Part IV of VI: Hunger & Holocaust – Glenn Beck on Stalin

Glenn Beck begins his segment on Joseph Stalin by calling the Ukrainian famine in the Soviet Union a genocide. He states: “Most know that the horrors of the Holocaust resulted in the deaths of approximately six million Jews. But what many don’t know is that the government-designed starvation in the Ukraine caused the deaths of between 7 million and 10 million in just one year.”

Again, Beck has the arrogance to act as if what he presents is anything new that hasn’t been endlessly parroted since the very beginnings of the Russian Revolution. Historical revisionism of this type seeks to “revise” the history of the world so as to justify the barbaric crimes of fascism against the peoples of the world by claiming that they find their equivalent in socialism. Neo-Nazis have two methods: they either outwardly deny the existence of a state-sponsored program by the German government to eliminate the Jews, or they align themselves in Glenn Beck’s camp and invent “Holocausts” supposedly perpetrated by communists. The so-called Holodomor, the Nazi-inspired tale of the engineered famine, is a tale for there has never been one single shred of evidence. There was a real famine in the Ukraine and it was not “man-made” at all. This is nothing less than historical falsification.

Falsified Newspaper Articles (such as the one above) were used as Propaganda by William Randolph Hearst

Comparing Nazis and Soviets

While deaths that did occur in the USSR and under socialist regimes were as a result of often violent civil struggle, the Nazis’ deeds were unique for the time in the sense that they were intentionally trying to exterminate entire groups of people. What you did or what someone suspected you of doing were of no consequence to them—only what you were. This attitude is laid bare in the writings of Hitler, Goebbels’ Diary, Himmler’s famous Posen speech, he Max Taubner verdict and many other important documents proving that the extermination of the Jews (among many others) was in fact the deliberate state policy of Nazi Germany.

Meanwhile, as we shall see, at no time did the USSR enact or even consider the idea of targeting any ethnic or religious group for extermination. Their were some injustices that occurred in the case of the Crimean Tatars, Chechens, and several other groups, but there was never any intent to exterminate them. In addition, even a rudimentary study of the deaths under Soviet socialism will reveal that eve during the periods of the most protracted violent struggle there was never anything even remotely approaching Hitler’s conquest of Europe or the “Final Solution.” To compare the two is to whitewash the latter. On Stalin

The famous Civil Rights leader W.E.B. DuBois has written an article that sums up the accomplishments of Stalin briefly. We encourage our readers to take a minute and read it for an alternative view:

http://www.mltranslations.org/Miscellaneous/DuBoisJVS.htm

The Truth Behind the Ukrainian Famine

The real, existing Ukrainian famine was caused by crop failures and not by the hoarding of grain by the Soviet government. Russia began as a backward, semi-feudal state known worldwide for having famines—they occurred at regular intervals under the oppressive reign of the Czar. The famine was the result of poor agricultural practice and drought, which was to be expected given that the USSR was just then able to modernize agriculture.

Collective Farming in the USSR

The Dust Bowl in the US had similar causation and there was a limited famine during that time period—limited to the poorest in the US, of course.

The Soviets were trying to alleviate the famine, especially in Ukraine. Many of the photos supposedly taken from the Ukrainian Famine were actually from the famine in 1922, which was the result of attacks from the White Guards, the Czarist forces which opposed the Bolsheviks.

The entire thesis that the Ukrainian Famine was “intentionally caused” makes no sense. The thesis seems to be that because of uprisings in the Ukraine, Stalin decided to starve them to death. Exactly what the Soviets would have gained from having their leading agricultural sector completely wiped out from hunger is anyone’s guess. People died in the Soviet Union of natural causes, and though Beck may have forgotten it, people do have the potential to die without any interference from the government. In addition, it is worth pointing out that a great deal of the reports of famine in the Ukraine come from the yellow journalist press of the infamous pro-Hitler mogul, William Randolph Hearst.

Here is the original article as it was published in Hearst’s newspaper: http://colley.co.uk/garethjones/soviet_articles/thomas_walker/walker_six%20million_perish_in_soviet_famine.htm

For further reading on where exactly the sources for the famine come from, we recommend this volume: http://rationalrevolution.net/special/library/famine.htm

Finally, for further resources from the Russian Archive Service showing Soviet efforts to alleviate the famine, go here (in Russian): http://www.rusarchives.ru/publication/famine/famine-ussr.pdf

Soviet Peasant Councils during Collectivization

What Are the Sources?

In order to make this comparison however, Beck decides to portray the famine as having killed more people than the Holocaust. The figure he gives of 10 million dead is one that goes up and down and wildly varies. This is typical of propaganda.

In 1932, the Ukrainian population was 25 million inhabitants. The figure of 10 million is supported by little concrete evidence, especially in light of variation of the figures given. Here are the main ones:

Robert Conquest—famous anti-communist writer. Estimated the number of dead at 6,000,000, which was later revised to 14,000,000. Has since said the Ukrainian famine was not a genocide.

Dana Dalrymple—“The Soviet Famine of 1932-1934.” 5,500,000 dead.

Nicolas Prychodko—Nazi collaborator during the occupation of the Ukraine. Rescued by the West. 7,000,000 dead.

Otto Schiller—Nazi civil servant in Ukraine. His text published in 1943 Berlin claimed 7,500,000 dead.

Ewald Ammende—Nazi who had not been in Russia since 1922. Submitted the figure of 7,500,000 to the New York Times, which was rejected by correspondent Harold Denny, who sent back, “Your correspondent was in Kiev for several days last July about the time people were supposed to be dying there, and neither in the city, nor in the surrounding countryside was there hunger.” And then, later: “Nowhere was famine found. Nowhere even the fear of it. There is food, including bread, in the local open markets. The peasants were smiling too, and generous with their foodstuffs.”

Frederick Birchall—4,000,000 dead. Upon publishing this figure he was in Berlin. He was famously one of the first U.S. journalists to support Hitler.

William H. Chamberlin & Eugene Lyons—one estimate of 4,000,000 and one of 7,500,000 dead. Both worked for the American Committee for the Liberation from Bolshevism, or Radio Liberty.

Finally, the highest figure, 10,000,000 was provided by Richard Stallet of Hearst’s  pro-Nazi press.

Dam built during the Soviets' Five-Year-Plan

“Genocide?”

All of this “evidence” is obviously skewed and based on unscientific mathematical formulas cherry-picked from various unrelated sources. Keep in mind also, that this is assuming Stalin was responsible for Ukraine, to which the American Party of Labor would contend that he and the Soviet government were not.

Even the anti-communist writer Robert Conquest, who is one of Beck’s own sources, has long since backed off the claim that the famine was intentional:

“In correspondence Dr. Conquest has 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.’”

(R.W. Davies & Stephen G. Wheatcroft. The Years of Hunger: Soviet Agriculture, 1931-1933. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. 2004. p. 441.)

Conquest accuses the Soviet government of negligence, not genocide. However, even the negligence claim holds no water, given the facts about the extraordinary efforts the Soviets, under Stalin, went through to alleviate the famine once it was public knowledge. Even if the accusations of negligence did prove true, this hardly amounts to intentional extermination of Ukrainians. The comparison of hunger to gas chambers, firing squads and ethnic cleansing is ludicrous.

As a further note, Ukrainian President Yushchenko, whom Beck cites as a source for some odd reason, has pushed for the imperialist governments of the world to recognize the famine as “genocide.” However, neither the United Nations nor the European Union has done so. It says much about this genocide theory that the imperialist coalitions themselves refuse to give it the time of day.

Capitalist Famine for Comparison

Oddly, President Victor Yushchenko admits a startling insight during the course of Beck’s documentary that does, in fact, ring true. He states: “Death from hunger was not unusual in the 20th century. But there is a difference between death from hunger and murder by hunger.”

We have already disproven the claims that the hunger in the Ukraine was intentional and exposed the utter lack of evidence for an intentional state policy. In response to this, there are those that say that any hunger at all that happens under a system which claims to be superior to capitalism, such as socialism, is unjustifiable. After all, where is the widespread preventable hunger under capitalism? The facts are there for all to see.

A Map of World Hunger

The World Health Organization (WHO) states that hunger is the leading cause of child mortality in the world today, being the root cause of half of all cases worldwide. Starvation affects more than one billion people, or one out of every six human beings. Despite this, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations states that the world already produces enough food to feed its entire population—in fact, it could feed 12 billion people, or double the current world population. A few more facts about famine today:

 
• A person dies every second as a result of hunger. 4000 people die every hour from it, amounting to approximately 100,000 each day or 36 million each year.
• 58% of all deaths result, directly or indirectly, from hunger or malnutrition.
• A child dies every 5 seconds from hunger, 700 every hour, 16,000 a day or 6 million each year. 60% of all child deaths result from hunger.

 

Sources:

(1) http://www.fao.org/docrep/011/i0291e/i0291e00.htm

(2) http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/docs/7session/A-HRC-7-5.doc

(3) http://hei.unige.ch/~clapham/hrdoc/docs/foodrep2001.pdf

(4) http://ap.ohchr.org/documents/E/CHR/resolutions/E-CN_4-RES-2002-25.doc

(5) http://www.fao.org/righttofood/kc/downloads/vl/docs/Rtf%20hearing%2031%2003%202004.doc

(6) http://www.fao.org/docrep/005/y7352e/y7352e00.htm

(7) http://www.fao.org/docrep/007/y5650e/y5650e00.htm

(8) http://www.fao.org/docrep/008/a0200e/a0200e00.htm

(9) http://ap.ohchr.org/documents/E/HRC/resolutions/A_HRC_RES_7_14.pdf

These Lies Are Monstrous

Joseph Stalin’s application of Marxism and Leninism to the Soviet Union liberated a nation from Czarism and industrialized it into a world socialist superpower in one decade. He was upheld as a great leader by his people for three decades and remained a leader through some of the darkest periods in the history of humanity, including the largest war ever fought. The Soviet Union and Russia were built thanks to the government he and the CPSU led. He remains the most popular Russian leader to ever exist to this very day.

Socialism has literally saved the world, and all Glenn Beck can do to stop it is to accuse it of genocide. Was it preferable for the USSR to surrender to the imperial pressures and allow the Nazis to conquer Europe and enslave the world?

Mr. Beck seems to think so.

Categories: Germany, History, Imperialism, International, Media & Culture, Revolutionary History, Russia, Second World War, Soviet Union (USSR), TV, Ukraine, World History