There
can be little doubt that the social, technical and economic transformation that
occurred in the Soviet Union, particularly during the period of Joseph Stalin's
leadership, was one of the most significant achievements of the 20th century.
Millions of workers and peasants had their lives transformed from the back-breaking
toil and oppression of near feudalism to becoming true masters of their own
destiny as they carried forwards the historic cause of building socialism.
Soviet power had been proclaimed by the
Congress of Soviets on 25th October 1917. The old state machine was abolished
and elected Soviets established in the villages, factories and military units.
Free education was introduced in all native languages and the people started to
build a new socialist society. The peaceful progress of the young republic was
cut short, however, by counter-revolutionary forces consisting of former
military personnel, kulaks (wealthy peasants with land and animals), and
sections of the privileged intelligentsia.
The struggle to build Socialism was going
to be a hard, demanding sacrifice made more difficult by foreign intervention.
The problems faced can be illustrated by an examination of events in the
Ukraine, which to avoid becoming vassals of the Polish Princes or the Ottoman
Empire had been part of Russia since 1654. Following the Russian Revolution and
the Kiev Bolshevik Uprising it became part of the new Soviet state. The
population comprised Slavs of the eastern group and Tatars of Turkish origin, in
addition to Polish and German descendants and other minority groups.
The Ukraine language is similar to Russian
and for many years was considered to be a Russian dialect. The Tatars have
their own language and live mainly in the Crimea; a region associated with the
suicidal Charge of the Light Brigade in 1854 during the war for control of the
Middle East. Although the main religion is Russian Orthodox, former Polish
influence has left a strong Catholic church. At the time of the Russian
revolution Ukraine's social strata comprised 80 per cent toiling peasantry,
five per cent workers, and a small but growing class of capitalists who owned over
90 per cent of the wealth and land.
By 1918 Ukrainian reactionaries had set up
four separate capitalist statelets, which all fought each other as well as the
Soviet government that was using armed detachments of workers to oppose attacks
by the White Guard alliance. The White Guards consisted of Nationalist armies
and Cossack chieftains.
Following the end of the First World War
the Soviet state, including the area of Ukraine, was subject to brazen naked
foreign aggression. Attacks and occupations were carried out. Britain occupied
Odessa, and Germany occupied a large part of western and central Ukraine. The
onslaught against the Soviet state itself was carried out by British, French,
German, American, Hungarian/Austrian and Japanese forces. A civil war with a
war of intervention was taking place as the workers state opposed reactionary
forces and the full fury of Imperialist aggression.
Unlike the imperialist backed forces of
counter-revolution who all wanted dominance and personal gain, the Soviets were
united for the common good, with military units formed of working peasants who
took up arms to join the ranks of the Red army. The Soviets were supported by a
war economy, unlike the largely mercenary White Guards who relied on foreign
sponsorship. The well-to-do sided with the old regime but increasingly others
found Soviet rule to their liking, including women who now enjoyed a new found
status of equality with men.
In the spring of 1920 the Poles,
encouraged by Western powers, attacked and captured Kiev. The White Guards
advanced from their stronghold in the Crimea to capture areas of southern
Ukraine. The Red Army counter-attacked and regained some territory. Overall the
Soviet Union lost other areas in the Baltic and Byelorussia. Reactionary
regimes were installed to form a {cordon sanitaire} designed to isolate the
Soviet Union and provide a base from which to carry out sabotage and
provocations.
During the 1920s and ‘30s the Ukrainian
Soviet Socialist Republic became an industrially developed region, with coal
from the Donbas supporting iron and steel production for machine building. Many
attempts were made to wreck the factories but they were defended gallantly by
the workers. The collectivisation of agricultural also took place during this
period. For centuries the land, owned by the rulers, had been tilled by
peasants on small plots using wooden ploughs with horses. Collectivisation
enabled farms to be modernised and by the late 1930s the area had become the
bread basket of the Soviet Union. Heavy industry in the region was referred to
as the Soviet Ruhr.
The process of collectivisation, however,
was not an easy one and coincided with one of the worst known drought periods
of 1932–1934. Hitler and later the CIA alleged that the famine had been created
deliberately by Stalin and vastly over-estimated casualties. Over one million
people died at this time in addition to a vastly greater number who had earlier
perished when invading armies killed, raped, slaughtered the farm stock, and
burned the crops. There were four chief causes for the suffering:
1. Unprecedented drought conditions in
many parts of the Soviet Union.
2. A typhoid epidemic that ravaged the
Ukraine and North Caucasus regions.
3. Provocations by the Kulaks who
slaughtered their cattle, horses, sheep, goats, pigs and hens to avoid
collectivisation.
4. Disorder of work provoked by sabotage,
and also the murder of many leading cades and specialists by German-backed
nationalists – the same people who would later support Hitler. The lies were designed
to justify their invasion seven years later.
At 0400hrs on 22nd June 1941 Hitler
attacked the Soviet Union in a war that led to the death of 27 million Soviets,
destruction of over 90 per cent of its industry and widespread devastation.
Over eight million people lost their lives in Ukraine, including over one million
Jews murdered by the SS.
Nationalists from the former ruling class
in Western Ukraine enthusiastically supported Hitler and the Nazis. Hitler did
not trust them, they had betrayed their own people and no doubt would betray
him if given half a chance, so they were not given front-line roles but put in
charge of the death camps where they undertook with great enthusiasm the
massacre of Jews, Communists, Socialists, trade unionists, disabled people and
those mentally ill. Stepan Bandera, a leading fascist, active during this
period, is today regarded as a national hero by some leading Ukrainian politicians.
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