Holodomor genocide question

Holodomor genocide question explores the facts whether the Holodomor, the disastrous famine in 1933 that claimed millions of lives in Ukraine, was an ethnic genocide, a natural catastrophe or democide. [cite web
url=http://www.artukraine.com/famineart/forgiven_hol.htm
title=The Great Famine-Genocide in Soviet Ukraine (Holodomor)
publisher=www.artukraine.com
accessdate=2008-05-25
last=
first=] [cite web
url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/ukrainian/domestic/story/2008/03/080313_latvia_holodomor_oh.shtml
title= uk icon Латвія визнала Голодомор ґеноцидом
publisher=www.bbc.co.uk
accessdate=2008-05-25
last=
first=] Currently, there is no international consensus among scholars or politicians on whether the Soviet policies that caused the famine fall under the legal definition of genocide. [http://www.uofaweb.ualberta.ca/historyandclassics/davidmarples.cfm Dr. David Marples] , [http://www.expressnews.ualberta.ca/article.cfm?id=7176 The great famine debate goes on...] , "ExpressNews" (University of Alberta), originally published in "Edmonton Journal", November 30, 2005] Stanislav Kuchytsky, " [http://www.day.kiev.ua/177442/ Holodomor of 1932–1933 as genocide: the gaps in the proof] ", "Den", February 17, 2007. ru icon] As of April 2008, the parliament of Ukraine and the governments of more than 12 countries have recognized the Holodomor as an act of genocide.Sources differ on interpreting various statements from different branches of different governments as to whether they amount to the official recognition of the Famine as Genocide by the country. For example, after the statement issued by the Latvian Sejm on March 13, 2008, the total number of countries is given as 19 (according to "Ukrainian BBC": = [http://www.bbc.co.uk/ukrainian/domestic/story/2008/03/080313_latvia_holodomor_oh.shtml "Латвія визнала Голодомор ґеноцидом"] ) or 16 (according to "Korrespondent": [http://korrespondent.net/ukraine/politics/403002 "После продолжительных дебатов Сейм Латвии признал Голодомор геноцидом украинцев"] ]

What is Genocide?

Genocide definitions contains a list of scholarly and international legal definitions of genocide, [Based on a list by Adam Jones pp.15-18] a word coined by Raphael Lemkin in 1944.Oxford English Dictionary "Genocide" citing Raphael Lemkin "Axis Rule in Occupied Europe" ix. 79] While there are various definitions of the term, Adam Jones, has written that the majority of genocide scholars consider that "intent to destroy" is a requirement for any act to be labeled genocide, and that there is growing agreement on the inclusion of the physical destruction criterion. [Adam Jones pp.20-21]

Determining what historical events constitute a "genocide" and which are merely criminal or inhuman behavior is not a clear-cut matter. In nearly every case where accusations of genocide have circulated, partisans of various sides have fiercely disputed the interpretation and details of the event, often to the point of promoting wildly different versions of the facts. An accusation of genocide is certainly not taken lightly and will almost always be controversial.

What is Democide?

Democide is a term coined by political scientist R. J. Rummel for "the murder of any person or people by a government, including genocide, politicide, and mass murder". Rummel created the term as an extended concept to include forms of government murder that are not covered by the legal definition of genocide, and it has found currency among other scholars. [Encountering Evil: Live Options in Theodicy, Stephen Thane Davis, Westminster John Knox Press, 2001, ISBN 066422251X [http://books.google.com/books?id=CLdLpWrQQ6EC&pg=PA2&dq=democide&sig=nPAv8SuB6vqdQix1BS5m5qDX6eQ Google Books] ] [Understanding and Preventing Violence: The Psychology of Human Destructiveness, Leighton C. Whitaker, CRC Press, 2000, ISBN 0849322650 [http://books.google.com/books?id=H62VO8MzhpkC&pg=PA163&ots=4Y_m56fwt_&dq=democide&sig=hOx3MsYv1tYY6DFoD7ZkjcycyTg#PPA164,M1 Google Books] ] [Contemporary Responses to the Holocaust, Konrad Kwiet, Jürgen Matthäus, Praeger/Greenwood, 2004, ISBN 0275974669 [http://books.google.com/books?id=fNYqavdZ0YcC&pg=PA3&dq=democide&sig=wk9l_luxDTDqHSK9ooCxTmXqS9Y Google Books] ]

According to Rummel, genocide has three different meanings. The ordinary meaning is murder by government of people due to their national, ethnic, racial, or religious group membership. The legal meaning of genocide refers to the international treaty, the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. This also includes nonlethal acts that in the end eliminate the group, such as preventing births or forcibly transferring children out of the group to another group. A generalized meaning of genocide is similar to the ordinary meaning but also includes government killings of political opponents or otherwise intentional murder. It is to avoid confusion regarding what meaning is intended that Rummel created the term democide for the third meaning. [http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/GENOCIDE.HTM R. J. Rummel DEMOCIDE VERSUS GENOCIDE: WHICH IS WHAT] ]

Rummel defines democide as "The murder of any person or people by a government, including genocide, politicide, and mass murder". For example, government-sponsored killings for political reasons would be considered democide. Democide can also include deaths arising from "intentionally or knowingly reckless and depraved disregard for life"; this brings into account many deaths arising through various neglects and abuses, such as forced mass starvation. Rummel explicitly excludes battle deaths in his definition. Capital punishment, actions taken against armed civilians during mob action or riot, and the deaths of noncombatants killed during attacks on military targets so long as the primary target is military, are not considered democide. [http://www.freedomsnest.com/rummel_definition.html Rummel’s definition] .]

Background Holodomor

The Ukrainian famine (1932–1933), or Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор) (literally in Ukrainian, "death by hunger"), was one of the largest national catastrophes in the modern history of the Ukrainian nation.

The word comes from the Ukrainian words "holod", ‘hunger’, and "mor", ‘plague’,Ukrainian "holod" (голод, ‘hunger’, compare Russian "golod") should not be confused with "kholod" (холод, ‘cold’). For details, see romanization of Ukrainian. "Mor" means ‘plague’ in the sense of a disastrous evil or affliction, or a sudden unwelcome outbreak. See .] possibly from the expression "moryty holodom", ‘to inflict death by hunger’. The Ukrainian verb "moryty" (морити) means "to poison somebody, drive to exhaustion or to torment somebody". The perfect form of the verb "moryty" is "zamoryty"mdash"kill or drive to death by hunger, exhausting work". The neologism “Holodomor” is given in the modern, two-volume dictionary of the Ukrainian language as "artificial hunger, organised in vast scale by the criminal regime against the country's population" [ [http://slovnyk.net/?swrd=%E3%EE%EB%EE%E4%EE%EC%EE%F0 Голодомор] , in "Velykyi tlumachnyi slovnyk suchasnoi ukrainsʹkoi movy: 170 000 sliv", chief ed. V. T. Busel, Irpin, Perun (2004), ISBN 9665690132] Sometimes the expression is translated into English as "murder by hunger." [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6179818.stm news.bbc.co.uk] ]

The reasons of the famine are the subject of intense scholarly and political debate. Some historians claim the famine was purposely engineered by the Soviet authorities to attack Ukrainian nationalism, while others view it as an unintended consequence of the economic problems associated with radical economic changes implemented during Soviet industrialization. [http://web.archive.org/web/20030429084514/http://www.unimelb.edu.au/ExtRels/Media/UN/archive/1998/319/stalinismwasacollective.html 'Stalinism' was a collective responsibility - Kremlin papers] , "The News in Brief", University of Melbourne, 19 June 1998, Vol 7 No 22]

The aftermath of Holodomor and its effects on the Ukrainian population can be seen more clearly by comparing the rate of population growth of the various ethnic groups within the Soviet Union when comparing the the Soviet census of 1926 with the 1937 census [http://ukrainianworldcongress.org/Holodomor/Komitet_Holodomor/press-releases/2008/Australia04.08.pdf Press release by Ukrainian Embassy in Australia April 4, 2008] ] .

Genocide debate: Ukrainian position

On November 28, 2006, the Government of Ukraine passed a law classifying the Holodomor as genocide [ [http://www.infoukes.com/history/famine/ InfoUkes: Ukrainian History - The Artificial Famine/Genocide (Holodomor) in Ukraine 1932-33 ] ] . Another bill sought to criminalize those disputing that the Holodomor was genocide, but such a law has never been adopted by the Ukrainian parliament. The law would make denying that the Holodomor was "an act of genocide against the Ukrainian people" equal to denying the Holocaust an act of genocide against the Jews. The maximum punishment proposed would be 100-300 "gross salaries", and a prison sentence of up to 2 years [ [http://www.nrcu.gov.ua/index.php?id=148&listid=56782 Public denial of Holodomor Famine of 1932-1933 in Ukraine as genocide of Ukrainian people to be prosecuted / News / NRCU ] ] .

Genocide debate: Russian position

The Russian Federation accepts historic information about the Holodomor but rejects the argument that is was ethnic genocide by pointing out the fact that other Soviet citizens also died because of the Holodomor. On 2nd of April, 2008 - a statement was voted by the Russian parliament stating there was no evidence that the 1933 famine was an act of genocide against the Ukrainian people. This was in response to the 2006 Ukraine's parliament recognition that the Holodomor, which claimed the lives of around 3 million people, was an act of genocide by the Soviet authorities against the Ukrainian people. The declaration adopted by Russia's lower house of parliament, the State Duma, condemned the Soviet regime's "disregard for the lives of people in the attainment of economic and political goals", along with "any attempts to revive totalitarian regimes that disregard the rights and lives of citizens in former Soviet states." yet stated that "there is no historic evidence that the famine was organized on ethnic grounds." [http://en.rian.ru/world/20080402/102830217.html Russian lawmakers reject Ukraine's view on Stalin-era famine ]

According to a Moscow Times article: "The Kremlin argues that genocide is the killing of a population based on their ethnicity, whereas Stalin's regime annihilated all kinds of people indiscriminately, regardless of their ethnicity. But if the Kremlin really believed in this argument, it would officially acknowledge that Stalin's actions constituted mass genocide against all the peoples of the Soviet Union." [ [http://www.themoscowtimes.com/article/600/42/362297.htm Equating Holodomor With Genocide] Moscow Times Retrieved on May 1, 2008] .

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, laureate of the Nobel Prize in Literature and historian, opined in "Izvestia" that Holodomor was no different from the Russian famine of 1921 as both were caused by the ruthless robbery of peasants by Bolshevik grain procurements. According to him the lie of the Holodomor being genocide was invented decades later after the event and Ukrainian efforts to have the famine recognised as genocide is an act of historical revisionism that has now surpassed the level of Bolshevik agitprop. The writer cautions that the genocidal claim has its chances to be accepted by the West due to the general western ignorance of Russian and Ukrainian history.Alexander Solzhenitsyn [http://www.izvestia.ru/opinions/article3114723/ Поссорить родные народы??] Izvestia 2 April 2008 ru icon]

Genocide debate: Israeli/Jewish position

Many Jewish people express the idea that the Holocaust was unique and lack of willingness to officially recognize that other tragic events as genocide such as the Holodomor are no less painful for Ukrainians, than the Holocaust is for Jews. [http://eng.maidanua.org/node/792 Will Holodomor receive the same status as the Holocaust?] Shimon Peres, President of Israel, has a position on genocides having said: "We reject attempts to create a similarity between the Holocaust and the Armenian allegations. Nothing similar to the Holocaust occurred. It is a tragedy what the Armenians went through but not a genocide." [Robert Fisk. [http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/peres-stands-accused-over-denial-of-meaningless-armenian-holocaust-681774.html Peres stands accused over denial of "meaningless" Armenian Holocaust] , The Independent, 18 April 2001] [Barak Ravid, [http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/897273.html Peres to Turks: Our stance on Armenian issue hasn't changed] , Haaretz, 26 August 2007] He has made similar statement about the Holodomor.Fact|date=April 2008

In September 2008 Israeli Ambassador to Ukraine Zina Kalay-Klaitman stated that Israel consider genocide only destructions by ethnicity. Thus, Israel could not recognize Holodomor as genocide. The same time Israel consider Holodomor to be a great catastrophe of Ukrainian people. Israel supports all resolutions of International bodies including UNESCO that affirm Holodomor tragedy not to be repeated again and that it should be studied around the world [ [http://www.dt.ua/1000/1600/64180/ Зіна Калай-Клайтман: Ізраїль не може визнати Голодомор актом етнічного геноциду] Zerkalo Nedeli N36 (715) 2008 [http://www.zn.ua/1000/1600/64180/ Russian version] ]

Genocide debate: other countries and international organizations

Several countries and international organizations made public statements addressing the Holodomor and recognizing it as a tragedy. Some went further as to recognize it as genocide, or a crime against humanity.

In the framework of international organizations, such resolutions were adopted by
* Baltic Assembly [ [http://www.baltasam.org/images/front/_pdf/Doc_8_ENG.pdf Statement on On Commemorating the Victims of Genocide and Political Repressions Committed in Ukraine in 1932 and 1933, 26th Session of the Baltic Assembly, 13th Baltic Council, from 22 to 24 November 2007, Riga, Latvia, (accessed on December 9, 2007)] ] [ [http://www.ukrinform.kiev.ua/eng/order/?id=114710&ulq=holodomor Baltic Assembly Adopts Statement "In Commemorating Victims of Genocide and Political Repression in Ukraine in 1932 1933"] , Ukrinform , December 4, 2007, (accessed on December 9, 2007)] ]
* General Assembly of the United Nations [ [http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N03/604/02/PDF/N0360402.pdf OpenElement Letter dated 7 November 2003 from the Permanent Representative of Ukraine to the United Nations addressed to the Secretary-General] , Permanent Mission of Ukraine to the UN, on November 7, 2003 [ [http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Joint_Statement_on_Holodomor UN Member-states sign joint declaration on Great Famine] ]
* Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe [ [http://assembly.coe.int/Main.asp?link=/Documents/AdoptedText/ta06/ERES1481.htm Resolution 1481 (2006) Need for international condemnation of crimes of totalitarian communist regimes, Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly, on January 25, 2006 ] ] [ [http://assembly.coe.int/ASP/APFeaturesManager/defaultArtView.asp?ID=382 PACE strongly condemns crimes of totalitarian communist regimes, PACE News, (accessed on June 22, 2007)] ] [ [http://assembly.coe.int//Main.asp?link=http://assembly.coe.int/Documents/WorkingDocs/Doc05/EDOC10765.htm Doc 10765 Need for international condemnation of crimes of totalitarian communist regimes] , Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly, December 16, 2005 ] ] [ [http://www.ucrania.com/forum_topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=2162&FORUM_ID=13&CAT_ID=2&Forum_Title=Sociedad&Topic_Title=Ucrania+propone+a+la+Asamblea+Parlamentaria+del+Consejo+de+Europa+condenar+el+Holodomor Holodomor Ucrania proposes a la Asamblea Parlamentaria del Consejo de Europa el condemn Holodomor] , UCRANIA.com, January 26, 2006, (accessed on April 3, 2007) ] ]
* Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe [ [http://www.mfa.gov.ua/data/upload/news/mfa/ua/9097/jointstatement.doc Joint Statement "On 75th Anniversary of Holodomor in Ukraine 1932-1933"] , Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, (reached on December 9, 2007) ] ] [ [http://www.ukrinform.kiev.ua/eng/order/?id=114686&ulq=holodomor 25 OSCE-Participant Countries Adopt Joint Statement "On 75th Anniversary of Holodomor in Ukraine 1932-1933"] , Ukrinform, December 4, 2007, (reached on December 9, 2007) ] ]
* United Nations Organization for Education, Science and Culture [ [http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0015/001538/153838e.pdf Remembrance of Victims of the Great Famine in Ukraine (Holodomor), UNESCO, (reached on October 15, 2007)] ] [ [http://www.ukranews.com/eng/article/77253.html UNESCO Calls On Its Member-Countries To Honor Memories Of Victims Of 1932-1933 Famine in Ukraine] , November 1, 2007, Ukrainian News Agency, (reached on November 1, 2007) ] [ [http://www.day.kiev.ua/190928/ Not too late. Three messages in UNESCO resolution commemorating Holodomor victims] , Mykola By Siruk,The Day, November 6, 2007, (reached on November 7, 2007)] ]

Highlighted below are recognitions of Holodomor-Genocide as expressed by parliaments, Heads of Government and Heads of State of the following countries:
* [ [http://www1.hcdn.gov.ar/folio-cgi-bin/om_isapi.dll?clientID=1679593240&E1=&E11=&E12=&E13=&E14=&E15=&E16=&E17=&E18=hambruna%20ucrania&E19=&E2=senado&E3=&E5=declaracion&E6=aprobado&E7=&E9=&headingswithhits=on&infobase=proy99.nfo&querytemplate=Consulta%20de%20Proyectos%20Parlamentarios&record={F341}&recordswithhits=on&softpage=Doc_Frame_Pg42&submit=ejecutar Resolução do Senado da Argentina (n.º1278/03)] , Resolution of the Senate of Argentina (No. 1278-03), June 26, 2003 ] [ [http://www.ukrainianworldcongress.org/Holodomor/Passed_resolutions/Argentina.pdf El proyecto de ley number 1278-03] , Ukrainian World Congress (accessed on October 31, 2006) ] [ [http://www.senado.gov.ar/web/senadores/prley.php?id_sena=339&iOrden=0&iSen=ASC National Senator Carlos Alberto Rossi] , Honorable Senate of the Nation, (accessed on February 13, 2007) ] [ [http://www.ukrinform.com/eng/order/?id=116408&ulq=holodomor Argentinean Parliament approved resolution to commemorate 1932 to 1933 Holodomor victims in Ukraine] , Ukrinform, December 28, 2007, (accessed on December 28, 2007) ]

* [ [http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/work/journals/2003/jnlp_114.pdf Resolution of the Senate of Australia (No. 680)] , Journals of the Senate No. 114, October 30, 2003 ] [ [http://www.ukrweekly.com/Archive/2003/460302.shtml Australian Senate condemns Famine-Genocide] , The Ukrainian Weekly, November 16, 2003, No. 46, Vol LXXI, (accessed on June 26, 2007) ]

* [ [http://www2.camara.gov.br/comissoes/cdhm/projetos.html Proposition: REQ-124/2007 CDHM ] , Commission on Human Rights and Minorities (CDHM), Chamber of Deputies of Brazil, August 27, 2007, (reached on September 17, 2007) ] [ [http://www.revistafatorbrasil.com.br/ver_noticia.php?not=19,918 Ukrainian Holocaust is remembered in the National Congress] , Portal Factor Brazil, September 22, 2007, (accessed on March 17, 2008) ]

* [ [http://www.parl.gc.ca/37/2/parlbus/chambus/senate/jour-e/pdf/072jr_2003-06-19.pdf Resolution of the Senate of Canada] , Journals of the Senate At 72, June 19, 2003 ] [ [http://www.ukrweekly.com/Archive/2003/260305.shtml Canadian Senate adopts motion on Famine-Genocide] , by Peter Stieda, The Ukrainian Weekly, June 29, 2003, No. 26, Vol LXXI, (accessed on June 26, 2007) ] [ [http://pm.gc.ca/eng/media.asp?category=3&id=1915 Prime Minister Harper commemorates Ukrainian famine] , Office of the Prime Minister, November 28, 2007, (accessed on December 8, 2007)]

* [ [http://www.camara.cl/diario/noticia.asp?vid=28589 Cámara pide recognize hambruna en Ucrania en 1933 ] , Chamber of Deputies of Chile, November 14, 2007, (Accessed on November 28, 2007) ]

* [ [http://www.ukranews.com/eng/article/90449.html Colombia Recognizes Holodomor Famine in Ukraine in 1932-1933 The Genocide] , Ukrainian News Agency, December 24, 2007, (Accessed on December 26, 2007) ] [ [http://helsinki.org.ua/en/index.php?id=1198597096 Columbia declares Holodomor an act of genocide] , Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union, December 25, 2007, (Accessed on March 26, 2008) ]
* [ [http://www.congreso.gov.ec/noticias/contenido.aspx?codigo_bol=5542&sitio=noticias Aprueba resolution: Congress if solidariza with pueblo Ukrainian] , Congreso Nacional del Ecuador, October 30, 2007, (Accessed on October 31, 2007) ] [ [http://mignews.com.ua/en/articles/277450.html Ecuador Recognized Holodomor in Ukraine!] , Media International Group, October 31, 2007, (Accessed on October 31, 2007) ]

* [ [http://www.velkaepocha.sk/content/view/3923/33/ Prijali deklaráciu k hladomoru v bývalom Sovietskom zväze] , EpochMedia, December 13, 2007, (reached on March 26, 2008) ] [ [http://www.ukrinform.com/eng/order/?id=115330&ulq=holodomor Slovak Parliament Recognizes Holodomor of 1932-1933 in Former USSR, Including in Ukraine, "Extermination Act] , Ukrinform, December 13, 2007, (reached on December 13, 2007) ]

* [ [http://www.congreso.es/public_oficiales/L8/CONG/BOCG/D/D_569.PDF#page=5 Proposed resolution of the Congress of Deputies of Spain (No. 161/002237)] , Boletin Oficial de las Cortes Generales, Series D: General, No. 569, June 15, 2007 ] [ [http://www.actualidad.terra.es/nacional/articulo/congreso_honra_victimas_gran_hambruna_1609724.htm Congreso honour victims of the great Ukrainian hambruna en su 75 aniversario] , May 30, 2007, Terra Actualidad - Reuters, (reached on June 1, 2007) ]

* [ [http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?dbname = 108_cong_bills & docid = f: hr356eh.txt.pdf resolution of the House of Representatives of the US (H.R. 356)] , U.S. Government Printing Office, October 20, 2003 ] [ [http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=39348 Proclamation 5273 - Commemoration of the Great Famine in the Ukraine] , October 30, 1984, The American Presidency Project, (reached on January 4, 2007) ]

cholarly debate

Genocide conclusions

Yaroslav Bilinsky Professor Emeritus Political Science and International Relations University of Delaware writes in the Journal of Genocide Research (1999) in a review of Holodomor literature he concludes:

"Political usage should not override scholarly logic, especially political usage which is just being established in independent Ukraine, arguably seven years late. My argument, however, is that both logic and political usage in Ukraine point in one direction, that of the terror-famine being genocidal. Stalin hated the Ukrainians, as accepted as a fact by Sakharov, revealed in the telegram to Zatonsky and inferred from his polemics with the Yugoslav communist Semich. Stalin decided to collectivize Soviet agriculture and under the cover of collectivization teach the Ukrainians a bloody lesson. Had it not been for Stalinist hubris and the incorporation of the more nationalistlcally minded and less physically decimated Western Ukrainians after 1939, the Ukrainian nation might have never recovered from the Stalinist offensive against the main army of the Ukrainian national movement, the peasants." [http://www.faminegenocide.com/resources/bilinsky.html Was the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-1933 Genocide?]

James E, Mace, a Ukrainian historian of American-Irish origin wrote:

"For the Ukrainians the famine must be understood as the most terrible part of a consistent policy carried out against them: the destruction of their cultural and spiritual elite which began with the trial of the Union for the Liberation of Ukraine, the destruction of the official Ukrainian wing of the Communist Party, and the destruction of their social basis in the countryside. Against them the famine seems to have been designed as part of a campaign to destroy them as a political factor and as a social organism." [Mace, J. E. (1986) "The man-made famine of 1933 in Soviet Ukraine," p 12; in R. Serbyn and B. Krawchenko, eds, Famine in Ukraine in 1932-1933 (Edmonton: Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, University of Alberta). ]

Kyiv Post reports on Stanislav Kulchytsky:

So what actually happened in Ukraine in 1932–1933? And did it really amount to “genocide”?
...
Ukrainian historian Stanislav Kulchytsky argues the way Stalin dealt with the Ukrainian countryside lifted the events out of the category of merely a famine and into the realm of genocide. In the fall of 1932, on orders from Moscow, government troops came to villages requisitioning grain to meet Stalin’s unrealistic quotas. At gunpoint they took away grain, even when peasants did not have enough for themselves. Those peasants who had no grain were deprived of other food stocks. Those who resisted were shot. Then a Jan. 22nd, 1933 directive from Stalin and Molotov sealed off Ukrainian borders to prevent famished peasants from escaping. [http://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/oped/29075/ Evidence proves genocide occurred ]

Environmental factors conclusions

Historian David Marple commenting of the Holodomor debate states:

”There are no English-speaking historians working exclusively on Ukrainian aspects of the famine. Indeed the leading authority, in terms of output, appears to be Mark Tauger. Tauger subscribes to what he calls the "environmental school"; in other words, that climatic conditions resulted in famine, and the Stalin government took some steps to alleviate it.” [http://www.uofaweb.ualberta.ca/historyandclassics/davidmarples.cfm Dr. David Marples] , [http://www.expressnews.ualberta.ca/article.cfm?id=7176 ...] , "ExpressNews" (University of Alberta), originally published in "Edmonton Journal", November 30, 2005]

Jeff Coplon

In Jeff Coplon's article "In Search of a Soviet Holocaust".Jeff Coplon, [http://www.chss.montclair.edu/English/furr/vv.html "In Search of a Soviet Holocaust"] , "The Village Voice", January 12, 1988.] , Coplon does not deny that "hundreds of thousands, possibly one or two million" died as a result of a famine in the 1930s, but while he acknowleges it was "an enormous toll of human suffering" and that Stalin was "partially responsible" he downplays the responsibility of the Soviet dictator. Instead, he quotes Sovietologist John Arch Getty, insisting that "there is plenty of blame to go around. It must be shared by the tens of thousands of activists and officials who carried out the policy and by the peasants who chose to slaughter animals, burn fields, and boycott cultivation in protest." More specifically, he denies that it was a deliberate genocide, quoting historians like Lynne Viola of SUNY Binghamton and Moshe Lewin at the University of Pennsylvania who reject any such claim. Much of the article is specifically critical of Robert Conquest, suggesting his writing was biased because of his previous employment with the Information Research Department, and citing Sovietologists who denounce Conquest's work.

Coplon also claims those who continued to bring the Holodomor to the attention of the public had ulterior political motives, even giving quotes from Adolf Hitler's "Mein Kampf" to stress this point.

Coplon also penned the article "Rewriting History — How Ukrainian nationalists imposed their doctored history on High School Students" heavily relying on Tottle with his additional comments regarding the inclusion the Holodomor as one of a number of subjects included in the curriculum for social studies classes in New York. In the article published in the magazine "CAPITAL Region" March 1988, he wrote:

quote
The losers, of course, are the New York state schoolchildren, who will absorb this disinformation between algebra and chemistry — and may even be asked to parrot the fraud for a higher score on their regents exam." [ [http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/essays/coplonrewriting88.pdf Rewriting History - How Ukrainian nationalists imposed their doctored history on High School Students] ]

Mark Tauger

Professor Mark Tauger writes that he is skeptical of Conquest's claims about the famine and of the accuracy of Conquest's book on the subject [ [http://www.as.wvu.edu/history/Faculty/Tauger/Tauger,%20on%20famines%20and%20scholarship,%20H-Russia%2004.16.02,%20my%20p.pdf H-Net Discussion Logs - Re: Ukrainian Famine (2) ] ] . He has argued that the 1932 harvest was smaller than the official estimate, and smaller than the harvest of 1933, which would suggest the famine was not "man-made." Tauger's evidence, methodologies and conclusions in regard to the famine were criticized by Robert Davies and Stephen Wheatcroft in their book "The Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931–33", published in 2004Tauger, Mark B. "Arguing from errors: On certain issues in Robert Davies' and Stephen Wheatcroft's analysis of the 1932 Soviet grain harvest and the Great Soviet famine of 1931-1933", Europe-Asia Studies, 2006, 58:6, p973] . Wheatcroft additionally claims Tauger's view represents the opposite extreme in arguing the famine was totally accidental [Wheatcroft, S. G. "TOWARDS EXPLAINING SOVIET FAMINE OF 1931-3: POLITICAL AND NATURAL FACTORS IN PERSPECTIVE", Food and Foodways, 2004, 12:2, 107 — 136] Tauger, however, maintains that his harvest estimates are supported by evidence and shared by a number of other scholars. In reply, Wheatcroft and Davies continue to maintain Tauger's use of the evidence is oversimplified, that his methodology is faulty, and that his conclusions overall are wrong. [Wheatcroft, S. G. "On continuing to misunderstand arguments: Response to Mark Tauger", Europe-Asia Studies 2007, 59:5, 847 — 868]

References