Review of RED FAMINE: STALIN'S WAR ON UKRAINE by Anna Applebaum

 4 Stars

Because of events in Ukraine, my book club decided to read a book that would help us understand current relations between Russia and Ukraine.  This is the book most recommended for background information.  The author’s thesis is that the 1932-33 famine, that was worst in Ukraine than in other Soviet grain-growing regions, was a product not so much of poor weather conditions but of government policies.

Applebaum begins in 1917 with the Ukrainian revolution which she argues influenced Soviet views of Ukraine.  Lenin, and later Stalin, needed Ukraine’s grain to feed his people or they would question the Soviet system and demand change, so Ukrainian national movements which could lead to the loss of Ukraine were seen as a threat to Soviet power.  The book suggests that leaders were always focused on getting Ukrainian grain and undermining any expressions of Ukrainian nationalism. 

The book outlines Stalin’s decision to create collective farms as a response to grain shortages.  Collectivization would, he believed, increase the food supply, and state-controlled agriculture would also eliminate the kulaks, prosperous land-owning peasants, who were a threat to socialism.  Because collectivization was Stalin’s signature policy, it could not be seen as failing.  Any failures (activism against the policy) were attributed to class enemies and foreign influences so Stalin’s paranoia about the counter-revolutionary potential of Ukraine grew. 

A lack of rainfall contributed to the famine of 1932-33 but Applebaum argues that policy decisions were responsible for starvation and deaths.  Grain collection quotas were unrealistic and when they weren’t met, all grain was confiscated, even that reserved for consumption and seeding.  Farms and entire villages were blacklisted and severely sanctioned so eventually even kerosene, salt and matches needed for cooking food could not be purchased.  Borders were closed to prevent peasants from leaving to find food in cities or other countries.  Violent searches were conducted to confiscate food.  And, of course, there were always propaganda campaigns. 

Stalin’s agricultural policy could not be blamed for food shortages, so Ukrainization (development of Ukrainian language and culture) was blamed:  nationalist elements had infiltrated the state apparatus and sabotaged grain collection.  So the Ukrainian Communist Party was purged, the Russian language made primary in public life, educators systematically fired, Ukrainian schools and institutions closed, churches shut, writers banned, and even monuments destroyed; in essence, the intellectual class was eliminated.  There was a systemic assault on the very idea of Ukraine.

The chapters describing the effects of the famine are heart-wrenching to read.  Both the physical and psychological effects of starvation are detailed.  Witness stories about personality changes, family abandonment, and the loss of trust and empathy are included.  I was horrified to read about widespread cannibalism and necrophagy. 

Because about 3.9 million Ukrainians died, there was a labour shortage after conditions improved so a mass resettlement programme was started; Russians and Ukrainians from problematic border regions were moved into empty villages.  In a decade, over 1 million Russians migrated so Russification occurred. 

A section I found most interesting was the chapter describing the lengths to which the Soviet government went to cover up the famine.  Public speech was curtailed, village death registries were destroyed, the 1937 census was abolished because it showed such a drastic population decrease, and foreign visitors and foreign press were controlled and manipulated.

The last section of the book focuses on explaining how word of the famine eventually reached the outside world.  After World War II, the Ukrainian diaspora spread the oral stories which contradicted official denials, and Gorbachev’s policy of glasnost allowed discussion.  The author concludes by arguing that the Sovietization of Ukraine and the Holodomor meet the general, if not legal, definition of genocide.

The book suggests that techniques used in the Soviet past have not been abandoned by Russians.  In 1919, Lenin had his forces enter Ukraine in disguise and called them a liberation movement; in Russia’s invasion of Crimea, masked soldiers in unmarked army uniforms were used.  Propaganda and disinformation campaigns have always been common; for instance, the invasion of Crimea was described as a defense against the cultural genocide of Russian speakers by Ukrainian Nazis.  Stalin’s secret police fabricated criminal charges against those who didn’t support policies, and that tactic continues to be used against Putin’s opponents.  Dissenters were ordered killed by Stalin, and a number of Putin’s critics have died in violent or mysterious circumstances.  Information about the Holdomor was strictly controlled so citizens were ignorant of events in Ukraine; Putin has cracked down on media outlets and individuals, imposing prison sentences of up to 15 years for those spreading information that goes against the Russian government’s narrative on the war.

I had wondered why Putin and others in his government have labeled the Ukrainian government and its leaders as “Nazis.”  This book offers one explanation.  During their occupation of Ukraine, the Nazis used the famine to promote hatred of Moscow, especially amongst rural Ukrainians whose efforts were needed to feed the Wehrmacht and Germany.  Since the Russian state argues that the Holodomor never happened, they claim only “Nazis” would speak of it.  “The memory of the Nazi occupation, and the collaboration of some Ukrainians with the Nazis, also meant that even decades later it was easy to call any advocate of independent Ukraine ‘fascist’.”  And any criticism of the Soviet government was “an anti-Soviet, Nazi propaganda drive that also had links to Western intelligence.” 

“Much later this same set of links – Ukraine, fascism, the CIA – would be used in the Russian information campaign against the Ukrainian independence and anti-corruption movement of 2014.”  (Now the Kremlin has alleged that the United States and Ukraine are conducting chemical and biological weapons activities in Ukraine.)  Of course, calling Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his government Nazis is an attempt to delegitimize Ukraine in the eyes of the Russian public, which considers its war against Nazi Germany its greatest moment. 

Once again, as in the past, Ukraine is being perceived as a rightful part of Russia.  Putin wants to build a Russian empire which must include Ukraine which he thinks of as an illegitimate country that exists on rightfully Russian territory populated by rightfully Russian people.  In a speech, Putin stated, “Ukraine is not just a neighboring country for us.  It is an inalienable part of our own history, culture and spiritual space.  Since time immemorial, the people living in the south-west of what has historically been Russian land have called themselves Russians.” 

Once again, forces in Ukraine are perceived as a threat.  As the book points out, since 1917, Soviet citizens were taught to distrust Ukrainians.  A sovereign, stable Ukraine successfully integrated with the West could have Russians asking for similar changes.   Putin fears a Maidan Uprising against his own government.  Bringing Ukraine to heel — demonstrating that a pro-Western protest movement in Russia’s historical heartland cannot succeed — is vital to protecting his own government. 

This book examines some of the historical reasons for bad feelings on the part of Ukrainians toward Russia.  Ukrainians have been warned that “’Only an independent Ukraine can guarantee that such a tragedy [the Holodonor] will never be repeated.’”  Could that be one reason why Ukrainians are fighting so valiantly and with such determination against the Russian invasion?