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Uncovering the truth about the Holodomor. Holodomor facts: Historical events leading to the famile-genocide of 1932-33 that took the lives of millions innocent Ukrainians.

Holodomor Facts and History: What does Holodomor mean? This word is formed from 2 words in Ukrainian: “holod” meaning hunger or starvation, depending on context; and “mor” meaning death or plague. It is likely that the word derives from the expression “moryty holodom” which means “to inflict death by hunger.” Listen to the Pronunciation of Holodomor What was the Holodomor? The term Holodomor is often used to refer specifically to the brutal artificial famine imposed by Stalin’s regime on Soviet Ukraine and primarily ethnically Ukrainian areas in the Northern Caucasus in 1932-33. In its broadest sense, applying Lemkin’s definition (see THE HOLODOMOR AS GENOCIDE), it is also used to describe the Ukrainian genocide that began in 1929 with the massive waves of deadly deportations of Ukraine’s most successful farmers (kurkuls, or kulaks, in Russian) as well as the deportations and executions of Ukraine’s religious, intellectual and cultural leaders, culminating in the devastating forced famine that killed millions more innocent individuals. The genocide in fact continued for several more years with the further destruction of Ukraine’s political leadership, the resettlement of Ukraine’s depopulated areas with other ethnic groups, the prosecution of those who dared to speak of the famine publicly, and the consistent blatant denial of intent by the Soviet regime. Holodomor Timeline: 1917 The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin take power in Russia. 1922 The Soviet Union is formed with Ukraine becoming one of the republics. 1924 After Lenin’s death, Joseph Stalin ascends to power. 1928 Stalin introduces a program of agricultural collectivization that forces farmers to give up their private land, equipment and livestock, and join state owned, factory-like collective farms. Stalin decides that collective farms would not only feed the industrial workers in the cities but could also provide a substantial amount of grain to be sold abroad, with the money used to finance his industrialization plans. 1929 Most Ukrainian farmers, known for their independence, refuse to join the collective farms, which they regarded as similar to returning to the serfdom of earlier centuries. In late December, Stalin introduces a policy of “class warfare” in the countryside in order to break down resistance to collectivization. The successful farmers, or kurkuls, (kulaks, in Russian) are branded as the class enemy, and brutal enforcement by regular troops and secret police is used to “liquidate them as a class.” Eventually anyone who resists collectivization is considered a kurkul. 1930 1.5 million Ukrainiansin the countryside fall victim to Stalin’s “dekulakization” policies, Over the extended period of collectivization, armed dekulakization brigades forcibly confiscate land, livestock and other property, and evict entire families. Close to half a million individuals in Ukraine are dragged from their homes, packed into freight trains, and shipped to remote, uninhabited areas such as Siberia where they are left, often without food or shelter. A great many, especially children, die in transit or soon thereafter. The remaining farmers are hounded to give up their land, livestock, and equipment and join the collective farms. As the traditional structures of rural livelihood disintegrate, the religious clergy are demonized and arrested or deported, and their churches destroyed or repurposed for grain storage or other secular use. 1930-1931 Rebellions against collectivization intensify throughout Ukraine. The Kremlin is intent on putting them down right away, as it remembers the serious threats to Bolshevism posed by peasant rebellion during the civil war just over a decade earlier. Many of the current rebellions are “genuinely political” and led by people who played some role in the Ukrainian national movement during the civil war. These latest rebellions against the state are brutally suppressed, and often blamed on supposed outside agitators in order to shift blame from Stalin and his policies. 1930 The nationalist tinged rebellions in Ukraine’s countryside intensify concerns about the strong expressions of nationalism increasingly evident in the cities. The secret police, OGPU, creates conspiracies involving links between city intellectuals and rural contacts to explain the rebellions. As result, Stalin launches his first major public assault on Ukrainian “local nationalism” with a carefully planned and orchestrated show trial of supposed members of a fictitous anti-Soviet Ukrainian organization, the Union for the Liberation of Ukraine, or SVU. It is staged at the Kharkiv Opera Theatre throughout March 9 – April 19, 1930, with the defendants selected to represent members of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church, ethnic Ukrainian nonparty intellectuals, and Ukrainian former pre-Soviet socialist party members. The trial is widely reported in all the Soviet press, signaling the beginning of a terror campaign against those whom Stalin designa...

Holodomor Facts and History: chronology of events surrounding the famine