The 20th Century's Worst Crime Goes Unpunished

[Karmadillo]

http://www.bigeye.com/foreignc.htm

Copyright: Eric S. Margolis, 2003
November 17, 2003

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How, I wondered, could such historical amnesia afflict so many young North-American Ukrainians? For Jews and Armenians, the genocides their people suffered are vivid, living memories that influence their daily lives. Yet today, on the 70th anniversary of the destruction of a quarter of Ukraine’s population, this titanic crime has almost vanished into history’s black hole.

So has the extermination of the Don Cossacks by the Soviets in the 1920’s, and Volga Germans, in 1941; and mass executions and deportations to concentration camps of Lithuanians, Latvians, Estonians, and Poles. At the end of World War II, Stalin’s gulag held 5.5 million prisoners, 23% Ukrainians and 6% Baltic peoples.

Almost unknown is the genocide of 2 million of the USSR’s Muslim peoples: Chechen, Ingush, Crimean Tatars, Tajiks, Bashkir, Kazaks. The Chechen independence fighters today branded `terrorists’ by the US and Russia are the grandchildren of survivors of Soviet concentration camps.

Add to this list of forgotten atrocities the murder in Eastern Europe from 1945-47 of at least 2 million ethnic Germans, mostly women and children, and the violent expulsion of 15 million more Germans, during which 2 million German girls and women were raped.

Among these monstrous crimes, Ukraine stands out as the worst in terms of numbers. Stalin declared war on his own people. In 1932 he sent Commissars V. Molotov and Lazar Kaganovitch, and NKVD secret police chief G. Yagoda to crush the resistance of Ukrainian farmers to forced collectivization

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[WhoCountsTheVotes]

1. yep

It's embarrassing to Americans that Stalin was our major ally in WWII.

[Ficus]

2. yes embarrassing

however 20 million Russians gave their lives in that war - not including that insane man's purges - far more of a sacrifice than any other nation at the time. I like to think of it as being allies with the Russian people.

and of course Churchill's qoute (something like this) "If Hitler invaded hell I would at least give the devil a honorable mention in the House of Commons."

edit: I'd like to point out that Stalin was probably worse than Hitler in my opinion - at least equal in their level of insanity and evil.

[forgethell]

3. Didn't Patton

want to go right through Berlin and fight the Russians?

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. but who can we punish now?

70 years is too long to wait - the chances of finding anyone responsible is very small.
It should be more widely known, I agree.

As for the alliance with Stalin, it was always known as a marriage with the devil - Stalin took parts of Poland in conjunction with Hitler's invasion. Our alliance with him only started when Hitler turned on him.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

5. According to freepers, the answer is YOU

Because, you know, everybody who dares entertain unpatriotic (i.e. anti-Bush) thoughts is a willing accomplice if Stalin. And if you think public schools should exist, you pulled those triggers yourself. No, it doesn't matter that you weren't born. You did it. </sarcasm>

[Zuni]

7. All the big fish are dead

Stalin, Molotov, Beria, Kaganovich, Voroshilov, Malenkov, Yezhov, Yagoda, Krushchev (who was involved in the Ukraine) and even Lenin who started the purges and Trotsky, who commanded the Red Army to seize nominally independent territories

[Character Assassin]

10. Let's go after the Paraguayans! Those bastards have it comin'!

Why? How the hell should I know why?

[Zuni]

6. My grandparents grew up there

Where my grandmother lived, Rostov on Don,(near the Ukraine, in Southern Russia on the Sea of Azov, and near Chechnya) was victim to insane purging and famines. Many of her relatives and neighbors disappeared, were sent to Gulags or simply shot. My grandmother grew up often having to eat bark and grass. She was a Don Cossack, too.
The genocide of Cossacks, rural peasants and others began under Lenin. Stalin just took it to another level.

[JHB]

8. There's and old black humor joke...

...to the effect that Hitler and Stalin made a bet to see who could kill more Soviets, the punchline being that Stalin won.

[Zuni]

9. This is all sadly true

unlike the biggest Nazi survivors like Goering, Wilhelm Keitel and Kaltenbrunner---these guys all died free men.

No one can imagine the sheer terror that pervaded all walks of life in the USSR during the 1930s.