Uncovering the Holodomor: The Other Side of the Iron Curtain By Leah Dorotiak “A bad harvest is from God, but famine is from people.” Longstanding folk saying. 1 Holodomor. A term that is virtually unknown amongst the majority of the world’s population, yet a term that represents a painful period in Ukrainian history. Between 1932-33, mass starvation and terror engulfed the Ukrainian nation in one of the most atroCious genoCides in world history. The man-made famine, known as Holodomor, was irrefutably manufaCtured by Soviet Russia with the intent to starve the Ukrainian population into submission, whilst simultaneously liquidating the Ukrainian intelligentsia and Ukrainian AutoCephalous Orthodox ChurCh to further weaken opposition to Russian domination over the Country. Ukraine’s place in history as the ‘breadbasket’ of Europe is well established, onCe even supplying anCient Greece with her abundanCe of wheat. With suCh fertile lands, it seems almost implausible that famine Could have merCilessly ravaged the Countryside, killing one in every eight Ukrainians. 2 Indeed, in the years preCeding Holodomor, provisions suCh as extra grain stores were in plaCe, to protect against suCh an eventuality. For example, in 1921 a severe drought in the Steppe regions of Ukraine destroyed the harvests, but peasants living in drought-affected regions of Ukraine always maintained stores of grain in their pantries. 3 However, stores of grain were of no use in Holodomor. Brigades, organised by MosCow, searChed for food, the ground was probed with iron rods, walls broken, holes dug, and ovens destroyed 4 as Stalin forCed his poliCy of Collectivisation upon the peasantry. The 1932 harvest yielded enough grain to feed the Ukrainian population for two years,5 yet the people of Ukraine starved. Anything edible held by the peasantry was ConfisCated. Harrowingly, thousands of aCres of wheat were never harvested, and instead were simply left to rot in the fields6. Out of 195 Countries in the world, only 16 UN Countries and the VatiCan City reCognise the Holodomor as an aCt of genoCide on the state level. 7 Russia is not one of them. On the 9th DeCember 1948, the UN General Assembly adopted the Genocide Convention. ‘Article II’ states that the term genoCide is defined as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethical, racial or religious group.” 8 Raphael Lemkin, the author of the word ‘genocide’ and initiator of the GenoCide Convention, Called the “destruction of the Ukrainian nation” a “classic example of the genocide.” 9 Moreover, in aCCordanCe with the UN Convention, Lemkin Considers the following items as an integral part of the genoCide against Ukrainians: the hunger of the Ukrainian peasantry; the extermination of the Ukrainian intelligentsia and the elimination of the Ukrainian AutoCephalous Orthodox ChurCh. 1 (Zelensky, 2007, p. 224) 2 (Radio Free Europe, 2019) 3 (Zelensky, 2007, p. 147) 4 (Konoval, 2007, p. 27) 5 (Harvest of Despair - The 1932-33 Man-made Famine in Ukraine, 1984) 6 (Lemkin, 2009, p. 34) 7 (Euromaidan Press, 2018) 8 (United Nations, n.d., p. 174) 9 (Holodomor ViCtims Memorial, n.d.) 1 In order to fully Comprehend the motivation behind Soviet Russia’s determination to ruthlessly crush the Ukrainian national spirit, it is necessary to examine Russia’s long-standing imperialistic desires. It was not until the 18th century that Ukraine Came under Russian domination. Prior to this, in the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth Centuries, Ukraine was an extremely popular name in Western Europe. Maps published in several Countries during this period always bore the designation “Ukraine”, with one of the oldest to do so being the map of Ukraine dated 1572, whiCh was commissioned by Charles IX for his brother Henry of Anjou. 10 OnCe dominated by Russia, MosCow was not prepared to lose its wealthiest Colony and would go to extreme lengths in order to retain Ukraine. Russian desire to supress the Ukrainian nation Can be evidenCed as early from 1863, as a Russian Minister of the Interior, Count Valuyev, deClared “there never has been and never will be a Ukrainian language or nationality.” 11 Thus, whilst Ukrainians retain their feelings of national identity, Ukraine will Continually pose a threat to Russian domination. Russian aggression beCame inCreasingly heightened during the period of the Ukrainian National Liberation Struggle, 1918-21, with a resurgenCe of the Ukrainian national spirit. It was expressed in a slogan by the Ukrainian Communist writer Mykola Khvylovy “away from Moscow!” 12 Even the leader of Ukraine’s Communist party at the time, Mykola Skrypnyk, perCeived the USSR as a form of League of Nations and argued for greater Cultural and politiCal autonomy to win Ukrainians over to Communism. 13 According to James E. MaCe, Skrypnyk saw himself as an independent national ruler, as an equal to Stalin. When he visited MosCow, he took a translator, despite speaking perfect Russian. 14 As the national movement in Ukraine expanded, Soviet Russia reverted to the policies of mass terror; deportations, forCed ColleCtivisation and systematiC starvation to subdue the Country. Numerous attempts have been made to dismiss Holodomor as simply disastrous eConomiC poliCy, caused by Stalin’s ‘Great Turn’ towards industrialisation and ColleCtivisation. This Could not be further from the truth. Holodomor was more than just a famine. It was the intention of Soviet Russia to subdue and diminish the national Ukrainian spirit. In the book Late Victorian Holocausts: El Niño Famines and the Making of the Third World, Mike Davis explored famines in whiCh millions perished, establishing a key connection between colonialism and the introduction of capitalism. Davis attributed the causes of famines to two key faCtors. Firstly, in natural terms, a Change in how Certain ocean Currents interaCt with the atmosphere (known as ‘ENSO’), Can lead to Conditions Called ‘El Niño’ and ‘La Niña’, whiCh Can then, in turn, lead to famine, with either drought or exCessive rainfall. SeCondly, Davis argues that these affected countries have come under the Western ‘Laissez Faire’ economiC system, in whiCh the market Comes first, leaving no provision for insuring against food shortages through stoCkpiling foodstuffs.15 As a direct consequence, populations starve. However, the Soviet system in plaCe during the period 1932-33 was the antithesis to that of the Liberal one. It was a system in whiCh everyone had supposedly equal entitlement to things, inCluding food. 16 This was not the Case within the USSR. Whilst Ukrainian ColleCtive farmers starved on just 1072 Calories a day in 1933, those in Leningrad consumed double this amount, at 2251kCal/day. 17 Additionally, between 1926 and 1939, the perCentage of Ukrainians within the USSR deClined by 10%, whilst the 10 (Shankowsky, 1967, p. 214) 11 (Shankowsky, 1967, p. 213) 12 (Konoval, 2007, p. 93) 13 (Harvest of Despair - The 1932-33 Man-made Famine in Ukraine, 1984) 14 (Harvest of Despair - The 1932-33 Man-made Famine in Ukraine, 1984) 15 (Levene, n.d.) 16 (Levene, n.d.) 17 (Nefedov, 2014, p. 144) 2 perCentage of Russians inCreased by 27.2%. 18 Therefore, these demographiC statistiCs strongly support the faCt that Holodomor was not the result of disastrous agriCultural planning, but rather an organised plan to liquidate the Ukrainian people. 19 In what Lemkin desCribed as “systematic pattern” of attaCk, Soviet Russia began paralysing the “national brain” 20 of Ukraine, the intelligentsia. The liquidation of suCh a large proportion of the Ukrainian intelligentsia and religious leadership halted the separate development of Ukraine, in cultural, religious and political fields. As the government of the Soviet Union became increasingly centralised, independent actions of Ukraine became limited. On 5th January 1932, the Supreme CounCils of EConomy of the USSR and of the Ukrainian SSR were abolished and replaCed by the Union Commissariat of Heavy Industry. 21 SuCh Changes brought about a signifiCant reduCtion in Ukraine’s control over its industry and removed the little independenCe the Ukrainian SSR had. Simultaneously, Soviet Russia began an attaCk on the heart of the nation in 1929 – the Ukrainian Orthodox ChurCh. In aCCordanCe with ‘Article II’ in the GenoCide Convention, “causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group” 22 is Classed as an aCt of genoCide. Indeed, the artifiCial famine had an unimaginably appalling mental and physiCal impaCt upon the Ukrainian population. The average daily consumption of 1070 kcal (which was recorded in the Odessa region, in early 1933) allowed life sustaining aCtivity of a human being for just three months. 23 During this time frame, the physiCal effects are inConCeivably inhumane. Professor M. MishChenko described the impact as ageing human beings from hour to hour. “To carry out the most necessary functions of life – breathing and heart beat – the organism uses up its own substance, albumen, that is, it consumes itself.” 24 The mental impaCt, however, is far more reaChing. The food instinCt gains absolute domination over the personality, dictating new laws of behaviour and loosening family ties. 25 This Culminated in reports of cannibalism in several regions. On DeCember 8th, 1932, MosCow ordered a bloCkade of all raions in Ukraine 26 that had failed to Carry out the grain delivery plan. All deliveries of consumer goods were banned, as trading and credits in those regions were halted.27 The benefit of this was twofold for Soviet Russia. Primarily, it intensified the famine, but also prevented the spreading of information. These Conditions, again, echo those set out in the GenoCide Convention, whiCh states that “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part” 28 is an aCt of genoCide. Soviet Russia suCCeeded in their aim of weakening the demographic structure of the Ukrainian nation. The destruCtion of suCh a large part of the population stifled the biologiCal growth.29 According to S.