Thread: Pro or Anti Stalin

There's also a well-known fact that photographs which are used routinely to demonstrate the terrible consequences of Ukrainian "golodomor" to Western public in books and media (starving children, skeletal-looking corpses, etc.) are in fact photos of Russian peasants, starved to death near Volga.

I think the word is supposed to be spelled "holodomor" (?) in English.
But I have to admit, I never actually heard about it until quite recently. Don't know why really.

When I think about Ukrainian peasants, all that would come to mind is "black earth" and a Soviet era miniseries from TV about some peasants in Ukraine, forgotten what it was called.

I would not presume to have any opinion or view about holodomor, since it seems to be controversial and no substantial proof about the underlying reason for the starvation. It does seem like a bit of a conspiracy theory to think that a country that claims to look out for the working class and peasants would set out to deliberately starve them to death... It is equally hard to imagine that a civilised person who was a convinced communist from an ideological perspective would support this. On the other hand, some people were indeed treated despiccably in the USSR, so to me this is hard to form a clear view about. And in light of what the Germans got up to at around the same time, perhaps it is not any harder to understand than the holocaust.


On the executions from the videoclip - yes, gruesome! But were they enemy sympathisers? If so, any country would have pretty much done the same thing back in those days. Remember the incredibly high death tolls of Soviet civilians as well as troops. These particular executions do not surprise me much. The main thing that Stalin did, that I find very repulsive, is allowing regular people to be labelled "enemies of the state" and similar based on hearsay, gossip among neighbours and reading private correspondence, then sending them to labour camps that were so harsh that many died. As I understand, this only happened to a very small percentage of the population but it is still awful. Anyone can have a bad day and slag off the state a bit. Even say things they later regret! Either way people must be allowed to have a personal opinion about things and be able to discuss it with their friends without fear, regardless whether they live in a state that is trying to build communism etc, etc.

I think the word is supposed to be spelled "holodomor" (?) in English.

Thank you, I should have checked it out instead of simply transliterating it. You might be right. It's spelled "голодомор" both in Ukrainian and in Russian, but Ukrainian "г" is usually transliterated as "h" in English.

I enjoy your assertiveness. Did we continue WWII in 1946?

This is a fragment of a film "Blokada" about Blockade of Leningrad. It shows the execution of 8 German war criminals on 05 Jan 1946, including former Pskov commandant Heinrich Remlinger. Of 11 accused 8 were sentenced to death. This was the only public execution in Leningrad.

Originally Posted by gRomoZeka

Thank you, I should have checked it out instead of simply transliterating it. You might be right. It's spelled "голодомор" both in Ukrainian and in Russian, but Ukrainian "г" is usually transliterated as "h" in English.

The spelling is quite similar to "holocaust"

The main thing that Stalin did, that I find very repulsive, is allowing regular people to be labelled "enemies of the state" and similar based on hearsay, gossip among neighbours and reading private correspondence, then sending them to labour camps that were so harsh that many died.

I do not know your skills in Russian but I suggest you to read this document signed by Stalin and Molotov:
Молотов В.М., Сталин И.В. Об арестах, прокурорском надзоре и ведении следствия: Постановление Совета Народных Комиссаров ССС

Originally Posted by Anixx

I do not know your skills in Russian but I suggest you to read this document signed by Stalin and Molotov:
Молотов В.М., Сталин И.В. Об арестах, прокурорском надзоре и ведении следствия: Постановление Совета Народных Комиссаров ССС

That's why the year of 1938 is usually said to be the end of the great terror in Russia?

Originally Posted by gRomoZeka

Oh, don't start again.

Genocide is "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", and nothing of said above applies to "golodomor". Modern nationalistic Ukrainian politics prefer to label it genocide to strengthen the opinion, that "Russians" (or rather Stalin regime) deliberately tried to annihilate all Ukrainians.

Still, peasants starved to death not because Ukrainians were specifically targeted, but because peasantry in general faced unbearable demands of the state. The same starvation scenario happened to Russian peasants in Volga region in 1921-1922. Was it Russian genocide against Russians, then? Well, no. It was cruel economical policy, which hurt agricultural regions indiscriminately regardless of ethnic (or any other) groups living there. You can call it genocide against peasants, figuratively speaking... but that's it.

There's also a well-known fact that photographs which are used routinely to demonstrate the terrible consequences of Ukrainian "golodomor" to Western public in books and media (starving children, skeletal-looking corpses, etc.) are in fact photos of Russian peasants, starved to death near Volga. That does not make what happened to Ukrainians any better, but it gives a (deliberately?) wrong impression of what was going on during that period.

Ok, if it makes you feel better, you can call it "deliberate mass killings". And I would still insist that it was genocide, maybe not ethnic genocide but "class genocide" - the bolsheviks just wanted the people that were more successful than them to die, and of course, to rob their houses and grab what they had managed to produce so that the bolsheviks wouldn't have to make it on their own.

Originally Posted by Eric C.

Ok, if it makes you feel better, you can call it "deliberate mass killings". And I would still insist that it was genocide, maybe not ethnic genocide but "class genocide" - the bolsheviks just wanted the people that were more successful than them to die, and of course, to rob their houses and grab what they had managed to produce so that they wouldn't have to make it on their own.

I can agree with you naming it "class genocide", even if massive death toll among peasants was not a goal, but mostly a byproduct of policy at that time. What I don't like is people calling it genocide, implying it was ethnic, i.e. turning it into Russians vs. Ukrainians affair (with current Ukrainian official policy actively supporting this point of view).

Originally Posted by Eric C.

That's why the year of 1938 is usually said to be the end of the great terror in Russia?

Yes. The term "Stalinist repressions" was invented later, by Khrushchev. The Khrushchev's aim was to indirectly attack Beria. Before that it was known as "Yezhovshchina". Stalin was the first to turn public attention towards it.

Originally Posted by Eric C.

Ok, if it makes you feel better, you can call it "deliberate mass killings". And I would still insist that it was genocide, maybe not ethnic genocide but "class genocide" - the bolsheviks just wanted the people that were more successful than them to die, and of course, to rob their houses and grab what they had managed to produce so that the bolsheviks wouldn't have to make it on their own.

Is there any evidence that the "mass killings" were deliberate? As you know around that time gained popularity a pseudoscientist Lysenko with his promises to increase the wheat production by multiple times. Although his theory turned out to be incorrect, his skyrocketing carrier can only be attributed to the government's desire to put an end to the famines.

I also wonder whether would you call famines in Bengali in 1943 and in Bihar in 1966 "deliberate mass killings", as it is known that there was enough food in India at the time, just the established policy disallowed people to get food as they had no money. Note that British administration exported from Bengali 80000 tonnes of wheat that year, when 1.5 to 4 million people died. Possibly this was also a class genocide so that the British wanted people less successful than them to die.

Originally Posted by Anixx

Yes. The term "Stalinist repressions" was invented later, by Khrushchev. The Khrushchev's aim was to indirectly attack Beria. Before that it was known as "Yezhovshchiva". Stalin was the first to turn public attention towards it.

But the whole atmosphere of the document was just horrible, I think more horrible than that of "Silent Hill", etc. Why set up a special department to be searching for "enemies of the USSR", "public enemies" in the first place? There's something basically wrong with a system that assumes to be surrounded by enemies.

Originally Posted by gRomoZeka

(with current Ukrainian official policy actively supporting this point of view).

are you sure Yanukovich's regime upholds this nonesense? i don't think so
this rhetoric has been considerably toned down
not sure what they teach in schools though

Originally Posted by Eric C.

Ok, if it makes you feel better, you can call it "deliberate mass killings". And I would still insist that it was genocide, maybe not ethnic genocide but "class genocide" - the bolsheviks just wanted the people that were more successful than them to die, and of course, to rob their houses and grab what they had managed to produce so that the bolsheviks wouldn't have to make it on their own.

i can't speak for the bolsheviks and can't know what was on their mind but i too disagree with the genocide statement
the peasantry in its mass wasn't wealthy by far especially with the collectivization going on so their assumed 'success' envied by the bolsheviks was non-existent
by the beginning of the 30's i believe the majority of peasants had joined collective farms, forced upon them by the very bolsheviks, so it would be inaccurate to set them against each other, the peasantry had already been playing by the bolsheviks rules

Originally Posted by Eric C.

But the whole atmosphere of the document was just horrible, I think more horrible than that of "Silent Hill", etc. Why set up a special department to be searching for "enemies of the USSR", "public enemies" in the first place? There's something basically wrong with a system that assumes to be surrounded by enemies.

What special department do you mean? I did not find it in the text.

Originally Posted by Eric C.

But the whole atmosphere of the document was just horrible, I think more horrible than that of "Silent Hill", etc. Why set up a special department to be searching for "enemies of the USSR", "public enemies" in the first place? There's something basically wrong with a system that assumes to be surrounded by enemies.

But is there any state that does not assume that? Practice of searching for "enemies of the state" is widespread even nowadays, otherwise why set up FBI, or CIA, or Mossad, or any agency for that matter?

the problem is not the security entities by themselves but the policy and ideology of the central government or the Party for that matter
the former only serve the agenda the latter dictates and the agenda was 'witch hunt'

the movie (1992) is about the period of Red Terror (1918-23)

Originally Posted by LXNDR

Why is it us who celebrates the Victory, but it's the Germans who are better off?

Хорошая у тебя подпись, сразу объясняет многое.