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This is an archive of past discussions about Holodomor. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page. |
Archive 1 | Archive 2 | Archive 3 | Archive 4 | Archive 5 | Archive 6 | → | Archive 10 |
At what point does one move to abribtration? This is becoming a very annoying game of attrition. The way things are going right now does a) not contribute to the article, b) does not improve the intro (the version I reverted to is, by the way, not even close to what I think it should look like), but will probably result in the article representing the views of those who have a greater tolerance for repetetive behaviour. I, for one, am sick and tired of this. This was once a neat little article, evolving towards a point at which one could have a nice reference to yet another disgusting aspect of Marxist inspired totalitarian terror. Too bad that one-trick-ponyism is turning this article into a serious mess. Dietwald 20:08, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
This anon's trollistic entry is unhelpful. To Dietwald, I am with you on this. We have enough evidence of many attempts to try to resolve this peacefully, much more than an RfC and mediation usually generates and this talk documents this very well. I think we can go to arbitration. We will need to read up on policies on how to submit content disputes to arbitration but I also see no other means to move on with the article. What happened is that Andrew Alexander got a couple of buddies who got to this article either stalking myself or 172 and who resort to blind reversions without bothering to read the discussion. The latest entry by AndriyK to this discussion shows that he didn't read anything on this page. Yakudza and Ultramarine didn't write anything significant to this talk (if at all). So, attemting to find a compromise with users who don't even bother to read talk is pointless. I am for arbitration. In the meanwhile, Yakudza, Ultramarine, AndriyK and whoever else who does nothing but reverting, please readup on this talk page. --Irpen 22:23, 23 January 2006 (UTC)
Guys, do you need to loose time? You know - it takes very long to play this game. All you get - person gets banned for 1 month, 2 months etc. Also are you going to start arbitration against AndrewAlexander, Yakudza and AndriyK together? Why not to include everybody else who does not agree on what you agree. Include me please into the list. Or let's find a compromise. All I see at the moment - 172 prefers 4-th from the top paragraph in the intro for explanation of the word "genocide" (I must say that this insisting is rather strange for historian). Anrew Alexander prefers first paragraph. Does it change much in sense? In historical sense - nothing. 172, please take into account that articles like this are not compatible with blunt historical approach. They are very sensitive issue. What sounds OK for third party may look in wrong place for sensitive people (call them patriots, nationalists, trolls - whatever you feel like). And usually serious historians do not play such childish games as Wikipedia. This place is for amateurs.--Bryndza 03:21, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
So you want to say that your "coalition" will not allow anybody to dispute your opinion? Is WP open then? Just close it to all "patriots, nationalists, trolls" and leave open only for "professional folk". Why to let us disturb your majesty? I was also thinking that WP is an encyclopedia. But I have heard that it is open. BTW, how position of the text in intro is affecting your POV?--Bryndza 04:17, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
The last sentense smells of Americal democracy model. THis is no Iraq. Let's play a game better.--Bryndza 17:41, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
If someone wants to open an arbitration case, this is not yet the reason to abuse other editors and assume bad faith in every disagreeing edit. I understand that some would like to never admit that the mass murder of 7+ million people is considered a genocide by quite a significant portion of the world. I don't understand why this should require personal attacks directed at other editors who simply try to enforce the WP:NC policy.--Andrew Alexander 05:43, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
While the page is protected it is good to try to find a compromise on the talk page.
I suggest the intro like this:
Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор) is a term derived from the Ukrainian expression moryty holodom (Морити голодом), which means "to inflict death by hunger". The term refers to the 1932–1933 famine on the territory of today's Ukraine, as well as some regions of Russia (see Famines in Russia and USSR). Many historians refer to the event as the Ukrainian Genocide stating that it was a man-made disaster engineered by the Soviets to specifically target Ukrainian people (see section #Was the Holodomor genocide?.
It is longer, but manageable. It refers to the event as Genocide, but also shows that it is not the opinion of all historians abakharev 06:20, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
I would swap the description and atymology (no politics, just a matter of convenience):
I am still not completely satisfied with this version, but hope it is more close to the compromise.--AndriyK 15:51, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
P.S. I'd propose to all involved parties do not request unprotecting the page, until the final consensus is reached. Let's concentrate our effort on the discussion instead of the edit war.--AndriyK 15:56, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
I agree that the article should not be unprotected, otherwise some who now pay attention to talk, will seize doing it and resume counting time windows in revert games recruiting more buddies to help. That said, I strongly object to bolding the Ukrainian Genocide and the Ukrainian Holocaust as this should be replaced by linking. The latter article I started myself and it could use the improvement. The U. G. articl about the term needs to be written to replace the POV redirect created by Andrew Alexander to make a point. According to the Wikipedia style only alternative names to the article's title are bolded in the intro in addition to the first mention of the title itself. These words are appropriate terms only if there is a universal agreement that the term Genocide and Holocaust are applicable, that is when the mainstream historical scholarship agrees on them, like it agreed on Shoah. Thus my opposition to bolding is not mild but strong as this implies much. Finally, someone, please return the POV tag to the protected article. I don't care that it stays at A.A.'s version while protected, but the POV tag whoever removed it, needs to be returned since there is a disagreement about neutrality as of the frozen version. --Irpen 01:00, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Andrew Alexander, I did not react to your labeling of your opponents "genocide erasers" and even "deniers" only because I usually don't feed trolls. But this is also a progress on your part. You used to call your opponents simply "pigs" here. I am glad you are making progress in the discussion. --Irpen 02:50, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
I also "happen to know" Ukrainian. In fact, Yakudza, your friend in revert warring may confirm that because I corresponded with him by email. Also, you could check this post which still did not convince another eternal partner of yours anyway. Also, I happen to notice the timing of that announcement of yours at the forum relating to the edits of this article. Whoever you meant, I don't care. Calling people "pigs" is trolling. I do not either deny or confirm the genocide, because I am not a historian to research that on my own. As such I derive my view from the works of people who established themselves in the field, not the web-blog writers, and I don't see the consensus, unlike the one in the Shoah. Similarly, there is a consensus that the Famine did happen and that it was catastrophic and that it was largely man-made. This, in itself, still doesn't make it a Genocide as explained to you above. That is about the "denier" part. As for "eraser", I did not erase it from the article. I emphatically support the discussion of the issue in the chapter "Was Holodomor a Genocide". I only object to preconcluding this yet an unresolved discussion in the intro by using an "also known as" or other similar weasel terms. I don't hope much that I answered the questions to your satisfaction but my answers are here for everyone to see. --Irpen 03:09, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Ok, if you want to play a "who me?' game regarding that post at Maidan, I don't care. My skin got much thicker since you and AndriyK started your name-calling.
What I said many times is that scholars do not agree that this was a genocide. What I think doesn't matter much, because I am just a Wikipedian rather than someone whose papers pass a scrutiny and get published in the "Slavic Review" or conference proceedings. The opinion of Raphael Lemkin, unlike mine or yours, is notable. But so are the opinions of established historians who do not consider Holodomor a Genocide. It has nothing to do with the denial of the Holodomor itself. Such historians who do not see Holodomor as a Genocide are not marginalized such as those who deny the Holocaust. As such, the issue is unresolved and the Wikipedia article should present it as such. The perfect way is the separate section and we already have that. --Irpen 03:39, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор) was a famine on the territory of today's Ukraine, as well as some regions of Russia(see Famines in Russia and USSR) in the 1932–1933 also known as the Great Famine. The Holodomor was a result of deliberate policies by the government of the Soviet Union. Many authors refer to the event as the Ukrainian Genocide or even Ukrainian Holocaust stating that the Holodomor was engineered by the Soviets to specifically target Ukrainian people (see section #Was the Holodomor genocide?).
The term Holodomor is derived from the Ukrainian expression moryty holodom (Морити голодом), which means "to inflict death by hunger".
Dietwald 20:38, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
"Ukrainian Holocaust" and "Ukrainian Genocide" should instead of being bolded be linked to their respective term article. There is a Ukrainian Holocaust article, which, although imperfect, is the correct approach (a term article). Ukrainian Genocide for now is a redirect created by Andrew Alexander to promote the POV to which he adheres. That redirect needs to be turned into an article too devoted to the term itself and its usage. --Irpen 20:44, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
I do not see the reason to have three articles on the same subject.
What I miss in the present version is the mentioning of the fact that official bodies of several contries recognized Holodomor as an act of genocide. The info is important enough to be mentioned in the leading paragraph.--AndriyK 09:06, 26 January 2006 (UTC)
Let's see if this works:
Intro Game | |
---|---|
Trolls coalition | Allmighty coalition |
Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор) is a term derived from the Ukrainian expression moryty holodom (Морити голодом), which means "to inflict death by hunger". The term refers to the 1932–1933 famine on the territory of today's Ukraine, as well as some regions of Russia (see Famines in Russia and USSR). It is often referred to as the Ukrainian Genocide stating that it was a man-made disaster engineered by the Soviets to specifically target Ukrainian people (see section #Was the Holodomor genocide?. | Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор) is a term derived from the Ukrainian expression moryty holodom (Морити голодом), which means "to inflict death by hunger". The term refers to the 1932–1933 famine on the territory of today's Ukraine, as well as some regions of Russia (see Famines in Russia and USSR). It is often referred to as the Ukrainian Genocide stating that it was a man-made disaster engineered by the Soviets to specifically target Ukrainian people (see section #Was the Holodomor genocide?. |
Now please edit to make it as close as possible (as much as your POV allows you) to your opponents version. Bryndza
Hmm, seeing those names all ower our talk pages (even with direct fingerpointing) and edit summaries is not inflammatory, but having them i table somehow is. Interesting phenomena. Teams can be renamed up to your taste. What about text? everybody agrees upon this version?--Bryndza 20:37, 24 January 2006 (UTC)
All of the absurd, fallacious allegations of "genocide" are simply rantings of uneducated right-wingers conditioned to have a vicious attitude towards communism. That is what it all amount to; they are trying to politicise history instead of telling the truth. They deliberately falsify figures and when someone points to the number of deaths from the archives, they spin it the most vile possible ways. The myths of "man-made" famine have been thoroughly disproved by R.W Davies's "Years of Hunger"; there were numerous natural factors that played a role in the [b]4.5 million[/b] deaths in the USSR from 1931-1933.
Here we go again with the "apologist" term, thrown around by those who like to think that their over-simplified views on history are unbreakable. The connotation from the term "apologist" is often demonic and borders on infantile insult. One who defends Stalin in the West is an "apologist" or "revisionist" as if the man was solely evil, disregarding a doubling in life expectancy. The Soviet archives contain reports of the 1931 harvest being delayed due to extremely bad weather, a decline in available horse power, and dissary in grain cultivisation. The grain harvest in 1931 was 10-15mn tons less than the one in 1930. That is a fact. This page still contains 6 million deaths in UKRAINE ALONE even though the Soviet archives as summarised in Davies's recent work amount the deaths in Ukraine to no higher than 1.5 million. The total in USSR excluding Kazakhstan in 1932-1933 is not quite 2.9 million.
Actually, they've all got valid points. It's perplexing how a famine contributed in large part by natural factors is equivalent to the Ottoman government's forceable deportation of Armenians to deserts. Your over-simplified right-wing views plucked from abominable organisations like Human Right Watch are truly vile. 172 asserts that Davies' figures are "atrocious". But these were not Davies' figures; rather, he derived the figures from the Soviet archives. It's bewildering why you refuse to take official reports into account and resort to backwards, politically-driven, inflated "estimates". If you're going to stick "7 million", there has got to a mention alongside the official death toll from the archives. Having completed one-quarter of Davies's "Years of Hunger", I've observed that the 1932 harvest in fact was below that of 1931 (67.11 mn tons compared to 69.48mn tons in 1931 whose harvest was about 10-15 mn tons below that of 1930). In regard to plaughing, the short supply of fodder resulted in a sharp decline of horses to 19.5mn in 1931 down from 20.9mn in 1930. Horses infected with ringworm, mange, foot and mouth disease, and glanders were not isolated. A fair share of the tractors were in poor shape; 20% of them were damaged and 20% didn't function due to the need of spare parts. In 1932, due to a foreign trade crisis, there were only 679,000 tractors delivered of which only half were brought in time for the harvest. The kolkhozy used up fodder in autumn without preparing for spring. The use of straw roots for fodder poisoned horses; Source: RGAE 7446/5/97. In regard to the weather in 1931, the cold spring delayed sowing and development of grain; the southeast suffered from dry-winds in June and the months of June and July were hotter than in previous years. "Rain poured down endlessly, roads were turned into a sea of mud, potatoes could not be dug, hemp could not be harvested, the hemp and sunflower seeds were drowned in the fields."--- RGASPI, 17/2/484. Plus, it is not mentioned in this article the numerous allocations of seed to the countryside. On 16 Feb. 1932, Sovnarkom allocated 53.3mn puds for seed and food to drought-stricken areas. On 7 March 1932, the Politburo called for further allocations of grain for seed, amounting to 22mn puds, Source: RGASPI 17/162/12. The decree of March 7 called for an END TO EXPORT OF FOOD GRAIN, Source: RGASPI 17/162/11, 159-item/2. Molotov and Yakovlev in a telegram stated, "the position is worse than we have supposed, until recently the authorities did not know the real position in the countryside." and called for issue of seed, fodder, and food loans, RGASPI: 82/2/138, 124.
"I am going to be ignoring" - are his comments true or not. They appear - buttressed by your attitudes - to be getting close enough to the truth to be really painful. Why? You got a dog in this fight?
A link with some interesting info - plp.org A pro-communist site but full of good research ( mixed in with a lot of garbage ) - quotes many sources. Epidemics, bad weather, anti-Communist( pro-Nazi unfortunately ) feelings among the richer farmers, sabotage ( self-sabotage ), a little incompetence, etc all hit at the same time. Is there any evidence of pre-Communist famines - I suspect this was a problem long before Stalin - what were the causes at those times.
Seems Alexander is opting out of the discussion, as feared by 172. Ultramarine and the other promoters of the 'holodomor was genocide' thesis are not contributing either anymore. We got ourselves an (anonymous) Stalinist on board. Great. This place is still going to hell. HOWEVER, we have been working on an intro, quite nicely actually.
I make the following proposal, trying to incorporate most recent suggestions by participating parties (ignoring Stalin Apologists, of course).
I STILL don't like the placing of the etymology section. I just can't see how even AA or others can't be happy with this wording. Can't get more factual, if I may say so myself. Dietwald 00:15, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
Disagree. Read the discussion above. Ukrainian Genocide is another common name of the Holodomor and must be mentioned as such.--Andrew Alexander 04:50, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
172, stop repeating this ridiculous argument. It's been mentioned to you many times that people use slightly different wordings for Ukrainian genocide. E.g. "famine-genocide", or "1933 genocide", "genocide of Ukrainians". You will find a "whooping" 2+ million results (as mentioned to you again above) for all these wordings. You resist to the word "genocide" being mentioned in the first paragraph, not to a specific wording. We can change the wording if you wish. What we can't do is erase something used all over the world. This is the last time I will repeat this to you, it's enough to say the same thing over 10 times for an average person to understand it.--Andrew Alexander 16:02, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
I don't mind arbitration and if anyone initiates it I would be willing to participate. On the other hand, this is such a hemongous and time-consuming procedure, as I learned after participating in the obvious case that seemed so open and shut but took 2-3 months to be settled, that I would still hope something else could work. Maybe a straw-poll? Article RfC? Anyway, if others want to take it to an arbitration, I would support as well. I just won't initiate it myself as of yet. --Irpen 14:54, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
Dear "coalition" if arbitration will take place, I will stop my participation in English WP. Moreover, at any occasion I will advise others to do so. I will actively advertise WP project as doomed and being ruled by "coalitions" with certain political POVs that allow no compromises. Also I will inform administators of highest possible rank of such situation. Collecting proofs of coordinated activities among certain individuals here on pushing their agendas in the articles and organisation of bans of "inconvenient" editors will not be a problem. I anticipate that my opinion will be supported by a number of other editors that experienced mentioned practices.--Bryndza 20:44, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
Yakudza, I firmly stand by my words above. I don't care about the views of this or that user here until these views get into his/her editing. My criticism of A.A.'s nationalism appears here only because it goes into his editing and not only to this article.
I will not refrain from discussing this article because I consider this article to be an important one. The Ukrainian Famine was a major national catastrophe of my nation and I would like this to be a serious article that would give the readers an account as objective as possible about these events. While personally, I don't think that Ukrainians suffered from Famine purely because they were Ukrainians (as A.A. tries to present it) but because they were peasants working on rich lands whose harvest the criminal Bolshevik government wanted to use to advance their economic and social goals, I do not purge from this article the views of those scholars who consider otherwise. All I want is to see all mainstream views presented, the discussion on this issue to be kept in the "Was H. a Genocide" section, and the intro not be used to advance a single side of the debate.
Andrew Alexander's trademark style, on the other hand, is to aggressively alter the intro first of all. He've done this here, he've done this at UA L article too. He frequently attempts to do it even at the Khreschatyk street article. NPOVing the UA L article is now very high on my priority list but I consider this article even more important. At the same time, your services of helping Andrew Alexander to revert to his versions in spite of or even, contrary to, the extensive discussions, bring nothing but extra annoyance. Please refrain from doing that. If you have anything to say on the issue, just say so at the talks. Your English is good enough for others to understand. --Irpen 05:29, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
Irpen, I'm sorry to inform you that you are wrong. In many aspects. To name just a few of them: 1. A.A.'s opinion is shared (in some variations) by other editors here. Including myself. If we are all Ukrainian nationalists, trolls, rusophobes, agressive banderovtsy - then you are Ukrainophobe, evil katsap, russian shauvinist - in your own terms. 2. Those terms that I mentioned are all over Ukrainian corner of WP here brought by you and your team mates. And terminology that I used to call opposing parties in the proposed [Table] above is not my invention, but solely yours. I checked how it would sound pronounced not by Irpen. And indeed, it became "inflammatory" as it was used by other person towards you. You immediately rejected this proposal for dispute. 3. Beside stopping (not the first time) my call for solving the dispute, you also interrupted ongoing discussion (even though tuff) between Dietwald, Alex, 172 and A.A. and inflicted personal accusations and arguing with him. Beside these "contributions" (not counting invitation for 172 to help you fight "nationalists") to the article and talk you have only put forward a "bolding" issue. While 172 is reasonably trying to fulfill his mission, you are only "rv POV pushing by notorious revert warriors" and are exersizing in eloquent epitets towards people who do not share your opinion. 4. If you claim that you are balanced and fair - I would like to see your fair comments to Zvesda's writings here, Mr. anonimous writings, Girla's and Kuban kazak's aggression all over articles. Please show the same level of enthusiasm.
I suggest you set aside half-an-hour, close your eyes and forget our POVs, then think of what I wrote here and above. If you do not see other solutions rather than blocking editors - then you are a looser. If you do not see other ways to sustain discussions rather than eloquently assault people - then just shut up and leave it for those who can talk. If someone here gives up on discussion - follow Irpen please. If A.A. will be banned by you - means you are powerless. Then if I ever stay on WP - only to take his position. --Bryndza 05:58, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
Clearly you are full of it. It is claimed that the so-called "Stalinist apologist" has posted information "outside the mainstream consensus" even though the term "Holodomor" is exclusively used by Ukrainian Nationalists. As reported by J.Arch Getty, the majority of serious scholars do not agree that the famine revolved around Ukraine and that the famine was artificial and deliberate. I've observed the so-called "vandalist" submission, and it is far superior to the current rubbish. It find it dishonorable how Wikipedia's corrupt leadership ignores refutations with such comments as "I don't care what you think" rather than trying to keep a Neutral Point of View that is regularly violated. Every single line in the current article has been thoroughly refuted.
172, What's the status on Arbitration? Dietwald 18:17, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
Could somebody with more wiki-brains than I do some archiving? The page takes ages to load on my dial-up. Thank you. Dietwald 00:19, 27 January 2006 (UTC)
Putting the debates on Ukranian nationalism aside for a moment, as a soil scientist, I would just add that "poor weather conditions" and other factors that are debated by the "scholars" as a role in the famine need to wait until paleao-archeological data on pollen and soil chemistry for this period become known. As any farmer will agree, "poor weather conditions" can wreck entire commuinties, indeed empires. This is not to be a Stalin apologist, but the Ukraine/Soviet Famine is certainly generated thought some mix of climatic with lessez-faire (e.g. British role in Irish 11840's famine)and exclusively active (ie. the Chinese 1960 famine that tranversed numerous global climate zones) factors.
"Meager harvest" and "in toto" - how much of the harvest was taken? The Caucasian region actually had a higher death rate I believe - Ukranians have/had other fish to fry - politics mostly.
add this -> pl:Wielki głód na Ukrainie exe 11:49, 28 January 2006 (UTC)
The word should be "drought". I don't have the Wiki-smarts to know how to request to fix it on a protected page. Cheers, Peter1968 12:20, 28 January 2006 (UTC)
"The Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор), also known as Ukrainian Genocide,[1] [2] [3] was the 1932–1933 man-made[4] famine on the territory of today's Ukraine, as well as some regions of Russia populated by ethnic Ukrainians. The Holodomor was caused by the seizure of the 1932 crop by the Soviet authorities.[5] The Soviet government admitted the famine's existence only in the late 1980s"
Conveniently, the dead Ukrainians just happened to have been in areas of extensive agriculture. If there was a genocide planned against Ukrainians, why did mass starvation stop after 1933? Your allegations of a genocide inflicted on Ukrainians is beyond the of any credibility. Citing the leader of an independent country, who clearly held vehement biases, is not very credible. This is the representative from the same Catholic Church that supported the Nazis and the Fascismi. The disruptive Solidarnosc group in Poland, funded by the CIA and George Soros, were also supported by this pope. This is a blatant manifestation of POV. It has been documented that the harvests in 1931 and 1932 were over 15 million tons below the harvest of 1930. The reasons for these poor harvests were due to undesirable weather and a sharp decline in plaughing.
“At the height of the famine, while confiscating crops from the starving peasants, the USSR exported 1.70 million tons of grain in 1932 and 1.84 million tons in 1933 (close to a quarter of a ton per each victim in each year).[6]”
You fail to mention that these exports were far below the plans. There were numerous concessions made to the countryside in the form of reduced quotas and allocations of grian.
“The death toll of the famine is estimated at between five and ten million people[7]. The rationale behind the famine as well as the exact number of casualties is unknown because the pertinent archives of the NKVD (later KGB, and today FSB) remain closed to historians in general.”
This estimate has been exposed to be bogus by the registered deaths from TSUNKHU files. The historians compiling this fallacious death toll (Robert Conquest) were merely engaged in a campaign of propaganda during the Cold War. The preference of biased authors amounting to yet another manifestation of POV. http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/faculty/harrison/archive/hunger/deaths.xls
“Today, the governments or parliaments of 26 countries recognized the 1932-1933 famine as an act of genocide. Among them Ukraine, Argentina, Australia, Canada, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, United States, and Vatican City.”
The bulk of these countries including and Estonia and Latvia are members of NATO and practice discrimination towards Russian minorities. Why is Russia, the most relevant country in East Europe, omitted?
“This was however ended and replaced with the return to Russification, as soon as Ukrainian strong national identity started to become an obstacle for Stalin's plans.”
Plans, what plans? Plans of Russian chauvinism? Stalin was not even Russian; neither were Kaganovich, Ordzhokinidze, Mikoyan, Eikhe, Rudzutak, Petrovsky, Kossior, Chubar, and several other members of the Politburo. This amounts to a paranoid statement from ultra Ukrainian nationalists.
“Simultaneously, a policy of collectivization of agriculture was introduced, which primarily hit Ukraine, having the strongest agriculture in the country and a long tradition of individual farms (over 50% of Russian wheat originated from Ukraine in the beginning of 20th century).”
There was collectivisation of agriculture throughout the country including agriculturally rich areas in North Caucasia, Volga Basin, Central Black Earth, and Kazakhstan.
“It is estimated that around 2 million Ukrainians became victims of these repressions in 1929-1932.”
False. There were 1.8 million exiled throughout the Soviet Union. There were 63,000 households from Ukraine exiled out of a total 381,000 in USSR. The 381,000 households amounted to 1.8 million people. Source: Davies's "Years of Hunger"
“On August 7, 1932, the Moscow government imposed death penalty in Ukraine for any theft of public property [9] [10] [11]. Hundreds of peasants were executed each month under the new law. Still, until October 25, Moscow received only 39% of the demanded grain supplies.”
What is not mentioned is that the death penalty for this decree was seldom enforced. The bulk of those prosecuted under this decree were deprived of liberty for 5-10 years. There were amendements to this decree that called for the death penalty to be sentences to "ACTIVE saboteurs"
From Davies's "Years of Hunger", "According to a report of the head of the Supreme Court, by January 15,1933 as many as 103,000 people had been sentenced under the provisions of the decree. Of the 79,000 whose sentences were known to the Supreme Court, 4800 had been sentenced to death, 26086 to ten years' imprisonment and 48094 to other sentences.
“The famine mostly affected the rural population. In comparison to the previous famine in the USSR during 1921–22, which was caused by draught, and the next one in 1947, the famine of 1932-1933 in Ukraine was caused not by infrastructure break-down, or war, but by deliberate political and administrative decisions (e.g., see [14]).”
Lies, lies, lies. The harvests in 1931-1932 were far below expectations. There was drought throughout the country and the USSR government issued numerous allocations of grain and reduced the quotas several times.
“By the end of 1933, between five and ten million people had starved to death or had otherwise died unnaturally in Russia and Ukraine.”
The Soviet archives reveal that there 2.9 million excess deaths in the USSR from 1932-1933 excluding Kazakhstan. The rise in infectious disease contributed to these deaths.
“While the course of the events as well as their underlying reasons are still a matter of debate, even the official Soviet statistics show a decrease of roughly four million people in the population of Ukraine between 1927 and 1932.”
Official Soviet data show that the births in Ukraine decreased by 100,000 every year from 1926-1931. The population went from 28.5 million in 1926 to 28.925 million in 1926 to 28.387 million in 1937. http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/faculty/harrison/archive/hunger/deaths.xls
“Taking an estimate of natural population growth of one to two percent, the calculated loss of population in Ukraine was over ten million during these years.”
Outdated speculation from hard-line Cold Warrior historians. This has been debunked from Lorimer.
“The USSR exported 1.70 million tons of grain in 1932 and 1.84 million tons in 1933 ([18]), almost a quarter of a ton in each year per each dead in the Holodomor.”
What again is neglected is that these totals were far below export levels of previous years.
(thousand tons of grains) 1930 level: 5832 1931: 4786 1932: 1441 1933: 2319
Source: Davies's "Years of Hunger"
Other information neglected is the rise in infectious disease:
(thousands) 1929: Typhus, 40; Typhoid Fever, 170 ; Relasping fever, 6 ; Smallpox, 8; Malaria, 3000
1932: Typhus, 220; Typhoid Fever, 300; Relasping fever, 12; Smallpox, 80; Malaria, 4500.
1933: Typhus, 800; Typhoid Fever, 210 ; Relasping fever, 12; Smallpox, 38; Malaria, 6500.
Zvesda
This needs to be kept in perspective in order to prevent the manifestation of POV. Trade continued albeit at a mere faction of previous year. Trade continued due to the Soviet's deep foreign trade crisis which obstructed the acquisition of additional tractors. If Conquest's figure of "7 million" must be stated, then should Davies's of 1.5 million in Ukraine. Davies's work unlike those of Western Cold Warriors almost entirely consist of material derived from archives. What must also be cited are the various measures taken by the Soviet regime to assist famine-stricken regions. Between February and July 1932, no less than 35 decisions and decrees of the Politburo and Sovnarkom authorised allocations of grain for food.--- Pg. 214 of Davies's "Years of Hunger". You can't smear Davies or Wheatcroft as "Stalin apologist" because of how they actually list Conquest's work in their bibliography. By also citing Tauger, these two authors maintain a non POV balance. Zvesda
It has been documented in Davies's "Years of Hunger" that weather in fact contributed to the relatively disastrous harvest of 1931 followed by a slightly worse harvest in 1932.
The genocide theory is fallacious beyond perception. I can't understand how anyone can go around calling this genocide when there were measures taken by the government to feed the starving population. Ukraine similarly to North Caucasia and Volga Basin, regions also struck by famine, just happened to be a major center of agriculture.
During 1925-1929, there was favourable weather sans a break in 1927. During 1931, June and July were much warmer. The cold spring had delayed sowing and the development of grain. The southeast had suffered from dry-winds in June. In May-July, normal weather pattern in the Volga and Black-Earth regions and on the Ukrainian Steppe was hat warm, dry, south-easterly winds from Kazakhstan gave way to colder and wetter from the north-west. For the first time in twelve years, south-easterlies dominated. Winds became scorching, no rain fell, and earth became parched. Grain yields fell significantly when similar winds in 1891 and 1921 brought rural famine.
"Rain poured down endlessly, roads were turned into a sea of mud, potatoes could not be dug, hemp could not be harvested, the hemp and sunflower seeds were drowned in the firleds" --- RGASPI, 17/2/484, 53
Zvesda
The tenor of events/feelings ( toward the new communist government ) in Ukraine can be best expressed when Ukraine joined the Nazis fighting against the USSR. I suspect - others here probably know - that earlier famines - and maybe this one - were the result of diehard rebels who continued the fight and probably precipitated a bigger diaster than they realized through abotage,etc.
So, AA has totally opted out, the rest is no longer discussing, the page has died. Unbelievable. Maybe we need to get it back to life with unprotect & arbitration?? This is simply disgusting. AA & Co., you have done a great job -- the victims of the Holodomor are duly honoured by the way things are going here. Or not going here. Ain't nationalism a great thing? Dietwald 05:50, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
Yakudza, this is disgusting. Were did I or 172 say that H. was caused by bad weather? The dispute has been on how to present the issue whether H. was a Genocide and whether we can call it as such in view of the scholarly disagreement and whether we can use these words in the first line or in the intro while the discussion in the appropriate section shows that there is no agreement on the issue. My point is that intro should not make an assertive claim on the issue that is unresolved. You accusations are totally off-mark and rather unhelpful. Better reread the discussions above carefully. --18:17, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
Yakudza, in this "my editing" you are pointing out the phrase you quote where the weather is mentioned is preceeded by: "The famine was caused by the Soviet authorities seizing the 1932 crop" That is it's clear from this version that the cause of Holodomor was the grain confiscation. As such your statement that "version User:Irpen and 172 that Holodomor is caused by bad weather" is a plain lie. Please discuss in good faith if you want others to take you seriously. --Irpen 23:57, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
I don't think I ever opted out of the discussion. There is no discussion. No well supported facts, references, quotes provided here. I have provided plenty on this page and on the article page itself. I don't know what else should be countered that hasn't been countered. Let's check again. Is "genocide" a common term for the Holodomor? Yes, it is.--Andrew Alexander 05:21, 3 February 2006 (UTC)
A friend of mine discussing the invaladity of wikipedia mentioned this article, and said it was wrong because of these issues:
Tables Registered births and registered deaths in famine-stricken areas -- show that 4 million people died in the several republics hit with famine, with less than 2 million deaths in the Ukranian Socialist Republic. The primary figures on excess deaths amount to 2.9 million, then you have to add the figures from Kazakhstan which amount to another 1.5 million, the deaths in the OGPU system (0.3 million)" (pp. 412-416) This table and quotes are taken from The Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931-1933[/i]. Volume 5 of [i]The Industrialisation of Soviet Russia. Basingstoke (England) and New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004.
As the book Fraud, Famine and Fascism, The Ukrainian Genocide Myth from Hitler to Harvard by Douglass Tottle showed, all the high estimates are based upon lies and gross exaggerations.
Now, since I have complete faith in wikipedia, and it's editors. I'd like this to be examined, and explain why there is this contradiction, since I do not know enough about this subject. Chris M. 16:26, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
1) So what if it disagrees with the range of figures "accepted" by "most" historians?
2)Sources
a, b) Registered births and deaths RGAE, 1562/329/108. These are the 1936 TsUNKhU evaluations. They differ slightly from earlier evaluations as explained in Wheatcroft, TSD 3, 867-880
c) Estimated population based on 1926 and 1937 censuses, a number of official population estimates, movements in mortality and natality registration and estimates of over registration.
d,e) Crude birth and death rates based on a,b and c above
f) Average normal mortality is taken as average mortality rate for 1927-9 and is calculated from e above.
g) Excess mortality above 1927-9 level of cdr for 1932 and 1933 are simply the 1932 and 1933 levels of mortality (cdr) in e) less the average level of mortality in f).
h) Excess mortality in numbers of deaths is calculated from the excess mortality level (cdr) in g) multiplied estimated population size in c) divided by 1000.
That is the sources used in the table where the figures come from.
Nope, didn't say they were wrong. You yourself wrote this "...historians will only provide an estimated range," and this particular estimation claims 1.5 million died unnaturally from the "Holodomor". While Wikipedia's page claims the estimations by historians range from 5-10 million and that 30-50% of the Ukrainian died from the famine (as opposed to this historians estimate of 5% of the Ukrainian populace perished). I see no reason why not to amend the range to 1.5-10 million and 5-50%.
The 1937 census was classified in the Soviet Union but is now avaliable.
In regard to the 1937 census, it has been misrepresented by western Cold Warrior historians. Numbering at 162 million, the population of the USSR was 6 million below projection contrary to the lie from the West that the 1937 population was 14 million below projection. Davies's and Wheatcroft's "Years of Hunger" explains, "However, if the net increase in population (that is, births minus deaths) shown by the official registrations is added to the 1926 population, the 1937 total becomes not 162 but 168 million."
The primary factor for why the population did not conform to the projection was due to the decreased number of births. As the chart posted by a user above shows, the number of registered births in USSR were as follows: 1927: 6,197,277; 1928: 6,192,347; 1929: 5,993,795; 1930: 5,684,412; 1931: 5,270,120; 1932: 4,828,318; 1933: 3,776,503. Thus, in the pre-famine period of 1927-1931, there were 2.1 million projected births that never took place. During the famine of 1932-1933, an additional 3.7 million projected births never took place. Overall, 5.8 million projected births in the USSR from 1927-1933 never occurred.
The weak argument of "it doesn't show deaths in resettlement camps" in trying to discredit the chart posted by an above user is unacceptable. This topic is about famine in Ukraine, not the hardships endured by those in labour camps and other areas of deprived liberty. Deaths in camps, a rather insignificant factor, numbered at approximately 300,000 during the famine years according to Wheatcroft & Davies's "Years of Hunger"
—Zvesda
Let's see if this works:
Discussion of Introduction | |
---|---|
Locked version | Currently proposed version |
The Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор), also known as Ukrainian Genocide,[1] [2] [3] was the 1932–1933 man-made[4] famine on the territory of today's Ukraine, as well as some regions of Russia populated by ethnic Ukrainians. The Holodomor was caused by the seizure of the 1932 crop by the Soviet authorities.[5] The Soviet government admitted the famine's existence only in the late 1980s.
At the height of the famine, while confiscating crops from the starving peasants, the USSR exported 1.70 million tons of grain in 1932 and 1.84 million tons in 1933 (close to a quarter of a ton per each victim in each year).[6] The Soviet authorities also banned travel out of the famine affected areas under the pretext that people travelling for food spread "anti-kolkhoz agitation". The death toll of the famine is estimated at between five and ten million people[7]. The rationale behind the famine as well as the exact number of casualties is unknown because the pertinent archives of the NKVD (later KGB, and today FSB) remain closed to historians in general. Ukrainian émigré historians were among the first to argue that the famine was an act of genocide against the Ukrainian people. Today, the governments or parliaments of 26 countries recognized the 1932-1933 famine as an act of genocide. Among them Ukraine, Argentina, Australia, Canada, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, United States, and Vatican City. The fourth Saturday of November is the official day of commemoration of the Holodomor victims in Ukraine. Still the Holodomor remains a politically charged topic for many parties, especially in Russia. Some Russian authors continue claiming that the Holodomor was not an act of genocide but a "mere famine".[8] Holodomor is the noun derived from the Ukrainian expression moryty holodom, (Морити голодом) "to inflict death by hunger". |
The Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор) was a famine on the territory of today's Ukraine, as well as some regions of Russia(see Famines in Russia and USSR) in the 1932–1933, also known as the Great Famine. The Holodomor was the result of deliberate policies by the government of the Soviet Union.
Many authors refer to the event as the Ukrainian Genocide, or even Ukrainian Holocaust, stating that the Holodomor was engineered by the Soviets to specifically target the Ukrainian people. While historians continue to disagree whether or not the Holodomor was a genocide as defined by the United Nations, numerous governments have officially recognized the Holodomor as genocide (see section #Was the Holodomor genocide?). The term Holodomor is derived from the Ukrainian expression moryty holodom (Морити голодом), which means "to inflict death by hunger". Further text to be incorporated into the article body: At the height of the famine, while confiscating crops from the starving peasants, the USSR exported 1.70 million tons of grain in 1932 and 1.84 million tons in 1933 (close to a quarter of a ton per each victim in each year).[6] The Soviet authorities also banned travel out of the famine affected areas under the pretext that people travelling for food spread "anti-kolkhoz agitation". The death toll of the famine is estimated at between five and ten million people[7]. The rationale behind the famine as well as the exact number of casualties is unknown because the pertinent archives of the NKVD (later KGB, and today FSB) remain closed to historians in general. Ukrainian émigré historians were among the first to argue that the famine was an act of genocide against the Ukrainian people. Today, the governments or parliaments of 26 countries recognized the 1932-1933 famine as an act of genocide. Among them Ukraine, Argentina, Australia, Canada, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, United States, and Vatican City. The fourth Saturday of November is the official day of commemoration of the Holodomor victims in Ukraine. Still the Holodomor remains a politically charged topic for many parties, especially in Russia. Some Russian authors continue claiming that the Holodomor was not an act of genocide but a "mere famine".[8] |
I posted the whole Introductin here. I suggest to leave untouched left panel and start editing right one. Please explain your opinion below in a constructive way, support with valid arguments. --Bryndza 17:31, 4 February 2006 (UTC)
Bryndza, I don't agree with the "proposed version". It skips another common name of the Holodomor from the first paragraph. Besides, it doesn't add in any way to the quality of the article. Simply reshufles important facts away from the intro. The problem is, there is no point of editing the text before the editors agree on the common principles. The principle "it's not a genocide so we must erase that word" doesn't suit me. Together with 26 countries. Sorry to be "blunt", but we need to come up with a common view before starting cutting the intro.--Andrew Alexander 01:41, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
The principle is that since it is not universally agreed to be Genocide, unlike the Holocaust, the debate on whether Holodomor was a Genocide belongs to a chapter the article already has. Calling it a Genocide or claiming that it was not in the intro is not NPOV. So many people are tired of repeating this to you. If you persist, it means the dispute between you and others is unresolvable in the usual ways. Mediations and RfC are useless here because we already have more attemtps of people commenting and mediating than any of the formal requests would generate. I see the arbitration as the solution and whatever I think about Andrew Alexander (or whatever he thinks and says or said of me) is irrelevant to taking this to ArbCom. We need to get this article moving. As for our personal differences, we can live with them. --Irpen 03:00, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
Lest I get myself suckered into even more personal attacks, I will refrain from commenting on anything AA is going to say here in the future and instead support wholeheartedly an arbitration process to be started.
At the same time, I wish to apologize to the wiki community for my most recent outbursts against AA. While I stand by my assessment of him, they were inappropriate. Dietwald 12:25, 5 February 2006 (UTC)
While I think the historical record proves that soviet grain requisitions and the decision not to engage in any famine relief contributed greatly to the number of deaths, there is another side to it. Ukranian peasantry strongly resisted collectivization, and there are many personal and official accounts of ukranians slaughtering their herds and not planting or sowing any crops as a form of resistance. The obvious result of these actions were famine. The soviet authorities (stalin) chose to punish the ukranians for thier behavior, and so refused to aid them. My understanding is that the problem was twofold. The soviets requisitioned some grain, but there wasn't enough being grown there to begin with, so the requisitions were particularly devestating. The article only mentions that in one sentence, when it may very well have been largely or completely responsible for the famine. Collectivization was not a disaster because it was inherently flawed. It was less efficient than the individual plots in most cases, but had the peasantry cooperated they would have produced enough food both for soviet export and for personal consumption. The article starts out very POV and gets less so as it continues, still, it would be preferable to make it NPOV throughout.
Other notes: Was it genocide? I think that's a bad question. A better question is: Was it systematic cultural reppression? I think the answer to that is pretty clearly yes. The intention was not to destroy the ukranian people but to destroy their culture. Cultural Genocide? maybe. Genocide? No.
--Irongaard 04:45, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
I find it hard to beleive and I would like to see the refs that would point out that the resistance to collectivization was particularly fierce in UA, compared to other parts of the USSR and, if it is indeed the case, that scholars make a connection between the resistance and the famine. Voiceover by Conquest, a respected scholar no doubt, is a reference all right, but since Dietwald is not entirely sure, I request some assurances. The connection between resistance and famine contradicts my grandma's stories she told me and her family were not kulaks, far from it. Despite being of the poor peasant stock, they barely survived the famine and many in their village died: "kulaks" and not. In general, the stories of how tough and resistive Ukraine was for Bolsheviks are greatly exagerated. Ukraine was the place of the country were Bolsheviks had the least problems, compared to many other places. --Irpen 09:21, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
I have partial data from Ukraine. The Germans were relatively willing, the Ukrainians in the middle, the Poles the most anti. The result was that the Polish authonomy was cancelled and the majority deported to Kasakhstan. The biggest peasant revolt I know was in Tambov region, which is in Russia. Xx236 11:23, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
I'm a bit busy now, (I realize that usually graces the beginning of the defense of a weak argument, but bear with me) but in the next few days I'll try to marshall together some sources discussing ukranian resistance. I have a few decent documentaries and books on the subject, I'll go through them for specifics. Irpen, I think the collectivization resistance in ukraine was particularly fierce because it was coincided with stalin's program of cultural reppression of the Ukraine. Additionally, Ukranian peasantry had little history with farming collectives, having always prefered individual plots, while many of the other areas of the soviet union had previously had farming collectives. Sources are forthcoming, I promise. Perhaps a side note: I was curious as to how reputable Alec Nove is considered in these parts. I've read a good number of his books on the soviet economy, and they seem to synch up decently with declassified russian documents and CIA reports on the soviet union, but I may be missing something. --Irongaard 03:56, 9 February 2006 (UTC)
Irongaard - Stalin's policy toward Ukrainians was changing, there were periods, when Ukrainians were supported against minorities. Divide et impera. If you have data about Ukrainian resistance 1921-1938 you may put it into History of Ukraine and/or History of the SU. Russian Wiki contains many data and links about the Holodomor. At this moment I tend to believe that Stalin fought rather peasants than Ukrainians, but I may be wrong. The main goal was industrialisation, the peasants were to finance it. Xx236 10:42, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
I intend to resume work on this article, picking up where we all left off in the next few days. I all of sudden became much busier at work than I'd expected a couple of weeks ago. My apologies especially extend to Irpen and Dietwald, who were closely collaborating with me here a couple of weeks ago. 172 | Talk 19:51, 11 February 2006 (UTC)
Fourth paragraph down in this section. The word should be drought not draught. Page is currently protected so I can't correct this. -- Krash (Talk) 18:36, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
Is there any chance this article is ever going to be revived? Has unreason finally defeated reason? How wonderful -- Stalin would enjoy this. 11:26, 21 February 2006 (UTC)
Very well done, Irpen. Bravo! --Lysytalk 22:24, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
Two same troublemakers resort to large scale reverts undoing the work of multiple people. What is this if not trolling? --Irpen 00:43, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
The article is protected again. Please note that edit wars do not produce 'any results besides getting everybody involved stressed out. Discuss the desired outcome, negotiate a version that all can live with, and when you are ready to resume editing, place a request for unprotection at WP:RFPP. If you need other editors to make comments on the dispute, place a request for comments. ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 03:17, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
I don't see what good is coming from stopping anyone editing this article. I'm unprotecting, and will watch very closely. Be warned that I'm generally intolerant of edit warring in circumstances like this. --Tony Sidaway 01:52, 8 March 2006 (UTC)
There are a number of very strong photos in the article but they are very small and are almost unreadable (esp photos #2 and #3). Maybe we could zoom them out to the size 250..300? The article is long and we can accommodate it without problems. Also there seems to be a revert war over which photo to put to the top. I do not see this be a matter of principle, so maybe just have a straw poll? I, personally would prefer the photo #2, with the city folks walking through the dying people, but it does not seem to be an option for the other editors abakharev 06:27, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
Andrew posted a request for assistance on the admin incident noticeboard (see http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia%3AAdministrators%27_noticeboard%2FIncidents&diff=43297483&oldid=43295812]). I see fomr the above that there has been sustained edit warring over this article. Without weighing the merits of the competing claims, I looked at the most recent revert by Andrew and it seems to me that Irpen's version is stated in more neutral terms, and his tone is closer to that of an encyclopaedia - Andrew's reads to me as being more polemical. I repeat, though, that this is just the tone and presentation - good intentions and references are evident on both sides.
If Andrew has additional facts (which I think he does) these can surely be worked in in similarly neutral terms. Please do not edit war, I am sure that with a bit of reasoned debate a suitable compromise can be reached. It does not look to me as if there is any fundamental dispute as to the nature, cause and seriousness of the famine - you seem to me to be in violent agreement! Just zis Guy you know? 16:40, 11 March 2006 (UTC)
Andrew Alexander, one of the problems is with your attitude of throwing everything into the lead. This is your common approach dispayed in many articles. If you have a thing or two to add, you go straight to the intro to make your point said most voicefully. I've elaborated on this style of yours many times before, incluidng on this very page. That you persist with the discussion until you get a the result you want is nothing new either. I tried to talk to you many times in the past and so did others. Your tactic seem to drain everyone into tiredome by pestering and then claim that your points are "ignored" and launch a complaint against your opponents accusing them in conspiracy. Also, I recently reviewed the History of UA Britannica article that you used as a ref here. You subtly misrepresented what is said there when rewriting it for this article and I will get to editing that when I have time. More is said above and in the archives if the visitors to this page have time to read it all. I would very much appreciate the third party's neutral look. --Irpen 03:06, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
Andrew Alexander, this cheating of yours is appalling. Right after you said this above, you again reverted to non-encyclopedic intro. Moreover, you pasted there two pieces from the sections that followed (word for word) and added a ref (Bilinsky) which actually doesn't say what you claim. The Bilinsky's article is very interesting and I read it from top to bottom. While I think author makes several overstretched conclusions, this is a very serious study. However, while the author hints what Lemkin might have said (an unusual stretch in a serious academic work) you go one step further by putting in Lemkin mouth the thing that he didn't say (or at least it is not clear from the ref you added whether he said that). As such, your edit is a simple revert to the intro preferred by you but only worse because you pasted two pieces in the intro from further down in the article and made added a false statement not supported by your ref. The useful thing you did, was bringing up Lemkin an Bilinsky's work, but they don't belong to intro. What I think needs done, is adding the info on Lemkin and an extra ref to the "Was H a Genocide" section. Also, the revert wars mess up the numbering of the ref section. To address the problem created by your latest edit and the edit warring in general, three steps need to be taken.
Of these, I will do as much as I can today. I am asking others for help. This is a tedious work. Finally, I am glad you placed the note at WP:AN/I. it exposed the article and behavior of its participants to a wider audience. The responses it generated were what I would have expected. --Irpen 06:44, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
Thank you, whoever reopened the article. And thanks to the others for staying on the ball. The intro right now is really nice, I think. Everything in there, even references to the more controversial words. Maybe we can try to to leave the intro as it is now, though here and there flow COULD be slightly improved, and move on to the article? There is a lot of work that needs to be done there, lot's of sloppy wording and structural problems.Dietwald 09:08, 12 March 2006 (UTC)
Thanks TzG! I am very happy that the intro I rewrote gets such responses from several editors. Too bad Andrew Alexander keeps reverting it. I will try to address the problem again (see my entry above). I will need all the help I could get. Besides, the Cultural purge material is presented in a grossly POV way, but this I know how to handle now once I read the sources A. A. claims to have used. I will get to that in a due time. The useful thing is that I am also going to learn the inline refs that was a mumbo jumbo for me until today. --Irpen 06:44, 13 March 2006 (UTC)
This page is in dire need of drastic restructuring. It seems that much of the material within this article was merely plucked out from the sensationalistic "Black Book of Communism". This is supposed to be an independent online encyclopedia, not an outlet for imperialist propaganda.
"By the end of 1933, between five and ten million people had starved to death or had otherwise died unnaturally in Russia and Ukraine."
Pardon my skepticism, but where is the evidence for this alleged death toll? Are these merely outdated estimations from rabidly anti-Communist Westerners to the effect of Robert Conquest who wrote speeches for Margaret Thatcher? I thought there was a non-POV policy at this website.
RGAE files show that in Ukraine there was a total of 1.54 million excess deaths in 1932-1933. Source: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/faculty/harrison/archive/hunger/deaths.xls
Keep in mind that the above data of births and deaths is a revision that occurred in 1934, one year after the famine.
According to RGAE 1562/329/107: (1933) 1933: Current registration of deaths in Ukraine: 1,309,000
According to RGAE 1562/329/108, 6 (mid-1934) 1933:Revised registration of deaths in Ukraine: 1,909,000
This is all derived from Davies and Wheatcroft's "Years of Hunger" in the final chapter.
"The exact number of the victims remains unknown; the Soviet Union long denied that the famine had ever existed, and the NKVD (and later KGB) archives on the Holodomor period have never been fully disclosed."
Why would the NKVD deal with agriculture and the the demographics of USSR? The purpose of this agency was to eliminate internal counter-revolutionary threats to the power of the Soviets. To repeat, RGAE archives show that there were 1.54 million excess deaths in Ukraine from 1932-1933.
"even the official Soviet statistics show a decrease of roughly four million people in the population of Ukraine between 1927 and 1932."
Now this here is a lie. If you'd take a look at the chart that I've linked, Ukraine's population went from 28.9 million in 1926 to 28.6 million in 1931 to 28.4 million in 1934 to 28.3 million in the 1937 census.
"Taking an estimate of natural population growth of one to two percent, the calculated loss of population in Ukraine was over ten million during these years."
This is inaccurate because Ukraine's population declined by about 50,000 annually even from the famine-free period of 1926-1931.
"The premeditation of the mass murder can also be judged from the official Soviet figures of grain exports. The USSR exported 1.70 million tons of grain in 1932 and 1.84 million tons in 1933 ([15]), almost a quarter of a ton in each year per each dead in the Holodomor."
Address this one: how could there have been a premeditation of mass murder in Ukraine when according to pg. 214 of "Years of Hunger" by Davies and Wheatcroft states that between Feb. and July 1933, no less than Politburo decisions and Sovnarkom decrees authorised 320,000 tons of grain for food to be issued to famine-stricken areas? Plus, it must be taken into perspective that the export of grains during 1932-1933 was a mere fraction of the level of previous years. The following manifests this fact: (exports of thousand tons of grain)
1930: 5832 1931: 4786 1932: 1441 1933: 2319
"The Soviet authorities made sure to prevent the starving Ukrainians from traveling to areas where food was more available."
Actually, the Soviet authorities made sure to assist starving Ukrainians as I showed in my above refutation.
Zvesda
Way to dodge the issues by copping out by baselessly stating "your pov has been soundly refuted here" when in fact there have seldom been responses to my various posts at this section. You have just proved with the use of the phrase "Stalin apologist" that you're just some mindless western stooge for Rockefeller, Ford, George Soros, and other imperialist oligarchs.
I've taken a look at the sources and they are from credible and are ridden with vehement anti-Soviet agendas which is what is expected from the 1980s U.S Congress pressured by Ukrainian Nationalists. Citing the Vatican here is inappropriate as well given that this the Catholic Church was supportive of the Nazis and Fascismi. Robert Conquest the paradigmatical Neo-Con who wrote speeches for Margaret Thatcher is another POV selection.
Zvesda
Trying to compare evolution, a component of biology to the the "Holodomor", which is a historical event is inappropriate. Comparing Stephen Wheatcroft and R.W Davies to "Holocaust deniers" is defamotory. You look truly moronic because the scholars that I've cited can hardly be considered to be "Stalin apologist" given that Robert Conquest is cited in their bibliography. All of the material of the work in concern is derived from Russia's archives. You and your echoing of free-speech stifling euphemisms such as "Holocaust denial" are an absolute disgrace to academia. You and your clique still have yet to refute anything I've contributed to this section. Zvesda
I think leaving detailed discussion on what's genocide out of the intro is appropriate. I would suggest current editors to agree on a truce on the intro, and leave it as it is -- even the grammar looks rather good now. Let's move on to the other sections. That would be nice. Dietwald 06:54, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
The issue of genocide is one of the most important in the article, and leaving it out of the inroduction is wrong. The modification I have proposed for the intro addresses it. Comparing the two editions proposed by Irpen, I think the current version is better with one correction: "tragedy" is more appropriate word than "catastrophe" in describing what's happened.
may be a good idea again? If someone does it, please remove this section, since it adds nothing to the discussion as such...Dietwald 12:35, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
This article needs to be drastically altered. Despite the fact that famine struck several regions of USSR urban and rural alike, we are treated to a bourgeois Ukrainian nationalist perspective that concocts a little fairy tale called the "Holodomor" on par with the Zionists' Holocult. There is not even a distinct Ukrainian culture. "Ukrainians" are biologically identical to Russians and just about linguistically identical as well. What must also be taken into consideration is that a fair portion of the Soviet leadership consisted of non-Russians including the Georgians Stalin and Ordzhonikidze, the Latvian Yan Rudzutak, the Armenian Anastas Mikoyan, and the Jews Lazar Kaganovitch and Yakov Yakovlev. To accuse these of Great Russian chauvinism is absurd. This article needs to titled something along the lines of "1932-1933 Soviet Famine". It is utterly insolent to develop a cult of the so-called Ukrainian people stating that they suffered more than other nationalities.
No mention is made of the fact that the 1931 and 1932 harvests were 12 million tons below the 1930 level. Factors that contributed to these were poor weather and a decline in livestock that obstructed cultivation. The famine ended because of the excellent 1933 harvest. The notion that Soviet policy caused famine through grain collections is a sensationalised myth. Grain collections never exceeded 25% of the total production. Plus, no less than 30 or so decrees set forth allocations of food to famine-stricken regions during Feb-July 1933 alone. There is no evidence whatsoever that the death toll was at all close to the 7 million alleged in this article. Material from Russia's archives shows that for the whole USSR, there were 2.2 million deaths above normal during 1932-1933. [Source]. At the bottom, the source is listed as RGAE 1562/308/108. RGAE stands for Russian State Archive of Economy. I will post a major revision of this later. Dynamite
Here we go with these infantile techniques of calling someone a "Stalin apologist" simply for pointing out the bloated propaganda and the blatant omission of facts on an encyclopedic entry. Frankly, the only apologist here is you with your "Ukrainian" Nationalist sympathy and your worship of diabolical western propaganda. Why don't you actually try refuting what I've posted instead of trying to dodge the issue by labelling me a "Stalin apologist" as if someone who favours Stalin is a sort of devil's advocate.
Dynamite
I guess that is to say that wikipedia is a haven for Nazi-minded anti-Communist activists e.g Lech Walesa, Solzhenitsyn, and all the "foundations" in America operated by the likes of George Soros. This page is not even about the "Holocaust" and I have never altered any material relating to the "Holocaust" because any reports of the truth will just get sabotaged by ZionNazis. So spare us of these demagogic cries of "Holocaust denier".
You are labelling me a "Stalin apologist" even though nowhere did I deny the occurrence of famine. My reporting of material directly from Russian archives that 1.5 million died in Ukraine manifests that I am not trying to cover-up anything. You're just frustrated because every single line in this article has been refuted by users above such as Zvesda. I will reiterate why this article is bloated with propaganda:
-There is not a "Ukrainian" culture. They are just about identical to Great Russians. -The Sovet leadership included several non-Russians including the Latvians Yan Rudzutak, Karl Bauman, and Robert Eikhe; Ukrainians Vlas Chubar and Grigori Petrovski; Poles Stanislaw Kosior and Vyacheslav Menzhinski; Armenian Anastas Mikoyan; Jews Lazar Kaganovitch and Yakov Yakovlev; Georgian Grigory Ordzhonikidze and of course Stalin. To accuse these of Russian chauvinism and to connote that Russians resent their close to indistinguishable Ukrainian neighbours is absurd. -The unsatisfactory harvests of 1931 and 1932 were what brought about famine. Contrary to Robert Conquest's lies, it is a fact that the 1932 harvest was worse than the previous year. It has been proven that agricultural production was not exclusively caused by "artificial" factors. -There was never an excess collection of agricultural products. Grain collections in 1931 and 1932 amounted to about 33% of total production. The suggestion that every husk of grain can be confiscated could not convince a 10 year old. -The Sovet regime assisted famine-stricken regions. In Feb-July 1933 during which 95% of all famine deaths occurred, no less then 35 decrees by the Politburo and Sovnarkom set forth allocations of grain for food. Again, the assertion that famine was deliberately constructed is a lie.
Now, please tell me why I am wrong instead resorting to silly labels intended to be attacks such as "Holocaust denier".
Dynamite
Winners wright History, winners gennerally falsify history..... After the fall of the Soviet Union, the demonization process of that Nation,it's legacy, it's leaders, it's simpathysers and even it's people as increased exponentially. The primary objective is one and one alone, the whitewashing of Natzi-Fascism. The entire story of the engineered famine of Ukraine is false. It is based on old Nazi-German propaganda, that was revived at the end of the cold war for dirty political purposes, by the american radical right wing. The perpetuators of these lies are the same people that have invaded Iraque and Afghanistan to depose previous criminal allies of them killing hundreds of thousands of civilians (of course american figures are fare more conservative). It saddens me that as time goes by, and wikipedia gains international relevance, it becomes more and more a medium for the perpetuation of comunist demonization (and fascism whitewashing) and thus an instrument for the demobilization of all honest, hard working, politicied workers (as opposed to exploiters=capitalists). In fact, the long term objectives of this propaganda are not just the rehabilitation of Fascism, which as time goes by will increasinglly become the Capital's preferred solution for the imposition of their power over the rest of Mankind, as the internal entropy of final capitalism increases in the same measure that macro-economic growth stagnates. An important goal is also the demoralization of workers, leading them to the false conclusion that a diiferent world is impossible, that society will alway be exploitation based and that parasitical scum will always rule us... IT IS NOT TRUE... THIS ARTICLE IS MOSTLLY A "NAZI-FASCIST ORIGINATED" LIE
I just hope that the day never comes, where when editing wikipedia we have to salute using "zieg heil"...
By the end of 1933, between five and ten million people had starved to death or had otherwise died unnaturally in Russia and Ukraine.
May I ask where the evidence is for this controversial claim? There is not a single archival document that I know that supports this. This death toll does not correspond to demographic reports from Russia's archives, specifically in RGAE 1562/308/108, excess deaths in Ukraine amounted to a mere 1.54 million in Ukraine alone. This article also makes a false statement about archives in concern to famine being closed manifested by how I just reported from Russia's archives that 1.54 million died in Ukraine. Please respond to this post instead of dodging, ignoring, and childishly insulting with of "Go play with the Zundel" similar concerns above.—Preceding unsigned comment added by User:204.102.211.115 (talk • contribs)
~~
I guess we are dealing with vandalism at this point. I suspect "Zvesda", "Dynamite", and the anonymous apologist vandal are identical and are trying to get this page ruined with constant reverts. Time for 3RR???
Dietwald 09:23, 4 May 2006 (UTC)
How could there have been vandalism if the page is perfectly factual? You do not make any sense and the use of the term "apologist" is POV.
How is it apologetic to assert that 1.8 million kulaks were relocated? How is it apologetic to assert that a documented 2.5 million died? Perplexing how you can't provide an answer to this question and similar ones above. Your name-calling to the effect of "troll" demonstrates your lack of intelligence.
History is supposed to be based on facts and not demagoguery. We have clarified that almost every single point in this article from alleged excess exports to the death toll are completely unsupported by numerous archival documents. Not a single mainstream source from Encarta to Brittanica to both of my 10th grade history textbooks use the term "Holodomor" or accuse the Sovet regime of implementing a man-made famine. It is a fact that as described by J.Arch Getty, the theory of famine-terror-genocide is not supported by MOST scholars. Amongst those scholars that have refuted the load of CIA propaganda here are Stephen Wheatcroft, R.W Davies, Mark Harrison, and Mark Tauger.
Actually, Wheatcroft, Getty, and Davies are amongst the finest scholars of Sovet history. Your attempt to trivilize them demonstrates that you have an agenda to push. They are out simply to report the facts without taking your sort of freaky Neo-Con perspective. Your assertion that I quoted Tottle as a real source is completely false. I did not derive material from his completely valid work that you clearly have not read. You're characterization of the term "kulak" as 'Stalinist hate propaganda language' is yet another misconception. The term has been part of the Russian vocabulary for quite some time and it did not originate in the Bolshevik era. A kulak is a wealthy peasant that hires and labor. The only hate propaganda being transmitted is by you and other pathetic right-wingers heard on AM Talk Radio that use the term "Nazi" as a slur and make incendiary comparisons between Stalin and Hitler. Trying to associate the identification of a social class to the identification of a perceived racial group is flawed and is totally fallacious. You have yet again called me a "denialist" even though in the version I submitted, the death toll of the famine is explcitly stated. If I'm a "denialist" because I have not accepted the sensational, discredited rubbish that you and your ilk endorse, then from my perspective you're a denialist for trying to cover up the truth. Your accusation of "hate speech" is extremely shallow and is devoid of any validity. Dekulakization was not even related famine, again demonstrating your complete lack of the subject.
Fortunately, the civilized world no longer accepts racist hate speech. Unfortunately, marxist hate speech is still acceptable among the fashionable chattering classes.
Spoken like a true Neo-Con: a crypto-fascist who takes offense from those who are hostile to the ruling class while simultaneously pretending to oppose racism and the Nazis to which he is akin in the political spectrum.
Again, you have failed to answer my inquiries of how there I've been an apologist when I've explcitly stated that 1.8 million kulaks were relocated and 2.5 million died in the famine.
Dietwald, I am totally with you on that. One comment though, the numbers Zvezda presents are a plain disagreement in facts, not on interpretations. We need to show what's wrong with them to stop this from being resurrected. I haven't been able to get to analize them. I recently found a good series of article in a respected Ukrainian Weekly by Stanyslav Kulchynsky. I will post the links to them here soon. Please take a look at Zvezda's numbers. Remember Fomenko's chronology? It was only dismissed when real historians finally bothered to respond and show the public how the whole thing was a mere scam. --Irpen 19:29, 7 May 2006 (UTC)
Zvesda -- your personal attacks are so laughably off the mark, it's quite entertaining.
As someone who uses the term fabricated, point of view term "totalitarian", you are a true Neo-Con in the Democrat/Republican vein if I've ever seen one. You are adamantly biased against Marxism yet you also use the term "Nazi" as a slur. Since when did it become a personal attack to correctly summarize your political leaning?
the numbers Zvezda presents are a plain disagreement in facts, not on interpretations.
The numbers I've presented are the facts. It has been said countless times that these are birth and death registration data derived from Russia's archives. Though you have not knowledge of what has been presented, you or someone of your ilk above have lied about "not all births and deaths were registered" and "this does not include special settlements." First, manifesting your ignorance of the data, the table that has been presented countless times is revised data from 1934. Initially, registered deaths in Ukraine were at 1.3 million and later revised to 1.9 million. Next, deaths in special settlements are completely irrelevant to famine-stricken regions and particularly Ukraine. Numbering at 300,000, excess deaths in special settlements do not at all substantially alter the death toll. This page should not even center around Ukraine because as most scholars on Russia have pointed out numerous times, famine was not an exclusive part of Ukraine. Tens of thousands died from famine in Kazakhstan, North Caucuses, German ASSR, Siberia, and in the major cities Moscow and Leningrad.
We have first-hand data from the archives, yet you and your ilk continue to persist with politically-motivated, ultra unrealistic "estimations" of a median 7 million dead in Ukraine when this has utterly been refuted by archival data. The Russian language version of this page presents the true death tolls in several tables. Countless times, I have pointed out that state collections of grain never exceeded 35% of production. Utterly destroying the myth of excess collections leading to a "man-made famine", it is perplexing why there has not been a response for such. This famine was neither deliberate nor was it exclusively caused by human factors.
I see that in a purely demagogic manner, Dietwald persists with comparing social class to race when such a comparison is completely fallacioius and inappropriate. It is the term kulak to which Dietwald takes offense, yet he calls my entire submission vandalism. If this is the case, why not just edit the summary of a kulak instead of trying to obstruct breakthrough progress on this page? Your incendiary Neo-Con comparisons of USSR to Nazi Germany are not even worthy of a serious response. He again compares 1.8 million relocated wealthy land-owning farmers to millions of Jews indiscriminately targetted in occupied Poland in order to try and prove some moronic point of how it is not any different from Hitlerism to punish people on the grounds of economic behavior. To repeat, the term "kulak" has been in the Russian lexicon for centuries. It simply means a wealthy land-owning peasant who exploits the labor of others. Social class structure did not instantly change with the October Revolution.
That you have vandalized this page is evident in the fact that your IP with which you have vandalized has been blocked by the administration (after I complained).
Go right ahead and persist with mindless repression because this ip address does not even belong to me as I only use the internet at school.
Comparing the usage of the word Kulak to the usage of the word Untermensch is not even very original, but commonly accepted theory of totalitarianism.
The term "totalitarian" is a bogus term devised by the western imperialists to try and defame any one regime that does not comply with foreign subjugation. The use of this term is used exclusively by bourgeois liberals like yourself who are purely academic frauds.
To define the so-called kulaks as 'wealthy' families shows a complete ignorance of the economic situation in the Ukraine at the time.
I am completely aware of the economic situation of Ukraine at the time and contrary to what you are trying delude everyone into, there was sharp class division in this particular region at the time.
Comparing Bolshevism with Nazism is also not very original and commonly done by most students and scholars of totalitarian rule -- whether Hanna Arendt, or Karl Popper, or others.
The opinions of a handful of rubber stamps for American imperialism are not worthy of much consideration. The comparison to Marxism to Nazism is an incendiary method that originated from 1950s America in order to defame the international revolutionary movement. The way you latch on to these absurd liberal insults is monstrous.
I compare the utilization of the social class concept to that of the race concept as an instrument of totalitarian rule usde to demonize and dehumanise arbitrarily defined groups of human beings.
Ironically, here you are arbitrarily defining those that set forth definitions of social class as "totalitarian". Quite contradictory on your part.
The concept of social classes is purely Marxist, and unlike the concept of races, it still finds acceptance among the puerile intellectuals that crowd both academia and society in general.
Thank you for displaying your ignorance manifested by your ludicrous statement of social class theory having been pioneered by Karl Marx.Class struggle has always been an integral part of history whether in Ancient Greece or revolutionary France.
Like races in the Third Reich, social classes in the USSR were considered to immutably define the character of those who belong to them, regardless of their personal merits or faults.
It is undeniable that the upper echelons of society habitually commit crime. Such an argument cannot be made on the basis of race.
The term 'kulak' has been defined and re-defined by the Bolsheviks throughout the collectivization period to specifically target anybody who opposed collectivization.
A kulak has always been a land-owning peasant who exploits labour. The term was neither coined by the Bolsheviks nor was it redefined by them.
The entire lingo of Zvesda smacks of classism -- the moral equivalent to racism.
Here he persists with the incendiary comparison of class struggle to racism. If anyone should be restricted from this encyclopedia, it should be you.
And this is in addition to the clearly erroneous data Zvesda supplies.
Bewildering how such data is "clearly erroneous" when there have yet to be any refutations to what has been contributed in this section. This page is rife with largely discredited Cold War era rubbish even though there is complete access to the Russia's archives that the anti-Communist Stephen Wheatcroft and R.W Davies extensively reported in "Years of Hunger".
This is a encyclopedia, not a haven for revisionism, nationalism, or other benighted agendas.
Yet you have defined yourself as a bourgeois Popperian-Lockian-Tocquevillian-Utiltarian-Rationalist Liberal. Frankly, your ilk are just as bad if not worse than the Hitlerists and Fascismi.
anti-Americanism... is little more than the anti-semitism of the intellectual.
Completely absurd. What you term "anti-Americanism" is actually hostility towards America's subjugative deeds. Anti-Semitism is opposition to Semites exclusively on biological grounds.
Sorry that I don't have time to participate in discussion and editing here, but I'll just throw in my two cents. Zvesda's edits are clearly fare outside the range of mainstream literature on the subject. I can't comment on Zvesda's motives, but based on the content and point-of-view being pushed, it's hard to avoid the label of "Stalin apologist". It is skewed so far beyond the fringe of historians' consensus, that I don't see the point of engaging in discussion—just take the steps necessary to protect all of the hard work that went into this article previously, and try not to waste too much of your time here. —Michael Z. 2006-05-10 16:05 Z
If information such as the one that Zvesda is attempting to enforce into the article is "far beyond the fringe of historian's consensus" is only because this article is brutally biased, towards the POVs of western cold warrior "historians" which are little more than anti-soviet and anti-communist propagandists. Worst than that, this article is recicling old (not even neo) nazi propaganda and selling it as factual truth, when it infact has been thoroughly proven false a long time ago. Many of those, which are accusing Zvesda and others of being a Stalinist, of illegitimatelly disrupting the article and of pushing a Bolshevist POV, are the ones which are infact pushing there POV on every reader of this article. Someone once said that "The best defense is offense", this is surelly the motto of many of Zvesda's detractors, which underneath their Liberal or even Libertarian clothes hold all the same fobias, hatreds, prejudices and disliking for diverging ideas that fascists did. The neutrality of an article so ridiculously ideological as this should at least be disputed.HelderM 10:10, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
I completely agree with you (or Stephen Colbert), when you say that "Reality has a liberal bias", and I would infact go further and say that "The people, meaning the working masses, is always right", even when they are wrong, on the long run, the people, even if not consciously, will eventually do the right thing and "walk hand in hand with truth and justice" and with those who fought one their side. This article, is not "The people" and it is not "Reality". It is merely a concatenation of lies, prejudices, ideology and propaganda. It's bias is not liberal, it is anti-communist fascist leaning wishful thinking. In your latest contribution, much to the similarity of your row models, like Robert Conquest, you doged my remarks (doged reality), and misdirected any reader with your "Reality has a liberal bias" (desinformation), when what I said was that the article is no more than Cold War and recycled old Nazi-Fascist propaganda. About Liberalism, all that I said is that is only a frequent cover for dark creatures, which deep down have only despise for it. HelderM 10:47, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
It is not faith it's statistics based science.
At one time we swung from trees and we lived in caves. After that our ancestors built slavery based civilizations, plunged into a millenium of religious darkness, extinguished slavery, emerged from the darkness, built colonial empires, brought slavery back again in the 16th centuty, and abolished it later on. They broke away with feudalism and developed the more progressive capitalism, and yet again the human being was reduce to a "wage slave". They (we) fought exploitation and have achieved a greater (although only partial) state of emancipation (from exploiters, caudillos, fuhrers and messias) than anything ever achieved in the past. The next step, and be sure of this, is a democratic working people-led Socialist society, no matter what pessimistic comodists and communist demonizers may say. Do you know what is truly strange?!! It's the disgust you show for the masses. For a supposed democratic individual your distrust for "the people" profoundly antagonical. This is even more strange given the context. This is a MASS EDITED ecyclopedia, anyone (or that's what is said) can edit it, and not just an enlightened elite to which you obviously think you belong. Now regarding communist mass-murders, all that I can say is, let time go by, and as the prevailing super-power, it's allies (lackies) and the socio-economical system they (their ruling classes) promote do it's worst, the people will start to see through all the old and new anti-communist pro capital-fascist propaganda. They will realize that... maybe the winners of the Cold War (which are mostly but not just the USA's rulling class) were just a bunch of liars, whom, through history perpetrated innumerous mass murders, like the enslavement of Africa, the deliberate systematic and patient extermination of the Native Americans, the artificial famines in Ireland and India, two imperialist world wars, innumerous other chauvinistic wars, the extermination of 4 million Indochinese, etc, etc, etc... Who knows maybe they will realize that the loosing side (of the Cold War), was not even remotelly as bad as it was portrayed by the historian's on the winners payroll. Maybe they will see that the loosing side wasn't just the "Soviet Empire ( :-) what bull....)", but infact it was, in a way, the entire working class of this world. LONG LIVE THE WORKING PEOPLE my friend. HelderM 12:34, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
To be perfectly honest, discussions like this, and badly edit-warred articles are no small part of the reason why most people are suspicious of WP and dubious of its ability to ever be anything more than a general potpouri of ideas, opinions, and unverified footnotes. I'm always appalled by people, regardless of their WP "credentials", trying to make NPOV a shorthand for "whatever my point of view is."
That having been said, I'm rather amazed at how decently some portions of the article have turned out, particularly the intro, which I think does an excellent job of contextualizing the famine, and the particular national perspective the article (should) focus on. But some portions of the article seem to still bear the scars of people wielding their own ideological or nationalistic axes... the grammar here is atrocious:
In controversy, the term democide, introduced by R.J. Rummel is "the murder of any person or people by a government, including genocide, politicide, and mass murder".[24]. Moreover, arguments that the rural population (in 1932 75% to 85% of Ukrainians resided in villages) does not represent the whole nation, also what terminology to use for the designation of an event that led to the extermination of roughly one quarter of the population of the former Soviet republic of the Ukraine in 1932-1933, as well as the dispute to what extent the Soviet government deliberately aggravated the famine is rather unreasonable and often used for confrontation and politicization of the tragedy.[1]
Although the famine went outside Ukraine's borders into the Volga Basin and the Don and Kuban steppes of Russia, yet the full extensiveness of Stalin's intervention in crop seizure was seen only in Ukraine and Kuban - a region in Russia whose significant rural population was Kuban Cossacks - 18th century descendants from the Zaporozhian Host, and thus with potentially significant Ukrainian lineage.
Really. Could someone clean that up? Maybe just eliminate that whole mess? There are sentences that are internally contradictory and reflect not just recognition of controversy, but push a particular agenda. Honestly, I think what the intro says puts it best and most succinctly. The term Genocide is highly fraught, and as in the introduction, I think it would be best to simply address the sides of the controversy breifly and matter-of-factly. This can be done -- cite the scholars, cite the political resolutions, refrain from calling either "apologists" or accuse "politicizing/exagerating." Let the reader look at the article on Genocide, look at the arguments and sources cited here, and decide for themselves whether they feel that this was a unique, ethnically-targeted, intentional killing, or whether it was just a horrible and unintended consequence of some horrid Soviet policies.
I think that "causes" very well highlights the different strands that played into creating the crisis. The question of terminology is clearly the real root of the problems here -- but that's not something that can be defnitively resolved by an encyclopedia. National and ethnic identity and politics did not disappear with the Soviet Union and then magically reappear afterward -- I think this article, or at least, the idea of this article -- is a perfectly legitimate recognition of the impact of a severe famine and violent state policies surrounding it on a particular nationality/group. Political/policy elements are no small part of why some people consider this to be unique and differentiated from the more general famine in the USSR at the time. That perspective and the facts that support it do not need to be presented in a way that says "this was a genocide!" nor rejected in a way that says "this is just nationalist exaggeration!"... And I think this article is a lot closer to NPOV than some people are willing to see. Cleaning up/combining "genocide?" and "politicization" would go a long way to making this article "controversial" only to those with an axe to grind.
Just my $.02. --69.74.48.25 20:57, 16 May 2006 (UTC)
According to the usual formulation of Genocide: Genocide is defined by the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG) Article 2 as "any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such: Killing members of the group; Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; and forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.".
The Holodomor occur is referred to the artificial famine in the region where Ukrainians, Russians and other people were intermixed. There is no single official document asserting preferential treatment of any national, ethnic, racial or religious group during that time and on these territories. Thus, it is not genocide. We can put any attributed opinions in the article, but presenting this as a fact is wrong. abakharev 00:24, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
If several countries and significant historians classified this as genocide it should be mentioned. If Russian historians disagree with that we can add that Russian state refuses to follow reckognition of the genocide. --Molobo 15:49, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
Just as I did at Talk:Expulsion_of_Germans_after_World_War_II#Genocide_category_or_not.3F, I'll stress that it is very important to cite sources. If there are academic publications that use the term genocide, note them. If there are others who dispute that this term should be used, cite them and note that there is no consensus within academic community. If one of this POVs is in visible minority, note that, citing sources again.--Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 22:43, 23 May 2006 (UTC)
By the end of 1933, millions people had starved to death or had otherwise died unnaturally in Russia and Ukraine.
I don't mean any disrespect to the efforts of Wikipedia's editors, but this information is simply incorrect. Demographic data from former USSR archives have revealed since 1990 that the death toll in Ukraine amounted to 1.54 million. I would suggest for you to look up RGAE 1562/329/109. This can be located in "Years of Hunger" by Stephen Wheatcroft and R.W Davies. This consists of demographic data that had recorded 1.9 million deaths in Ukraine in 1933 compared to 522 thousand in 1927. Subtracting the 1927 total from 1933 gives us 1.4 million excess deaths in 1933. For 1932, there were 668 thousand deaths and compared to the data of 1928, there wer 100 thousand excess deaths. Therefore, 1.4 million in 1933 + 100 thousand in 1932 = 1.54 million excess deaths. It is available here on the website of scholar Mark Harrison of Warwick University: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/faculty/harrison/archive/hunger/deaths.xls
The exact number of the victims remains unknown and probably impossible to find out even within an error of a hunder thousand.
Again, this is incorrect. In April 1990 of Soviet Studies, scholar Stephen Wheatcroft reported extensively on revelations from Russian archives in concern to demographic data. You can look up this article on jstor.org. He very accurately reported that there were between 4 to 5 million deaths in the whole USSR.
The estimates vary as much as from 1.5[3] to 10[4] million (with the numbers in the higher or lower end of the range being strongly affected by political or otherwise unreliable considerations).
It can be agreed that figures above 5 million are heavily motivated by right-wing politics, however, the figure of 1.5 million is correct at least according to reported demographic data from Russia's archives. Even way back in August 23, 1933 when such data was impossible to assess, Pulitzer Prize winner Walter Duranty of New York Times extremely accurately estimated that there were 2 million excess deaths in Ukraine, Lower Volga, and North Caucuses:
So with a total population in the Ukraine, North Caucasus, and Lower Volga of upward 40,000,000 the normal death rate would have been about 1,000,000. Lacking official figures, it is conservative to suppose that this was at least trebled last year in those provinces and considerably increased for the Soviet Union as a whole.
Even the results based on the scientific methods also vary widely but the range is somewhat more narrow, 2.5 million (Volodymyr Kubiyovych) and 4.8 million (Vasyl Hryshko). Modern calculation that use demographic data including those available from formerly closed Soviet archives narrow the losses to about 3.2 million or, allowing for the lack of the data precision, 3 to 3.5 million.
Not only is such information wrong, it is also unnecessary. With the availability of archival documents, estimates are completely worthless.
even the official Soviet statistics show a decrease of roughly four million people in the population of Ukraine between 1927 and 1932.
This contradicts the demographic data I have presented which shows that Ukraine's population declined by roughly 600,000 between the censuses of 1926 and 1937.
I looked over the edits made by user:Mikhail Frunze. I will do my best to put aside some time to merge two versions. His deletions of the sourced info and the map will be restored. OTOH, he brings new info referenced to
This book seems rather noteworthy in the academia and its authors are not discountable from the amount of google info I could find. But since the book isn't online and isn't indexed by google books, I request the author to provide the quotes in addition to the page numbers. Not everyone can easily get a hold of the book and such info would be helpful. TIA, --Irpen 22:54, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
Yakudza, I know those Kulchitsky articles because I linked them myself. Among other things, K. warns about the is politicizing the issue and criticizes those who do. K represents a purely scientific and non-histerical approach which is needed if we ever want to get to the bottom of this.
Wheatcroft, however, is also a very serious work and we can't just delete it. He is a Prof and a head of history dept in the University of Melbourne. I asked for quotes and I hope I will get them. I will, in the meanwhile, restore the info deleted by Frunze and try to preliminary integrate his references as well provided that he will soon confirm them by quotes. For now, the most comprehensive review of Wheatcroft I found is here. Another one is here. Also here at art-Ukraine.com, definetely not a revisionist site, his presentation is feaured as well. Another respected author, a prof from Alberta,here speaks respectfully about both Kulchytsky and Wheatcroft emphasizing that unlike Conquest, these two both worked with the formerly close archives, while the author more agrees with Kulchitski. For now, I would like the quotes from Wheatcroft. --Irpen 00:29, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
also, Kulchytsky's 6-part work "Why did Stalin exterminate the Ukrainians? Comprehending the Holodomor. The position of Soviet historians"in Den is available in English. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6 I linked it to an article a long time ago. Pity if those who follow the article missed it. In part 4 Kulchytsky devotes some space to discussing Wheatcroft's work. An instructive reading.
I tried to merge the numbers and factual info linked to Wheatcroft recently added and expanded on the death toll calculations. I also touched up some other parts, restored the deleted info and removed some bullshit links. I, one more time, request the Wheatcroft's refs to be supplemented with quotes long enough to be sure nothing is taken out of the context. --Irpen 05:48, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
First of all Ultramarine, didn't care to read the discussion, which is obvious not only from the error pointed out by Alex above, but from Ultramarine's misterious claim that Wheatcroft wrote something earlier and then wrote something later. The link Ultramarine posted is the review of the very same book under the discussion. Besides, I already posted tis very link above.
User:Frunze added the following statement "Demographic data from Russia's archives show that in Ukraine there were 1.54 million excess deaths in the course of 1932-1933" citing this statement to Whatcroft's page 415. There is no disagreement here. This is the exact same number Kulchytsky cites to Soviet statistics. Now, the Soviet statistics was not known at the time of the Conquest's book as Soviet archives opened much later. One of the articles I linked above points that the major importance of Wheatcroft's and Kulchytsky's work is that they were written with the use of the previously closed archives where both researcher got apparently the same data, as far as the statistics goes. We are clear only up to this point. If the Soviet statistics were correct (that is the number of deaths and births registered each year were fully reliable and the migration was correctly accounted for) we would not have needed anything else to estimate the human toll. However, the is a direct evidence that there are incorrect numbers in the Soviet statistics because the numbers of registered annual births and registered annual deaths for 1927-1936 when added up to 1926 census should than match the results of 1937 census. The fact is that they don't. Now, there are good reasons to believe (described in links) that the census numbers are correct and the error is in the annual statistics, with some deaths being unregistered. The death toll is then calculated based on the censuses and the years for which the statistics is considered reliable (the details are in the article where Kulchytsky's calculation is currently present.)
Perhaps Wheatcroft does present his own analysis? I didn't read his book. That'w why I requested more info above.
Finally, upon rereading, I notice that nowhere from the refs posted by Frunze it follows that Wheatcroft estimaets 1.5 mln as the death toll. The exact statement is that these are excess deaths for 1933 according to the Soviet statistics. This statement is correct but I will change in the article which says instead that 1.5 million is the death toll by Wheatcroft's estimation.
Finally, if anyone read the chapter 4 of Kulchytsky's 6 article series, where he describes his disagreement with Wheatcroft, note that he doesn't dispute his numbers. The disagreement is mainly on the reasons of the Famine and wheather it should be considered a Genocide. Kulchytsky says yes, Wheatcroft says no. But this is a separate issue from the death toll estimation. --Irpen 23:26, 9 June 2006 (UTC) --Irpen 23:26, 9 June 2006 (UTC)
It was the largest national catastrophe of the Ukrainian nation in modern history, with loss of human life in the range of millions (estimates vary)
This comment is not only unsourced, it is also inaccurate. World War II resulted in 6 million dead Ukrainians while this famine resulted in a documented 1.54 million deaths.
the famine was caused by the deliberate policies of the government of the Soviet Union.
There is not a consensus amongst academians on this theory. Stephen Wheatcroft, R.W Davies, Mark Harrison, and Mark Tauger have all rejected this the intentionalist theory and have provided substantial acrhival evidence that famine resulted from natural factors including poor weather, drought, and an inadequate availability of horses. Even Robert Conquest in p.344 of "Harvest of Sorrow" stated that it is not his opinion that "Stalin purposely inflicted the 1933 famine. No. What I argue is that with resulting famine imminent, he could have prevented it, but put 'Soviet interest' other than feeding the starving first -- thus consciously abetting it"
This was, however, ended and replaced with the a policy of effective Russification, as soon as the Soviet regime firmly took root, thereby causing significant social, cultural, and political conflict in the Ukrainian populated territories.
To my knowledge, never was the Ukrainian language in the USSR restricted. In consideration of the fact of how the Ukrainian people after 70 years of Soviet power are fluent in their native tongue, the use of the term "Russification" is baseless and inappropriate. Russification refers to policies that curtailed the use of the mother tongue of a minority group. With the possible exception of the Jews, there was not any sort of Russification in the USSR. The hundreds of nationalities of the former USSR speak their own languages, eat their traditional food, practice their traditional religions, have their own schools, etc, etc. The charge that Ukrainian culture was assaulted in the USSR is simply unfounded. I propose for this unsourced, blatantly Ukrainian Nationalist POV to be removed.
Despite the decrease in agricultural output, Soviet authorities soon drastically increased Ukraine's crop production quotas (by 44% in 1932). The targets were unrealistic and some historians believe that this was intentional.
This does not correspond to data presented by Stephen Wheatcroft and R.W Davies. According to page 448 of their work on the subject "The Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931-1933", the agricultural production plans for the harvest of 1932 had been reduced numerous times. In January 1932, the production plan was set at 90.7 million tons. Half way through the year in July 1932, the production target had been reduced to 76 million tons. In September 1932, it had been reduced to 67.1 million tons. Collection plans correspondingly dropped from 29.5 mn tons in Jan. 1932 to 23.3 mn tons in July 1932 to 22.8 mn tons in September 1932. I propose for this unsourced, inaccurate information to be removed.
Mass arrests of the hierarchy and clergy of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church culminated in the liquidation of the church in 1930. Thousands of priests were tortured, executed and sent to labor camps in Siberia and the Far North.
This was part of a broad anti-religion campaign that did not exclusively apply to Ukraine. Churches in Russia were similarly closed down. Mosques and synagogues were closed down as well. Plus, it is debateable as to whether the restriction of religious practice attempts to target the cultural identity of a group because people of every cultural background can belong to one religious body. For instance, observe the Catholics of Western Europe, West Africa, Philippines, and South America. If Catholic churches in France were to be shut down, I don't think that this would amount to an assault on French culture.
The artificial famine of 1932-33 fit well into the politics of assault on Ukrainian national culture.
It is hotly debated that this famine was artificial. Many scholars have rejected this theory including Stephen Wheatcroft, R.W Davies, Mark Tauger, and Mark Harrison.
You are incorrect. As I have said, the scholars Stephen Wheatcroft, R.W Davies, and Mark Tauger have published works that prove that there were natural factors involved with the harvests of 1931 and 1932. Their conclusions, based almost exclusively on archival documents, need to be given some emphasis if these fallacious Sovetologist theories must get any mention. I have documented facts of how the production quota for 1931 and 1932 were reduced. This flatly contradicts the incorrect claim that the 1932 quota was inreased by 44%. Mikhail Frunze
I'm sorry, but there simply is not a consensus in mainstream academic circles that famine was limited either to Ukraine or that there was a genocidal attempt towards the so-called Ukrainian people. This page needs to be changed to accomodate the 160 million people of the USSR as a whole rather than one measley socialist republic that somehow deserves extra attention. This current "Holodomor" outlook is not reflected in Brittanica. It is not reflected in Encarta. It is not reflected in either of my high school history textbooks. It is not reflected in any college course. Of the 59 results on Proquest database of the term "Holodomor", 49 results are found in the psychopathic, Yushchenko-supporting, Russophobic, nationalist outlet called "Ukrainian Weekly". This is clearly a fringe point of view that is not accepted by any mainstream academic circles. The researchers Stephen Wheatcroft, R.W Davies, Robert Thurston, Gregory Freeze, and Mark Tauger completely object to any view that includes so-called "Holodomor" towards the so-called Ukrainian people. Wikipedia is supposed to accomodate all views and not give disporportionate emphasis on sectarian nationalist propaganda.
Modern calculation that use demographic data including those available from formerly closed Soviet archives narrow the losses to about 3.2 million or, allowing for the lack of the data precision, 3 to 3.5 million.
This is disproportionate emphasis on a single author whose views do not posess a consensus. The journalist Walter Duranty In "The New York Times" correctly estimated in 1933 that excess deaths in Ukraine, North Caucuses, and the Lower Volga amounted to 2 million. The demographic reports from the Tsunkhu archives have proved these estimates to be correct as there were indeed 2 million excess deaths in these aforementioned regions. These Tsunkhu figures can be found on p.415 "Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931-1933" by Stephen G. Wheatcroft and R.W Davies: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/faculty/harrison/archive/hunger/deaths.xls
Additionally, Wheatcroft and Davies estimated 1.5 million excess deaths in Kazakhstan but there exists no archival documents to back up these conclusions. It is probably an overestimate because 1.5 million dead out of a population of 6 million is too inconsistent with the much lower proportion of Ukraine of 1.5 million dead out of a population of 28 million.
The map by Maksudov has to removed because it has been contradicted by the above archival chart.
The artificial famine of 1932-33 fit well into the politics of assault on Ukrainian national culture.
This unsourced assertion is strongly objected to by respectable academic scholars including Stephen Wheatcroft, R.W Davies, Mark Harrison, Mark Tauger, and Gregory Freeze. Wheatcroft and Davies, the ones who have actually done research on the topic, have documented how disastrous weather resulted in decreased agricultural production. They have documented how the lack of horses obstructed the harvest. Mikhail Frunze
In the "Estimation" section, Vasyl Hryshko is cited with 4.8 million deaths for the Holodomor estimate. I tried to look up the source of this, and could not. After some search of academic journals, I came across an article by Yaroslav Bilinsky in Journal of Genocide Research (1999), 1(2), 147-156 titled "Was the Ukrianian Famine of 1932-33 Genocide?" In this article, Vasyl Hryshko is cited and the number of "over 6 million" is stated. That is why I replaced 4.8 with 6 in the "Estimation" section.--Riurik 18:17, 17 July 2006 (UTC)
Hryshko, V. I. [W. I.] (1983) The Ukrainian Holocaust of 1933, edited and translated by M. Carynnyk (Toronto: Bahriany Foundation, Suzhero, Dobras).
Still, with the correction for this number, the total number of death in Ukraine due to unnatural causes for the given ten years was 3,238 thousand, and taking into account the lack of precision, especially of the migration estimate, the human toll is estimated between 3 million and 3.5 million.
This is wrong. The declassified Soviet demographic records show that excess deaths totalled 1.5 million deaths. Puzzling as to how you reach a figure of 3 million dead even though the demographics clearly show that there were 1.5 million deaths beyond normal.
Is there a reasonable explanation as to why the work of one single author is receptive to 4 full paragraphs? This is a clear violation of NPOV policy. There is a misrepresentation that the figure 1.5 million is an estimate. It is not an estimate. It is a fact derived from declassified demographic records. They can be found here: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/faculty/harrison/archive/hunger/deaths.xls
Numerous problems with this are present. Scholars have refuted the Cold War era myths in regard to this famine. No reasonable scholar feels that this was a famine exclusive to Ukraine. It was found that the 1931 and 1932 harvests were disastrous. These disastrous harvests alone clearly caused the famine. Collections by the state did not have anything to do with the famine. Collections by the state did not exceed 30% of total production. There was famine not because of collections but because of a series of inadequate harvests. Mark Tauger found that the famine was in fact caused by natural factors. And it has been documented that the Soviet government actively sought to help regions struck by famine.
I largely agree with the above. But reasons for famine where not soley due to bad wheater. But also caused by farmers resitance to collectivization itself. hundreds of thousands of cattle,sheep,goats, etc. where sluaghtered by farmers as a form of resistance.
-smert007
I have removed the discussion about Russification in Ukraine because it is baseless. Ronald Grigor Suny's "The Soviet Experiment" shows that that even the majority of Russian children in Ukraine SSR were instructed in the Ukrainian dialect in the 1920s and 1930s. In the USSR, the state distributed newspapers, journals, radio, and programming in more than 100 different languages. Soviet currency contains the official language of each of the 15 former republics.
In addition to the direct losses from unnatural deaths, the indirect losses due to the decrease of the birth rate should be taken into account in consideration in estimating of the demographic consequences of Holodomor. For instance, the natural population growth in 1927 was 662 thousand, while in 1933 it was 97 thousand, in 1934 it was 88 thousand. The combination of direct and indirect losses from Holodomor gives 4,469 thousand, of which 3,238 thousand (or more realistically 3 to 3.5 million) is the number of the direct deaths.
This tries to put forth a distorted impact of the famine. The main concern is the amount of excess deaths rather than these abstract "demographic consquences." These will be removed as they do not pertain to the issue of loss of life.
Most modern scholars agree that the famine was caused by the policies of the government of the Soviet Union under Stalin, rather than by natural reasons
This is incorrect as there is a sharp debate between those who have provided evidence showing that poor weather and the absence of traction power had seriously obstructed the sowing. The views set forth by these scholars who have conducted groundbreaking research have not been seriously challenged. These views are endorsed by RW Davies, Stephen Wheatcroft, Grover Furr, Mark Tauger, D'ann Penner, and Gregory Freeze. These are all scholars, not politicians, who teach at higher education campuses. Their views therefore need more emphasis. The only ones who have alleged that the famine was brought about by the policies of the Soviet government were those whose work was published before the declassifying of Soviet archives.
I would just like to point that I and a number of other scholars have shown conclusively that the famine of 1931-33 was by no means limited to Ukraine, was not a "man-made" or artificial famine in the sense that she and other devotees of the Ukrainian famine argument assert, and was not a genocide in any conventional sense of the term.
http://www.ukrweekly.com/Archive/1986/448620.shtml
Absolutely ridiculous. What if I were to derive material from Pravda which challenge claims of famine? A nationalist Ukrainian outlet is not a serious, scholarly, objective source and neither is a Marxist outlet.
Neither are the so-called findings by the American government, prior to the declassifying of the archives, of any objective value. It is a flagrant violation of NPOV policy to take deliberately partisan, non-scholarly sources. It would frankly be no different than citing material from the Nazi German period which systematically exaggerate famine. Likewise, it would be no different than citing Soviet sources in regard to conditions in America.
http://www.colley.co.uk/garethjones/otto_schiller_daily_telegraph_1.htm
Otto Schiller worked for the Nazi German government. Needless to say, it is not an objective, unbiased source. This is a flagrant violation of NPOV.
Finally there has been improvement on this page. In no longer reads like a CIA polemic. I will proceed to add more work by Wheatcroft & Davies and Tauger.Jacob Peters
The article underwent some extensive editing yesterday and today by anonymous account and by user:Jacob Peters. Some of their edits are likely to anger lots of people. I am also very uncomfortable with such a drammatic change. Nevertheless, their edits brought in some sourced information. Therefore, I urge everyone to refrain from wholesale revert. I started to carefully go through the recent edits and processed the lead paragraph. I almost finished processing their chamges to the first section but, unfortunately lost data in my browser and will have to try again this weekend. It will take little effort to purge some obvious nonsense, such as calling the countries and historians that recognize the Genocide a "reactionary" and "conservative", respectively, but calling the "weather theorists" as "progressive". This is an easy part that will take no time. Processing substantial changes will take a significant effort and I plan to spend some time this weekend on that. If others want to jump in, please do but I urge care.
Here is one hint on the caution with Whatcroft data. There is no question that numbers and facts he cites that are based on declassified archives are factually correct. Other researchers who publish these data cite the exact same numbers to every digit. But here is one example that illustrates why caution needs to be applied to the data. The article correctly cites the following statement properly referring it to Wheatcroft
What is ommitted here is that there was another resolution that ordered dividing peasants hospitalized and diagnosed with dystrophy into ailing and recovering patients. The resolution ordered improving the nutrition of the latter within the limits of available resources so that they could be sent out into the fields to sow the new crop as soon as possible.
This is just an example that illustrates why the recent edits need to be not reverted wholesale but worked on with care and dilligence.
No one is of course prohibited from editing the article, but I urge everyone to be careful, unlike the recent editors. I thank Alex for semiprotecting it. At least, the endless anonymous editing will stop now. Later, --Irpen 07:11, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
The portuguese article is only the best! Why?
Because they proved the genocidal nature of the Holodomor...
Dear Wheatcroft lovers (Jacob Peters and another folks!), please read this paper [] or [] or or or []!
Do you want more? I have a lot...
In the Wikipedia, Genocide its like the Nanking Massacre, or the Pontic Greek Genocide, or the Revolt in the Vendée, or the Rohingya Massacre, or the First Jewish-Roman War, or the Darfur conflict, or the Bar Kokhba's revolt, or the Kitos War, etc, etc, etc, etc, but not the Holodomor!
Amazing!
LuisMatosRibeiro 20:12, 8 October 2006 (UTC)
Some thoughts. Among the links posted by LuisMatosRibeiro, while not to academic papers, several are written by authors known as established academics, so the links are acceptable. Academic does not automatically mean NPOV, true enough. But if the article in a general use newspaper (that is not peer reviewed) is authored by an academic who established his credibility in peer reviewed publications, the article is usable as a source.
As for why Ukrainians, this is exactly where the crux of the matter is. Is it because, indeed, Ukrainians were the most agricultural nation, additionally sitting in the fertile land? Or was it a part of the plan to crush the potential separatism of the nation whose allegiance was considered absolutely crucial for the survival of the USSR? Several academics suggest just that. Those are notable opinions and should be covered. At the same time no hard facts and documents were revealed with orders to specifically target Ukrainians. Also a notable fact and should be covered that evidence, no matter how convincing to some scholars, is circumstantial.
Also questions: is Soviet statistics from the formerly classified archives reliable? Most scholars think so. Is there still non-declassified info? Several articles say that all the crucial data is available now. Notable fact and should be covered.
Next question, formerly classified yearly death/birth statistics (that's where 1.5 mln "excess deaths" come from) do not add up to the census data (also formerly classified). A notable fact that should be covered. How do we explain this descrepancy? We have a sourced explanation in the article.
Next question, the harvest in 1932 was indeed low as the opened archives show. Is it relevant? Of course it is! Is the harvest alone responsible for the famine? Impossible. The catastrophic famine did not happen in the non-Soviet Ukrainian lands where weather was roughly the same.
Next comes the question of state reserves. The paper of Tauger (cited), notably a scholar who does not agree with the Genocide applicability, confirms that the state reserves were still being filled, while the famine was already raging and when the relief effort was started, a significant share of reserved grain was ordered to be not distributed and the orders to fill reserves through grain confiscation were still given.
About the relief, are the documents ordering the relief authentic? Of course they are. Are the numbers on amount of grain distributed by relief effort correct? Also likely true. Soviets did not need to lie to themselves in the classified statistics because they wanted to know what's going on. However, is the secret order to separate the affected people into those who could possibly work in the field and give food aid to them only authentic? Very much so! Are the orders of crop confiscation authentic? No doubt - as well as the data about the amount of collected grain. And so on and so forth.
As long as we present all the facts untendentiously, the unfamiliar reader will be able to make up his mind as many scholars did (and they also do not agree with each other). As for the users who already made up their mind here, it is unlikely they will change their views.
The question of Genocide indeed reduces not to how many of those perished were Ukrainians and how many were not. The question is the presense (or lack of) the specifically anti-Ukrainian genocidial intent in the action of the Soviet leaders, because in the definition of the Genocide the intent is the crucial issue. In legal issues the proof in intent is a very difficult challenge. Lack of documents where such intent is directly expressed leaves it to trying to derive the intent from the actions which is a very non-trivial puzzle. Some scholars think they have can do it. When we get the agreement of the majority of them, we will add the article to Cat:Genocides.
What damages the article a whole lot, is the tendentios approach of part of its editors who edit it with the sole intention to white-wash or demonize the Soviet leadership. The rest of us are then forced to process their changes and argue with such editors instead of carefully developing the articles further. --Irpen 23:54, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
The major factor that led to the lower than expected 1937 census were declining births rather than increasing deaths. From 1931-33, it is shown that there 5 million projected births that did not take place.
http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/soc/economics/staff/faculty/harrison/archive/hunger/deaths.xls
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