“Ukraine is devastated by a man-made famine; Ukraine is bereft of the nationl elite; Ukraine is amidst ruined temples; Ukraine is robbed of all family values; Ukraine is denied national cultural, political, and cultural life for decades.” This accurate and hair-raising inscription is the true diagnosis of what happened to our native land during the horrifying years of 1932-33 that saw the deliberately engineered act of genocide against the Ukrainian people. These ruthlessly truthful words catch the eye of every visitor at the documentary art exhibit “Ukraine Remembers. The World Acknowledges” and the ceremony of launching the National Holodomor Victims’ Memory Book on Nov. 18, 2008 at the Ukrainian House.
Millions of victims died of starvation in the world’s most fertile land and were never properly buried and mourned for. Are we fully aware of one bitter fact: present-day Ukrainians are descendants of people who survived (most often miraculously) that tragedy? Before the launching ceremony we heard a girl’s mournfully calm voice (it was so calm that it gave one the shivers, but this was the right approach as any hysterical overtones would be inappropriate) unhurriedly listing family names, villages, and oblasts and calling the names of victims killed by the terror famine.
Most families lost half of their members at the very least. This heart-rending enumeration continued for 10-12 minutes (as the ceremony schedule was tight). A total of 18 oblasts were mentioned, from Sumy and Khmelnytsky to Odesa and Chernihiv. I found myself wondering how many decades, years, and months it would take to list the innocent victims’ names in the same unhurried, soft voice.
Academician Ihor Yukhnovsky, director of the Ukrainian Institute of National Memory, noted that of 18 volumes on display each is dedicated to a particular oblast and an additional volume is about Kyiv. Together these make up the National Holodomor Victims’ Memory Book.
What was the reason behind this inhuman act of terrorism, organized by the Soviet communist regime? It was to stop — at all costs — the Ukrainian people’s progress toward independence as laid down in the Fourth Universal of the Central Rada and subsequent documents issued by the Ukrainian National Republic. Suppressing this movement required the destruction of the Ukrainian peasantry as an age-old carrier of the national idea, culture, and language. (It should be remembered that, in the early 1930s, 80 percent of Ukrainian residents lived in rural areas and 92 percent of them were ethnic Ukrainians.)
There is every indication that this unprecedented crime against humanity was a deliberate and well-planned act, Yukhnovsky continued. All this could not have been accidental. According to the Institute of Demography and Social Studies at Ukraine’s National Academy of Sciences, a total of 3.6 million Ukrainian peasants starved to death in the winter of 1932-33. Add here 1.1 million unborn children, and the sum total will be 4.7 million. Those who died of starvation would have had children, so the Holodomor’s aggregate death toll amounts to six million. Yukhnovsky said that there is no way of avoiding the fundamental question, who perpetrated this crime in the first place? The academician answered the question by declaring that it was not a “hostile” nation and not even bloodthirsty political leaders (although there is no denying the diabolical role played by Joseph Stalin and his henchmen). The main culprit, in his words, is communism, its inhuman ideology, and its utopian legend that hurled Ukraine, Russia, and other countries into a boundless ocean of evil.
Those present listened attentively to the speech of President Viktor Yushchenko of Ukraine, who asked, “Why is it so important for us to understand the essence, causes, and consequences of this tragedy?” Because this event offers a direct answer to the question of who we are today and who we will be tomorrow, the president said. We cannot move forward into the future if we forget the fundamental values, language, faith, and the very life of past generations of Ukrainians. There is no country on the political map of the world that emerged through reliance on someone else’s culture and history. If you want your country and your nation to prosper, you have to put together its foundation bit by bit, stressed President Yushchenko. There are two things of which the history of a people is made up: its struggle for independence and its progress as a nation-state after it gains independence.
Communists are saying that the Great Famine was caused by bad crops and a drought, Yushchenko continued. This is absolutely untrue. The key to understanding the causes of this catastrophe (and, in general, the reasons behind Stalin’s hatred of Ukraine) is the little known words of the “father of all nations,” which he said back in 1925: “The national liberation issue is the peasant issue.” In other words, if a liberation movement is to be suppressed, the peasantry should be subjugated in the first place. President Yushchenko stressed that free peasants had their family plots, property, and livestock; they were almost self-sufficient and could stubbornly resist the pressure of the totalitarian state. That was why they were subjected to annihilation. This is why, in President Yushchenko’s opinion, the Holodomor was a crime against the Ukrainian nation that cannot be assessed only along the lines of morality, spirituality, and humanity — it also has a colossal political implication.
I might as well point out that those present could sense in Yushchenko’s words the inexpressible pain and his personal engagement. He said that in his native village of Khoruzhivka, which has 13 cemeteries, two-thirds of the graves contain victims of the 1932-33 Holodomor.
Yushchenko ended by saying that we shall preserve our statehood if we cope with the challenges that actually caused the tragedy of 1933 and that everything is in our hands.
A few words about the documentary art exhibit “The 1932-33Holodomor in Ukraine: Genocide against the Ukrainian People. Ukraine Remembers and the World Acknowledges” are in place. It was launched at the Ukrainian House on Nov. 18, 2008 and will be open until November 30. Every visitor can explore items that are documentary proof of the preconditions, causes, and consequences of this horrible tragedy in Ukraine. Also, there is a separate stand “Genocide’s Mechanisms” dedicated to the work of the US Cogress Commission on the Ukraine Famine and its staff director, the unforgettable Prof. James Mace. The stand offers the commission’s main findings proving that the tragedy was premeditated and engineered to “cleanse” Ukraine’s territory of the national potential — peasants and intelligentsia.
Both the exhibit and the National Holodomor Victims’ Memory Book pursue one noble and vitally important purpose-open Ukrainians’ eyes on the fact that an independent nation—state is the only guarantee of preventing such genocidal horrors in the future. You cannot trust foreign political leaders to rule over your people, least of all those who are still speaking and writing about the “the so-called Holodomor” (always in quotes), because it always leads to a sad ending.
