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Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust by M Dolot
In 1929, in an effort to destroy the well-to-do peasant farmers, Joseph Stalin ordered the collectivization of all Ukrainian farms. In the ensuing years, a brutal Soviet campaign of confiscations, terrorizing, and murder spread throughout Ukrainian villages. What food remained after the seizures was insufficient to support the population. In the resulting famine as many as seven million Ukrainians starved to death.
This poignant eyewitness account of the Ukrainian famine by one of the survivors relates the young Miron Dolot's day-to-day confrontation with despair and death"his helplessness as friends and family were arrested and abused"and his gradual realization, as he matured, of the absolute control the Soviets had over his life and the lives of his people. But it is also the story of personal dignity in the face of horror and humiliation. And it is an indictment of a chapter in the Soviet past that is still not acknowledged by Russian leaders.
This poignant eyewitness account of the Ukrainian famine by one of the survivors relates the young Miron Dolot's day-to-day confrontation with despair and death"his helplessness as friends and family were arrested and abused"and his gradual realization, as he matured, of the absolute control the Soviets had over his life and the lives of his people. But it is also the story of personal dignity in the face of horror and humiliation. And it is an indictment of a chapter in the Soviet past that is still not acknowledged by Russian leaders.
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First published September 25, 1985
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April 20, 2022
2022-04-13 Finally remembered that I had read and reviewed this book, so timely for folks to read now, to understand, partly, why Ukrainians are so opposed to Putin's Russian invasion, and willing to fight it at most any cost.
2014-05-28 This book provides a first person account of the tragedy of the forced Ukrainian famine of 1929-1933, where about "seven million people in the 'breadbasket of Europe' were deliberately starved to death."
Very gripping.
Incredible detail of how the Soviet system implemented their "voluntary" collectivization of the Ukrainian farms. The methods described are all the more chilling, when one considers how the US's "voluntary" tax system, and "voluntary" Obamacare system [and more recently and even more coercively - COVID lockdowns and mandates] are implemented. The "voluntary" window-dressing terminology is the same [though with COVID lockdowns, the officials can't even pretend with that fiction any more]. The force behind the plans are the same. The differences of the ruthlessness of the officials, the ability and history of the people to "push back" with legal and forceful means is about all that really separates us. But every year that we have more regulations, more taxes, and less private property, less unrestricted defensive weapons, training and ammo, the easier it gets for the government to go farther. [The COVID mandates illustrated that statement in spades!]
There are points in this book where it is somewhat unbelievable - times when tears and fears and exhaustion would seem to be impossible to overcome. Yet the author's general story, and many details line up with the facts that have been coming out over the last 25-50 years.
The prose of this book is very well done. I finished this book in 5 days because it was so gripping. I rarely finish a book of this size or type so quickly.
If you want to find out about this "Hidden Holocaust" that few know about, but was just as devastating, you could do much worse than this book.
If you want to know how statists of the communist persuasion actually implemented their collectivization schemes on an intransigent public, and the almost inevitable results, here is your book.
If you want a well written book with pathos and incredible human interest, here it is.
----
Other books/sources on this topic that reinforce it:
Harvest of Sorrow by Robert Conquest
Red Famine by Anne Applebaum
Congressional Hearings on the Ukrainian Starvation
Mr. Jones - excellent movie that came out in Dec. 2020 on the journalist who uncovered the story of the Holodomor.
2014-05-28 This book provides a first person account of the tragedy of the forced Ukrainian famine of 1929-1933, where about "seven million people in the 'breadbasket of Europe' were deliberately starved to death."
Very gripping.
Incredible detail of how the Soviet system implemented their "voluntary" collectivization of the Ukrainian farms. The methods described are all the more chilling, when one considers how the US's "voluntary" tax system, and "voluntary" Obamacare system [and more recently and even more coercively - COVID lockdowns and mandates] are implemented. The "voluntary" window-dressing terminology is the same [though with COVID lockdowns, the officials can't even pretend with that fiction any more]. The force behind the plans are the same. The differences of the ruthlessness of the officials, the ability and history of the people to "push back" with legal and forceful means is about all that really separates us. But every year that we have more regulations, more taxes, and less private property, less unrestricted defensive weapons, training and ammo, the easier it gets for the government to go farther. [The COVID mandates illustrated that statement in spades!]
There are points in this book where it is somewhat unbelievable - times when tears and fears and exhaustion would seem to be impossible to overcome. Yet the author's general story, and many details line up with the facts that have been coming out over the last 25-50 years.
The prose of this book is very well done. I finished this book in 5 days because it was so gripping. I rarely finish a book of this size or type so quickly.
If you want to find out about this "Hidden Holocaust" that few know about, but was just as devastating, you could do much worse than this book.
If you want to know how statists of the communist persuasion actually implemented their collectivization schemes on an intransigent public, and the almost inevitable results, here is your book.
If you want a well written book with pathos and incredible human interest, here it is.
----
Other books/sources on this topic that reinforce it:
Harvest of Sorrow by Robert Conquest
Red Famine by Anne Applebaum
Congressional Hearings on the Ukrainian Starvation
Mr. Jones - excellent movie that came out in Dec. 2020 on the journalist who uncovered the story of the Holodomor.
July 13, 2013
This book was strangely tragicomic. On the one hand, the descriptions of starvation, abject suffering and the results (suicide, murder and cannibalism all feature within these pages) were physically painful to read. It had a stronger affect on me, in fact, than the books I've read about the Holocaust.
On the other hand, there were times when I felt like laughing because the Soviet officials brought in to maximize productivity on the collective farm knew NOTHING about farming and they were so stupid it was funny. For instance, at one point the Soviet commissar called a general meeting and spent the time ranting about how there were not enough foals on the farm and how could the mares reproduce when they were locked up in their stalls all day, and henceforth they must be allowed to roam freely, and then they would have more babies. The people listened in silence, and obeyed, because they knew better than to protest, but they knew it would do no good because there were no stallions on the farm.
See what I mean?
To borrow a phrase from Sara Nomberg-Przytyk, the Soviet Union in 1933 was a strange and grotesque land.
The book is kind of caught between being a memoir of the author Miron Dolot's experiences -- he was a boy during this period, about thirteen or so -- and a general report of what happened. It's neither one thing or the other. I do wish he had included more about his family and his personal life. And I wish it hadn't ended so abruptly: "World War II separated us [that is, Dolot and the rest of his family], and what happened after that I don't know."
I looked up Dolot online to see if he had gotten in touch with his family again after the Iron Curtain fell, but I couldn't find out much about him and he's dead now.
On the other hand, there were times when I felt like laughing because the Soviet officials brought in to maximize productivity on the collective farm knew NOTHING about farming and they were so stupid it was funny. For instance, at one point the Soviet commissar called a general meeting and spent the time ranting about how there were not enough foals on the farm and how could the mares reproduce when they were locked up in their stalls all day, and henceforth they must be allowed to roam freely, and then they would have more babies. The people listened in silence, and obeyed, because they knew better than to protest, but they knew it would do no good because there were no stallions on the farm.
See what I mean?
To borrow a phrase from Sara Nomberg-Przytyk, the Soviet Union in 1933 was a strange and grotesque land.
The book is kind of caught between being a memoir of the author Miron Dolot's experiences -- he was a boy during this period, about thirteen or so -- and a general report of what happened. It's neither one thing or the other. I do wish he had included more about his family and his personal life. And I wish it hadn't ended so abruptly: "World War II separated us [that is, Dolot and the rest of his family], and what happened after that I don't know."
I looked up Dolot online to see if he had gotten in touch with his family again after the Iron Curtain fell, but I couldn't find out much about him and he's dead now.
July 2, 2011
It's very hard to imagine people starving from here in suburbia, counting calories and fighting the obesity war. This very personal account of the events in Dolot's village reads like a novel but is a chilling record of the Holodomor or death by starvation of millions of Ukrainians in the 1930s, which was both the results of failed economic policy of the Communists, and a deliberate act of genocide. Tough stuff to read...but essential knowledge.
July 21, 2025
The 1985 memoir Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust (which I am reading on Open library but now definitely want a copy of for my bookshelves) is considered the first book-length and eyewitness account of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin's 1932 to 1933 planned famine, of Stalin's very much deliberate genocide of the Ukrainian people (and that of course, the Soviet soldiers and governmental "officials" who goose-steppingly and with fanatically brainwashed anti-peasantry fervour ruthlessly enforced the famine, who carried out Joseph Stalin's orders should be seen as culpable as well), with author Miron Dolot (under a pseudonym) describing with Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust the Holodomor as he lived through it as a fifteen-year-old, how he and his family somehow managed to survive Stalin's terror famine in their Ukrainian village (and we should also remember that the Holodomor took place within the space of less than one year and that millions of Ukrainians were deliberately starved to death on the orders of Joseph Stalin, with the lowest fatality estimate being around three million and the highest as many as ten million, and that for all intents and purposes, the Holodomor absolutely was and totally needs to be seen as a genocidal, as an on purpose created and carried out holocaust, with Stalin disgustingly and monstrously turning the entire Ukraine into a border-to-border death camp).
And simply but powerfully, Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust painfully, horrifyingly (and for me hugely and justifiably infuriatingly) both shows and also tells (since what Dolot writes in Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust is his personal account, is what he and his family actually experienced) how the Soviet government (and lead by Stalin) induced and created the Holodomor by confiscating the ENTIRE Ukrainian crop after the 1932 harvest (and that indeed means absolutely everything, down to necessary and required seed grain) and then sealing the border, so that all Ukrainian men, women and children were basically imprisoned in their country without access to food, and that Ukrainians who tried to cross into Russia were stopped at the border and if not shot, forcibly repatriated. But in the Ukraine, confiscation of the crop was not the only measure taken, as Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust depicts ALL food provisions being forcibly taken during house-to-house searches, and that when starving Ukrainians resorted to having to eat their pets, it was then putridly and ridiculously declared that the USSR somehow had an urgent need for animal skins, and the GPU, the forerunner of the KGB went on horrid hunting expeditions to kill and cart away thousands of dogs and cats (and indeed, very poignantly heartbreaking for its brutal realism is Miron Dolot describing in Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust Russian soldiers, or rather pathetic barbarically evil demons brutally killing his beloved dog Latka in front of his eyes, tormenting Miron, laughing at him).
Now Dolot's text for Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust opens in the prosperous, still largely undisturbed agrarian culture of his home village (poor but whose inhabitants are textually described by Miron Dolot as being generally pretty happy and contented), proceeds quickly but more than sufficiently informatively through the fear and the violence of Joseph Stalin's enforced collectivisation, climaxes with the horror of the famine (which is brutally honest, textually painful, wholly believable and should in my humble opinion make any reader who is not somehow a frigging Stalinist or an ignorant Vladimir Putin fan both furious and equally so absolutely horrified) and then ends with a pretty rapid denouement (Dolot's life after May 1933 and his ultimate escape as an Ukrainian refugee to the West). And yes, I really do appreciate how Miron Dolot writes Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust in a steady-paced, unadorned and often stylistically simple prose, letting the awful events of the terror famine, of the Holodomor totally and utterly speak for themselves, showing Dolot crying when he cried, but that for the most part, Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust is actually more information and not so much emotion driven, but which at least for me makes the tragedy of the famine in fact much more powerful, much more all-encompassing and also centres the blame and the responsibility for what happened during the Holodomor all the more squarely and specifically, lastingly and permanently on the Soviet state and of course first and foremost on Stalin himself.
Five stars for Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust, highly recommended (and although what Miron Dolot has penned is terrible, is realistically and even naturalistically penned, his memoirs are also in my opinion penned from the perspective of his teenaged self and are thus also appropriate for teenaged readers, that Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust with caveats regarding the realistic themes and often heavily horrifying contents is suitable for readers from about the age of fourteen or so onwards).
And in conclusion, I want to personally say to the United Kingdom, to the United States, to Canada, to France, to Germany, to basically the entire Western Hemisphere (and actually beyond) that we really and truly need to jointly make any kind Holodomor denialism as unacceptable, as horridly racist and as stupidly ignorant as Holocaust denialism is and also mandate that the Holodomor must be taught in EVERY CLASSROOM and also with total contempt for and blame of Joseph Stalin as well as his Soviet state (and that no, accepting that the Holodomor was a deliberate genocide and a major, a total crime against humanity and pointing out that Adolf Hitler and Jospeh Stalin were equally evil and guilty of the mass murders of millions of innocents does not in any way even remotely trivialise the Holocaust either and that anyone who would think the latter is at best hugely naively ignorant).
And simply but powerfully, Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust painfully, horrifyingly (and for me hugely and justifiably infuriatingly) both shows and also tells (since what Dolot writes in Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust is his personal account, is what he and his family actually experienced) how the Soviet government (and lead by Stalin) induced and created the Holodomor by confiscating the ENTIRE Ukrainian crop after the 1932 harvest (and that indeed means absolutely everything, down to necessary and required seed grain) and then sealing the border, so that all Ukrainian men, women and children were basically imprisoned in their country without access to food, and that Ukrainians who tried to cross into Russia were stopped at the border and if not shot, forcibly repatriated. But in the Ukraine, confiscation of the crop was not the only measure taken, as Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust depicts ALL food provisions being forcibly taken during house-to-house searches, and that when starving Ukrainians resorted to having to eat their pets, it was then putridly and ridiculously declared that the USSR somehow had an urgent need for animal skins, and the GPU, the forerunner of the KGB went on horrid hunting expeditions to kill and cart away thousands of dogs and cats (and indeed, very poignantly heartbreaking for its brutal realism is Miron Dolot describing in Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust Russian soldiers, or rather pathetic barbarically evil demons brutally killing his beloved dog Latka in front of his eyes, tormenting Miron, laughing at him).
Now Dolot's text for Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust opens in the prosperous, still largely undisturbed agrarian culture of his home village (poor but whose inhabitants are textually described by Miron Dolot as being generally pretty happy and contented), proceeds quickly but more than sufficiently informatively through the fear and the violence of Joseph Stalin's enforced collectivisation, climaxes with the horror of the famine (which is brutally honest, textually painful, wholly believable and should in my humble opinion make any reader who is not somehow a frigging Stalinist or an ignorant Vladimir Putin fan both furious and equally so absolutely horrified) and then ends with a pretty rapid denouement (Dolot's life after May 1933 and his ultimate escape as an Ukrainian refugee to the West). And yes, I really do appreciate how Miron Dolot writes Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust in a steady-paced, unadorned and often stylistically simple prose, letting the awful events of the terror famine, of the Holodomor totally and utterly speak for themselves, showing Dolot crying when he cried, but that for the most part, Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust is actually more information and not so much emotion driven, but which at least for me makes the tragedy of the famine in fact much more powerful, much more all-encompassing and also centres the blame and the responsibility for what happened during the Holodomor all the more squarely and specifically, lastingly and permanently on the Soviet state and of course first and foremost on Stalin himself.
Five stars for Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust, highly recommended (and although what Miron Dolot has penned is terrible, is realistically and even naturalistically penned, his memoirs are also in my opinion penned from the perspective of his teenaged self and are thus also appropriate for teenaged readers, that Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust with caveats regarding the realistic themes and often heavily horrifying contents is suitable for readers from about the age of fourteen or so onwards).
And in conclusion, I want to personally say to the United Kingdom, to the United States, to Canada, to France, to Germany, to basically the entire Western Hemisphere (and actually beyond) that we really and truly need to jointly make any kind Holodomor denialism as unacceptable, as horridly racist and as stupidly ignorant as Holocaust denialism is and also mandate that the Holodomor must be taught in EVERY CLASSROOM and also with total contempt for and blame of Joseph Stalin as well as his Soviet state (and that no, accepting that the Holodomor was a deliberate genocide and a major, a total crime against humanity and pointing out that Adolf Hitler and Jospeh Stalin were equally evil and guilty of the mass murders of millions of innocents does not in any way even remotely trivialise the Holocaust either and that anyone who would think the latter is at best hugely naively ignorant).
September 29, 2012
There aren't many books available from people who lived through the ukranian famine. As other reviewers have said, this is difficult to read because of its unbelievable horror. I really enjoyed a first person account of this completely under-reported atrocity. Why this isn't more in the forefront of all-time-world-horrors is beyond me.
March 19, 2013
Collectivism and communism are EVIL.
April 7, 2013
Coming soon to a country near you.
Any one of the 50,000,000+ Americans depending upon the State to feed, clothe and/or shelter them would be wise to revisit the human cost of instituting Marxism.
Any one of the 50,000,000+ Americans depending upon the State to feed, clothe and/or shelter them would be wise to revisit the human cost of instituting Marxism.
August 27, 2011
As expected, this book was a hard read. Miron Dolot's memories and thoughts on Ukraine's Holodomor ruminated for 50 years before this book was published. Russian and Ukrainian history is not something that was taught to me in school. I had never heard of the Holodomor until I came to Ukraine as a Peace Corps volunteer. It was every bit as bad as Hitler's Holocaust and every bit as important to study. Dolot does an excellent job of explaining exactly how Stalin was able to execute millions of his own people and why he did it. It's an incredible memoir.
February 9, 2014
Man's inhumanity to man knows no bounds. The paranoia and power-hunger of Stalin's USSR used a systematic approach to annihilating Ukrainian farmers in the early 1930s as the collectivization of the "breadbasket of Europe" failed miserably. Ukrainian farmers were an independent lot, and the Soviets could not tolerate this. Thus the imposed famine that killed 7 million Ukrainian farmers and their families in a matter of two years. A survivor's tale tells all about the death of his village.
May 19, 2013
Great memoir explaining first hand how Stalin's policies directly effected caused the death of millions of Ukrainian farmers between 1930 and 1933.
The author tells his story of surviving as well as dealing with the outrageous demands from the government. Excellent lesson in the outcome of communism and how absolute power corrupts.
The author tells his story of surviving as well as dealing with the outrageous demands from the government. Excellent lesson in the outcome of communism and how absolute power corrupts.
January 28, 2015
To understand why communism does not work in real life, read this true account of forced collectivization and the starvation of the Ukraine in the early 1930s by the Soviet Union's agricultural policies. Be forewarned: graphic descriptions of starvation are in this memoir. A must read for history lovers.
February 23, 2015
Should be required reading for a history lesson in Marxism / Communism / Socialism. It's amazing what one human will do to another when an overreaching government promises goodies in exchange for loyalty to the system, whatever that system is, at the expense of the innocent. Also, a very important lesson in why the 2nd Amendment should never be taken lightly. Why this evil event in history is hardly mentioned is very puzzling!
August 12, 2013
I would like to thank Miron Dolot for his great work of revealing the inconvenient truth that Russia has been trying to hide for many years what the Communism really did for people, even for their own citizens. The Communism is the worst crime committed by humanity since we killed Christ.
October 14, 2019
Account of a nightmare so horrible it is hard to believe.
February 12, 2025
Heartbreaking from beginning to end. The amount of suffering inflicted is astounding. Such an important bearing witness.
April 3, 2023
A must read for anyone who wants to understand European history better. The author is a witness of the one of the most atrocious genocides in the history of mankind.
NOTE: this is an original English edition of the book, and this is the one to be read. There are many Russian translations on the network exist which heavily pervert the text. Beware of the Russian translations. They are part of the Russian informational war against the Ukraine. For those who is interested how it works, get two editions: this one (an original) and any Russian translation (there is one, actually, spread the most) and compare. You'll see exactly what is changed, and understand, why.
NOTE: this is an original English edition of the book, and this is the one to be read. There are many Russian translations on the network exist which heavily pervert the text. Beware of the Russian translations. They are part of the Russian informational war against the Ukraine. For those who is interested how it works, get two editions: this one (an original) and any Russian translation (there is one, actually, spread the most) and compare. You'll see exactly what is changed, and understand, why.
September 26, 2014
This is the story of Stalin's forced collectivization of Ukranian farms in the early 1930's, which the author lived through as a teen. Seven million people in the "breadbasket of Europe" were deliberately starved to death at Stalin's command. Made even more interesting considering what Putin is doing in Ukraine now.
"The farmers had often witnessed the collapse of these types of collective farms (voluntary ones), and therefore laughed at the rumors of collectivization. Why would any government wish to repeat its mistakes?" Indeed.
"The farmers had often witnessed the collapse of these types of collective farms (voluntary ones), and therefore laughed at the rumors of collectivization. Why would any government wish to repeat its mistakes?" Indeed.
March 4, 2009
This book was very powerful in it's descriptions of surviving a famine that is believed to be largely man made. The author's descriptions of his memories were so vivid that at times it made me feel sick to my stomach. This was a great book to inform me of an event that I never even knew took place.
January 8, 2013
Valuable as a historical document, not so much as a piece of literature. The author tells instead of showing. As well, I found the language to be clunky, but perhaps that's unfair of me, considering English is probably the author's second/third/etc language.
December 23, 2014
This story by a survivor of the 1932-1933 Execution by Hunger of at least 7 million Ukrainians by the Soviets was a very painful read for me because of a close personal connection. My maternal family lived through it in the same oblast of Ukraine as the author.
September 3, 2010
Interesting but tragic. I am constantly amazed and bewildered by man's inhumanity to man.
March 25, 2011
An absorbing first person account of Stalin and Lenin's "Terror-Famine" aimed at exterminating their political enemies by starving them to death. A chilling and cautionary tale.
June 25, 2013
Best book Ive read this year, I cant believe it isnt more widely known.
January 18, 2016
Less grim than the previous one I read on Ukraine
February 1, 2016
Probably one of the most horrific books I have ever read. It is amazing this story is not better know. A detailed account of collectivization of farms and the atrocity of hunger
February 4, 2020
Gripping recount of the starvation that Ukraine went through under the Socialist regime.
November 5, 2014
Genocide by hunger. The Communists, again, on amurder spree.
February 21, 2023
Simon Starow (1916-1998), pseudonim literacki Miron Dolot, był synem ukraińskiego rolnika. Można powiedzieć, że dorastał wraz z rosyjskim komunizmem, a potem przeżył jako nastolatek Wielki głód na Ukrainie (Hołodomor, Голодомор) – wywołaną sztucznie przez komunistyczne władze ZSRR klęskę głodu w latach 1932–1933, która szczególnie dotknęła wieś ukraińską. W czasie wojny trafił do niewoli niemieckiej, potem do zachodniej strefy okupacyjnej, a po wojnie wyemigrował do USA, gdzie został profesorem języków słowiańskich i pisarzem najbardziej znanym ze swych prac dotyczących historii Ukrainy.
„Zabić głodem. Sowieckie ludobójstwo na Ukrainie” to świadectwo. Świadectwo zbrodni popełnionej przez komunistyczną Rosję, która nie ma odpowiednika w historii świata. To też przejmujące przypomnienie tragedii narodu ukraińskiego skazanego przez Stalina na śmierć głodową. Zamiarem Stalina było bowiem zlikwidowanie wszystkich samodzielnych chłopów ukraińskich, gdyż uważał, że oni właśnie są kręgosłupem ukraińskiej tożsamości narodowej, ostoją tradycji i ukraińskiego umiłowania wolności. Poza tym Ukraina nie tylko była solą w oku Rosji stalinowskiej, ale jest nią i obecnie. Zawsze można stłamszonym, zubożałym Rosjanom jakoś pokrętnie wytłumaczyć, dlaczego na przykład w Polsce dzieje się ludziom lepiej, bo Polacy zawsze byli obcy, ale Ukraińcy byli „swoi”, więc jak wytłumaczyć, że jest im lepiej i że nie chcą iść rosyjską drogą?
Choć dzieło ma formę wspomnień dziecka, a później nastolatka, tworzy spójny i wyrazisty obraz z opracowaniami historycznymi, jak choćby ze świetnym „Czerwonym głodem” (Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine:1921-1933) Anne Applebaum czy też tak znanymi arcydziełami jak „Archipelag Gułag” Sołżenicyna. Ze względu na subiektywną formę, na perspektywę ofiary znajdującej się w samym sercu horroru z piekła rodem, lektura jest przejmująca, a koszt emocjonalny jej poznania spory. Jednak, podobnie jak i oba wspomniane wyżej dzieła, stanowi jeden z kluczy do poznania przyczyn i faktycznego stanu dzisiejszej Rosji, Ukrainy oraz ich wzajemnych stosunków. To jedna z lektur absolutnie must read dla każdego, kto chce wiedzieć i rozumieć.
Wiele osób koncentruje się na Putinie czy Stalinie nie zwracając uwagi na ciągłość procesów historycznych, które ukształtowały dzisiejszą Rosję i choć ci dwaj dyktatorzy pełnią w nim wyjątkową rolę, to nie należy jej przeceniać i łudzić się, że Rosja bez Putina może stać się normalnym krajem, cokolwiek to znaczy.
Warto też podkreślić fascynującą różnicę między Ukraińcami, Rosjanami i na przykład Polakami. Z wszystkich trzech narodów Ukraińcy zostali najbardziej sterroryzowani przez komunizm i doznali największych strat osobowych (straty w wyniku Hołodomoru przewyższają znacznie nawet straty narodu polskiego w następstwie II wojny światowej), a w dodatku ich dzieje jako narodu praktycznie pozbawionego własnej odrębnej historii i państwowości (w porównaniu do wieków samodzielnej Rosji i Polski) nie dają żadnych podstaw do wytłumaczenia fenomenu ukraińskiego umiłowania wolności, którego obecna wojna jest kolejnym przykładem. Ciekawym by było dogłębne poznanie tematu mechanizmów społecznych, które pozwoliły Ukraińcom mimo przeciwności wytworzyć w tak krótkim historycznie czasie tak silne poczucie tożsamości i determinację do walki o niepodległość.
Lektura jest też łakomym kąskiem dla tych, których fascynuje problematyka inteligencji przetrwania w warunkach ekstremalnych, bowiem autor, któremu ojca komuniści zamordowali już w 1919, raczej nie był tym, komu by można prorokować przetrwanie, a jednak przeżył i Hołodomor, i II wojnę.
„Zabić głodem” to dzieło wybitne zarówno jako subiektywne świadectwo, jako wyrzut moralny i przejmujące emocjonalnie studium człowieczeństwa i odczłowieczenia, ale i jako dokument będący niezbędnym elementem do zrozumienia dzisiejszej Rosji i Ukrainy. Zachęcam do zmierzenia się z tą lekturą
„Zabić głodem. Sowieckie ludobójstwo na Ukrainie” to świadectwo. Świadectwo zbrodni popełnionej przez komunistyczną Rosję, która nie ma odpowiednika w historii świata. To też przejmujące przypomnienie tragedii narodu ukraińskiego skazanego przez Stalina na śmierć głodową. Zamiarem Stalina było bowiem zlikwidowanie wszystkich samodzielnych chłopów ukraińskich, gdyż uważał, że oni właśnie są kręgosłupem ukraińskiej tożsamości narodowej, ostoją tradycji i ukraińskiego umiłowania wolności. Poza tym Ukraina nie tylko była solą w oku Rosji stalinowskiej, ale jest nią i obecnie. Zawsze można stłamszonym, zubożałym Rosjanom jakoś pokrętnie wytłumaczyć, dlaczego na przykład w Polsce dzieje się ludziom lepiej, bo Polacy zawsze byli obcy, ale Ukraińcy byli „swoi”, więc jak wytłumaczyć, że jest im lepiej i że nie chcą iść rosyjską drogą?
Choć dzieło ma formę wspomnień dziecka, a później nastolatka, tworzy spójny i wyrazisty obraz z opracowaniami historycznymi, jak choćby ze świetnym „Czerwonym głodem” (Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine:1921-1933) Anne Applebaum czy też tak znanymi arcydziełami jak „Archipelag Gułag” Sołżenicyna. Ze względu na subiektywną formę, na perspektywę ofiary znajdującej się w samym sercu horroru z piekła rodem, lektura jest przejmująca, a koszt emocjonalny jej poznania spory. Jednak, podobnie jak i oba wspomniane wyżej dzieła, stanowi jeden z kluczy do poznania przyczyn i faktycznego stanu dzisiejszej Rosji, Ukrainy oraz ich wzajemnych stosunków. To jedna z lektur absolutnie must read dla każdego, kto chce wiedzieć i rozumieć.
Wiele osób koncentruje się na Putinie czy Stalinie nie zwracając uwagi na ciągłość procesów historycznych, które ukształtowały dzisiejszą Rosję i choć ci dwaj dyktatorzy pełnią w nim wyjątkową rolę, to nie należy jej przeceniać i łudzić się, że Rosja bez Putina może stać się normalnym krajem, cokolwiek to znaczy.
Warto też podkreślić fascynującą różnicę między Ukraińcami, Rosjanami i na przykład Polakami. Z wszystkich trzech narodów Ukraińcy zostali najbardziej sterroryzowani przez komunizm i doznali największych strat osobowych (straty w wyniku Hołodomoru przewyższają znacznie nawet straty narodu polskiego w następstwie II wojny światowej), a w dodatku ich dzieje jako narodu praktycznie pozbawionego własnej odrębnej historii i państwowości (w porównaniu do wieków samodzielnej Rosji i Polski) nie dają żadnych podstaw do wytłumaczenia fenomenu ukraińskiego umiłowania wolności, którego obecna wojna jest kolejnym przykładem. Ciekawym by było dogłębne poznanie tematu mechanizmów społecznych, które pozwoliły Ukraińcom mimo przeciwności wytworzyć w tak krótkim historycznie czasie tak silne poczucie tożsamości i determinację do walki o niepodległość.
Lektura jest też łakomym kąskiem dla tych, których fascynuje problematyka inteligencji przetrwania w warunkach ekstremalnych, bowiem autor, któremu ojca komuniści zamordowali już w 1919, raczej nie był tym, komu by można prorokować przetrwanie, a jednak przeżył i Hołodomor, i II wojnę.
„Zabić głodem” to dzieło wybitne zarówno jako subiektywne świadectwo, jako wyrzut moralny i przejmujące emocjonalnie studium człowieczeństwa i odczłowieczenia, ale i jako dokument będący niezbędnym elementem do zrozumienia dzisiejszej Rosji i Ukrainy. Zachęcam do zmierzenia się z tą lekturą
January 16, 2023
During the years of 1932-3, seven million Ukrainians died of starvation. In his book, Execution by Hunger: the Hidden Holocaust, Miron Dilot’s describes the Ukrainian countryside before the Russian invasion:
"The plains were divided into strips of fields. Every spring and summer these strips would disappear beneath miles of wheat. Waves of rich grain, green in spring and golden in summer, gently rolled in the summer breeze. After the harvest, the fields again bared their soil as if in mourning for their lost beauty. Near the end of the year, the new cycle of color--winter's white--blended with the horizon of the plains into the gray-blue frosty sky.”
This was the land of the Ukrainian farmers. They lived in one or two-room huts with dirt floors. They cared for their families, their farms, their animals, and their crops. Then came the Russians with their plan to “collectivize” the Ukrainian countryside, to rid the country of the “rich farmers” they called “kufkuls,” to turn peasants into slaves of the state. The country that was once the breadbasket of Europe was nearly destroyed.
Under the direct orders of Stalin, Russian thugs seized the land, what food the peasants had stored, and even their seed. They imposed taxes on the poor farmers that were impossible to pay. They killed pets and left their bodies rot.
They accused anyone whose had a tin roof on their huts of being a kufkul. The Ukrainian people were left with nothing. Those who resisted this forced “collectivization” were threatened, stripped of their possessions, arrested, tortured, loaded onto trains, sent off to be never heard from again.
Mass starvation resulted. Piles of corpses littered the countryside. Thatched-roof houses became tombs for peasant families who once lived there.
Miron Dilot was a boy of fourteen when these things happened. Fifty years later he wrote of what he and others in the Ukrainian countryside endured. He tells the story of the total indifference of the Russians to the suffering and despair of the people.
The incompetence of these propagandists sent to rob the people of their land and their way of life is on full display. Horses died for lack of the most basic care. Basic tools needed to work the land were seized. Machinery promised did not materialize. When the farmers became too weak to work their fields, they accused them of being traitors.
If Stalin’s aim was to neutralize the nationalism of the Ukrainian people, to stop the country’s drift toward Europe and democracy, he failed. Miserably.
The story of the famine in Ukraine has been largely suppressed. Even today, Russia will not admit to what they did. But the Ukrainians remember. It is the reason they are fighting so hard today to preserve their democracy.
When I finished this book, I needed time to reflect on what I had read. Weeks later I wonder: can one ever understand such cruelty, such disregard for human suffering, such horror?
In the light of the Russian war against Ukraine that is currently raging, Russian attacks on hospitals, apartment buildings, infrastructure, and schools, could there be a more important book?
If Putin were to read this book, he might begin to understand why he will never be able to conquer this country and its people.
Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust truly deserves five stars.
"The plains were divided into strips of fields. Every spring and summer these strips would disappear beneath miles of wheat. Waves of rich grain, green in spring and golden in summer, gently rolled in the summer breeze. After the harvest, the fields again bared their soil as if in mourning for their lost beauty. Near the end of the year, the new cycle of color--winter's white--blended with the horizon of the plains into the gray-blue frosty sky.”
This was the land of the Ukrainian farmers. They lived in one or two-room huts with dirt floors. They cared for their families, their farms, their animals, and their crops. Then came the Russians with their plan to “collectivize” the Ukrainian countryside, to rid the country of the “rich farmers” they called “kufkuls,” to turn peasants into slaves of the state. The country that was once the breadbasket of Europe was nearly destroyed.
Under the direct orders of Stalin, Russian thugs seized the land, what food the peasants had stored, and even their seed. They imposed taxes on the poor farmers that were impossible to pay. They killed pets and left their bodies rot.
They accused anyone whose had a tin roof on their huts of being a kufkul. The Ukrainian people were left with nothing. Those who resisted this forced “collectivization” were threatened, stripped of their possessions, arrested, tortured, loaded onto trains, sent off to be never heard from again.
Mass starvation resulted. Piles of corpses littered the countryside. Thatched-roof houses became tombs for peasant families who once lived there.
Miron Dilot was a boy of fourteen when these things happened. Fifty years later he wrote of what he and others in the Ukrainian countryside endured. He tells the story of the total indifference of the Russians to the suffering and despair of the people.
The incompetence of these propagandists sent to rob the people of their land and their way of life is on full display. Horses died for lack of the most basic care. Basic tools needed to work the land were seized. Machinery promised did not materialize. When the farmers became too weak to work their fields, they accused them of being traitors.
If Stalin’s aim was to neutralize the nationalism of the Ukrainian people, to stop the country’s drift toward Europe and democracy, he failed. Miserably.
The story of the famine in Ukraine has been largely suppressed. Even today, Russia will not admit to what they did. But the Ukrainians remember. It is the reason they are fighting so hard today to preserve their democracy.
When I finished this book, I needed time to reflect on what I had read. Weeks later I wonder: can one ever understand such cruelty, such disregard for human suffering, such horror?
In the light of the Russian war against Ukraine that is currently raging, Russian attacks on hospitals, apartment buildings, infrastructure, and schools, could there be a more important book?
If Putin were to read this book, he might begin to understand why he will never be able to conquer this country and its people.
Execution by Hunger: The Hidden Holocaust truly deserves five stars.
April 17, 2019
Simon Starow Is the author of this book about the genocide of the Ukrainian people in the years 1931-33. Russian Communists hated Ukraine nationalism and conspired to kill as many Ukrainians as possible by deprivation. First, they forced the farmers into collectivization by ruthless, insidious ways. Next, they demanded the livestock, and forced them to produce ever higher portions of grain. Taxation was added until there simply wasn't anything more to give. Refusing to admit that they were starving the people to death, Communist party officials insisted that those who died in this way were too lazy to work. more than 7 million Ukrainians died in this way. The book ends suddenly, when Starow finds a way to get into higher education and leave the country, eventually fighting in WWII and becoming a POW for a time in Germany. For whatever reason, he never attempted to find his mother and brother he left behind, and emigrated to the U.S. where he became a professor in a university in Monterey, CA.
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