine gatherings. Images of Siberia and the locals For special settlers living in Buryat-Mongolia, this East Siberian republic was primarily a place of exile. Some special settlers, like Lithuanians, did not give up a hope that one day they would return to their fatherland throughout the entire period of exile. At the beginning of exile, everything around seemed hostile and alien. Petras Svilis remembered that his first impressions were quite strong. He had never seen such mountains and so much coniferous forest around before. The terrain in Lithuania was very different as were the climatic conditions. Svilis said that Siberian summers seemed extremely hot and dry for Lithuanians who were used to living in a more moderate and wet climate. Winters were snowy and cold, with frequent blizzards and temperature often dropped below – 30 C. In the MVD files, I came across different, mostly negative statements about Siberia and Buryat-Mongolia. Yet, as informative as they are, these archival sources should be critically interpreted. The MVD officers supervising the special settlers had a task of monitoring “hostile

55 NARB, f. R-248, o. 4, d. 164, l. 41-47. 18 moods” and, of course, carefully collected only negative information. All positive feelings and emotions dropped out. Positive impressions about Buryat-Mongolia, its nature, people, and were shared by the former deportees who chose to spend their lives in this land and can be found in the memoirs of those who repatriated in the late 1950s – early 1960s. Negative emotions that the special settlers frequently expressed in their “hostile statements” were stirred up by the absence of normal accommodation, adequate food, constant knocking on the head by the local authorities and Soviet propagandists, and backbreaking work. Longing for fatherland is obviously present in such expressions when the deportees compared the severe nature of Siberia with the forests and fields of their homeland. A Lithuanian woman named Stasya Tubutite who lived in Kharakutul settlement said, …We live in Buryat-Mongolia and see nothing good here, only taiga and mountains. How can one compare this Siberia with our fatherland Lithuania! If we die of starvation in this taiga, nobody will pity us! The Soviet power and its leadership will be glad that we died.56 However, as the deportee life in Buryat-Mongolia gradually improved their moods began changing. For example, as the sovietization of the Baltic republics went on, the Lithuanians started to receive bad news about the situation in Lithuania. If at the beginning of their exile term many wanted to escape regardless of the consequences by 1952 despair and longing for Lithuania gave way to more realistic perceptions of their situation. In May 1953, the stool pigeons reported that conversations about a possible release from exile were spreading among the deportees. According to their data, many Lithuanians showed their unwillingness to return home because of collectivization and worsened living conditions there. One Lithuanian special settler named Jonas Krasauskas said, I by no means will go back to Lithuania. There are kolkhozes and one can die of starvation there.57 The time came when the exiled Lithuanians had to help their relatives in Lithuania with money. A woman named Wilhelmina Škirnene told her girlfriends about a possibility of going back to Lithuania, I will not return to Lithuania whatever it takes. There are the kolkhozes and people die of hunger. My mother nearly died of starvation and if I did not send her money, she would surely perish. I want to live but not die of starvation.58 Such statements prove the fact that by the mid-1950s the special settlers had already firmly settled themselves in Buryat-Mongolia. Some families built their own houses; many had plots of

56 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, op.1, d. 93, t. 1, l. 118. 57 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, op.1, d. 130, t. 1, l. 250. 58 Ibid. 19 land where they grew vegetables. Lithuanian special settlers showed the local people how to fatten pigs to improve the quality of meat and bacon. They also taught the locals how to smoke bacon and build good stoves. The attitude of special settlers to the local people was mostly friendly and they soon reached mutual understanding with their neighbors, common peasants or workers. Petras Svilis remembered that when the Lithuanian deportees arrived in Buryat-Mongolia both they and the neighboring locals lived in poverty because the war had ended just three years before. Common poverty and deprivation facilitated understanding between Lithuanians and local Russians and Buryats. Lithuanians and other special settlers in the area felt sympathy to the simple kolkhozniks regardless of their nationality as they saw that life was hard for them too. One Lithuanian special settler named Orvidas, depressed by the poverty in the neighboring villages, felt pity for the local people and said, I like wealth but if I had a chance I would give away everything I had and in one shirt would go out to the villages to tell people the truth. Here the people, especially the kolkhozniki, are blind, their heads are filled with rubbish about one man, and they believe him and remain hungry and naked.59 These words clearly express a view of a religious man on the evil character of the Soviet state, which mercilessly oppressed its own people. In general, religion was also a common ground where the special settlers and the local people found understanding. As Petras Svilis said, Lithuanians were already well acquainted with the religious rituals of the Russian Orthodox and the , but the religious practices of Lamaist Buryat- Mongols were unknown to them. He remembered that when the Lithuanian deportees first saw the “Dugzhuuba” Buddhist ritual during the White Moon holiday (the Buddhist New Year) they were struck. To Catholic Lithuanians throwing pieces of cloth and sponge into a high ritual campfire while going in circles around it seemed pagan and weird. However, later when they learnt the meaning of this ritual (cleaning and preparing the souls for the New Year) they understood it and were not surprised anymore.60 My informants could not recall cases of misunderstanding over religious matters between the special settlers and the locals during the entire exile in Buryat-Mongolia. Lithuanians who moved to Ulan-Ude, the of Buryat-Mongolia, attended services at the Orthodox church, performing christening and other religious rituals.61 Most probably among the predominantly Catholic Lithuanians there were some Orthodox Christians, ethnic Russians or Byelorussians, but taking into account the fact that the Catholic cathedral in Ulan-Ude was only

59 GSF ITs MVD RB, f. 58L, o.1, d. 91, t. 1, l. 160. 60 Interview with Petras Svilis, a former special settler, taken on 16.03.2005. Transcript is in the author’s archive. 61 NARB, f R-248, o. 4, d. 164, l. 41-47. 20 rebuilt around the year 2004, it is easy to believe that other Lithuanians attended the Orthodox church as well for no other option was available. Of course, there were cases of aggression, quarrels, and even fights. The head of the Lithuanian national-cultural society Bernardas Razgus remembered a big scuffle in Kharakutul between the Lithuanians and the local youth. There were even casualties: two or three young men died in a fight. Such incidents usually happened in late evenings after dances or movie shows. However, Soviet rural youth was always aggressive to any newcomers, not necessarily special settlers, and scuffles regularly occurred everywhere. The situation did not change much even today. At the same time, Bernardas Razgus could not recall any violent clashes between different contingents of special settlers. He stated that the contacts between them were quite random.62 As Petras Svilis remembered, sometimes the local hooligans would throw stones at them, or drunken World War II veterans would drop offensive words, like “fascists”, but that was seldom. Other people would tell the bullies to stop and helped. One local informant remembered that when he was a young boy they had Lithuanian classmates whose Russian was poor and they were frequently mocked at. When his mother learnt about it, she taught him a good lesson with a belt and then explained that those people were forcibly driven from their homeland and they need help. Then she gathered some food and sent him to bring it to the Lithuanians. Since that time, he never again mocked at or bullied his Lithuanian classmates. In short, my informants formulated the attitude to the local peoples in the following way, “If they believe in God, this means that they are good people.” In return, the deportees received respectable treatment and assistance when needed, especially during the first severe years of exile. In the memoirs of Lithuanians who survived the exile in Buryat-Mongolia there are such words, “But for the Buryats, we would all die here.”63 Conclusions The special settler population of Buryat-Mongolia was diverse and the reasons why those peoples underwent repressive resettlement significantly differed. Background of the deportation decision played a significant role in the fate of each special settler contingent. There were the Soviet Germans, whose exile was obviously a case of ethnic cleansing. There were the “ukazniki”, whose deportation was recommended by local authorities based on their supposedly inadequate “labor performance”. There were Lithuanians. Moldavians and Ukrainians deported for their connections and assistance to nationalist anti-Soviet resistance.

62 Interview with Bernardas Razgus, a former special settler and the head of Lithuanian national-cultural society of Buryatia, taken on 03.04.2010. Transcript is in the author’s archive. 63 Antanas Seikalis, “Atgal į Sibirą,” in Gyvensyme tevų žemėje, ed. Rima Gudelytė (Vilnius: Mažasis Vyturis, 2004), p. 57.

21 Each special settler contingent was a unique Soviet social experiment in miniature: uprooted, desperate and humiliated people placed into unknown geographical, ethnic, social, and labor environment. Therefore, each contingent of special settlers developed its very own survival strategies and ways to defy the Soviet authorities. The Lithuanians willingly erected a certain ‘protective wall’ around their culture, religion, language, and traditions to shield their children’s identity and religious and moral foundations from the ideological influence of the regime. The ‘punished peoples,’ like the Soviet Germans or Kalmyks had to use other, less obtrusive, forms of protest, for example, binge drinking which sabotaged certain political events without exposing the ideological reasons and national identity of the protester. The Ukrainians portrayed the Soviet authorities as demons and referred to the Siberian exile as hell. At the same time, all such survival strategies, dissent and anti-Soviet sentiments, individual as they were, melted into a single multi-sided phenomenon of psychological rejection of the Soviet reality and a passive, but determined struggle with it. Many components of the Soviet reality were so false that the special settlers, many of whom grew up outside the USSR, could not accommodate them and the slogans that they daily heard and saw. Even the very status of “special settlers” was a remnant of the slaveholding and feudal systems, so many legal norms in it coincided with those from the past. For example, during the deportation of the Soviet Germans in 1941 Russian women went to exile with their German husbands but German women married to Russian men stayed with their families. Alternatively, if a free woman chose to marry a special settler, she would automatically receive a status of special settler. If a free man married a special settler woman, he would not become a special settler himself and sometimes his wife’s status was lifted.64 Such humiliating legal norms from the times of serfdom could not make the special settlers feel like citizens of “the most democratic state on the globe.” Grass root nationalism and segregation provoked many angry statements and “hostile” judgments based on the daily observation of the Soviet reality. Year by year the special settlers built up a “protective shield” in an effort to secure their children from the poisonous lies poured upon them by the Soviet brainwashing machine. Religion, language, traditions, and culture were important elements of their resistance to the Soviet regime. On the other hand, there were positive feelings and memories. They are associated with simple human relationships, mutual assistance, understanding, and trust. The more the Soviet system oppressed the deportees, the more they adhered to the lifebuoy of their traditional culture, religion, and language. Yet, at the same time, the exiles tried to understand and respect the cultures of the others and the local peoples paid with the same respectful attitude. Special settlers

64 V.N. Zemskov, Op. cit., pp. 169-170. 22 learnt survival skills from the locals and shared their own knowledge to the mutual benefit of both. Some of them are still remembered with respect in the villages of the Zaigraevo and Horinsk districts of Buryatia. For example, many people know where Lithuanian graveyards are located. These graveyards are usually taken care of, a quite unusual feature of today’s reality when cemeteries are desecrated throughout Russia. “If they believe in God, this means that they are good people” – this principle, to which both the special settlers and the local peoples attached, helped them to understand and accept each other, smoothing bitterness of illegal and cruel deportation and a feeling of nostalgia for the native land.