On November 20, the US journalist, writer, historian, and Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum came to Ukraine to launch her new book Red Famine: Stalin’s War on Ukraine. Her previous works were on the history of Central and Eastern Europe. In particular, the author was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for the book Gulag: a History. The Day interviewed Ms. Applebaum on the eve of her visit to Ukraine. Our conversation focused not only on the new publication, but also on Ukrainian-Polish relations (Ms. Applebaum lives in Poland and is the wife of the Polish politician and statesman Radoslaw Sikorski), the prospects of Putin’s regime in Russia, and the problems of Western liberalism.
“IN POLAND, INEXPERIENCED POLITICIANS IN POWER BELIEVE THEY CAN WIN POPULARITY AT HOME BY STARTING ARGUMENTS ABROAD”
Ms. Applebaum, you are going to launch your new book Red Famine: Stalin’s War on Ukraine in Kyiv. It is not the first book by a Western author on the Holodomor. In particular, the work of Robert Conquest has been a bestseller in the West before. There were also English-language publications by James Mace and other authors. Why do you think it became necessary to write about the Holodomor for the Western reader again? Who is your new book intended for above all?
“After speaking to colleagues at Harvard in about 2012, I realized that there had been enough new discoveries in Russian and Ukrainian archives to merit a new book. Both Conquest and Mace were writing in an era before archives. But in the past decade, both Ukrainian and Western scholars have found quite a lot of material, enough to change the story and the way that it can be told. There is also far more memoir and oral history than there used to be. The result is that you can make a much clearer argument about why Stalin wanted to target Ukraine.
“This book is primarily intended for Western readers, who perhaps know some European or Soviet history but don’t know much about Ukraine. Although it is focused on the famine, I realized while I was doing the research that the famine could not be explained without some history of the Ukrainian revolution of 1917, the peasant uprising of 1918-19, and the 1920s. In the 1930s, Stalin was constantly referring back to the civil war era, and I felt that readers needed to know what had happened.
“Although of course Ukrainians know this history, I think some Ukrainians, especially younger Ukrainians, may find my book useful too. My perspective is probably different from yours, and maybe that is interesting.”
You once said that history helps us understand the politics of today. In the last while, history has become the cornerstone of Polish home and foreign policies, particularly in the context of Ukrainian-Polish relations (which, incidentally, brings Poland closer to the present-day Russian regime). What do you think caused this “fixation” of Polish society and politicians on historical issues? What consequences may this have for the relations between our countries? Can you see a “new Jerzy Giedroyc” among Polish intellectuals or are you a pessimist in this question?
“A few years ago, I regarded the question of Polish-Ukrainian history conflicts as completely closed. There had been joint Polish-Ukrainian history commissions, which published joint books and came to an agreed-upon narrative that satisfied both sides. Thanks partly to this effort, which lasted for many years, Polish foreign policy, from the 1990s to 2015, was consistently based on the idea that Ukraine should be a strong and independent country; successive Polish governments, of different parties, promoted this idea. As you know, it was Poland that first proposed that the EU should negotiate a trade deal with Ukraine. Even now, there is no general ‘fixation’ on a Ukraine ‘problem’ in Polish society, and I am guessing that most Ukrainians don’t hate Poles either.
“In Poland, what you are seeing now is a group of inexperienced politicians in power who believe they can win popularity at home by starting arguments abroad, not just in Ukraine but in France, Germany, and the European Union. What Ukrainians should do is keep the rhetoric down. Don’t respond to petty nationalism with more petty nationalism. Go back and read the books published by the joint historical commissions and look for common ground. In the long term, the Polish-Ukrainian relationship is incredibly important for both sides. The only country which wins from a stupid Polish-Ukrainian conflict over something that happened many decades ago is Russia.”
“TRUMP HAS A BIZARRE FIXATION ON RUSSIA, AND HAS HAD FOR MANY, MANY YEARS”
Some of the latest events in Russia show that Putin has set himself a goal to shape new state elite. In particular, a special course is to be given to a group of new-generation officials, which includes not only lectures by academics and top office holders and oligarchs in Putin’s inner circle, but also some rather exotic tests, such as parachuting and participation in military maneuvers. A number of the participants in this “special school” were recently appointed as governors. Do you think this means that Putin is planning to reformat his regime after the 2018 presidential elections? What kind of a regime will it be and what challenges will it issue to Ukraine and the rest of the world?
“I really don’t know – I don’t travel to Russia anymore and don’t have a sense of who the new elite is. My guess is that Putin is now copying China, which has given up the pretense of democracy and now promotes its leaders through a similar-sounding process.”
There are talks in some Western political circles that without Russia there is no possibility to guarantee security in many regions. And even Trump recently tweeted: “When will all the haters and fools out there realize that having a good relationship with Russia is a good thing, not a bad thing. There always playing politics – bad for our country. I want to solve North Korea, Syria, Ukraine, terrorism, and Russia can greatly help!” Why does such opinion about Russia appear from time to time?
“Trump is not typical. He has a bizarre fixation on Russia, and has had for many, many years. This may be related to Russian investments in his business, as well as in the role Russia played in the US election.
This book is primarily intended for Western readers, who perhaps know some European or Soviet history but don’t know much about Ukraine. Although it is focused on the famine, I realized while I was doing the research that the famine could not be explained without some history of the Ukrainian revolution of 1917, the peasant uprising of 1918-19, and the 1920s. In the 1930s, Stalin was constantly referring back to the civil war era, and I felt that readers needed to know what had happened.
“Although of course Ukrainians know this history, I think some Ukrainians, especially younger Ukrainians, may find my book useful too. My perspective is probably different from yours, and maybe that is interesting.
“Of course it is true that, for the US as well as everyone else, it would be wonderful to have Russian cooperation on North Korea or Syria or Ukraine. The trouble is that Russia does not want to cooperate, and does not have the same aims as the United States or Europe, and so this attempt to cooperate always fails.”
How in your opinion should West (EU and NATO) deal with Russia to force it to return to international norms and reverse its action in Ukraine?
“I think that sanctions – much to my surprise – are working very well. They really anger Putin. What we should do now is eliminate Russian corruption and money-laundering in the West entirely, as that would directly affect the wealth of the Russian ruling class. We should spread the visa ban farther.”
“THE INTERESTS OF THE RUSSIAN ELITE AND THE INTERESTS OF RUSSIAN SOCIETY ARE NOT THE SAME”
You noted in one of your articles that it is the Russian political elite, not society, that should be blamed for modern Russia’s anti-Western and anti-Ukrainian policy. Tellingly, differentiating between Russian society and the Russian political class is quite a widespread approach among Western analysts. What is your attitude based on and why do you not share the opinion of another, smaller, group of observers who believe that the current Russian regime meets the underlying demands of Russian society itself?
“I don’t know which article you are referring to, so I don’t know what the context is. But I do think it is important to remember that the interests of the Russian elite and the interests of Russian society are not the same, even when their views seem to be. For example, it would be very good for Russians if Ukraine were a prosperous, democratic country, integrated into Europe, because it would be good for Russian business to have a wealthy neighbor to trade with. But for Russian elites, this idea is threatening.”
You maintain in one of you latest columns that lying about the past, the present, and the future, and violence were the essential characteristics of the Bolshevik movement. You find, rather unexpectedly, the same features in the current Western far right and far left movements and parties. But what place do you think the Bolshevik legacy occupy in the ideology of the current Russian regime? Are the official propaganda, which often spreads not just one lie but two or three lies that contradict one another, and war as the main instrument of foreign policy (suffice it to recall all the local conflicts Russia has provoked in the neighboring countries in the past 25 years), sufficient grounds to consider the current Russian regime neo-Bolshevik?
“The Bolshevik legacy is complicated for Russia, as evidenced by the fact that Russia did not celebrate the 1917 anniversary. On the one hand it created a Russian-speaking empire; on the other hand, millions of people died and the country was impoverished. Russians are still wrestling with how to remember it.
“When I was writing about ‘neo-Bolshevism’ I was referring to a certain way of thinking: that there are no legitimate opponents, that the goal of all politics is to eliminate independent organizations, courts, and media. Yes, you could say that’s true of Putinist thinking in Russia, though of course Putinism is also worse than that, because Putin also arrests and murders his opponents. As for Russia provoking conflicts in neighboring countries, this is simply longstanding Russian foreign policy, dating back to the Czarist era.”
“LIBERALISM NEEDS BETTER ANSWERS FOR INEQUALITY AND INSECURITY”
You often warn in your publications about the danger of anti-liberal forces in the West, to which you include not only various extremist parties and movements, but also such mainstream phenomena as Donald Trump and the Law and Justice Party in Poland. But do you share the opinion that contemporary liberalism really has some weak sides that do not satisfy the demands of society? If you do, what are these sides? What changes do you think the liberal idea needs today?
“A few years ago, Donald Trump would have been considered an extremist, and much of what Law and Justice says now is far more radical than anything it said the last time it was in power. So, our definition of ‘extreme’ and ‘mainstream’ are evolving.
“Contemporary liberalism needs better answers for inequality and insecurity; it also needs ways to reach people who don’t live in cities and don’t benefit from educational meritocracy. It should focus more on cohesion, and on strategies to help people adjust to globalization. It should not allow the idea of ‘patriotism’ or pride to be stolen by the far-right nationalists.
“Frankly, I still don’t hear anything on the ‘left’ or the ‘far-right’ that sounds like solutions to any real world problems, whether economic or political or sociological. Liberalism, which comes in both center-left and center-right versions, is still the better answer.”
What you think about role of Western media making public know more about crime of totalitarian communist regime?
“Do you mean now, or in the 1930s? I actually think that now, there is a lot more written about Stalinism than there used to be; there is also a general acceptance that communism was a criminal system and that Stalin was one of history’s bloodiest dictators, which was not true twenty years ago.
“As I write in my book, the question was more complicated in the 1930s. At that time, many people in the West hoped that the USSR would provide the answers to an international economic crisis and they did not want to hear bad news about the Soviet Union. In this era, it was also true that journalists had to collaborate with the USSR in order to work in Moscow. Some people went farther: famously, Walter Duranty, the New York Times correspondent, dismissed stories of famine in a famous article entitled ‘Russians are hungry but not starving.’ Of course there were also one or two brave journalists, whom I also wrote about, who tried to tell the real story. But I think the real problem was that, as I have said, people did not want to hear that the Soviet Union had failed.”
Probably you have seen recent publication by The New York Times which keeps whitewashing communism’s crimes. While the Trump administration marked this week’s 100th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution by declaring a National Day for the Victims of Communism, The New York Times marked the same anniversary in a different way: by running a series of articles extolling the virtues of communism. How would you comment on such a position of this paper which is considered by many Ukrainians in US as leftist or socialist?
“I am not really in the business of criticizing other newspapers, and there are many good journalists at The New York Times. As for that series, some of the articles in it were not that bad – others were silly or foolish. But yes, some of them should not have been printed by the newspaper which once employed Walter Duranty.
“As for President Trump, I don’t believe that he cares much about the history of communism, or the history of anything, at all. I am glad that some of the people who are working for him do, just like all American administrations have done for the past several decades.
“My newspaper, as you know, published a long article about the Bolsheviks on November 7 – which I wrote!”
