Holodomor Remembrance Day: Memory and witness for the victims of Stalin's Ukrainian Famine

 "In the future, there will be fewer but better Russians." - Greta Garbo, Ninotchka, 1939

The genocide in Ukraine is known as the Holodomor and took place between 1932 -1933. Millions of children died in an artificial famine. This crime was ignored by the United States as it formally recognized the Soviet Union in 1933.  The Economist in 2012 reported on the 80th anniversary of this man-made famine:

Holodomor literally means death by hunger. In 1932 and 1933, a vast famine in Soviet Ukraine killed three to seven million people, according to estimates. While people starved, the grain was shut away in barns for export.

The deadliest famines in the 20th century were not in Africa but in Europe (Ukraine) and China.
Social science research has demonstrated that famines "happen only with some degree of human complicity."  Human decisions "determine whether a crisis deteriorates into a full-blown famine."

According to Felix Wemheuer, professor of Modern China Studies at the University of Cologne, in his book Famine Politics in Maoist China and the Soviet Union," during the twentieth century, 80 percent of all famine victims worldwide died in China and the Soviet Union." 

Millions starved to death under brutal famine imposed by Joseph Stalin

However, to understand the nature of famine politics in communist regimes the monograph of Andrea Graziosi and Frank E. Sysyn in the East/West: Journal of Ukranian Studies titled "Communism and Hunger" is required reading. Consider the following:

"In fact, with the exception of the 1943 Bengal famine with its approximately two million victims, all of the other major famines of the twentieth century are directly connected to socialist "experiments": in 1921 and 1922 in Russia and Ukraine ( 1million - 1.5 million deaths); in 1931, 1932, and 1933 in the USSR (6.5 million - 7.5 million deaths, of which 4 million were in Ukraine and 1.3 million - 1.5 million in Kazakhstan); in 1946 and 1947 in the USSR (1 million - 1.5 million deaths); from 1958 to 1962 in China (30 million - 45 million deaths); from 1983 to 1985 in Ethiopia (0.5 million - 1.0 million deaths); and from 1994 to 1998 in North Korea ( estimates vary from a few hundred thousand to more than 2 million deaths)."

This was not due to poor central planning and socialist inefficiencies, but a deliberate policy of genocide against targeted population to consolidate political control by eliminating those who do not support their regime. The percentage of victims in the USSR and China relative to their respective overall populations were the same (5%). In the case of the USSR that meant around 7 million deaths out of a population of 160 million and in the case of China  estimates between 30 million and 45 million deaths out of a population of 600 million.

 

 We must also remember those who bore witness and spoke truth, and those who covered it up. 

Gareth Jones, a Welsh journalist broke the story on the Ukranian famine on March 29, 1933 despite official denials. Walter Duranty of The New York Times wrote an article a day later rebutting Jones's claims that was published in the paper of record on March 31, 1933. 

 

High price of good journalism: Case of Gareth Jones and the Ukranian famine told in the film Mr. Jones now streaming

Honoring honor

Brave Welsh journalist Gareth Jones broke story on Soviet famine

Gareth Jones, a Welsh journalist broke the story on the Ukranian famine on March 29, 1933 despite official denials. Walter Duranty of The New York Times wrote an article a day later rebutting Jones's claims that was published in the paper of record on March 31, 1933. 

In the end seven million souls starved to death in a communist manufactured famine in the Ukraine between 1931 and 1933 under the rule of Josef Stalin. Mr. Jones was banned from returning to the Soviet Union by the Communists. 

Two years after publishing this story he was murdered in Inner Mongolia on the eve of his 30th birthday by Chinese bandits in what his family believes was a Moscow coordinated plot to eliminate him.

Mr. Gareth Jones

There are many who look the other way, remain silent, or worse defend the lie to cover up the crime, and are rewarded with prizes and a long and healthy life. This was the case of Walter Duranty, who won a Pulitzer Prize for covering up the famine. Gareth Jones took the path less traveled, that of truth and honor, and paid a high price.

Thankfully, the Polish director Agnieszka Holland has brought his story to the big screen in the 2019 film Mr. Jones. 

The film is not a docudrama, and takes dramatic license, but it should lead a new generation to explore what he did and the price he paid for witnessing a great crime and reporting the truth. Between 1931 and 1933 Josef Stalin weaponized famine against millions of civilians in the Ukraine, and he had willing accomplices in the West, like Mr. Walter Duranty of The New York Times.

Famine victim in the Ukraine

Thankfully, there were also men of honor like Gareth Jones who risked their lives gathering the facts, and reporting the truth. These are heroes that are still needed today, and tragically all too rare. If you have not seen the film, see it, but also learn the full story of Mr. Jones.