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Belorussian Review
8
September
1960
CONTENTS
N. NEDASЕК National Self-Determination under the Soviets
U. HLYBINNY The Latest Developments in the Struggle for the Independence of Belorussian Culture
ANTHONY ADAMОVICH The Official Parnassus of Belorussian Literature
H. KOSTYUK The Twentieth Anniversary of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and Soviet Westward Expansion
I. KONASH Rail Transport in Belorussia
S. KABYSH Polesye and the Problem of the Reclamation of the Peat Bogs in Belorussia
A. PARAMONOV The Present Condition of the Belorussian Forests
Ten Years of the Institute for the Study of the USSR 1950-1960
National Self-Determination under the Soviets
N. NEDASЕК
The … center of the stage, and there ever since, for weal or woe, it has obstinately clung."1
However, even all specialists do not know that the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party from which the Bolsheviks, or Communists, who represented the Soviets, later emerged, had proclaimed the principle of national self-determination at its very formation in 1898; in fact, recognizing "the right of self-determination for any nationality" was then the only formulated principle of its program.2 And the Bolsheviks never dropped this principle from their program. In addition, they also claim that after they came to power they actually carried out this principle consistently in the areas they dominated. These claims are disputed by Western specialists who maintain that "the Communist regime... had in practice denied the right of all-around self-determination, and turned the right of secession into a pious protestation."3
This observation suggests that where self-determination is concerned, theory and practice do not coincide—a point that students of Bolshevism are fond of pressing in other contexts as well. When we examine the question closely, we see that most discussions of the relation between Bolshevik theory and Bolshevik practice fail to take a third factor into account—the propadanda factor. Bolshevik practice is always founded on certain definite theoretical principles. However, not all theoretical principles can actually be put into practice or are even meant to be put into practice—they exist only in the world of propaganda, of pseudo-theory. If ever they emerge in the world of practice, they become fictions, which are nevertheless put forward as facts. Students of Bolshevism often fail toi allow for this specially Bolshevik expedient of claiming absolute reality for obvious fiction; hence their interpretations of the principles and the practices of Bolshevism are often superficial and inadequate.
What are the facts and fictions in the theory and practice of national self-determination under the Soviets?
After the Revolution in Russia, during 1917—18, in a number of the borderlands new independent states were proclaimed one after another on the basis of the same rights to national self-determination which, as we have seen, the Soviets themselves "had brought into the center of the stage." The Soviets recognized the new independent states in one way or another. At the same time, they at once began trying to drive out the democratic regimes of the new independent countries and to establish in their place Soviet republics, also proclaimed as independent. In the early twenties they finally succeeded in Belorussia, the Ukraine, Azerbaidzhan, Armenia and Georgia, but they failed in Poland and the Baltic states (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania). As a Western student (W. R. Batsel) has rightly observed:
The policy as concerns the Baltic states and Poland was, in general, a repetition of the attitude toward the Ukraine, White Russia, and the Caucasus. There was, to begin with, what appeared to be a very hearty recognition of the right of these states to enjoy a separate existence. Then followed support from Moscow of the Soviet governments proclaimed in these republics. Such governments, if enabled to maintain their authority, would have been, of course, as subservient to Moscow as was the case with the Soviet governments of the Ukraine and White Russia. Supported by France and Great Britain, however, the new Baltic States and Poland were able to maintain their independence.4
There is no necessity to describe here at length the events sketched above— they are reported accurately enough in a number of studies by Western scholars, such as W. R. Batsell's Soviet Rule in Russia, W. Kolarz's Russia and Her Colonies, and R. Pipes' The Formation of the Soviet Union. Let us examine the Communist policy on self-determination hidden behind those events and establish its true purport.
It is well known that the Communists proceed from the first premise of Marxism—that the proletariat is the class predestined by the inexorable laws of economic development to transform the present human society into a classless Communist society. However, this idea has undergone what we might call "fictivization," and as a result, the active and all-determining factor itself, the "proletariat," no longer really exists at all except as the instrument used by propaganda to effect the transformation of society and as the fictitious base on which the new society is to be built. Lenin narrowed the base by substituting the "avant-garde of the proletariat," the Communist Party, for the "proletariat" as a whole. The real bond between the "proletariat" and the "party of the proletariat" is rather spiritual than physical; the Party is the sole ideological repository and agent of this class and acts in the name of the "proletariat" even when it is dealing with the proletariat itself, The Party is the only active and all-determining political factor. In the "proletarian state" that it is creating, it alone controls the "dictatorship of the proletariat" and therefore, in fact, it alone is the state. According to the Communist Manifesto of Marx and Engels, "the proletariat must first of all acquire political supremacy, must rise to be the leading class of the nation, must constitute itself the nation."5 Therefore, since the Party has been substituted for the proletariat, the Party is indentified with the nation. In actual fact, the Communist Party is a nation if we accept the most general definition of one Western expert, that "any territorial community, the members of which are conscious of themselves as members of a community and wish to maintain the identity of their community, is a nation."6 And in fact one of Lenin's early opponents (F. Xiebmann) was right when he said: "Consequently, to the question: what nationality do you belong to? The worker must answer: `I am a Social-Democrat.' (Now he should say, "a Communist.") Lenin himself could find no substantial argument against this statement; all he could do was to make ironic remarks about "the acme of wit" of his opponent.7
Hence, for the Communists, true national self-determination is in fact only Party self-determination, or, more precisely, national self-determination at the party level, the highest level for the Communists. And the facts of history show that the Russian Communists emphatically barred this kind of self-determination at the outset.
When in 1901 the Bund, the Jewish party that had taken an active part in organizing the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party, demanded national self-determination for itself within the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party as the "independent party of the Jewish proletariat," most Russian Social Democrats, and particularly the Bolsheviks, were violently opposed. Lenin attacked the Bund's demands several times in the press and at the Second Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party in 1903. He declared:
We must act as a single and centralized fighting organization; we must have behind us the whole of the proletariat, without distinction of language or nationality, a proletariat whose unity is cemented by having constantly to solve problems of theory and practice, of tactics and organizations, in common; we must not set up organizations that would march separately, each along its own track; we must not weaken our offensive by breaking up into a number of independent political parties; we must not breed estrangement and isolation.8
In the Bund dispute Lenin repeatedly condemned "the absurd and reactionary viewpoint of the `independent workers' party" and advocated for the first time complete assimilation of the Jews. Later he repeatedly extolled: "the assimilation of nations, which manifests itself more and more powerfully with every passing decade, is one of the greater motive forces that are transforming Capitalism into Socialism."9 For him not only the assimilation of Jews but also the assimilation "of the Great-Russian and Ukrainian proletariat is an undoubted fact. And this fact is absolutely progressive."10
Attacking the Bund, Lenin went so far as to say that "Zionism appears to be a greater enemy to Social Democracy than anti-Semitism.. . the Zionist movement is a more immediate threat to the development of the class organization of the proletariat than anti-Semitism."11
The chief reason for this rejection of national self-determination on the party level lay in Lenin's conviction, which he inherited from Marx and Engels, that "the centralized large state marks a tremendous historical step forward from medieval disintegration towards the future socialist unity of the whole world, and except through such a state {inseparably connected with Capitalism), there is no road to Socialism, nor can there be."12
Hence, such a state, as Russia for instance, is to be preserved through a single and indivisible centralized party identified with it—the Russian Communist Party in the present case (or, after Russia became the Soviet Union—the All-Union Communist Party, now the Communist Party of the Soviet Union). Self-determination on national grounds cannot be tolerated within it, nor has it ever been tolerated.
The Communist parties of Belorussia, the Ukraine, and the other Soviet republics are not products of national self-determination at the party level. They only represent the territorial subdivisions of the single Communist Party of the Soviet Union, and their Central Committees "enjoy the rights of the regional single and indivisible centralized party identified with it—the Russian Committee of the Russian Communist Party,"13 as laid down by the Eighth Party Congress in 1919. Whenever the national Communist parties sprang up spontaneously, as did the Belorussian Social Democratic Workers' Party (Bolshevik) in 1917, the Belorussian Communist Organization in 1919—20, and the Ukrainian Communist parties ("Ukapists" and "Borotbists"), they were subsequently integrated into the corresponding territorial organizations of die Russian Communist Party (the Comunist parties of Belorussia and th* Ukraine), and assimilated politically, or "bolshevized." All attempts at national self-determination on the Party level for these or any groups inside the Russian Communist | Party were nipped in the bud. In Stalin's time, especially during the Yezhov period, the former members of the abovenamed parties were physically "liquidated." Prohibition of national self-determination, integration, assimilation, and even "liquidation"—this was what the Communist national self-determination policy became at the Party level. In fact, the world Communist movement knows of only one successful case of national self-determination at the Party level; Tito's Yugoslavia.
Having barred national self-determination at the Party level, the Com-j munists seem to permit it on the government or administrative level. Since for Communists the Party is the sole political organization, Soviet politics means j Party policy. But because the Party is identified with the state, all the state forms, which have preserved their separate existence to outward appearances but have lost their political independence, no longer have any meaning except as administrative forms. They have fallen from the political level to the administrative level. As political entities they proved to be fictions, and national self-determination, which is the political principle behind the forms, could be nothing more than a fiction either. The creation of the Soviet "independent" republics mentioned above marked a stage in the process of tie "fictivization" of national self-determination. It seemed safe to the Communist Party dictatorship, to permit this kind of "self-determination," especially because it brought other advantages to the Party.
However, some Communists failed to see the expediency of this policy and observing how fictitious national self-determination was under the circumstances, they proposed dropping self-determination from the Party program. At the Eighth Party Congress, Pyatakov argued this view energetically. Opposing him, another delegate, Osinsky, distinguished "three senses" in the principle under discussion:
First, the declarative sense. We declare that we are for the liberation of peoples. Furthermore, this is not just an abstract declaration of principle, as Comrades Pyatakov and Bukharin would have it, but a concrete program of action. We declare that we give the right of self-determination to the people and we demonstrate that only we can do such a thing. Second, this is the slogan that neutializes the national struggle itself. Third, this is an "unmasking" slogan.14
Osinsky and other speakers at the Congress were especially concerned with "unmasking" President Wilson, who was a thorn in the side of the Communists at that time, especially because of his advocacy of national self-determination.
But Lenin himself struck the final blow when lie "unmasked" Pyatakov, revealing that "the sense of his speech was as follows: what's the use of all this self-determination, if we have an excellent Central Committee in Moscow? It is a childish point of view. It forgets about all the other countries."15 The Communists championed the principle of national self-determination largely in order to stir up nationalist discontent in other countries. What seemed a safe fiction at home, could and would inspire the irredentist and separatist movements abroad, where distance made it difficult to distinguish fiction from fact. There was another aspect of this problem, however, that Lenin failed to mention; an aspect of such immediate and vital importance that it may have seemed best not even to acknowledge—namely, national self-dermination within the country itself. Only much later, in 1924, his successor, Stalin, admitted the fact that "the national movement proved to be far more weighty a factor... than might have appeared formerly, in the period prior to the war, or in the period prior to the October Revolution."16 This was the factor that Osinsky had in mind when he spoke about "neutralizing the national struggle itself" by means of the slogan of national self-determination. The fictitious introduction of this slogan at the government level had just that object in mind.
Nevertheless, the "fierivization" of national self-determination in government continued to puzzle some Communists. At the Twelfth Party Congress, in 1923, a Georgian Communist, Philip Maharadze, observed:
We speak here about independent Soviet republics. One has to be extremely cautious here not to exaggerate anything.
Comrades, it is clear to everybody, what sort of independence this is. Indeed, we have a single central organ, which decides absolutely everything for all the republics, even for the smallest; it even nominates the responsible leaders for the republics. Everything comes from this single organ. Therefore, even to speak about independence here is completely meaningless.17
This warning against taking fictions for facts was to the point. However, there was another and greater danger for the inventors of fictions, namely, that fictions might be turned into facts, that instead of facts being "fictivized," fictions might be "factualized." Any fiction persistently put forward as a fact eventually tends to become a fact. Actually, while the Communists were busy turning facts into fictions, their nationalist opponents, and even their own simple, conscientious and credulous followers were trying, on the contrary, to convert, or reconvert, those fictions into facts. In truth, the entire conflict between the Bolsheviks and their nationalist opponents stemmed from this cross purpose. To prevent "factualization" and to preserve "the large centralized state" administratively, as far as possible, governmental functions had to be integrated just as Party and policy had already been integrated. The word used to describe the process of government integration was, "federation."
The Communists always rejected federation where it contributed to disintegration or mere decentralization of the "large centralized state," but they accepted it as far as it would contribute to the integration and centialization of the state which was tending toward, or was threatened by, disintegration or decentralization, as was the case with the Russian Empire in 1917. Of course, since the governments of the Soviet republics were not permitted the power of determining policy, "federation" there was also a fiction, being only another name for integration. The history of Soviet "federation" is fairly well presented in the works mentioned above, especially in R. Pipes' The Formation of the Soviet Union. It runs through the period of "treaty relations" between the "independent" Soviet republics up to the formation of the USSR. Some Communists of the national republics, as for example the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Ukraine, in its letter of October 3, 1922,18 still opposed forming the USSR on the ground that "tactical centralized management of the independent republics can be fully attained by means of directives through Party channels.'3
Attempts were also made to exploit "confederation" as anotler fiction to be used for attaining the same goal of integration. These attempts are less known, because they were not so widely discussed. However, they found their way into practice and remain there even now. Stalin suggested the idea of "confederation" to Lenin in 1920, when Lenin was busy with the final formulation of the principles of Soviet "federation," drafting his theses on the nationality and colonial problems for the Second Comintern Congress. In his letter to Lenin of January 12, 1920, in connection with these theses, Stalin wrote:
Confederation is one of the transitional forms of rapprochement between the toilers of various nations. For the nations which were a part of old Russia, our (Soviet) type of federation could and should be considered the fitting and proper way to international unity. The reasons are clear: these nationalities had either not had their own statehood in the past or had lost it long ago, and therefore the Soviet (centralized) type of federation is being assimilated by them with no particular frictions. One cannot say the same of those nationalities which wore not a part of old Russia, which existed independently and developed their own statehood and which, if they should become Soviet, would be compelled by the force of events to enter into some kind of state relations or other with Soviet Russia, as for example, the future Soviet Germany, Poland, Hungary and Finland. Would these nationalities, having their own statehood, their armies, their finances, would they, if they should become Soviet, consent to enter at once into a federative relation of the Bashkir or Ukrainian type with Soviet Russia (in your theses you differentiate between the Bashkir and the Ukrainian type of federative relation, but in reality there is no such difference, or it is so insignificant that it equals zero), because they would consider a federation of the Soviet type a form of curtailment of their state independence, or as an attempt at the latter. I have no doubt that for these nationalities a confederation (a union of independent states) would be the most acceptable. I do not even speak of the backward nationalities, for example, of Persia, or Turkey, in regard to whom, or for whom, the Soviet type of federation and federation in general would be even more unacceptable.19
We have no documentary evidence of what Lenin thought of Stalin's ides, of "confederation." At any rate, it was not expressed in Lenin's theses mentioned above, and the very term "confederation" was never again used, not even by Stalin himself. Nevertheless, in accordance with this idea, a number of fictitiously independent "republics" were formed on territories which had never belonged to Tsarist Russia. They were called "people's republics," and later came to be known in the West as "satellites." The formation of these "republics" began as early as the spring of 1920, i. e., soon after Stalin's abovementioned letter to Lenin. The first were the "people's republics" of Khorezm (Khiva) and Bukhara (soon afterward abolished when their territory was incorporated into the USSR); next came the "people's republic" of Tannu-Tuva (also abolished when its territory was incorporated into the USSR) and the "people's republic" of Mongolia (still in existence); finally, after World War II, the Western "people's republics" including Rumania, Hungary, and East Germany, were formed, and the word "satellite" became current in the West. The fictitious nature of this "national self-determination" according to Stalin's old idea of "confederation" is clear enough in the Free World. The fictitious nature of the Soviet "federation" itself once again becomes clear from Stalin's letter quoted above, from his emphasis that the "way to international unity," i. e., integration, is the goal of "federation," and especially from the difference he pointed out between the "Bashkir" and the "Ukrainian" type of federation (i. e. between a "federation" of "autonomous" republics, such as those in the RSFSR, and a "federation" of "independent" republics, such as those in the USSR).
With the formation of the USSR, the fiction of Soviet national self-determination was last expressed in the well-known paragraph of the Constitution of the USSR on the right of the Union republics to secede from the Union. But Stalin himself had already explained authoritatively and conclusively in 1920:
We are for the secession of India, Arabia, Egypt, Morocco and other colonies from the Entente, because secession in this case would mean the liberation of those oppressed countries from imperialism and a strengthening of the positions of the revolution. We are against the secession of the border regions from Russia, because secession in that case would mean imperialist bondage for the border regions, a weakening of the revolutionary might of Russia and a strengthening of the position , o*f imperialism.20
Speaking at the First Congress of Soviets of the USSR on December 30, 1922, where the formation of the USSR was proclaimed, Stalin solemnly announced:
Today ... is ... the day of triumph of the new Russia отег the old Russia, the Russia that was the gendarme of Europe, the Russia that was the hangman of Asia. Today is the day of triumph of the new Russia, whicJi has smashed the chains of national oppression, organized victory over capital, crtated the dictatorship of the proletariat, awakened the peoples of the East, inspired the workers of the West, transformed the Red Flag from a Party Banner into a State Banner and rallied around that banner the peoples of the Soviet republics in order to unite them into a single state, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the prototype of the future World Soviet Socialist Republic.21
The sacred goal attained, the "large centralized state" was established once and for all, thanks to the "fictivized national self-determination." For the lover of high-flown language, the state even retained its historical name, Russia, with a single, rather political, modifier—"new." It is well known that even the odious "old Russia," "the gendarme of Europe, the hangman of Asia.," was "rehabilitated" a little later with the blessings of the same Stalin. As an emigre scholar recently put it,
... the reasoning implicit in this strange turn of the dialectic ... is reminiscent of the decadent exercises of philosophers such as Diodorus Cronus. It is as follows: Peoples making up the Soviet Union have the good fortune to live under the Communist regime. To what do they owe this good fortune? To the fact that they are a part of the USSR. How did this occur? By virtue of their having been conquered by Tsarist imperialism. Consequently, Tsarist imperialism is a salutary phenomenon inasmuch as it prepared the way to socialism and assured in advance th« happiness of the future Soviet peoples. . . . the Tsarist empire and the Soviet Union constitute a unified whole, a historical continuity. Everything that is or was anti-Russian is by the same token anti-Soviet.22
However, the latter formula is merely one of the expressions of the policy which was once termed "Russo-Sovietization"23 and which usually, but, in my opinion, inexactly, is called Russification. This is another aspect of the assimilation that was called "Bolshevization" when applied to the Party. As "Russo-Sovietization," the assimilation has been even more strikingly evident at other levels of Communist policy, at the cultural and linguistic levels, although the "fictivization" and integration which form its basis began to appear here much later.
Before the Revolution of 1917, the Central European (more precisely, German) concept of a nation as a cultural category was widespread in the Russian Empire, while the "Western European (Anglo-French) concept of a nation as a political category was hardly even known. Because of this, the national movements of the peoples of the Empire were mostly of a cultural orientation. Politically they simply entered the broad, common opposition, revolutionary and anti-government front throughout the Empire, and as a rule they formulated no private claims for political national self-determination in the sense of independent statehood, but limited themselves to demands for national autonomy. In Paragraph 11 of its program, one of the most popular parties in the Empire, the opposition liberal party of the Constitutional Democrats ("Cadets"), formulated the thesis of cultural, but not political, self-determination for the peoples of the Empire, correctly expressing the convergent trend in the aspirations of the national movements of those peoples at that time. Lenin had sharply criticized that paragraph of the program of the "Cadets," holding it up to the old paragraph of the program of the Russian Social Democrats on national self-determination which he interpreted, in the sense of the Western European concept, as "just political self-determination, the right of forming an independent national state."24 It is well known that while advocating political independence for the peoples of the Empire, Lenin bitterly condemned recognition of their right to cultural autonomy, whereas the "Menshevik" wing of the Russian Social Democrats had already recognized this right under the influence of the Austrian Social Democrats.
Lenin's controversial, "dialectical" tactics are easy to understand: before the Revolution, advocating political independence was quite safe and propagandistically effective as long as the national movements themselves made no such claims, while recognition of the cultural autonomy actually demanded by these movements would mean laying the foundation for disintegration of the "large centralized state," or, at least, providing a possible precedent for it. After the Revolution, however, when, according to Stalin, "the fact that the national movement proved to be far more weighty a factor . . . than might have appeared formerly" had become clear to the Bolsheviks, and the national movements began to advocate national self-determination themselves, trying even to establish their own independent states for the first time, these tactics had to be changed: it was safer to satisfy the traditional, and still the principal, aspirations of these movements, their cultural aspirations, in order to "neutralize" them as far as possible at the political level. In the first years of Bolshevist policy, as a Western scholar rightly observed, "the Communists were in fact paying homage to the social-democrat principle of cultural autonomy which they had condemned so bitterly in pre-Revolutionary days."25 But having started out on this path, they even had to condemn some of the arguments in favor of what was, according to Lenin, "absolutely progressive" national assimilation. And the Twelfth Party Congress in 1923 was compelled to state:
Talk of the advantages of Russian culture and the promotion of the thesis that the more advanced Russian culture will inevitably win out over the cultures of the more backward peoples (the Ukrainian culture, the Azerbaidzhan, Uzbek, Kirgiz, etc.) are nothing more than an attempt to consolidate the domination of the Great Russian nationality. Therefore, the decisive struggle against survivals of Russian Chauvinism is the first and foremost task of our Party.26
Of course, such a line could not help laying the foundations for disintegration of the "large centralized state" at the cultural level and introducing the possibility of the same disintegration at the most responsible political level as well. Therefore, in 1925 Stalin finally gave the formula which marked the turning-point toward "fictivization" and integration at the cultural level too — his famous formula of the "proletarian" (later "socialist") content and national form of "the universal culture toward which socialism is moving."27 By reducing the national aspect of culture to mere form, the hint was given for its reduction to fiction, while by establishing the principle of the single content of all national cultures, their integration was provided for. Subsequent developments were to be along these lines and at increased speed.
The present author has described the evolution of the interpretation of Stalin's formula, as well as its genesis.28 The turning-point here, identifying "national form" with language only, meant transferring, or, more precisely, lowering the entire problem from the cultural to the linguistic level, which, incidentally, is more suitable for the achievement of assimilation. Simultaneously, outright physical "liquidation" of those who opposed cultural integration and assimilation was undertaken by means of the terrorism that in 1929—30 was directed against workers in the field of national culture who were labeled "counter-revolutionaries" (especially in such mass trials as those of the "SVU"— Union for the Liberation of the Ukraine — in 1929, or of the "Belorussian National Democrats," also called the "SVB"—Union for the Liberation of Belorussia—in 1930, etc.). After such operations, when- the proper moment for the "rehabilitation" of the old Russia came, the Russian cultural supremacy that had been condemned at the Twelfth Party Congress was "rehabilitated" as well, and integration and assimilation at the cultural level definitively became the "Russo-Sovietization" mentioned above, which, in this case, consisted in forcing all national cultures into the single Soviet (or "Socialist," the more elegant adjective) Russian culture.
National self-determination in the sense of national independence was most complete and real at the purely linguistic level and lasted much longer there than at any other level. There one could see the main concurrence with the Bolshevist concept of nation which was basically linguistic. Actually, however, the practical side was more decisive here. It was formulated by Stalin at the Twelfth Party Congress: "In order that Soviet power may become dear also to the peasants of these other nationalities, it must be understood by these peasants, it must function in their languages."29 The linguistic concept of nation was current at the beginning of the Soviet regime, when the Soviet republics were being formed and their boundaries established (e. g., when the Uzbek, Turkmen, Kirghiz and Kazakh republics were formed as the result of the so-called "linguistic demarcation," or when the Belorussian republic was "enlarged" twice—in 1924 and 1926—by a kind of linguistic plebiscite), but the practical approach of exploiting the use of native languages to achieve Sovietization became the distinguishing feature of the whole next period of linguistic nationalization—Ukrainization, Belorussization, and so on. During this period, linguistic independence was permitted to flourish as the single real form of national independence, since exploiting the use of native languages to achieve the ends of Sovietization would otherwise have been very difficult. However, this single form of real national independence could not help becoming a base for the attempts of the nationalist groups to "factualize" other important forms of fictitious independence. Therefore, as soon as the ends of Sovietization had been achieved, linguistic independence, so dangerous for the precedent it set and even for the provocation it could prove, had to be broken down and simultaneusly replaced by transition to the same line of "fictivization" and, subsequently, integration and assimilation.
This process was initiated on the Ukrainian and Belorussian languages in 1933 with the government "reforms of spelling" for these Slavonic non-Russian languages. But the "reforms" were not merely of spelling; the whole system of the literary languages was, in these cases, revised with the quite undisguised aim of "rapprochement" to the Russian, i. e. along the same line of integration and assimilation that constitutes Russo-Sovietization. Regarding the non-Slavonic languages of the USSR, a similar process of breakdown and transition was carried out in the early forties when, for instance, the Cyryllic alphabet was adopted for the Turkic languages.
That national self-determination and independence at the cultural and linguistic level would be transitory only was quite clear to certain national Communists in the USSR in their time. As Marxists, they saw the solution in an appeal to the all important economic factor of Marxist theory. A Georgian National Communist, Budu Mdivani, said at the Twelfth Party Congress in 1923: "There is no sense in studying this language if it will not be used, there is no sense in creating this national culture if it will have no economic basis of its own."30 The Belorussian National Communists Ihnatouski and especially Pryscepau regarded concentration on mere cultural work as "cultural deviationism" and, like Mdiviani, insisted on developing the "economic basis" for each national culture.31 However' their enemies were Marxists to no lesser extent, and Pyatakov, as early as the Eighth Party Congress, for example, based his abnegation of national self-determination on the same reasoning:
As far as we achieve economic integration, build a single apparatus, a single Supreme Council of the National Economy, a single administration of the railroads, a single bank, etc., all of this celebrated "self-determination" is "Forth nothing at all. It is either a simple diplomatic game which must in some cases be played, or it is worse than a game, if we take it seriously. As for us, for the members of the party of the proletariat, we must openly say that we obviously cannot permit such independence. Where the proletariat has already conquered, integration should occur immediately, and we must follow a single line.32
The Bolsheviks have never deviated from this line. Therefore^ one is not permitted to speak of any national self-determination at the economi с level in Soviet dominated areas, and those who tried to do so were "liquidated" even before long as it was not permitted at the political level. And if one goes on to remember Lenin's definition of politics as "concentrated economics" to realize once more that national self-determination could not be permitted at the economic level as long as it was not permitted at the political level. And if one goes on to remember that Lenin also considered the enormous pressure of the centralized economics of the "large centralized state" the main reason for the inevitability of national assimilation inside such a state, one cannot but realize that the refusal to permit national self-determination at the economic level was the most important premise for carrying out the basic policy of replacing national self-determination, after its "fictivization," by national assimilation.
The fact that the Soviet Union follows a policy of assimilation was rightly observed by Alfred Cobban, who stated that "in practice three methods of dealing with the national demands of colonial populations were evolved—assimilation, strongest in the French Empire and the Soviet Union, self-determination, which the British and Americans have laid down as their aim, amd suppression, the chosen policy of the Italians and Japanese."33 One has only to add that the last method, that of suppression, is not unused in Soviet practice; in fact, it both precedes and accompanies the basic and concluding method of assimilation. As we have seen, suppression was the first technique used to deal with national self-determination in the Party and state, and in economic administration; at the decisive political level of the Party as well as the economic level it was the only approach. Permitted but "fictivized" at the administrative, cultural and linguistic levels, national self-determination was replaced by national integration and, finally, assimilation on all levels. In this way the slogan of "national self-determination even including secession," which the Bolsheviks did so much to popularize immediately before and during the Revolution, was replaced by the policy of national integration even including assimilation.
Such was the general course of Communist policy on national self-determination in Soviet-dominated areas after World War I. Have the Communists succeeded in killing the very idea of, and all hope for, national self-determination in these areas? No, they have not, for however fictitious Soviet "independence" may be, it cannot help fostering at least some feeling of separate national identity among the nationals of the Soviet republics. This results in free and conscious national self-identification, which in turn will inevitably result in free national self-determination, when freedom comes. Nor can the natural tendency to "factualize" fictions fail to drive individuals and entire nationalities in this direction. The idea of, and hope for, national self-determination are not yet dead in these areas.
THE LATEST DEVELOPMENTS IN THE STRUGGLE FOI THE INDEPENDENCE OF BELORUSSIAN CULTURE
U. HLYBINNY
From the second half of 1957, after Khrushchev's victory over the so-called "anti-Party group," the rights of the Union republics received greater recognition and the part played by national cultures increased to some extent;. In the case of Belorussia, this process was not confined to the transfer of a number of ministries of All-Union importance to the jurisdiction of the republic. These administrative and economic concessions by Moscow gave rise to further demands from the Belorussians for the right to greater cultural independence. The idea of cultural independence, which had been denounced during the years of the struggle against national democracy, had continued to exist in the form of work in the Belorussian language and had never been forgotten by the cultural representatives of the Belorussian people, although they had sometimes been forced to denounce it themselves in accordance with the demands of official circles.
Therefore, as soon as there was talk in Soviet Belorussia of increasing the rights of the Union republics, the people and its progressive intelligentsia took the first opportunity of demanding the full return of the right to the independent development of Belorussian culture in the Belorussian Republic. Complaints came from various parts of Belorussia that in the practical life of the republic the Belorussian language had been supplanted by Russian. The newspaper Litaratura i mastactva began to receive hundreds of letters in which the people protested and expressed their indignation at the fact that the Belorussian language had been ignored in institutions, schools, and public life. The facts about Rus-sification began to come to the surface and were condemned by the people themselves.
Under the pressure of the universal reaction against this Russification, Litaratura i mastactva published extracts from these letters. О л December 14, 1957, it published an article by Barys Sacanka, a student of the Department of Journalism of the Belorussian State University, entitled "Preserve the Mother Tongue." It may be assumed that the author of the article was a Party member or at least a member of the Komsomol, for only such persons are accepted into the ranks of Soviet journalists. But obviously he had not lest his national consciousness and conscience for he made an open protest against Russification. He cited the words of a teacher of mathematics at a Belorussian high school who, although she had graduated at the Belorussian State University, taught in Russian because she did not know the Belorussian language:
"You see, it's not my fault that I can't teach in the Belorussian language," she said.
"Whose fault is it?"
"Listen to me and see for yourself. I come from a village near Mogilev and taught in a Belorussian school. Before entering the university, I think I spoke Belorusian quite well. But then I forgot everything. And no wonder. During five years of lectures I didn't hear a single word of Belorussian! I don't know why this is so. ... Go to any organization, any institution, and you will find that everything is conducted only in Russian. ... It is time that Belorussian educational institutions became Belorussian in practice .. . What is lacking for that? Our own cadres? They have already been developed, we have them!"1
Conversations with other high-school teachers convinced Boris Sacanka that the teaching of the Belorussian language was badly provided for in the institutes. These institutes not only failed to give a sound knowledge of the mother tongue but, on the contrary, Russified the Belorussian students. Sacanka also criticized the Russified language of some Belorussian oblast newspapers.2
As a first practical measure, Sacanka proposed "the introduction of instruction in the Belorussian language in all the educational institutions of the republic."3 His article ended with a protest against the consignment of the Belorussian language to the background, although the author did not deny the importance and need of Russian as a language of communication between all the nationalities of the USSR.
The article, "Preserve the Mother Tongue," evoked a deep and broad response from circles of the Belorussian intelligentsia. On January 8, 1958, Litaratura i mastactva contained several letters on the same lines. A student of the Minsk Technical School for Architecture and Building Construction, V. Holub, reproached the film studio, Bielarusfilm, for the fact that the sound tracks of its films were not in Belorussian, and the Academy of Sciences of the Belorussian SSR for the publication of papers primarily or exclusively in Russian. He demanded an adequate place for his mother tongue in high schools, institutes, and technical schools.4
A senior at the Belorussian State University, M. Praskovic, directed attention to the neglect of the Belorussian language on the courses there.5 A fifth year student of the Philological Faculty of the Belorussian State University also expressed indignation at this, and stated that it was necessary to introduce the Belorussian language not only into schools and institutes but also into everyday life: he wished it to be used by teachers and salesmen, secretaries and engineers, directors of factories and ministries, in official declarations, records of legal proceedings, and academic publications.6
A high-school teacher of Belorussian, K. Sanko, demanded that schools and teachers should provide an example of the introduction at the Belorussian language into everyday life among all sections of the population.7 Another teacher, M. Los, expressed particular enthusiasm about the cultural value of the mother tongue and appealed to all teachers, writers, radio, cinema, and theater workers to draw the appropriate conclusions. She quoted examples of incorrect usage of Belorussian words by actors in Minsk theaters, and Announcers on the republic radio programs; she proposed that they should all make a thorough study of the Belorussian language.8
The newspaper editorial staff received hundreds of letters in response to the appeal to preserve the mother tongue and was unable to paint them all. No doubt all these letters provide a vivid picture of the general indignation and form an illustrious page in the history of the struggle of the Belorussians for an independent national culture. Litaratura i mastactva was forced to publish a survey of these letters under the title "Anxiety about the Well-being of the Native Culture" on February 26, 1958. This survey of the reactions of the readers indicated that broad circles of the people were expanding their program of demands in all fields of culture. They demanded an improvement in the quality of textbooks of the Belorussian language and literature, the publication of all books for schools and institutes in the Belorussian language, the publication of popular textbooks on the history of the language, dialectology, and comparative grammar, the provision of books in the mother tongue for all school libraries, the performance of Belorussian plays by school and public amateur dramatic groups, and the use of Belorussian place names.
Under the pressure of widespread public opinion, the Ministry of Education of the Belorussian SSR had to take some measures. As is indicated by a letter from the Minister of Education of the Belorussian SSR, Iljusya, included in the survey of letters published in Litaratura i mastactva, during the academic year 1957—58 the schools were instructed by the Ministry of Education to teach all subjects in the Belorussian language. The Minister of Education wrote:
Teachers in Belorussian schools are strictly required to teach, all subjects except the Russian language and literature in the Belorussian language. It is proposed that the leading national education officials should take into account the teachers' knowledge of the Belorussian language when staffing the Belorussian schools.9
In the same letter the Minister of Education reported that in primary school faculties of pedagogic institutes opened in 1957 the teaching of almost all subjects was already conducted in the Belorussian language. In other faculties of these institutes only certain subjects were taught in the Belorussian language. Teachers using the Russian language were given a definite time in which to prepare themselves for the use of the Belorussian language.10
It must be observed that the Ministry of Education of the Belorussian SSR did not say what its intentions were toward the many Russian schools, a great number of which were founded in Stalin's time allegedly in accordance with the wishes of the population, and which were centers of the further Russification of the country. Attention was drawn to this in the letters which were published. The abovementioned student, V. Holub, drew attention to the abnormal situation in which in the capital of the Belorussian SSR, Minsk, out of 58 high schools only 10 were Belorussian while the rest were Russian, and the same position existed in other cities of the republic such as Gomel, Vitebsk, Brest, and Mogilev.11
The result of this campaign to restore the Belorussian language was an undoubted revival of national cultural activities. Numerous facts indicate that the people tried to make the best use of the minimum opportunities for creative work in their mother tongue which had been granted them. Although the Communist Party dictatorship tried as before to give this process a Communist content and to subordinate this new cultural revival to the aims of the building of socialism, the Belorussian people managed to gain some opportunities for proving themselves to be an independent nation and used them for the development of their own culture. Proof of this is provided by a number of achievements in culture and science during recent years.
For example, in 1958, for the first time the State Publishing House of Educational and Pedagogic Literature of the Ministry of Education of the Belorussian SSR in Minsk published textbooks in the Belorussian language on mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, plant cultivation, and livestock breeding.12 New improved textbooks on the Belorussian language and literature for use in primary schools were published. There also appeared teaching aids and textbooks for pedagogic institutes and colleges for students of Belorussian philology, and books about the natural resources of Belorussia and its physical geography.13
During recent years Belorussian philology has been enriched by new publications of the Academy of Sciences of the Belorussian SSR such as Narysy pa historyi bielaruskaj movy (Essays on the History of the Belorussian Language), Narysy pa historyi bielaruskaj litaratury (Essays on the History of Belorussian Literature), Kurs sucasnaj bielaruskaj movy (A Course in the Contemporary Belorussian Language), and Narysy bielaruskaj litaratury XIX st. (Outline of Nineteenth-Gentury Belorussian Literature). The State Publishing House of the Belorussian SSR and the Publishing House of the Academy of Sciences of the Belorussian SSR have published multi-volume collections of the works of Janka Kupala, Jakub Kolas, Kuzma Corny, Zmitrok Biadula, Kandrat Krapiva, Platon Halavac, Maksim Tank, Eduard Samujlonak, Piatrus Brouka, and also collected or separate works of Maksim Bahdanovic, Vincuk Dunin-Marcinkievic, Francisak Bahusevic, and Ciska Hartny. It is planned to publish the formerly banned works of Uladzimier Dubouka, Maksim Harecki, Michas Zarecki, and other rehabilitated writers. The rehabilitation has not yet affected the works of Ales Harun, Jadvihin S., and Karus Kahaniec, but in view of their lesser importance, this does not cause as much regret as the long-standing ban on such outstanding writers of the twenties and thirties as Ciska Hartny, Michas Carot, Michas Zarecki, Maksim Harecki, Uladzimier Dubouka, and Jasep Pusca, or the still banned works of the outstanding poet, Uladzimier Zylka, and the father of Belorussian dramaturgy, Francisak Alachnovic. All these and other writers who suffered a similar fate are still awaiting rehabilitation and the republication of their works.
During recent years there has been an increase in the study on the Belorussian SSR and its people. The Institute of Linguistics of the Academ/ of Sciences of the Belorussian SSR has republished the well-known work bу Е. Karskah, Bielarusy (The Belorussians) and several collections of research papers on Belorussian linguistics. The Institute for the Study of Art, Ethnography, and Folklore of the Academy of Sciences of the Belorussian SSR has published a valuable collection of research papers on the history of Belorussian art, and is engaged in research on the history of the Belorussian theater and all branches of Belorussian folk and professional art. The same Institute has undertaken the ethnographic study of the Belorussians, and has published or prepared for publication a number of valuable monographs.14
At the museums of historical and regional studies which have been established in the main towns of Belorussia, bibliographical and research material is prepared and exhibitions are held. Researchers of the Academy of Sciences of the Belorussian SSR are required to work in close contact with students of local lore and ethnography. The newspapers appeal for a more thorough study of the culture of the Belorussian nation and the dissemination of knowledge among the masses.15
There has also been a change of attitude to Belorussian heroes of the past. Distinguished Belorussians of the past are now no longer accused of adhering to the ideology of the petty nobility. They are now recognized as distinguished educationalists as in the case of Francisak Skaryna, or eminent revolutionary democrats as in the case of Kastus Kalinouski—fighters for the happiness of the people.16 A special museum named after Kastus Kalinouski was established in his native town of Svisloch in Grodno Oblast and the Polotsk Pedagogic Institute was named after Franzisak Skaryna.17 Novels, stories, and plays about Kalinouski and Skaryna are being written and published, and as in the twenties, artists and sculptors are devoting more and more attention to these historical personages.18
In art a search has begun for the expression of national folk forms. At plenary sessions of the Union of Art Workers of Belorussia frequent reference has been made to the national characteristics of Belorussian art. "A genuine realist folk art must have national characteristics" declared several art workers at their plenary session in 1959.19 The State Publishing House of the Belorussian SSR has begun to publish studies on Belorussian folk art more frequently.
The Ministry of Culture of the Belorussian SSR had to face the fact that the film studio "Bielarusfilm" was not taking the appropriate steps to reflect national characteristics in its films. The Ministry demanded that the studio establish a close link with Belorussian writers who would provide it with Belorussian scripts.20 The result of this has been that recently several new films have been made on historical and contemporary Belorussian themes.
More plays by Belorussian playwrights are now being produced. The play by I. Koziel, Paparac-Kvietka, (The Fern Flower) merits attention as an approach to the expression of national character. Here a realistic subject is enriched by the folklore tradition of Belorussian dramaturgy. In the production of this play the national traditions of the dramaturgy of J. Mirovic and U. Halubok, and the theater of I. Bujnicki and F. Alachnovic were revived under the direction of L. Mazaleuskaja. The wealth of media of expression, imagination, innovation, and settings, the psychological perfection of the characterization based on the rich national traditions, and the dances, singing, and ceremonies did much to help the return of national traditions to the stage and the development of a national Belorussian theatrical style. Also important in the history of Belorussian culture is the ballet Kniai voziera by V. Zalatarou with its combination of folk music, dancing, and artistic characterization. All this indicates that the national traditions continue to play their part and that a struggle is being waged for the independence of Belorussian national art, causing the Communist doctrinaires to make some concessions.
To the struggle of the Belorussian intelligentsia to develop its national culture along independent lines must be linked the struggle for the development of the Belorussian language. The purity and originality of the Belorussian language has always been the center of attention of the best Belorussian writers and poets. During 1927—29, the literary journal Uzvyssa had a special section devoted to the development of the language. This accorded with the proposals made by such eminent Belorussians as Jazep Losik, Vaclau Lastouski, and Sciapan Niekrasevis.21
As is indicated by the progress of events in recent years, the tradition of developing the Belorussian language advocated by F. Bahushevic, K. Kahaniec, A. Harun, J. Kupala, J. Kolas, 2. Biadula, M. Harecki, V. Lastousky, J. Losik, S. Niekrasevic, the founders of Uzvyssa, and other Belorussian cultural workers, has been continued up to our own times, and has now found supporters among the younger generation of Belorussian cultural workers. Although this work is not carried out so overtly and is often accompanied by compulsory eulogy of the Russian language, signs of the struggle for the development on the Belorussian language are reflected in the pages of the press with ever increasing frequency.
An important role is played by Litaratura i mastactva which, in recent years, has contained numerous articles in defence of the Belorussian language, such as I those by A. Jaskievic22 and A. Paulo vie.23 Quoting concrete examples from text-books and other literature translated from Russian, and also from the Ruska-Xbieloruski siounik (Russian-Belorussian Dictionary) of the Academy of Sciences | of the Belorussian SSR, Paulo vie has pointed out the lack of consistency in the use I of terms, the violation of the laws and traditions of the Belarussian language, land the use of expressions and syntactic forms alien to it. Reviews and articles about literary works now frequently criticize the deficiences an note the merits I of an author's language.
In the department of Belorussian language and literature at the Belorussian I State University a student research group is already in its second decade of work on dialectology. Every summer students follow itineraries planned by the Institute of Linguistics of the Academy of Sciences of the Belorussian SSR and make research expeditions to different places in Belorussia to collect material for a dialectal atlas of Belorussia. Some of these young researchers hive written substantial monographs. Many of them have become Candidates of Philology and [are now working on problems of Belorussian linguistics.24
The recent two-volume course on the contemporary Belorussian literary language prepared by the Institute of Linguistics of the Academy of Sciences of the Belorussian SSR is of considerable value. As far as theory is concerned, this work is far above the standard of any previous studies of the same bind. It is interesting to note that this new course on the Belorussian language uses almost the same terminology as that proposed in their time by the eminent Belorussian philologists who compiled the first Belorussian grammars, V. Taraskievic and J. Losik. Thus the linguistic legacy of distinguished Belorussian scholars of the twenties, which was condemned by the Bolsheviks, is indirectly and unofficially j being restored.
In connection with this, attention should be drawn to the attempts to restore the traditions of the literary life of the twenties in Belorussia. The pages of the press contain demands for an objective description of the literary organizations I of those years and a fair evaluation of their activities.25
The struggle for an original national character both in content and in form is j reflected in Belorussian literature in a particularly interesting way. At the end of October, 1957, a meeting of writers and artists was held in Minsk. At this meeting the poet, Maksim Luzanin, directed the attention of the participants to the fact that literature and art in the Belorussian SSR had no national character, and that it was the task of writers and artists to improve this situation. Many other speakers at the meeting supported him.26 At the Fourth Plenary Session of the Governing Board of the Union of Writers of the Belorussian SSR held in April, 1958, the Minister of Culture of the Belorussian SSR, H. Kisialou, expressed the same opinion in his report.27 As a result of this, many new Belorussian works appeared and more Belorussian plays were produced in the theaters. It is true that most of these works were written in accordance with the demands of the so-called method of socialist realism; they consisted mostly of plays such as Sviatlo z Uschodu by Piatrus Hlebka or U bifrvie vialikaj by Arkadz Mauzou, i. e., in the epic style eulogizing the Communist heroes of the October Revolution and the Civil War. Many similar works were published in connection with the celebration of the fortieth anniversary of the Belorussian SSR, and had more propaganda than literary significance.
When, however, the writers and dramatists succeeded in treating the negative aspects of Soviet reality, they sometimes produced interesting realistic works. Examples of such works, which at the same time provide evidence of the antagonism of the Belorussian intelligentsia toward the Soviet Communist government were the comedy In four acts by Andrej Makojonak entitled Kab ludzi nia zurylisia (If Only People Wouldn't Grieve)28 and the story by Alaksiej Kulakouski entitled Dabrasielcy.29
Soon after its publication in the journal Maladosc, the organ of the Central Committee of the Belorussian Komsomol and the Union of Writers of the Belorussian SSR, the story Dabrasielcy aroused a storm in the Soviet press. Many Soviet critics wrote articles in Litaratura i mastactva, Zviazda, and Sovetskaya Belorussiya, attacking the story on grounds of ideological depravity, caviling and nihilism, a tendency to portray Soviet reality in dark colors and denigrate the Soviet people. They maintained that it was alien to socialist realism.
At the end of June, 1958, a joint session of the Central Committee Bureau of the Belorussian Komsomol and the Presidium of the Board of the Union of Writers of the Belorussian SSR was held at which the editorial board of Maladosc was denounced for publishing Dabrasielcy. Many writers and critics were forced to denounce Kulakouski's story as a work containing ideological errors and giving a distorted picture of kolkhoz life. The author himself had to admit that the publication of the story was a mistake and promised to revise it in accordance with the criticism.
Similar treatment was given to Andrej Makajonak's comedy Kab ludzi nia zurylisia. Its performance on the stage of the Janka Kupala Theater in Minsk aroused the displeasure of the Minister of Culture of the Belorussian SSR, H. Kisialou: in his report, "The Tasks of Cultural Institutions in Connection with Preparations for the Fortieth Anniversary of the Belorussian SSR,"я he demanded that the theater and the author revise it and depict the leading rob of the Party in the development of agriculture.
This and other similar works indicate that Belorussian literature is making its contribution to the common cause of the struggle against the Soviet system and that it does not remain indifferent to the sufferings of the enalaved people, but is using every opportunity of demonstrating its support of they interests. Belorussian literature thus presents a danger for the Communist system, which is taking every measure to suppress its strivings toward freedom.
All these developments in Belorussia under the Soviet regime during the past years testify to an unremitting struggle waged by the Belorussian people for their own national culture. In spite of the difficulties in evading the social and ideological demands imposed by the Party hierarchy, Belorussian culture often emerges victorious in this great struggle of the people against the oppressors. At various times it has had to retreat from its national traditions, to let against its own interests under pressure from above, and, during the struggle of the Party against national democracy, to lose its best forces so that later it can advance fresh ranks of young creators of Belorussian culture. Frequently this culture produces works under the label of Soviet culture and under the slogans of Marxism-Leninism. In spite of this, as is indicated by the cultural activity in Belorussia during the past years, works are being produced which reflect the creative originality of the Belorussian people.
THE OFFICIAL PARNASSUS OF BELORUSSIAN LITERATURE
ANTHONYADAMOVICH
Last year the first biographical directory of Belorussian writers was published in Minsk.1 For the student of Belorussian literature, this may prove to have been an event of notable historical importance. Until this directory was published one could only find biographical information on Belorussian writers scattered throughout various sources on literary history; it had never been collected in a single reference book, although the task of compiling such a book, a "complete dictionary of Belorussian writers," had been set by the well-known historian of Belorussian literature, Professor E. F. Karsky, as early as 1922.2
However, at the very first glance one sees how far the new Soviet publication falls short of fulfilling the task set by Professor Karsky nearly forty years ago. Its very title, The Writers of Soviet Belorussia, immediately shows its first main limitation; it includes only the writers who published their works in Soviet Belorussia, while all pre-Soviet authors, all those who neither contributed to the Soviet Belorussian press nor to other Soviet Belorussian publications, although their work was written during the Soviet period, are left out. On that ground, not even all the Belorussian classics, by far the most outstanding writers, are allowed on this particular Parnassus; while Janka Kupala, Jakub Kolas, Maksim Harecki, Zmitrok Biadula are admitted, Maksim Bahdamovic, Ales Harun, Jadvihin S., Francisak Alachnovic and many others are not.
The book's subtitle, Short Biographical Directory, reveals its next limitation in comparison with the "complete dictionary of Belorussian writers" Professor Karsky wanted. But one of the most serious of its limitations is a basic characteristic of the book. Officially authorized by the competent state agency, namely, by the State Publishing House of the Belorussian Soviet Socialist Republic, it is an official Soviet publication. Neither the cover nor the title-page bears any individual author's name. All one can find is: State Publishing House of the BSSR.3 The Preface (pp. 3-7) is a statement made by the same State Publishing House, and, in addition, this anonymous and collective Preface explicitly states the next of the book's limitations, the worst of all, in defining its purpose as being "to familiarize readers and library workers with the biographies of the writers of the Republic and with the most important publications *)f their works" and "to serve in propagandizing the best works of the writers of Soviet Belorussia."4
Here we have, therefore, no scholarly reference work in the: field of Belorussian literary history, but something which is first of all a piece Ы Soviet propaganda on the authors and works officially considered to be "the most important" and "the best." It must, therefore, be analyzed, evaluated, if possible, and subsequently used as primarily an expression of the official Soviet view and the official Soviet evaluation of the literature of Soviet Belorussia, rather than as a source of biographical information on Belorussian writers. And, is we shall see, it proves to be of extreme interest and value as the official guide to the official Soviet Parnassus of Belorussian literature; much more so than as a biographical directory of Belorussian writers.
The book contains material on 223 Soviet Belorussian writes with photographs of each of them. However, not all of these writers of Soviet Belorussia really belong to Belorussian literature. There are 22 Russian writers who publish their works in Russian, and this fact is mentioned in the material on every one of them. There are eight writers who are, it is stated, Jewish and "who never used Belorussian as the language in which they wrote. Neither Russian nor Jewish writers, even though their books are published in Soviet Belorussia, can be included in Belorussian literature or studied by the historian of this literature as a part of it. Nevertheless, these biographies are of some indirect interest in helping us to understand Soviet policies. As for the Russian writers, one may well wonder that only 7 of the 22 are true Russians by origin, while 3 are Jews, 3 Ukrainians and actually 9 Belorussians.5 In the twenties and thirties there were no Russian writers of Belorussian origin in Belorussia.
The case of the Jewish writers tells us even more about Soviet policy. There were several dozen Jewish writers in Belorussia in the twenties aid thirties, but by now all but one (Isak Platner) of the eight who are mentioned as Jewish in the book are, it is also stated, dead.6 Among others one finds at least four writers, and really the best ones in their group, who, it is common knowledge, were executed by a firing squad during the Yezhov purges (Izi Charyk in 1937 and Aron Judelson in 1938) or later, during the anti-Semitic drive at the beginning of World War II (Majsiej Kulbak in 1940 and Zelik Akselrod in 1941). However, even they are simply listed as "dead," not as executed. Four more besides the eight mentioned as Jewish writers (Codzik Dauhapolski, Lazar Kacovic, Ryhor Reles and Ury Finkel) published their few last works in Belorussian or Russian; it is not mentioned that they were Jewish writers at all (Reles is the only one among them who is still alive). All these details are meaningful in the picture of the "liquidation" of Jewish literature under the Soviets.
Excluding the 22 Russian writers, and the 8 listed and 4 not listed as Jewish, we have 189 writers in the book who belong to Belorussian literature. These 189 writers represent the overwhelming majority of the Belorussian writers in Soviet Belorussia. A number of writers, not only young beginners (as, for instance, Henadzi Buraukin, Kastus Cvirka, Juras Svirka, Viera Viarba and many others) but also men of letters who have for decades been uninterruptedly contributing to Belorussian literature in Soviet Belorussia and who are doing so now (Ilary Baraska or Lukas Bende, for instance) are not represented in the book. Perhaps they are considered to be minor authors. At any rate, one can hardly find any other explanation, although, on the other hand, it seems inconsistent to regard as minor certain authors who are no less outstanding than those included.
While the "minor authors" are left outside the book, three writers, evidently "major," Janka Kupala, Jakub Kolas and Kandrat Krapiva, are singled out and placed on the summit. Their biographies open the book, while all the others follow in strict alphabetical order. These three are raised above the alphabetical order obviously because they enjoy the highest position in the Soviet literary hierarchy, the rank of "people's poets and writers," a rank officially now granted them by the government. Thus, the principle of a literary hierarchy, of a "table of organization," proves to be the essence of the approach to the writers of Soviet Belorussia in the book reviewed, and this is another of its basic limitations, another of its basic characteristics.
The official title of "people's poet" was introduced by the Soviet government in Belorussia long ago: Kupala and Kolas received it as early as 1925 and 1926. Krapiva was granted in 1956 the similar title of "people's writer," corresponding to the title of "people's artist" established for the field of art. However, until recently there was no rank in the field of literature that corresponded to the title of "honored artist" long ago established in the field of art. Only in the book reviewed here do we have the first attempt to introduce something like that in the form of a standard definition, "well-known writer," applied very consistently and persistently to a number of the writers listed in alphabetical order.
A total of 15 writers are given this newly introduced rank of "well-known writer," and three of them (Janka Bryl, Piatro Hlebka and Ivan Samiakin) seem to outrank the others in their group because while they are simply "well-known," the others are additionally and restrictively classified as "well-known Belorussian writers" except for one isolated case (Ales Jakimovic) designated as "well-known children's writer."
The selection of the "well-known writers" appears to have been very carefully, thought out. Five of them (2mitrok Biadula, Edward Samujlonak, Pauluk Trus,
Michas Carot and Kuzma Corny) were picked from among the 45 writers who are no longer living. Three of them (Piatro Hlebka, 2mitrok Biadula and Kuzma Corny), are former members of the "Uzvyssa" group,7 six (Michas Carot, Michas Lynkou, Piatrus Brouka, Arkadz Kulasou, Ales Jakimovic and Pauluk Trus) are former activists of the "Maladnjak-BielAPP8, three (Edward Samqlonak, Pimien Pancanka and Ivan Samiakin) first appeared in the Union of Soviet Writers, and three (Maksim Tank, Pilip Piestrak and Janka Bryl) started as writers in what used to be Western Belorussia and thus represent its literary tradition.
So all the historically important traditions in the literature of Soviet Belorussia are represented in proportion and by authors who are really well-known for writing and activities that have always been the closest to the official Soviet line. Incidentally, the nine who were the leaders of Soviet Belorussian literature in the late thirties and early forties9 were admitted in a body into the highest ranks used in the book; they are all classified either as "people's* or as "well-known" poets or writers.
Besides the ranks of "people's writer" and "well-known writer," one finds that the book contains certain other standard classifications which may represent attempts to attribute other ranks to the Soviet Belorussian writers, For example, Kanstancyja Bujla and Janka Maur are classified as "senior Belornissian writers" (Maur is given the additional designation of "children's writer") although the rank of "senior Belorussian writer" is not conferred on some other writers, their seniors both in regard to age and to the duration of their literary activities (for instance, Janka Zurba). Similarly, Ryhor Baradulin, Mikola Vadanosau and Alaksiej Karpiuk are classified as "junior poets" (or "writers") although, again, many other writers, their juniors in age and in length of career, are not so classified. Finally, the designation of "children's writer," applied not only to Janka Maur and Ales Jakimovic mentioned above but to two more writers (Jadviha Buhanskaja and Ivan Sucko) as well, may to some extent represent a rank by implying that their audience and their appeal are limited.
The official table of ranks of Soviet Belorussian writers used in the book is not limited to these positive ranks: there are gradations of a negative nature as well. A slightly varied formula is applied to ten writers whose ideological guilt in the past it points out, arid who are thus given the peculiar rank of "guilty writer" as it were. True, any one of these slightly varied formulas sounds rather more like a stern reminder than like a severe reprimand, and, besides, most of the writers who in the past were usually mentioned with the standard reprimands of this kind in the Soviet press and in Soviet "criticism" are now mentioned without them in the book reviewed (for instance, Janka Kupala, Jakub Kolas, Kandrat Krapiva, Piatro Hlebka, Kanstaincyja Bujla and certain others). Curiously enough, only 2mitrok Biadula is still reprimanded for his former guilt, although in a somewhat milder form, while at the same time he has been promoted to the higher rank of "well-known writer"; one wonders if his Jewish origins might have something to do with this.
Within the rank of "guilty writer" there are certain gradations of culpability expressed by nuances in the formulas applied. For example, most writers are guilty of "errors," but some of "blunders"; sometimes the "errors" were "committed," but in most cases they simply "occurred," some of them are merely "errors," while others are qualified as "errors of ideological principle," or sometimes as milder errors "of an ideological nature," or simply "ideological errors." Besides, there are reservations of greater or smaller degree in every formula, and sometimes even excuses are found.
The mildest formula, with the maximum of reservations and excuses, is applied to one of the authors who was most extolled in the old days, Party poet Andrej Aleksandrovic: "In the complicated circumstances of the class struggle during the twenties and thirties, A. Aleksandrovic committed occasional errors, for which he was criticized by public opinion at that time."10 Fewer reservations and no excuses are found in the formulas applied to the other former members or candidate members of the Party: Symon Baranavych, "In occasional works (Mother's Son) the writer committed errors of ideological principle;"11 and Michas Zarecki, "In certain works M. Zarecki committed errors of ideological principle for which Soviet public opinion criticized him at the time."12 The strongest formula is applied to the former Party member Ciska Hartny: "In his literary and social activities he committed a series of errors of ideological principle as well as political errors for which he was criticized by Soviet public opinion at the time."13
The formulas applied to the writers who never belonged to the Party are briefer, contain fewer reservations, and obviously mark the next step down. Only the reprimand given 2mitrok Biadula, as already mentioned, was formulated rather mildly and with more reservations: "In a number of his works during the first Soviet years there were errors of ideological principle and alien influences. But the Communist Party helped the writer to overcome all the errors, to stand firmly on the path of the literature of Socialist realism."14
The next steps down are as follows: Ales Dudar ("In a number of Dudar's works, errors of an ideological nature occurred"),15 Maksim Harecki ("In his individual works and pieces of literary scholarship ideological errors occurred"),16 Jazep Pusca ("In individual works of J. Pusca errors of ideological principle occurred"),17 Maksim Luzanin ("In his individual poems of the twenties, blunders of ideological principle occurred"),18 and Uladzimier Dubouka ["In some works of the poet, blunders of ideological principle occurred").19 The poet Uladzimier Chadyka is also included under the general heading of "guilty writers," but his case is unique. He alone is awarded the unique formula of artistic and linguistic, but not ideological, culpability: "Some formalistic quest and a deviation from the established linguistic norms were peculiar to Ul. Chadyka's poetry of the first lyears."20 Other poets who actually indulged in such a "quest" and in such "deviation" much more than Chadyka (Uladzimier Dubouka, for instance) are spared any reminder of this kind; perhaps the formula of ideological culpability applied [to them was strong enough in itself not to need any other support.
With the exception of Zmitrok Biadula and Maksim Luzanin, the other "guilty writers" belong to the group of those who were rehabilitated after the death of Stalin. But this group is much larger than the ten or eleven writers classified as "guilty" in the book; it includes 38 names altogether, and 27 of these were spared (any reminder of culpability. Moreover, none of the rehabilitated writers, whether [or not they are classified as "guilty," are in any way singled out in the book by [mention of past repression and subsequent rehabilitation. The years passed them [by in concentration camps or in exile, and these years, from 20 to 25 or even more, [appear as simple gaps in their biographies with no attempts an explanation or justification. Thus, there is no such rank as "rehabilitated writer" in the book, but [there is some interesting material for the study of the problem of the post-Stalin [rehabilitation program in Soviet Belorussian literature.
Not all the authors mentioned as rehabilitated, not even all those who reap-)eared in the Soviet press as "rehabilitated," are included in the book; perhaps, [some of them are left out as "minor" with the same inconsistency that has been mentioned above (as, for instance, in case of Sciapan Lichadzijeuski or Mikola Nikanovic). But even if one adds these few to the 38 included in the book, one can easily count at least an equal number of Belorussian writers who have not yet been rehabilitated.21 One more interesting fact is that the majority, 24 out of the 38 writers included in the book, were rehabilitated only posthumously22 and at least 10 of these were most likely shot by firing squads, although this is, of course, never mentioned.23
In addition to classifying the writers according to the official table of ranks described, the book always lists the civic status of each writer. Of the most importance is, of course, Party membership; among 189 Belorussian writers in the book one counts 85 Party members, i. e. about 45 per cent. Only 20 of these have no decorations (orders, badges, medals),24 while 20 others who are not Party members are decorated,25 so altogether there are 85 decorated writers, exactly as there are 85 writers who are Party members. All these figures appear too regular to be mere chance; they are rather the result of a carefully planned selection made for the purpose of the official guide to the Soviet Parnassus of Belorussian literature.
The "social origin" of the writers, as important in the Soviet approach to literature as it is in everyday Soviet life, is very carefully indicated for each writer and immediately, side by side with the date and the place of birth. However, because of the vital importance of these data, there is a constant tendency to falsify them in varying degree in order to conceal or ennoble any "social origin" that might happen to be "bourgeois." And so it is in the book; all the writers prove to be of "worker origin," so that, for instance, a station-master is changed into a "railroad worker" (as in the case of Chviados Synkler),26 a psalmist into a "peasant" (as in the case of Maksim Luzanin),27 a tradesman into an "employee" (as in the case of Ales Kucar).28 The data on the "social origin" of the writers as given in the book are, therefore, very unreliable, and no valid generalizations or conclusions can be based upon them.
However, it is not only biographical data on "social origin" that is falsified in this
volume. Certain other data which could have political meaning under Soviet circumstances also
prove to have been altered. For instance, Janka Bryl and Michas Vasilok did not "flee from
German captivity in 1941," as stated in the
book,29 but were released as loyal Belorussians. Janka
Bryl even started then— and not "after the Great Patriotic War," as stated in the book!—to
publish his first short stories in the periodical
Bielamskaja Hazeta, which appeared in Minsk during
the German occupation. This fact, which does not fit into his Soviet biography, is therefore
glossed over. Similar glossing over or simple omission is sometimes found with certain works
considered politically or ideologically odious. For instance, Sasalevic's play "Apramietnaja"
(Lower Regions) is mentioned by the^ title under which it was first published, "Zrujnavanaja
ciemra" (Darkness Ruined)30 by which it is quite unknown to the public, and a number of odious
works by Kupala, Zarecki and others are not mentioned at all Sometimes, however, the omissions which occur in the boot are due to lack of
knowledge rather than to deliberate falsification. For
instance3 the first collection of poems by
Aleksandrovic and Volny, Kamsamolskaja nota
(Komsomol Note), 1924; Volny's collection
Carnakudraja radasc (Black-Curled Joy), 1926; Daroz-ny's collection
Vasilkovaja rossyp (Field of Cornflowers), 1919; Sasalevic's play "Roj" (The Swarm), 1931; are all omitted. In
general, lack of knowledge accounts for the bibliographical mix-ups and inaccuracies, which are
not infrequent. For instance, Harecki's novelette
Cicbaja plyn (Soft Current), 1930» was only
a second edition of his Cichija piesni (Soft Songs), 1926, omitted from the book; his
lartaulivy Pisarevic (Playful Pisarevich), 1928, was not a "collection of plays by the
writer,"31 but simply a play (or "scenes" in the author's own designation); Dubouka's long poems "Kruhi"
(Circles), 1927 (not 1928!), and "Branislava", 1929, (not 1928!), were never published as separate
books;32 Bandaryna's novelette Oj rana na Jvana
(Oh, Early on St. John's Day) was published in
1956, not in 194633, etc.
The most reliable biographical data in the book are those for years and places. With
the help of these data we may finish drawing the picture of the official Soviet Parnassus of
Belorussian literature as it is presented in this volume. More than half of the inhabitants of the
Parnassus (108 out of 189) are people of middle age born in the twentieth century before the Revolution
of 1917. About one third (61 out of 189) were born after the Revolution and thus represent
the Soviet generation in the strictest sense. On the other hand, only 20 out of 189 (about 10
per cent) were born in the nineteenth century, and only 6 of them are alive
today.34
However, only 11 out of 189 (about 5 percent) started writing before the
Revolution, and only 2 of these are alive
today.35 The largest group of the inhabitants of today's Parnassus
of Soviet Belorussian literature (41 writers) came into literature during the postwar years and
the last Stalin years, 1945-53. Only 6 writers coming after Stalin's death are admitted to
the Parnassus.36 A rather large group (33 writers) started writing during the years of the
preparation and development of the first, "maladniak," revolution in Belorussian literature,
1920-25.37 But, if one remembers that the "maladniak" group had from 500 to 1,000
members,38 the heavy losses of participants in this revolution become obvious, and no comment is really
necessary. The next largest group numerically (29 writers) came into letters during the second,
anti-"maladniak" revolution in Belorussian literature, in
1926-28.39 The last group of any
significant size consists of 24 writers who started their literary careers during the years of the
Stalinist stabilization of literature, in 1936-39. Only "ideologically consistent" but artistically
uninspired individuals then had access to literature, and it is no wonder that they were better able to
maintain their positions on the Soviet Parnassus.
Before the Revolution Belorussian writers came almost exclusively from Minsk
and Vilna provinces with only a few exceptions, such as Maksim Harecki, from Mogilev
province, or Janka Zurba from Vitebsk. On today's Soviet Parnassus Minsk and Vilna hold only
about one-half of the places (about 85), while the northeastern part of the BSSR, former Vitebsk
and Mogilev provinces, bordering on the RSFSR, is almost equal, with about 70 of the writers
born there (more than 50 of the writers were born in former Mogilev province alone). About 20
of the writers come from the southwestern part of Belorussia (Palessie and Grodno). A number
of "literary nests" become apparent, as in Uzda Rayon, where 10 writers were
born,40 or in Rudensk Rayon, with 7
writers,41 or Kopyl42 and
Starobin43 Rayons, with 6 each.
H. KOSTYUK
Twenty years after the famous Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
of 1939 it is highly instructive to recall the background and details of this important landmark in the expansion of Soviet
rule over Belorussia and other national entities on the western borders of the Soviet Union.
Space is lacking here to delve into the international events leading up to the pact, but
it is of interest to look briefly into some of the steps taken by Stalin within the Soviet Union
itself in preparation for a campaign of aggression whenever the opportunity might present itself.
By the second half of 1938 Stalin no doubt felt that he had become real master in
the USSR. He had annihilated all the actual and alleged "Trotskyites,"
"Zinovievites," "Bukharinites," "Democratic Centralists," and the "workers' opposition"; he had
liquidated most of the military commanders including Marshal Tukhachevsky, and had physically or
morally destroyed the most talented scholars, writers, and artists, entire theatrical companies, and
all the most experienced leaders in agriculture and industry. He had liquidated not only
the democratic anti-Communist forces of the national republics, but also the governments and
the Party Central Committees of these republics and their Communist Parties, incarcerating
more than ten million of the population of the Ukraine, Belorussia, and the Northern Caucasus. In
the end, he had killed the Party as a living, creative, ideologically united body, and had turned
it into a soulless and ruthless machine for coercing and enslaying the peoples under Soviet
rule. For the first time after twenty years of Soviet domination, Stalin had grounds for believing
that he had disposed of the dangerous and inflammable question of the national republics:
politically and economically they had been trasformed into helpless satellites of the Kremlin to
make "integral parts of the USSR."
In order to make his victory secure and give his new "firm course" some appearance
of legality, enabling him to hold his ground in the precarious situation which was
developing, Stalin hastily introduced a series of constitutional and administrative reforms which he
regarded as important for the consolidation of his dictatorship. First of all he removed from the
historical arena the man who had carried out all the purges—N. I. Yezhov. He replaced him by
Beria, who, although little known up to that time, now became the "favorite of the Party,"
the "distinguished organizer of the Transcaucasian Bolsheviks," the author of a "remarkable
book ... on the history of the Bolshevik organizations of the Transcaucasus," and the man who
had begun "a new page in the history of the АН-Union Communist
Party."1
With the arrival of Beria, the work of the NKVD acquired new forms and methods.
For some time the mass purges of the Party, the mass deportations, and the mass shootings in
the concentration camps abated.2 Some prisoners had their sentences revised. A very small
percentage were released and rehabilitated. This so-called "Beria springtime," which created the
illusion that the regime of terror was weakening, was primarily designed to give the appearance
of peace and mutual understanding between the government and the people. In the atmosphere
of increasing tension in the international situation, Stalin, whose aggressive plans entailed
the participation of the USSR in the military conflicts of the European states, found this
appearance of peace within the USSR to be an absolute necessity.
The second important event of the time was the ratification of a new law "On
Citizenship of the USSR."3 This law on a single Union citizenship in the USSR indicated that Stalin was
in a hurry to consolidate his victory over the Union republics and strengthen the centralized
imperial government in Moscow by practical and important decrees. At the same time he made an
intensive effort to establish a ruling stratum of Party members and Soviet officials.
Having destroyed the Party as an ideologically united body and having transformed
its remains into a personal police organization with covert and overt functions, Stalin could
not help noting the danger involved in the sharp decline in the number of its members, which,
after the purges and terror of 1936—38, had fallen off at least 30 percent. By the end of 1931,
the Ukrainian Communist Party, for instance, according to its semi-official organ,
Bilshevyk Ukrainy, had numbered 345,017 members but seven years later, on June 14, 1938, Khrushchev
reported to the Fourteenth Congress of the Ukrainian Communist Party that "By May 1, 1938 the
Ukrainian organization numbered 285,818
Communists."5 This indicates that by the end of the purges
the Ukrainian Party organization alone had lost 59,199 members, and it must be remembered
that Khrushchev did not mention the annual increment from the admission of candidates,
Komsomol members and new recruits which, according to official figures, before 1931 averaged
31.4 percent.6
Foreseeing a catastrophe as a result of the loss of personnel, the Central Committee
of the Soviet Communist Party officially announced as early as January 1939 the resumption
of admissions to the Party. But by the end of 1938 it was obvious that the workers and
collective farmers were not responding but were in fact silently but unitedly boycotting the Party. In
order to ensure the recruitment of new Party members, toward the end of 193 5 and the beginning
of 1939 Stalin ordered a drastic change of attitude toward the intelligentsia and the petty
bourgeoisie of the urban population, who thereafter became the main reserve for replenishing Stalin's
police and Party bureaucracy. At the Eighteenth Party Congress appropriate changes were made in
tie Party statutes to facilitate the admission of non-working-class strata. For all persons
applying to enter the Party there were to be "equal conditions for admission and the same length
of candidate membership whether they belonged to the working class, the peasantry, or
the intelligentsia."7
Thus Stalin answered the silent boycott of the Party by the workers and peasants with
an "open door" for the intelligentsia and the white-collar strata of the population. In addition,
in order to reassure those Party members who had survived the purges and encourage new
recruits from the intelligentsia, an official promise was given that no more mass purges would
take place; it was stated that the purges had been carried out by "class enemies and persons who
had protected themselves" by liquidating "honest Party
members."8 The removal of Yezhov
was alleged to be evidence of the seriousness and sincerity of the official promises, and in his
report delivered at the Eighteenth. Party Congress Stalin devoted an entire section to the
intelligentsia and the new attitude toward them.
At the same time, Stalin undertook to consolidate and give legal backing to the
new privileged stratum which had developed in previous years in all branches of the
economy, cultural life and the armed forces. A decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of
the USSR created the title "Hero of Soviet Labor" as the highest grade of distinction, and
instituted medals "For Valor in Labor" and "For Distinction in
Labor."9
Besides adding new awards and titles to the "Order of Lenin" and the others
which already existed, Stalin introduced grades of distinction on a wide scale: numerous lists of
the "best people" appeared which included writers and soldiers, artists and Stakhanovites,
factory managers and teachers, film producers and leading Party members, many of whom
had miraculously survived the period of the savage Yezhov-Stalin terror. Whereas they had
previously been hounded and persecuted and denounced by the press as "doubledealers,"
"Bukharinites," "Trotskyites," and "nationalists," now they were ceremoniously invested with orders
of distinction which automatically led to Party membership cards, and the press treated them
with respect and appreciation. While this Process was taking place, the "book of wisdom" of
the epoch of Stalin's dictatorship, A Short Course in the History of the All-Union Communist
Party of Bolsheviks (Istoriya VKB[b]), was published, to become the key to the understanding of
all truth and knowledge for the ruling stratum which was being developed.
In addition to the consolidation and replenishment of the Party bureaucracy and
the Soviet administrative bodies, efforts were made to increase the morale and combat readiness
of the Red Army. On the Twenty-First Anniversary of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army
and Navy an oath of allegiance was
taken.10 This, together with the endless stream of awards
and promotions, was intended to restore the morale which the recent terror had shattered.
Ideological propaganda was built up around Russian imperial nationalism. It was
no accident that for the first time a series of historical films appeared, including "Alexander
Nevsky" and "Peter the
First,"11 emphasizing the consolidation of the Russian state, while in
Moscow the musical drama "Ivan Susanin" was revived, although it had been banned after the
Revolution and was replete with chauvinistic adulation of
Tsarism.12 On the Ukrainian stage, and also in
a Russian translation at the Maly Theater in Moscow, the play "Bogdan Khmelnitsky" by
Aleksandr Korniichuk was produced; it was anti-Polish and extremely tendentious, written in
accordance with the concept of the "lesser evil" which Stalin had prescribed to justify Russian conquests.
These actions had been preceded by the closing of the theater of Vsevolod
Veyerhold, the most outstanding theater of the twenties in Russia, known for its anti-nationalism. In
this epoch of the triumph of the imperial centralized dictatorship and the psychological climate
of "Ivan Susanin," there was no room for a theater which, in its search for new dramatic
forms, was organically linked with the great tradition of the old and new art of the West and
had become part of universal human culture. Tairov's Kamerny Theater, equally universal and
anti-nationalist in its approach although completely different in style, received a severe warning.
Having strengthened the bureaucratic Party machinery by drawing upon the
intelligentsia, the white-collar workers, and the petty bourgeoisie, and having reared a privileged class of
so-called shock workers, Stakhanovites, and persons who had been awarded decorations, from
the beginning of 1939 the Kremlin rulers issued new decrees and laws designed to increase
control over the working class. Stalin had already begun to pursue a policy directed against the
Working class during the first years of the consolidation of his dictatorship. It is sufficient to point
to decrees such as that of the Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's
Commissars of the USSR of November 15, 1932, "On Dismissal for Absence from Work Without
Valid Reason."13 But these were only the first timid and tentative measures of the dictatorship,
which frequently failed to achieve the effects intended. For example, the abovementioned decree
of November 15, 1932, was not fully applied in practice until after special instructions had
been published in a decree of the Council of People's Commissars, the Party Central Committee,
and the All-Union Central Trade Union Council of December 28, 1938. The systematic policy
of attack upon the working class was not fully applied until 1939, when it was embodied in a
long series of decrees and laws regulating and defining the rights and duties of workers,
peasants, and office workers of various categories. They included a decree providing for the
introduction of labor registration
books,14 a decree enforcing labor discipline by depriving discharged
worker) of housing and other forms of social
security15 (rigorously enforced, according to reports
in Pravda16)) a decree reducing the size of private plots of collective farm members,
introducing compulsory labor day norms for such members and authorizing forcible resettlement in
Siberia and elsewhere in the East,17 a decree lengthening the working day and tying workers to
their, jobs18, a decide defining labor obligations for young people between the ages of 14 and
17,19 and a decree providing for the transfer of engineers, technicians, foremen, employees,
and skilled workers "from certain enterprises and institutions to
otters."20
At the same time, the process was renewed of dividing government institutions
and People's Commissariats into small economic and administrative subdivisions, each
receiving the title and function of an independent People's Commissariat. The People's Commissariat
of Defense Industry was divided into four People's
Commissariats,21 the People's
Commissariat of Heavy Industry into
six,22 and the People's Commissariat of Machine-Building into
three.23 The division of People's Commissariats and formation of new ones assisted Stalin in his plan
to consolidate his dictatorship and accelerate his preparations for war.
After these economic, administrative, and ideological measures, Stalin
probably considered that he had adequately strengthened his home front, which the terror had
impaired, and was ready to engage more actively in European adventures. The tragedy of the
Spanish people caused by the civil war of 1936—39, the Japanese aggression against China from
1937 onwards, and the Japanese-Soviet conflict of August 2—11,
1938,24 provided fertile ground for Stalin in his attempt to stage a gradual entrance into the approaching military conflict and to
try out his strength in the various centers of this conflict.
The aggressive policy of the fascist states obviously frightened, but at the same
time attracted and impressed Stalin. Without doubt he wished to have a share in the
forthcoming division of the world. He considered that the victors in the approaching world conflict would
be the fascist bloc. Only this belief can account for his conciliatory and ingratiating policy
toward the fascist aggressors which led to the pact between Hitler and Stalin, known as the "Treaty
of Nonaggression between Germany and the Soviet Union," of August 23,
1939.25
Events had developed with startling rapidity. After the Munich Agreement of
September 29, 1938, the democratic countries of the West had become aware of the fact that they
had committed an error and suffered a defeat. Hitler's tactics and policy were clearly leading to
a world war and there was no possibility of another Munich. It was essential to put an end to
his aggressive plans at any price. However, in the growing world conflict the policy of the
Soviet Union was vague and undefined. Stalin's advances to Hitlerite Germany, his justification
of Hitler's policy of aggression, his condemnation of the Versailles Treaty, and his accusations
in a report at the Eighteenth Party Congress that the Western European powers were
deliberately provoking war and trying "to make a cat's-paw of other people," had created favorable
conditions for an agreement with Hitler. The political reconnaissance by Hitler's diplomats indicated
to the Western Powers that there was a real possibility of such an
agreement.26 In order to clarify the situation and prevent the feared agreement, in the first half of April 1939 England
and France requested the USSR to start definite negotiations looking toward the conclusion of
a military alliance against the aggressors. Perceiving the great danger of such an outcome,
Hitler's diplomats began to explore the possibility of a working agreement with Stalin almost at
the same time as the latter was engaged in talks with England and France. This exploration
took place under the guise of negotiations on "trade agreements and new credits," with short
tactical intervals deliberately manufactured to mark time. But when the English and French
military missions came to Moscow, Hitler realized that the position was serious. Count von
Schulenberg, the German Ambassador in Moscow, received instructions to start extensive and
serious negotiations. From this moment, Moscow became the center of a tense political game in
which all the main European states were involved. This competition for Soviet favors gave Stalin
a feeling of self-assurance and importance which was reflected in a boastful declaration by
Molotov that "The USSR is not what it was, let us say, in 1921.... The USSR is not what it was
5—10 years ago ... The forces of the USSR have become stronger."
A comprehensive and objective analysis of these negotiations in Moscow in the
spring and summer of 1939 would be an enormous task Many writers on international policy
have attempted it but so far no profound analysis has appeared. Many of these quarrelsome
and heated negotiations remain a secret for us. Here we are interested in only one question, which
is directly related to the subject under discussion and appears to have been
the central question in these talks namely, the fate of all the states on the northwestern borders of the
USSR—Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, including the western parts of Belorussia and the
Ukraine—and Rumania.
In the approaching world conflict Stalin obviously wished to have these states under
his control, but England and France could not agree. This appears to be the main reason why
"the talks with France and England ended in a deadlock" as Voroshilov declared in an
"interview" on August 27,
1939.27 Long before breaking off discussions with England and France,
Molotov had made the Soviet position quite clear in his report at the Third Session of the
Supreme Soviet of the USSR on May 31,
1939,28 where he stated that the main demand of the USSR
was that England, France, and the USSR jointly guarantee against attack by an aggressor all
the states of Central and Eastern Europe, including all the European countries bordering on
the USSR, without exception.
However, according to Molotov's statement, "in some Anglo-French proposals
this elementary principle did not find a favorable response. Guaranteeing themselves ... by pacts
of mutual aid with Poland and securing for themselves the aid of the USSR in case of attack
on Poland and Rumania, the English and the French left it an open question as to whether
the USSR in turn could count on their aid in the event of its being directly attacked by the
aggressors, just as they left it an open question as to whether they would participate in a guarantee of
the small states coterminous with the USSR and covering the northwestern borders of the
USSR, should they be unable to befend their neutrality against attack by
aggressors."29
In this "diplomatic" and deliberately ponderous language Molotov was of course
referring to the northwestern neighbors of the USSR referred to above. Stalin was not interested in
a normal guarantee of their independence but in their transformation at least into satellites
of Moscow. He demanded a bigger price from
Poland30 than from the Baltic states. Indirectly,
if not directly, he demanded that Poland should cede Western Belorussia and the Western
Ukraine. Without such a cession he saw no possibility of localizing the danger of the Belorussian
and Ukrainian liberation movements, with which Poland was obviously unable to
cope.31
The truth of this view was partly confirmed by Voroshilov's "interview," already
referred to, which was given in reply to the sharp reaction of the world press to the conclusion of
the Soviet-German treaty of nonaggression. This "interview" was granted am
anonymous representative of Izvestia, in the same manner as all similar interviews and press
conferences staged by the Soviet rulers, at which a member of the staff of
Izvestia or Pravda is required to recite questions previously dictated to him. On this occasion the
Izvestia representative asked:
Does the following Reuter report on the radio correspond to the facts? "Today
Voroshilov informed the heads of the English and French military missions that in view of the
conclusion of a treaty of nonaggression between the USSR and Germany, the Soviet government
considers further negotiations with England and France to be useless."
Voroshilov replied:
No, it does not correspond to the facts. Military negotiations with England and
France have been broken off not because the USSR has concluded a pact of nonaggression with
Germany but, on the contrary, the USSR has concluded a pact of nonaggression with Germany as a
result of the fact, among others, that the military negotiations with France and England ended in
a deadlock because of insurmountable differences.
Asked what the "insurmountable differences" were, Voroshilov replied:
The Soviet military mission considered that the USSR, not having common
frontiers with an aggressor, can render aid to France, England, and Poland only under conditions of
the admission of its troops through Polish territory . ..
. . . the French and English military missions have not agreed with the position of
the Soviet mission and the Polish government has openly stated it does not need and will not
accept military aid from the USSR ... In this lies the basis of the differences. It was because of this
that the negotiations were broken off.31
This exchange makes it clear that the government of the USSR was demanding
the agreement of England and France to the transformation of all the states on the
northwestern borders of the USSR into a bridgehead for a military offensive. With such a bridgehead,
Stalin would have been able to make any transfer of forces and any redivision of the territory
within his sphere of influence. Not only the states concerned, whose fate was being decided in
these negotiations, but also England and France, were unable to agree to such proposals. Hitler
took advantage of the situation and made an agreement with Stalin without reservations.
On August 24, 1939 Pravda reported the conclusion of the "Soviet-German Treaty
of Nonaggression."32 A TASS report on "The Arrival in Moscow of the German Minister of
Foreign Affairs, J. von Ribbentrop" was published with a large photograph on the right showing
the German Assistant State Secretary, Dr. F. Haus, Ribbentrop, Stalin, and Molotov. Below was
the text of the historic pact. The Pravda leader commented on it as follows:
The treaty of nonaggression concluded between the Soviet Union and Germany, the
text of which we are publishing today, is a document of the almost importance, reflecting the
consistent peaceful policy of the Soviet Union ...
An end has been put to the enmity between Germany
and the USSR. Differences in ideology and political systems must not and cannot serve as a
barrier to the establishment of good neighborly relations between both sides. The friendship of
the peoples of the USSR and Germany, driven into an impasse by the enemies of Germany and
the USSR, will henceforth enjoy conditions enabling it to develop and flourish.
Such were the words with which the Party Central Committee hailed the pact by
which the "deceived dupe" Stalin, as Trotsky remarked, "became Hitler's
deputy."33 The pact was signed on August 23, 1939, and on August 24 Ribbentrop and his retinue left
Moscow.34 On August 24 the "Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on Convening
the Fourh Session of the Supreme Soviet" was
published.35 At the same time all futher
negotiations with the French, English, and other diplomatic and military missions were terminated and
they left Moscow with grim forebodings.
On August 27 Pravda published the interview with Voroshilov, which furnished
an explanation of the reasons for the breaking off of negotiations with the Anglo-French
military mission. On August 28 the Fourth Session of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR began,
and hastily ratified tie Soviet-German treaty of
nonaggression.36 Molotov again referred to what
he called the "deceitfulness" and "flippancy" of the Anglo-French missions and the wisdom
of Stalin, thanks to which "the intrigues of the Western European politicians to cause a
collission between Germany and the Soviet Union" were unmasked. He alleged that a provocative
sensation had been created by the "Anglo-French and American press in referring to German `plans'
for seizing Russia," and that the "corrupt" Anglo-French and American press, especially
`certain `socialist
newspapers',"37 had made ferocious attacks upon the Soviet-German treaty.
On September 1, 1939, at a session of the German Reichstag, Hitler announced that
the German government had added its ratification of the Soviet-German treaty of nonaggression
to that of the Soviet government and that "it could subscribe to every word that People's
Commissar for Foreign Affairs Molotov had said in this
connection."38
Thus, both in Moscow and in Berlin there was extraordinary haste in attempting to
give the treaty legal force and effect. What was the reason for such haste? The events of the fall
of 1939 which developed with fantastic rapidity provide the answer to this question. On the
second day after the ratification of the Soviet—German treaty in Moscow and Berlin, Hitler
commenced his war against Poland. On the same day, September, 1939, a decree of the Reichstag
incorporated the Free City of Danzig in the Third
Reich.39
Along with the ratification of the Soviet German treaty of nonaggression, the
Soviet government ratified a "Law on Universal Military
Service,"40 and the ranks of the Red
Army and Navy were quickly filled.
During the first two weeks of the German-Polish war, the Soviet Government
outwardly maintained its "neutrality," and the war was reported coldly and dispassionately while
feverish efforts were made to mobilize the Red Army. However, on September 14, there was a sharp
and unexpected change in the attitude of the Soviet government. In
Pravda a leader entitled "The Internal Causes of the Military Defeat of
Poland"41 took a hostile attitude toward
half-defeated Poland, a neighboring country with which, in the spring of 1939, the USSR had signed a
treaty of friendship and good-neighbor relations and which had given no grounds for hostility
or aggression. This change of attitude was but the prelude to military aggression against Poland
on the part of the Soviet Union. On September 17, 1939, in a speech on the radio, Molotov
informed the world that "the Soviet government... could no longer maintain a neutral attitude to
the situation which had been created," and that "instructions had been given to the supreme
command of the Red Army to order the troops to cross the border and defend the life and property of
the population of Western Belorussia and the Western
Ukraine."42
On the same historic date, Molotov, on behalf of the Soviet government, handed to
the representatives of the twenty-four states having diplomatic relations with the
USSR43 a note stating that "the Soviet Union will conduct a policy of neutrality toward these
countries."44 Meanwhile a note to the Polish ambassador in Moscow, Waclaw Grzybowski, was an
appalling document reflecting the harshness and ruthlessness of a cruel victor. On the same day the
Soviet Army crossed the border and struck at the rear of the Polish Army, which was retreating
under pressure from the German divisions.
Five days after this treacherous blow by the Soviet Army, a German-Soviet
communique was published on September 22 establishing a demarcation line between the two
states.45 On September 24 a decree of the Supreme Soviet of
THE TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY OF THE
MOLOTOV-RIBBINTROP PACT AND SOVIET WESTWARD EXPANSION