Natural disaster and human actions in the Soviet famine of 1931-1933

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The

Carl Beck Papers in Russian & East European Studies Number1506

MarkB. Tanger

Natural Disaster and Human Actions in the Soviet Famine of

1931-1933

Mark B. Tauger is Associate Professorof History at West VIrginia University. He has published numerous articlesand reviews on Sovieteconomic and agrarian history. His workhas beensupported by !REX, theSocialScience Research Council,the UCLA History Department, theWestVtrginia Humanities Council, and the WestVirginia University History Department He ispreparing a book onfamine andagricultural development in late imperial Russiaand the USSR.

~o.

1506, June 2001

© 2001 by The Centerfor Russianand East European Studies, a programof the

University Centerfor International Studies, University of Pittsburgh ISSN0889-275X

The Carl Beck Papers

William Chase,BobDonnorummo, Ronald H. Linden, Co-Editors EileenO'Malley,Managing Editor MikeSavitski, CoverDesign

Submissions to The Carl Beck Papers are welcome. Manuscripts must be in English, double-spaced throughout, and less than 100 pages in length. Acceptance is based on anonymous review. Mail submissions to: Editor, The Carl Beck Papers, Center for Russian andEastEuropean Studies, 40-17 W. W. PosvarHall,University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260.

Introduction Untilrecentlybothscholarly andpopulardiscussions ofthecatastrophic famine in theSovietUnionin 1931-1933 invariably havedescribedit as an artificial or "manmade" famine. Certainwell-known scholars have dominatedthisdiscussion, expressing two main interpretationsof the famine. A Ukrainian nationalistinterpretation holds that theSovietregime,andspecifically IosifStalin, intentionally imposed thefamineto suppressthe nationalistaspirations of Ukraine andUkrainians; revisionists argue that the leadership imposed the famine to suppress morewidespreadpeasantresistance to collectivization. Accordingto theseviews, a natural disasterthatcouldhavecauseda famine did not take place in those years.1 Whiletheintentionalistinterpretations ofthefamine remainwidely held, recent researchhascastsubstantial doubton them. Several studiesanddocumentcollections haveshownconclusively thatthefamine didnotstopatUkraine's borders,butaffected rural and urban areas throughout the SovietUnion, and even the military.' Studies based on this evidence, and on a reevaluationof published Soviet statistics, have shown that the grain harvests of 1931 and 1932 must have been much smaller than officiallyacknowledged. As tables 1and 2 show, what the regime called "net grain marketings" fromthe 1932 harvest-the amounts of grainremovedfromthe villages, includinggovernmentprocurementsandestimated privatesales by peasants,minus the seed, food, and fodder aid returnedtofanns-approximated 13.7 milliontons. Table 1: Soviet omdal Harvest and Marketing Data, 1930-1934, (sown area in million hectares, harvest in million metric tons, yields in centners per hectare) Yields

Harvest Sown Area 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934

101.8 104.4 99.7 101.6 104.7

Biological

89.9 89.4

Bam 83 69.5 69.9 68.5 67.7

Biological Biological Barn Barn ProcureAverage Kolkhoz Average Kolkhoz ments

8.8 8.5

8.5

8.5 6.7 7.0 6.7 6.5

6.8

22.1 22.8 18.5 22.9 22.7

Sources: Sel'skoekhoziaistvoSSSR. Ezhegodnik 1932(Moscow, 1936),215,243-49,269; I. E. Zelenin,"Osnovnyepokazatelisel'skokhoziaistvennogo proizvodstvav 1928-1935 gg," in

1

Ezhegodnik: po agramoi tstorii vostochnoi Evropy 1965 g. (Moscow: Nauka, 1970), 473. The biological yield was a projection made before the harvest, by a special network of agencies established in 1933, which took little account of potential harvesting losses; the biological harvest was calculated based on regional average biological yields and estimated crop areas. The barn yield was in principle based on actual harvests and harvest yields drawn from annual farm reports, which were prepared long after procurements and hence could not be used as a basis for demanding reduced procurementquotas, and therefore were considered reliable. The figures for kol/chozy are disaggregatedfrom total averageyields and harvests in the sources. For further informationon sources, see Tauger,"The 1932Harvestand the Soviet Famine of 19321933,"SlavicReview,50, no. 1 (Spring1990): 72.

Table 2: Soviet Rural Grain Balance from Official Data (million metric tons)

1931 1932 1933 1934

Rural

Barn Harvest

Est. Gross Marketings

Returns to Agriculture

Net Marketings

Remainder

69.5 69.6 68.5 67.7

23.7 19.4 25.6 27.1

4.9 5.7 1.3 1.1

18.8 13.7 24.3 26.0

50.7 55.9 44.2 41.6

Sources: Tauger,"The 1932 Harvest," 74; A. A. Barsov, Balans stoimostnykk obmenov mezhdu gorodom i derevnei (Moscow: Nauka, 1969), 103, citing archival sources on grain returned to agriculture in 1931-1932; Iu. V. Moshkov, Zemovaia problema v gody sploshnoi kollektivhatsii (Moscow: MOU, 1966),131,forgrainreturned to agriculture in 1933; Spravochnik partiinogo rabomika, (Moscow, 1935),9: 212, for grainreturnedto agriculturein 1934. The latter two sources refer only to stale seed and provisionaid and probablyunderestimate the amount of grainreturned. Gross marketings includegovernment grainprocurements and estimatesof private market sales by peasants; returns to agriculture comprises procured grain that the government returned to villages for food, forage, and seed; net marketingsare the difference resulting from subtracting returns to agriculturefrom gross marketings,and represent the total available to the governmentfor extra-ruraluse; the rural remainder is the differenceobtained by subtracting net marketings from the "barn harvest," and represent the amounts left in and returned to the countrysideafter grain procurementswere completed.

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Thisamount wassubstantially less thanthenetgrain marketings fromthe 1931harvest, 18.8 million tons. Consequentlythe 1932 procurements should have leftmorefood in the villages during fall 1932 and spring 1933 than in 1931-1932. The fact that a disastrous famine followedthe 1932procurements musthave been at least in part the result ofasrnaller harvest Newarchival sources,including annual reports from collective farms preparedafter all harvest work and grainprocurementswere completed,show that collective and state farms (kolkhozy and sovkhozy) produced much less grain than official statistics indicated. These data, partially presented in tables 3 and 4, indicate that the 1932 harvest was in the range of 50-55 million tons, some 20-30 percent below the official figure of almost70 milliontons, and even this may be an overestimate. These data also show that the harvest of 1933 was much larger than thoseof 1931and 1932: in Ukraine the yieldincreased from five centnersper hectare to eight; in Azovo-Chernomorskii krai (territory), formerlythe most fertile partof the North Caucasus,from less than fourcen tnersto more than six.' Table 3: Official and Archival Kolkhoz Yie lds and Implied Harvests, 1932 (harvests in million metric tons, yields in centners per hectare)

Region

Official Kolkho z Yield

USSR

RSFSR UkrSSR NorthCau.

6.8 6.5 8.0 6.1

Official Kolkhoz Grain Sown Area

Official Kolkhoz Harvest

69.1 53.0 13.0 7.1

46.99 34.45 lOAD 4.30

Percentage of All Kolkhozy inNKZ Reports 40 33.6 47.3 86.6

Archival Yield NKZ

Implied Kolkhoz Harvest

5.6 6.0 5.1 3.9

39.5 31.8 6.6 2.8

Sources: Tauger, "The 1932 Harvest," 78, 85, based on Sel'sko e khoziaistvo SSSR, 27 1; RGAE 7486.3.4456,112 ff. The archival yields are averages ofkolkhoz annual reports contained in Narkornzem archival documents for internal use; the implied kolkhoz harvest is the product of the archival yield and the official kolkho z grain sown area.

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Table 4: Recent Estimates of Soviet Rural Grain Balance (million metric tons) Tauger

Wheatcroft & Davies

1931 1932 1933

Net Marketings

Harvest est

ImpliedRural Remainder

18.8 13.7 24.3

56±9% 56± 10% 65±4%

38 42.3 41.7

Harvestest.

50

Implied Rural Remainder

36.3

Sources: R. W. Davies, Mark Harriston, and S. G. Wheatcroft, eds., The Economic Transformation o/the Soviet Union, 1913-1945(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 286; figures obtained by reducing official harvest statistics by a percentage based on rainfall data; Tanger, "The 1932Harvest," 76,84, estimate based on archival summariesof yields and sownareasfromannualkolkhoz reportsfor 1932containedin the archivesofNarkomzem and the CentralStatistical Administration.

Certainly, theharvest decline wasnottheonlycauseoftheSovietfamine: the regimeexportedfoodduringthe crisis," The amountof grainexportedduring the peak of the faminein the first halfof 1933,however, approximately 220,000tons, was small,less than 1 percentof the lowestharvestestimates,and the regime was usingvirtually all therestof theavailable harvest to feedpeople. Theactual amounts of grainneeded andutilizedforthispurposecanonlybeapproximated. A I. Mikoian, thecommissar of trade (Narkomtorg) estimated in 1928thattheregimeneeded11.2 milliontonsof grainto meetthe demands of townspeople, militarypersonnel,and othergroups whodidnot produce theirownfoodor sufficient food. Withthe rapid industrialization, collectivization, anddekulakization measures in thefollowing years, however, the numberof consumerswhomthe regime suppliedrapidly increased. Simultaneously,cropfailures andfamine conditions in 1927 and1928,the"graincrisis," forced theSovietregime to establish afood rationing systemthatby 1932encompassed morethan40million peoplein towns andindustrial sites. In addition, several million moreinthemilitary, in prisons andcamps, andevenmanypeasants andotherpeople in villagesreceivedfood supplies through otherrationing systems. Despitetheincreasing numberof consumers, theSovietgovernment's capacityto supplythemdecreased during thefamine crisis. According to official figures, thesupply systemdistributed approximately 16.3million tonsof grainthrough rationing systems fromJuly 1931 throughJune 1932,but only 14.5milliontonsfrom July 1932throughJune 1933. 4

During those same periods the regime drasticallycurtailed grain exports, from 4.7 million tons to 1.6million tons. As can be seen fromcomparing these statistics with the data on procurements in tables 1 and 2, the total of supply and exports nearly exhausts the total grain available from procurements in these years. The Soviet government did have small reserves of grain, but continually drew these down to allocate foodtothepopulation.' Sincevirtually theentire country experienced shortages offood, indicatingthatthe procurement anddistribution data are reasonably accurate, clearlytheSovietUnionfaced a severeshortage, andthe most importantcause of that shortage has to have been small harvests in 1931 and 1932. Consequently an understanding oftheSovietfamine, andof theintense conflict between regime and peasants over grain procurementsemphasized in most studies, requiresan examination of the causesof thosesmallharvests. Twoexamples from the vasthistoriography of faminesdemonstrates the legitimacy and importance of such an investigation. In thecaseof theGreatIrishFamine of 1845-1851, a nationalist literature, similar to the Ukrainiannationalist literatureon the Soviet famine, holds the British governmentresponsible. Withoutdenying thattheBritish government mishandled the crisis, however, every serioushistorian of the famine, from Cecil Woodham-Smith to the leadingIrishspecialist Cormac 6 Grada, attributes it firstof alltothe extraordinary naturaldisasterof the potato blight.PeterSolarcalculatedthatIrelandexperiencedan absolute food shortage in the main famine years of 1845-1848.6 Russia itself has enduredmorethanone hundredfiftyfamines inits thousand yearsof recordedhistory, virtually allof whichresulteddirectly from natural disasters, in mostcasesdrought, and Russian and Sovietspecialistshave publishedmanystudiesof the causes and effects of drought and cropfailures in Russiaand elsewhere.' These crop failures in Ireland and Russia are establishedfacts that mustbe consideredin any attemptto explain the famines.The NobellaureateeconomistAmartyaSen hascriticizeda narrowfocus on shortage in explainingfamines. In his classicstudy Povertyand Famines, however, Sen examined agricultural conditionsand harveststatistics in each of his four famine case studies before rejecting shortage as anexplanation. His arguments minimizing the importanceof shortages, moreover, havebeenchallenged intwoofthecaseshe studied. 8 Harvests duringtheSovietfamine of 1931-1933 havenotreceived comparable attention, in great part because of the assumption that the famine was not due to a smallharvest. Robert Conquest,forexample, employs the wordin thetitletohis wellknown book Harvest ofSorrow, but doesnot actually analyzethe harvestor examine its relationship to the famine in any detail." James Mace has recently reasserted the argument that the harvest was large, citing testimoniesbefore a U.S. congressional commission in the 1980s (fifty years after the event); on this basis he argues that the famine was thereforethe result of high procurementquotas. He does not, however, discuss statistical data and other evidence,somefrom his own sources,showing that

5

procurements weresubstantially lowerin 1932 thanin 1931, butleftrural peoplewith muchsmallerreserves thanafterthe 1931 harvest Thiscouldonlyhavehappenedif the 1932harvestwassmall." Thefactthatmemoirsources describe a largeharvest, however, suggests thatcropsmayhaveappeared to be inbettercondition (at least to thepeasants) thantheywereinfact; theevidence thatI present belowdocuments that this wasthe case. Nonetheless, twostudiesdiscuss theharvests in thoseyears. RobertDavies and Stephen Wheatcroftargue that the 1931 and 1932harvests were small due to droughtanddifficulties in laborandcapital, especially thedecline in draft animals.I I D' Ann Penner, in twostudiesof thefamine in theNorthCaucasus andDon regions, rejects drought asanimportant factor intheregion'ssmallharvestin 1932andinstead attributesit to peasantresistance,specifically a strike againstthe Soviet regime.12 Thesestudies thusrepresent twocontrasting Perspectives ontheharvest, andtherefore on the famine: one focusingon the old Russianagrarianproblemsof weather and poverty, exacerbatedbycollectivization andtheeconomic crises ofthefive-year plan, the otherfocusingon familiarpoliticalaspects, the conflictbetweenthe rapacious Sovietregime andtheresentful, resistantpeasantry. Theirstudies workfromdifferent assumptions andemploydifferentsources: DaviesandWheatcroftrelied more on published sources and consider the country as a whole, Penner more on archival . materials that focus on one region, albeit an important one. They also discuss environmentalconditionspurely in tenns ofdrought, when theIrish caseatleastsuggests thatotherfactors werefullycapableofcausing a disastrous cropfailure. In this essay I reexamine the harvestsof 1931 and especially 1932 on the basisof newlyavailable archival documents andpublished sources, including some thatscholars have neverutilized. I show thattheenvironmental contextofthese famines deserves muchgreater emphasis thatithaspreviously received: environmental disasters reduced the Soviet grain harvest in 1932substantially and have to be considered among theprimary causes ofthefamine. I argue thatcapital andlabordifficulties were significant butwerenotas important astheseenvironmental factors, andwerein part a resultof them. I alsodemonstrate thattheSovietleadership didnotfullyunderstand thecrisisandoutof ignorance actedinconsistently in response toit I conclude thatit is thusinaccurate todescribe theSovietfamine of 1932-1933 assimply an artificial or man-made famine, orotherwise to reduce ittoa singlecause. Overall, thelowharvest, andhencethefamine, resulted fromacomplex of humanandenvironmental factors, aninteraction of manandnature, muchasmostprevious famines inhistory.

6

The Global Context Natural disasters leading to famines both at home and abroad form the background to the 1932-1933 famine. Internally, the period 1917 to 1930 saw famines in large areas of the SovietUnion,in some cases on a nationalscale. The regimecame to power in 1917in the midstof seriousand growingfood shortages, causedmainlybythedemands ofWorld WarI, in townsthroughout thecountry and in mral areas in thenorthem "consumingprovinces"; thetsaristregime andtheProvisional Governmenthadestablishedstatecontroloverfoodsupplies andinstitutedrequisitioning policies, modeledonthoseofthewestern powers. 13 DuringtheCivil War, theBolshevik government, the White regimes, andeventheGreens requisitioned foodfrompeasants in regionsthattheycontrolled; thetownsin Bolshevikand Whiteregionsgenerally experiencedfamines. 14 The "famineof 1921"in factencompassedtheyears 19201923, due to severe crop failures in 1920and 1921 and low harvests in 1922 and 1923, andaffectednotonlyrural areas butalsocities, including Moscow andPetrograd. During these years the Soviet regimereceivedaid from abroad, but continued the requisitions ofwarcommunism in someregions while applying"methodsofrequisition" to collectthenew tax in kindimposed in 1921 inorderto supplementofteninsufficient aid supplies. IS Serious droughts led to famines during theperiodoftheNewEconomic Policy (NEP) in 1924--1925 in European Russia and Ukraine, and in 1928-1929, which wasmost severe in Ukraine. In bothcases,theregimeacknowledged the crisesand fanned extraordinary agencies to manage relief. 16 The 1928--1929 Ukrainian famine, whichhasnotbeenrecognized in theWestern literature butisdocumented in Ukrainian sources, wasa majorcauseof the "grain crisis"becauseit substantially reducedgrain suppliesfor theurbanpopulation as wellasforpeasantsin the droughtregions. The grain crisis and famine of 1928-1929 wereamongthe main factorsthat led Soviet leadersand officialsto resortto the "extraordinary measures" to procurefoodfrom peasantsin otherregions,to importfoodfromabroad, to rationfoodin townsand in ruralfaminedistricts, andultimately toundertake thecollectivization of agriculture. 17 Even in 1930manyregionshadunfavorable weatherandcropfailures: in partsof the NorthCaucasus, cropfailures forced localauthorities to appealto centralauthorities for seed aid,which theyreceived, andcropfailures alsoreduced harvests in Kazakstan and the MiddleVolga 18 Thedomestic contextofthe 1931-1933 famine, therefore, wasoneofchronic food insecurity. Naturaldisasters, especially droughtalone or in combination with otherenvironmental factors(to be discussed below), repeatedly causedcropfailures duringtheearlyyearsof theSovietUnion andthreatened to revivethefoodcrisesand famine of the Civil War period. NEP, despite one scholar's assertions, was not a 7

period of ''well-being'' free fromfamine. 19 TheSovietregime wasnotunique in thisexperience: othermajoragricultural countries in theworldalsoencountered majornatural disasters andfoodcrisesin the early 1930s. The UnitedStatesin 1930-1931 enduredwhatwastermed ''the great southern drought,"whichaffected twenty-three statesfromTexasto WestVIrginia, brought immense suffering andincreased mortality, andcaused amajorpolitical scandal when Herbert Hooverrefusedto allocate food relieffromfederal govemmentresources. Chinaendureda catastrophic floodalongthree majorrivers in 1931-1932thatled to famine and causedsome2 million deaths. French colonies inwestern Africain 19311932endureda drought, locustinfestation, andtheworstfamine everrecordedthere, though the French authorities continued to demand taxes." Both domestic and international contexts suggest thatenvironmental factors deserve careful consideration in evaluating thecausesof the 1932-1933 famine in theSovietUnion.

Natural disasters, 1931-1932 Drought

Historically, themostimportantenvironmentalfactor inharvestfailures andfamines in Russiahas been drought21 A main theme inthehistoriography of the 1933 famine, however,has been that drought did not occur in 1932, at least not on a scale that could have caused a famine. Stalin,for example,in a speech to the January 1933 CentralCommitteeplenum,acknowledged that "unfavorable climaticconditions" causedlossesin the NorthCaucasus andUkrainein 1932,but insistedthatthesedid not equal half the lossesdue to the 1931 droughtin the Volga region. Mace cites a tablefrom a standardSoviet study of droughtto argue that no major drought took placein 1932. Penner'srecentstudyofthe 1932-1933 famine, whichfocuses mostly on the North Caucasus,argues that althoughsome regionsexperienceddroughts, suchlocalunfavorable weatherconditions werenotunusual andoverall, droughtwas not a factorin reducingthe 1932harvest.22 On theotherhand, Davies andWheatcroftargue thatdrought wasanimportant factorin reducingthe 1932harvest. Theyreferto thedroughtof 1931 (whichI shall discussbelow)and statethat"droughtconditions continuedin 1932." They cite an unpublished paperbyWheatcroft in which heprojectedsteadily increasing harvests fromthelatenineteenth century, compared thistocertainestimates of harvests in the Soviet period, which were always lower,and then employed rainfall statistics to detenninetherelative significance ofweather in thosefluctuations.v Hiscalculations indicated thatdroughtwasan important factorin lowerharvests in theSovietperiod,

8

though not the only factor. Wheatcroftalsonoted that the 1930s were the warmest periodand one of the driest periods sinceRussiabegankeepingrecords. The Soviet publication that Mace cited to show the absence of drought did in fact document substantial droughtconditionsin several regions of theSovietUnionin 1932.24 Theincompleteness ofSovietweather dataintheseyears makesanydiscussion ofclimate conditions approximate at best: the network of monitoring points was highlyunevenandsparse,fewregions hadcontinuous recordsfora substantial period, and conditionsvariedgreatlyeven withindroughtregions.P Nonetheless,available sourcesindicate that droughtplayeda central role in precipitating thefaminecrisis. In 1931severe drought affected many regions. Duringsummer 1931drought and hot winds (sukhovei) struck the southern Urals, Western Siberia, the Volga region, Bashkiria,andsouthern and centralpartsof Ukraine. Accordingto a Sovietstudyof droughts publishedin the Khrushchevperiod,precipitationin the drought region in 1931, which the study defined only as the central and lower Volgaand portions of Bashkiria, the Don basin, Ukraine,andtheNorthCaucasus, had rainfallrangingfrom 10 percent to 48 percent below normal in winter 1930-1931, and 10 percent to 55 percentbelownormalin the springgrowing season. Sincetheseregionsnormally had rainfall ranging fromtwelveinchestotwenty inches a year, declineson this scalecould be extremely serious." Some local reportssuggest,moreover, that these data may have understatedthe 1931 drought's severity. In the main spring-grain maturation Period ofmid-April tomid-June, precipitation inthesouthern UralsandWestern Siberia wasone-fourth of the amountthatagronomists thereconsiderednecessaryfornonnal plantgrowth.n Reportswritten by the Canadianagricultural specialistAndrew Cairns after extensivetravelsthrough the USSR in 1932providestark evidence of the effects of the 1931drought on agricultural production. In Novosibirsk,the chief agricultural official ofWestemSiberia(which wasanimportantgrain-producing region) toldCairns that 38 of the 124districts in the krai had totalcrop failuresin 1931. The director of the Omsk graininstitutetold him thatthecroparoundOmsk was worsein 1931than it hadbeenin 1921. Sovkhozy thatCairnsvisited nearOmsk had averagegrainyields of 1.8 and 2.5 centners per hectare in 1931, as opposed to 9.3 and 13 centners in 1930. In the Middle Volga, spring wheat had yielded 2.5 centners on average in 1931,and officialsin Samara told Cairnsthatthe krai had lost 3-3.5 million tons of grainto drought28 Droughtalsoreduced grainharvests in Ukraine." The factthatthe 1931 cropped area exceeded that of any year between the revolution and the late 19308, yetresulted in anextraordinarily small harvest, further evidences thesignificance of droughtthatyear.30 The 1931 drought, exacerbatedby large procurementdemandsandsubstantial grainexportsin 1931(more than4 million tons),createdfamineconditionsin many 9

regions of theSovietUnion. The lateSiberian scholarN. Ia. Gushchin wrotethatthe 1931 cropfailure broughtextremeshortages andfamine in manydistricts of Siberia, which Otto Schiller, the Gennan agricultural attache totheUSSR,witnessed," While traveling in Siberiaandthe MiddleVolga, Cairns sawmanystarvingandemaciated people, especially children, begging inthetowns. In Slavgorod, themaintown in an important grain region in WesternSiberia, he was accosted by crowds of people tellingof villages emptiedandofpeople starving to death everydayin thecountryside." Theseconditionswerenot limited to Siberia. A sovietofficialin one district in the Uralsin early 1932describedKazakhsfleeingfaminein Kazakstan, a "wholesale nightmare h011Or," butfinding extreme shortages in the Uralsas well.33 Seriousfamine conditionsin villages andtownsinUkraine byearly1932required special foodrelief. 34 Theregimeadmittedtheseriousness of thisdrought publicly, in particularby holding a conference on droughtin October 1931 attended by agricultural specialists as wellas SovnarkomchairmanViacheslav Molotovand other high officials. The government also established a meteorological monitoring service andbeganplansfor construction of majorirrigation projects alongthe Volga and in otherdrought-prone areas," The CentralCommitteealsodispatchedseed and food loans to most of the severely affectedregions. According toa MiddleVolga kraikom party secretary, M M Khataevich, thecropfailure in 1931 leftdistricts withalmostno grain todistribute. Procurements frequently tookeverything, including seed, muchof whichthenhadto bereturned to thosedistricts.36 Thiswasthesituation throughout theeasternregions. The Urals oblast' (province) gave 770,000 tons in procurements but then had to obtaina seed and provisions loan of 350,000tons, 45 percent of its procurements. Kazakstan received back 36 percent, Western Siberia 22 percent, Bashkiria 20 percent," Theregimealso importeddrought-resistant seed in early 1932for use that year.38 In 1932Soviet agricultural officials andspecialists admitted lossesfromdrought inmanyregjons. N.M Thlaikov, theSoviet Union's leading specialistonaridagriculture anda keyadvisorto topSovietofficials on agricultural policy, toldCairns in August 1932in Saratovthat drought and hot windshad ruinedmostof thecrops on the left bankoftheMiddleandLowerVolga regions. Cairnsalsoobserved largefieldssouth ofMoscowstuntedanddamaged bydrought andhot winds. Theheadoftheagricultural department of theSovietstatistical agency underGosplan toldOttoSchillerin August 1932 inMoscowthatdroughtandhotwinds had significantly reducedcropsalongthe Volga, in Ukraine, andin Siberia," A secretevaluation of graincropsissuedon 1July 1932 by the People's Commissariat of Agriculture (Narodnyi Komissariat Zemledeliia; or NKZ) reported that dry weather had reduced crop Yields in the Urals, Bashkiria, portions of theVolga tenitory, Ivanovo oblast' in central Russia, and Kazakstan." Drought reduced harvests in other areas as well. Veger, the party

10

,"

secretary of theCrimeanregion(which ordinarily producedlargeharvests of exportquality wheat), wrote to Stalin in September 1932 that because of sukhovei, and certainotherfactors, the total harvestinstatefarms wassmallerthan theiraggregate procurement quota.41

Other Weather Factors Thesesourcesindicatethatdrought reducedharvestsin many areasin 1932, even if itdidnotapproach theseverity of 1931. Yetit wouldbeanoversimplification to attribute eventhemostclearly"drought-causedfamines" to thatfactoralone. The 1920-1923famine,for example,resultedfromharvests reducednot only by severe droughts but alsoby massiveinfestations of locusts, rodents, and plantdiseases." A focusondroughtcanreflectan assumption thatlackof droughtrepresented favorable weatherconditions andthatharvest sizecorrelatedpositively withrainfall. Daviesand Wheatcroft, for example, correlate more rainfall with a larger harvest and do not discussany other climate factors thatcouldhaveinfluencedthe harvest." Penner, whileminimizing droughtin 1932, notes thatincertain regions heavyrains affectedthe harvesting process, but does not draw any further conclusions from this." Jasny simply asserts that because 1932 was not a year of drought, the famine was manmade,eventhoughhe considersthe 1932harvest datainaccurate." This focus ondroughtastheonlyenvironmental condition affecting famine in Russia led these scholars, like Stalin and other Soviet officials, to overlook other factors thatcouldbeat leastas importantToomuchraincouldhaveas destmctive an effectas too little, andmanyothernatural eventscoulddestroy harvests aswell. Russian peasantagriculture evenin thetwentieth century, likepeasantfanning in medieval and earlymodemBurope, washighly wlnerable to weather, pests, anddiseases. Peasants' proverbsreflectedtheir utter subjection to thesefactors." Otherweatherconditions quitedistinct fromdroughtaffectedthe 1932crop. In January 1932a sudden warm spell in the southernregions of the Soviet Union causedfall-sown crops to startgrowing, afterwhich wintertemperatures returnedand killeda portion of thecrop. In Ukraine thiswinterkilldestroyed at least 12Percentof fall-sown crops,more than doublethelong-term average; in onedistrict 62percentof wintercropsfailed. 47 And most important,despitethe regional droughtsmentionedabove, 1932 wasoveralla warm and humid year. In severalregionsheavy rains damagedcrops andreduced yields, particularly on therightbankof theVolga, in the NorthCaucasus, and in Ukraine," Cairns notedheavyrains in Junethatcauseddrownings in basement apartments in Kiev,and the OGPU (internal securitypolice, predecessorto KGB) reportedflooding in thecottonfields inUzbekistan in August, aswellas a hunicane in 11

the centralindustrial regionin September," A report preparedby the Ukrainian Agriculture Commissariat on 20June 1932on agricultural conditions and workin spring attributedslowersowingin 1932than in1930-1931 partly to "thelargequandty ofprecipitation which interfered withwork." Thereport included a tablecomparing April-June precipitation in 1931 and1932thatdocuments notonlythepartial drought in 1931 butalso heavy rainfall in 1932 which wasdouble ortriple thenormal amount inmanyregions (seetable5). Table 5: Summary of Precipitation in Ukraine, from April to the First Half of June, 1931 and 1932 Percent

Milimeters

Oblast'

Kiev Vmnytsia Sumy Kharkov Poltava Zinov'ev Odessa Askenia Novoluk Iasinuvsk

Long-term Average

165 130 150 118 110 105 80 85 110 140

1931

1932

Long-term Average

191 76 113

328 171 178 233 210 315 191 143 136 210

100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100

99

58 115 77 57 66

56

1931

1932

116 51 75

199 132 119 198 192 300

84

53 110 96 67 69 40

240

168 124 150

Source: Tsentral'nyy derzhavnyy arkhivvyshchykh orhanivvladyta upravlinniaUkrainy

Central State Archive ofLeading State Organs ofUkraine 27,13. 213, U. 37,39.

Thisraincameintheearly partoftheseason, which was unusual andin principle should havebeen goodfor graincrops. Similarconditions appeartohaveprevailed in theNorth Caucasus: NKZinvestigators reported in 1933 thatpeasants said "rain fell according toplan [po plana]' in 1932, thatis,during thegrowing season, ratherthan in thetypical pattern ofheavier rainfall in latespring andsummer.so Plant Diseases

While highprecipitationcanbenefitcrops, itcanalso createfavorable conditions for plantdiseases, weeds,andotherblightsthatcan reduceharvests. The British geographerDavidGriggnotedthatinEurope generally, grainyields tend to beinversely 12

.:

related to rainfall during the growing season,in particular because such rainfall encourages the spreadof cropdiseases.SI This tyPe of problemchronically affected theSovietUnion. A reportprepared by theU.S.Central Intelligence Agency in 1978 foundthatamongthe mainfactors reducing Sovietgrainqualityand yieldwererust and smut, which are the most widespreaddiseasesof wheat, rye, and other grain crops. The report notedthatwhilethesediseases causedsignificant losses everyyear, in certainyearsthey wereespeciallydestructive.P Sovietagronomic literature and other publishedand archivalsourcesfromthe 1930s, however, whichno previous scholarship on thefaminehasdiscussed, indicate thatin 1932Soviet cropssuffered from an extraordinarily severecombination of infestations from crop diseasesand pests. Themostimportant infestation in 1932camefromseveral varieties of rust, a category of fungi thatcaninfestgrains andmanyotherplants. Different types of rust vary in their symptoms,with spores formingon the stems (black or stem rust and yellow or striperust), the leaves (brown or leaf rust), or the heads (crown rust of oats), but theireffects are similar. Afterapproximately a weekof infestation,rust causesplantcells to ageprematurely, reduces theplant'scapacity to photosynthesize to a fraction of itsnormalrate, anddivertsincreasing amounts ofcarbohydrates and othernutrients in theplantfortheinfestation's owngrowth andreproduction. Although in somecasesrust will killgrainplants, rusted grainordinarily willcontinueto grow, fonn ears, and in generalappearnormal; butthegrainheadswillnot "fill," so thatthe harvest willseem"light"andconsistof smaIl grains, oroffewernonnal-sized grains, anddisproportionately of husksandotherfibrous materials." In otherwords, a field of wheat(or barley, rye, oats, or othergrain, all of whichare susceptible to rust)could appear entirely normal andpromising, andyetbecauseoftheinfestation couldproduce an extremely low yield. One Soviet study showed that a 100percent infestation reducedtheweightof 1,000grainsof wheatfrom39.7gramsto 14.1 grams,or more than 60 percent," Rustshavebeen the mostcommonandthe mostdestructive infestationsof grain crops, andremainsotoday. Fromtheeighteenth through thetwentieth centuries rusts have infested U.S. crops, in a few cases severely. In 1935, wheat stem rust causedlossesof more than 50 percentin NorthDakotaand Minnesota; black rust infestationsreducedaveragedurum wheatyieldsfrom 14.5bushelsan acre in the 1940sto 3 bushelsan acre in 1954. Becauseof this destructive potential,the U. S. Anny producedand stockpiledrustsporesas a biological weaponin the 1950sand 1960s,and apparently the Soviet Union did so as well.ss Rust is among the most difficult of plantdiseases to combat Themain methods are elimination of alternative hosts, such as barberries, on which spores overwinter to spread during spring, application offungicides, and mostimportant, planting resistant varieties of grains. 13

The high-yielding varietiesthat madepossiblethe GreenRevolution and are now basic to world agriculturedevelopedout of efforts in the early 1940s to produce wheatvarieties resistantto therustthathadinfestedMexicanwheatfor threeyears nmning.56 Rustinfestations occuredrepeatedlyduring the early Soviet Period. In addition to drought, rustreducedcrops in 1921. IntheFarEastteIrltory, theregional commission forprojecting harvest yieldsdetected a widespread111stinfestation in thecoastaland centraldistricts thatbeganin July 1931 and spreadduringthefollowing month,but minimized itspotential effectsbecauseit developed aftertheplantshad matured.57 In 1932, however, a largeepiphytotic of 11181, oneofthemostsevererecorded, afIectedallEastemEurope. It spreadfrom theBalkans asaresultofwanntemperatures, highhumidity, and thunderstonns-the conditionswhichthe above-citedsources documentedas prevalentin Ukraineand elsewherein the southernregions of the USSR. As a reportby the WorldMeteorological Societydescribedit, "during the thunderstorms largered cloudsof sporeswereairborne, traveling alongthe Danube valley, andtheensuinginfectionkilledthecrops." InGennany, thunderstonnsin summer 1932causednot only hail damageto cropsbut also widespreadoutbreaksof plant diseases, especially 11181, in East Prussia, Pomerania, Silesia, Hanover, Bavaria,and western regions as well. Studies of estates in Germany found losses of 40 to 80 percent of wheat crops, a scale not seen in decades, if ever. One study gave an exampleof an ear of grain that externallyappearedcompletelynormal but which containedonly tiny shriveledgrains2 mmlong." In Romania, dry weather in fall 1931, followed by heavy snow in winter 1932 and a cold wet spring, left plants weakened andsusceptible to disease, which spreadbothby st011DS andwindfromthe southandfromotherparts ofRomania. Theinfestation lowered thewheatharvestin Romaniafroma previous average of 3.1milliontonsto 1.5milliontonsandcaused substantial losses inbarley, oats,andrye. Thissmallwheatharvest (onlya fraction of which was exported),combinedwitha late com crop, threatenedfamine by 1933, according to diplomatic reports," InHungary, a leadingspecialist describedthe1118t epidemicthatyear as the worstin generations; additional reports fromelsewherein theBalkans,Czechoslovakia, andPolandreferredto "fantastic" losses." European agronomists' reportson these outbreaksenabledlater specialiststo determine the existence of anEast European "tract"or windpatternthatspreadthe infestation," Thiswindpattern spreadtheinfestationintotheSovietUnion, where infestations also proliferatedfrom local causes in 1932and persisted into 1933.62 Numerous publications document widespread outbreaks of1118tin 1932. According to a western surveyof plantdiseases, one-fifth ofthe 1932wheatcropin Siberiawaslost to 1118t63 According to a Sovietagronomic guidebook, stem1118tof wheatcausedlossesof 8090 percent of the crop in regionsnear rivers in the North Caucasusin 1932 and in 14

1933. The North Caucasus hasseveral rivers, including theKuban andTerek, flowing throughits mainfarmingdistricts. During theirtravelsin summer1932, Cairnsand Schillerobservedwidespread rustinfestations and spokewithSovietagronomists whoconfirmedtheseimpressions inUkraine, in theNorthCaucasus (including the largesovkhozy Verblud andGigant), Belorussia, theCentral Blackearth oblast', and theVolga region." TheSoviet agricultural newspaperevenacknowledged majorrust infestations, though withoutexplaining inanydetail theirextentandconsequences." Identifyingrust requiredspecialized knowledgeand training. The Soviet agronomistS. E. Grushevoinoted that peasantsin the North Caucasuscould not distinguishbetween rust and other diseases/" The OGPU also did not detect the infestation; thenearesttheyapproacheditwasonedocument thatreportedaninfestation of gribok, a generaltermfor fungalplantdisease,in severaldistrictsof Ukraine." This problemwas by no meanslimitedto the USSR; a study of wheatgrowing in Marylandin 1929foundaninverse relation between thecondition ofthecropandits finalyield,becausethe highrainfall thatstimulated plantgrowthalsofostered plant diseases: "A farmer observing a lushstand reporteda highcondition, notrecognizing thedevelopment of the disease before harvest time.''68 Thefactthatrustwasdifficult for nonspecialiststo detect helps to explainthe numerousclaims in memoirs and testimonies of a good 1932harvest Famine survivors in the Volga region whomthe Russian historian VtktorKondrashin interviewed, however, remembered thatin the 1932harvesttheears weresomehow "empty," the characteristic one wouldexpect fromrustedgrain.69 Frequentreports ofpeasants consuming surrogates, particularly the highlyfibrous"ersatz" grainandbreadsold in the bazaarsin 1932-1933, may havebeenanother signoftherust infestadon," The rust epiphytotics spreadrapidly, but localauthorities for the most part failedto noticethem: thebranchof theagriculture commissariat in chargeof plant diseasesandpests, Db'edinenie po bor'be s vrediteliami rastenii (OBV), received nocorrespondence fromlocalofficials acknowledging theinfestations or noticesof decreestaking measures against them.71 Nonetheless agronomists andotherpersonnel in central offices andlocalbranches ofNKZdetected theinfestation andmadeefforts to surveyit andcombatit Theirinvestigations foundthatrusthadbecomethe most widely distributed disease andcaused themostharmtoagriculture inUkraine and in theSovietUnion generally. Onestudy found thatbrown rustofwheatseriously affected cropsin theNorthCaucasus andUkraine in 1932, where itdestroyedup to 70 percent oftheharvest in someregions, especially nearrivers, reduced theweight ofgrain4047 percentand the numberof seedsin earsby 20-29 percent Wheatsowingshad serious rustinfestations in allthegrain regions oftheUSSRin 1932, andrustreduced the wheatharvestin theNorthCaucasus by50 percent.72 Theselosseshelpexplain whythefamine wassosevere in thatregion. 15

Whilerustinfestations werenotanewprobleminRussia, theextreme outbreak in 1932took agronomists by surprise, andtheydid notfullyunderstandit. Their reports in 1932-1933 attributed it to susceptible varieties and the presence of barbenies, which mayhavebeencontributing factors butdidnotprovide acausative explanation. Only at the end of the decade, afteran exhaustive study of western reports oninfestations inEurope andtheUnited States, didtheplant pathologist N.A. Naumov publish a studydemonstrating thattheinfestation affected mostofEastern Emope; he evenasserted thattheinfestation affectedtheentire northern hemisphere," Rustaffected somecropsin theUSSR in 1933 as well; according to onesource, the infestation in theCentral Blackearth Region wasworse in 1933 thanin 1932.' 4 The sources givetheoverall impressionhowever, thatthe1932infestation wasmore serious. Rustwasnottheonlyplantdisease toaffect Sovietagriculture in 1932: large outbreaks of smutalsocausedsubstantial losses. Smutspreads throughthe soilor fromcontaminated seed, andlikerustdoes notaltergreatly theexternal appearance of the crop. Most types of smutresultin the husk filling with a muddy or dusty substance composed of fungal spores themselves ratherthangrain; the diseasenot onlydestroys grain ininfested plants.butalsoeasily contaminates healthy grain inthe harvest, producingdiscolored grain with a bad smell," Smut had been a severe probleminSovietagricultureduring NEP. Infestations inmany parts ofthecountry in 1922causedsubstantial losses, in extreme casesmorethan80percent; in 1925the Crimeahad30percentofitsgrain sowings infested with smut, andUkraine hadserious infestations in 1929. Thechaitman oftheOBVin 1931 identified smutasoneof the three basicpests in Sovietagriculture, alongwithlocusts androdents." NKZhad made progress against this disease, mainly by treating seeds with formalin, a formaldehyde compound thatwasthestandard preventative measure against smutat thetime." A lowpointof smutinfestations hadbeenreached by 1931, whenNKZ issueda decree for a seriesof measures to eliminatesmutin the followingyears. During 1932, however, NKZreceived notices that sovkhoz and kolkhoz managers andagronomists werenotfollowing thedecree. Farms, andevenstateagencies that procured grain, sometimes failed toseparate infested fromuninfested grain,which allowedthe infestations to spread. Farmsalso failed to disinfectseed treatment equipment andusedincorrect dosages offungicide, which ledtoinfestations of 12-16 percentin 1932.78 The agronomist P. K. Artemov estimatedlossesto rust and smut in 1932, shown intable 6;heacknowledges inafootnote thatlosscoefficients hadnotyetbeen fully worked out andprecise dataonthespread of theinfestations wereunavailable. The tabledoesrepresentsomedegreeof consensus amongspecialists at the time, however: lossesfromcrownrustofoatswereestimated in anotherpublication at 2 million tons, thesamelevel indicated inthis table," 16

Table 6: Harvest Losses from Smut and Rust, 1932 (centners) Losses fromSmut

.'

Rye Winter Wheat Spring Wheat Oats Barley Millet Total

Losses from Rust

457,000 1,313,000 5,771,000 3,056,000 1,442,000 1,406,000 18,445,000

40,000,000 11,000,000 20,000,000

71,000,000

Source: R K. Artemov, UK voprosu 0 porazhaemosti sortov zemovykh kul'tur gribnymi bolezniami," Trudy po prildadnoi botanike, genetike i selektsii, Seriia A: Sotsialisticheskoe rastenievodstvo 7 (Leningrad, 1933),75.

According to thistable, losses frommstandsmutin 1932reached approximately 9 milliontons, 13percentof the official harvestfigureand nearly20 percentof the lowestarchival harvestestimate. It should alsobenotedthatwhiletheseestimates are approximate, they are alsothe onlyconcrete estimates, basedon anyevenremotely scientific evidence,of overall 1932grainharvestlossesfrom anyenvironmental or humanfactors availablein any published or archival sourcesthatI havebeenableto find. Anotherplantdisease, themedieval scourge ofergot, was also verywidespread in 1932. Ergotis a fungusthatattacks grasses andgrains, especially rye,turningthe infectedgrain into a dark colored,largeprotmdingbody,often calleda spur. Such spurscontain extremely potent alkaloidcompounds, including lysergic acid, thesource of the drug LSD. In medieval Europe, whole villages would unknowingly eat contaminatedrye andbecomeill with hallucinating diseases calledSt, Vitus' Dance, St, Anthony'sFire andothernames. Moreseverecontamination couldcausepeople to contractgangrene in theirlimbs andevendie; infestations ofgrassandspursthatfell onthegroundduringharvesting andwereingested bycattlecouldkillthemas well.80 In August 1932,the Commissariatof Agriculture issued an emergencydecree on measures to deal withergot Thiswasthepublic representation of secretdecrees and OGPUreportsof ,'mass" infestations thatcaused widespreadillness and deathsamong peasants whoatecontaminated grain," Therewerealsosmallerinfestations of other plantdiseasesthatreducedharvests ofgrainandothercrops.

17

Pests The warm,humid weatherin 1932 alsoledtosevere insectinfestations, including locusts, fieldmoths, andotherinsects on grainandsugarbeets. An agronomicjournal reportedthat in 1932a "mass multiplication" of Asianlocuststook place in all the importantbreeding grounds ofthe desert zone, includingDaghestan, theLowerVolga, theUralRiverdelta,theNorthCaucasus, andtheKalmykoblast',82 OGPU reports duringspring1932notedinfestations of locusts, meadow moths,hessianflies, beet weevils, and otherinsects. A reportof 28Maynotedthatbeet weevilshad infested nearly 100,000hectaresof beets in Ukraine; in one districtthe weevils destroyed almost 500hectares ofbeetsin three hours. Asof 1JuneNKZrecognized thefailure of wintersowings dueto pestsandtheabove-mentioned winterkill in 333districts in Ukraine, encompassing an areaof 747,984hectares, whichincluded8.6 percentof wintersowingsand 10.5percentof winterwheat By lateJune locustsinfested2.2 million hectares ofgrain inKazakstan, meadowmoths 3 million hectares, andcatetpillars were"everywhere." In onedistrict in theMiddleVolga, locustsand meadowmoths infestedmore than 100,000hectaresand by July had caused an estimated 25,000 tonsoflosses in grain. Meanwhile hordes oflocusts hadflown into Thrkmenistan from Afghanistan, and meadow moth infestationsalso spread in Western Siberia and Bashkiria. Othersoureesconfinnthesereports. Ukrainianofficialsinvestigatedkolkhozy in the Donetsk region and found a large portion of the wintersowings spoiled by hessian flyandotherinsects. Cairns andSchilleralsonoticed suchinfestations." The Soviet agricultural administration had several branches to deal with infestations; whenthefaminebegantheycameunderofficial suspicion. An OGPU reportissued in March 1931,overthe signatureof OGPUvice-chairmanGenrikh Iagoda, claimedto havefounda wrecking organization thathadoperatedfor several yearsin all the central researchinstitutes and pest controlorganzations. This long reportcriticizedtheseagencies forfailing to take measures witha sufficient scaleand efficiency toeradicate thepestsandinfestations, thereby allowing them to continue in subsequent years. Mostof thereportcomprised detailed proposals for planningand carryingout measuresagainstinsectsandrodentsin 1931-1932.84 Zelenykhin,the chairmanof OBY,apparently in responseto this OGPUattack,sent a report to the CentralCommitteein June 1931on the accomplishments and failings of OBV. He notedthattheagency hadexpandeditsnetwork oflocalbranches, research andtraining centers, andpublications; thatit hadsentexpeditions toextenninateinsectsin border countries; andhad "struggled withcoentenevoludonary andwrecking ideas" in research institutes. He then presenteda longlist of OBV's shortcomings which focusedon problemsoriginating outside theagency: insufficientandpoor quality supplies ofpoisons, equipment, and transport. He alsocomplainedaboutthe inadequatesupportOBV 18

"

"

receivedforits technicalpersonnel, whoworkedin someof the mostdangerousjobs in theeconomy, but werepoorlysupplied withgrain. He arguedthatonlythe Central Committeecouldeliminate theproblems. Zelenykhin emphasizedthatpestsannually destroyed2 billion rubles' worth of harvest and that OBV's measures, despite its difficulties, had saved57millionrubles' worthof farmproducein 1930.as Zelenykhin'snote that pesteradication personnel receivedinadequatefood supplies reflects an additional effectofthefamine: foodshortages hindered effortsto overcomefoodshortages. Nonetheless, the regime didundertake substantial measures against pests. In late 1931 theCommissariatof Agriculture orderedsovkhoz directors and kolkhoz boards to conclude contracts with the OBV and with local Machine Extermination Stations (MIS)to eradicate pests. Officials estimatedthatsome89,000 agricultmal enterprises wouldneedtoconclude suchcontracts. Thedeadlineinitially had been 25 December 1931,but by 5 April 1932only 46,000 contracts had been drawn up, and for significantly less work than had been planned. The work was underfunded: the grain sovkhoz administration was supposed to allot between 8 million and12million robles forthiswork, butinsteadallottedonly2.5million rubles.86 InJuneaspecial CentralCommitteecommission, including agriculture commissarIa. A. Iakovlevand Zelenykhin, prepareda seriesof decrees;one, to be issued by the Politburo, addressed thestmgglewithpests. Thesedecrees connectedtheinfestations withthe weatherin 1932,but alsowithneglectof theproblemby all local agencies, andorderedthem to undertakea variety of measures to eliminatethe pests. By July 1932,a Kolkhoztsentr decree harshlycriticized pesteradication effortsand ordered theformation of "operative troikas" at various levels to coordinate andmotivatemore active measures," In some areas bothagency personnel andpeasants made concerted effortsto save crops. In one beet-growing sovkhoz in Vinnytsiaoblast' in Ukraine, accordingto an OGPU report, in one week workers gathered and destroyed more than 17tons(1,073 puds)of caterpillars, but5,000hectares of beetsin the regionstill threatenedto fai1. 88 According to a reportfor 1932,the OBV treated 2.37 million hectares outof a planned2.7million forlocusts, and351,000 hectares outof a planned 1 million for field moths, and blamed the underfulfillmentof the plan in part on mismanagement and malfeasance of local personnel. And in a reportsummarizing its workoverthe period 1930-1933,the OBVlisteda blankspacefor expenditureson rust. 89 Sovietscientists in the 1930s emphasized thatuseof resistant varieties wasthe bestwayto combat rust, but theyalsofoundthatalmost all Sovietgrainvarietieshad littleor no resistanceto it90 aearly, anyagriculturalsystemwouldhave had difficultyeliminatinginfestations on this scale. To provide some perspectiveon Soviet inability to deal with these infestations, we shouldnotethatpreventative measures, fungicides andinsecticides, hadonly limited effect. Formalin seed treatments, routinein the Westas well, were 19

notalways effective. Sovietscientists hadconducted studies withvarious sulfurand siliconcompounds whichunderexperimental conditions had reducedand in some casesnearlyeliminatedrustinfestations. Such fungicidal measures, however, areeffective only if applied at exactly therighttimeand,giventhescaleof theinfestation in 1932, requiredresources thattheSovietUnion couldnotobtain," Andnoinsecticides in the earlytwentieth century couldcompare in effectiveness andeaseofuse withDDT and othermodeminsecticides developed sinceWorldWarII. As will be seenbelow, thesenatural disasters wereonlypartof a complexof factorsthat made 1931-1932disastrous agricultural years. Nonetheless,drought, rain,andinfestations destroyed atleast20 percentoftheharvest, and thiswouldhave beensufficientonits ownto havecausedseriousfoodshortages or even famine. If these factors had not been in evidence in 1931and 1932,agricultural production wouldhave beenconsiderablylarger,and while procurements could have caused shortages in specific regions, theywouldnothavecauseda faminelikethatof 1933.

Human Actions The interpretations that minimizethe role of weatherin reducing the 1932 harvest arguethatitwassmall becauseof actions andomissions by allparties concerned. Davies and Wheatcroftfocus on the economicor "capital" aspects,especially the decline in draft forces; Pennerfocuses on labor, especially thepeasants'resentment, rebelliousness, andunwillingness to work While theseintetpretations overlap to some extent, sepamteconsideration ofthemwillhelpdistinguish eachcategory's importance to theharvest

Draft Forces Draft forces declined drastically directly or indirectly as a result of collectivization. In response to collectivization andthesocialization oftheirproperty in the kolkhozy, manypeasants soldorslaughteredtheirlivestock, fora variety ofreasons: asaprotestagainstcollectivization; because theydidnotwant to surrendertheiranimals to thenewcollectivefannswithoutcompensation; because oflocalofficials' unrealistic promises aboutmechanizadon/" Duringtheinitialcampaign of 1930,theseactions mostaffectedanimals usedforconsumption, especially cattleand pigs. Afterward, whenmostpeasants hadalready beencollectivizedandsubjected to theprocurement demandsof 1931,the numberof draft animals, especially horses,declinedrapidly. 20

"

Animals werethe immediate victims of shortages in 1930-1933sincestarving peasants had no choice but to feed themselvesfirst from the dwindlingreserves,and because peasants frequently expressedtheirresenbnentofcollectivizationbyneglectandabusive treatmentofsocialized livestock," Also, as discussedabove,the main grain forage for horses,oats, sufferedsubstantiallossesfrom rust in 1932. As a result,thenumberof horsesdeclineddrastically by 1932. Sovietfactories wereproducing tractorsin theearly19308, butnotin sufficientquantity tocompensate for the lossesof horses. Table7 presentssomeestimatesand calculations of available draftforcesin these years; the data show the complexityof the draft situation. Table 7: Estimates of Draft Forces, 1929-1934 (million head or horsepower) Horses Kolkhoz

1929 1930 1931 1932 1933 1934

Jan.

June

June

Tractorhp

Totalhp

32.6 31 27 21.7 17.3 15.4

34.6 30.2 26.2 19.6 16.6 15.7

0.3 4.4 12.1 10.8 10.1 9.9

0.4 1.0 1.9 2.2 3.2 4.5

29.7 27.0 24.2 21.3 20.6 21.6

Sources: Forcolumn1,Davies, Harrison, andWheatcroft, Economic Transfotmation, 289; for columns 2, 3, 4, and 5, Naum Jasny, The Socialized Agriculture of the USSR: Plans and Performance (Stanford, Cal.: FordResearch Institute, 1949), 797, 788~ 458 respectively. Jasny estimated total horsepower (column 5) based on Soviet standardsthat classified one horse as 0.75 tractorhorsepower, one ox as two-thirds the powerof a horse,and rated one truck and one combinetogetheras theequivalentof a tractor; he notedthat his estimates probablyshowed the Soviet draft situationin theseyearsin a morefavorable lightthan was actuallythe case (458).

Kolkhozy appear to havehad roughlysimilarnumbersof available horses in 1931-1933, which suggests that most of the horses that died were in sovkhozy or heldby noncollectivized peasants. The biggestdeclinein horsescame not during the 1932-1933faminebutduringthelessseverefamine of 1931-1932,thoughthe decline continuedthroughthefamineandafterward, Thelowpointin overalldraftforcestook placein 1933,yet the harvestsin 1933and 1934weremuch largerthan that of 1932. The overalldeclinein draft forces, whiledrastic,wassomewhatless drastic than the 21

decline inhorses alone. Thisimplies thattheregime's acquisition andproduction of tractors andcombineharvesters (also included in thelastcolumn ofthetable) cushioned thedecline. Aside from theusual uncertainties regarding Soviet statistics, thedatainthis table aresomewhat misleading because theydonotindicate thequality of thesedraft forces. Archival sources contain manyreports of ill-fed horses thatcouldnot work verywellorverylonginthefamine years. Ukrainian party secretary Stanislav Kosior wrote toStalinin April 1932thatindistricts hevisited, one-quarterof thehorses had diedandtherestwere"skinandbones." Party secretary Bykin ofBashkiriawrote to theCentral Committee thatbecause ofthecropfailure in 1931, andoverestimates and incorrect rationing of feed, anima1s weredyingeverywhere: in a distrietin goodcondition 17percent ofthehorses haddied, andinothers theconditions wereworse. ByApril 1932 30-40 percentof the horses were incapableof work. In Kazakstan, party secretary F.I. Goloshchekin wrote toIakovlev in early 1932thattheextreme shortage of draftanima1s made itimpossibleto fulfill the 1932spring sowing plan of 5.83 million hectares, andherequested a reduction to 4.8 million hectares." Theregime imported andproduced tractors in 1931-1932, butnotenough to meeteventhebasicneeds ofmanyregions, letalone tocompensate forhorselosses. The regimeproduced some46,000 tractors in 1932, butby the end of the yearthe total numberoftractors inthecountry hadincreased byonly23,000,from 125,344to 148,480; halfthenewtractors replaced machines damaged beyond repairduring the year.9S Regional officials continually appealed formore tractors." The numberof tractors gives a poorindication ofthedraftpowerthey could actually provide because thisdepended onthequality ofthetractors themselves, theavailability of scarcefuel andspareparts, andtheoften poorquality ofrepairs. Shortages andmismanagement keptavailabletractors outof commission for longperiods. In somecasestractors purchased fromtheUnitedStateshaddefects. AnOGPUnoticefromMarch 1931 reportedthatsome 5,000 tractors purchased fromtheAmerican company "Oliver" hadleaking radiators andloudsounds intheirmufflers, transmissions, andmotors, and thatAllis-Chalmers tractors purchasedin 1930arrived withmissing parts," Wealsohavehighly anecdotal andinconsistentevidence regarding howdraft forceswereactuallyused. For example, Kosiorwroteto Stalinin April 1932 that because of theirpoorcondition, horses played aninsignificantrolein sowing, which dependedmostlyon tractors. Duringthe springsowingthe Politburodispatched thousands ofadditional tractors to Ukraine.98 Anofficial oftheUkrainian Commissariat of Agriculture, however, claimedat theend of July that 80 percentof farmlandin Ukraine was being workedby horsesin 1932, and only 20 percent by tractors." Whetherthesediscrepancies reflected differences between sowing andharvesting, or betweendifferentsowcesofdata, orofficials' different levels ofknowledgeorwillingness 22

to tellthetroth,theyshowthatthestatistics themselves area poor guide to actualdraft conditions. And thisdoesnotevenbringintoconsideration theunknownnumberof casesin which farms employedcowsor even people as draft forces. In one kolkhoz in Ivanovo oblast' in August1932, kolkhozniki and kolkhoznitsy were harnessedto a horse-ronthresher. 1OO Russia beforeWorldWarI hadapproximately the samenumberof horsesas before collectivization, morethan 30million, andthiswasconsidered a surplus of draft forees.P' The declineby 1932-1934, to theequivalent of 20-21 millionhorsepower, approximatedthe declinein horses broughtbytheCivilWarandthefamineof 19201923.102 In both cases, these declinesmust have changed a surplus of draft into a shortage. The poor condition of horses, tractor breakdowns, and lack of fuel and traetorpartsexacerbatedthisshortage in 1932,making it difficult to plowandplanton time as large an area as in yearswhen draft forces weresufficient Several sources suggest that farms in 1931-1932 soweda substantiallysmaller area of crops than plannedor even claimedofficially; Ukraine by mid-June hadsown 86 percentof the admittedly verylargesowingplan, with variations aslowas64percent in Kievoblast'.I03 Undersuchcircumstances, theinfestations in 1932musthavehada muchmoreserious effectthantheymightotherwise havehad

Labor Availability

Thefollowing twosections examine themostdirecteffectof humanactionon harvests in the early 1930s,the processesof farm work. Before considering how peasantsworked,however, it is necessary to evaluatetheeffectsof Sovietpoliciesin theearly 19308on theavailability of laborforagriculture. The sizablegrowth oftheRussian population in the lateimperial periodled to what many described as agrarianoverpopulation. As a result, during WorldWarI Russian agricultural productiondidnotundergo adrastic decline despite the recruitment ofmillions of menfortheanny. NEP-eraSovietofficials sawthissituation as aresource for development.1M Narkomzem specialists preparingplans for the new collective farm system to presentto theSixteenthParty Congressin June 1930predictedthat "thefamous agrarianoverpopulation, which frightens everyone" wouldenable theregime to increaseanddiversify foodproduction. lOS Theregime'spolicies ofcollectivization, dekulakization, andindustrialization undermined thiscondition. Both collectivization anddekulakization, the main meansemployedby the regime to inducepeasantstojoin collectivefarmsin the majorcampaignsof 19301931,removedmanypeasants fromtheirhomevillages. Localofficialsconducting collectivization wouldidentify some peasant households as kulaks-often simply those who led oppositionto collectivization- confiscatepartor all their property, and in 23

mostcasesexilethemfromtheirvillages; a smallpercentage wereexecuted. A recent Russian publication basedon archival sources indicates thattheregimeexiled381,026 kulaksand theirfamilies, or a totalof 1.8million people,fromtheir villages. Exile on a smallerscalecontinuedduring1932-1933. DaviesandWheatcroftestimatethat44.5 million peasants wereexiled in 1930--1933.'06 The following discussion does not seek to minimize the criminality of dekulakization or the suffering it broughtto manypeople. Yet dekulakization may not have affected agricultural production as severely as it affected the alleged kulaks themselves. In particular, thecommonassertion thatdekulakization removedthe best farmers from farming contains two arguments that are questionable at best. 107 The assumption that a "kulak" class, comprised of the most competent and successful peasantfarmers, existedanddominated the villages, raises thehighlydisputedissueof class stratification in Russia and in peasantsocietiesgenerally. 108 Extensive Russian and Sovietresearchhas shown that peasant"wealth" dependedupon family size and chance factors such as fire and drought that could ruin a family overnight. Partible inheritanceand land repartition (in regions with repartitional communes) also made accumulation difficult. Well-off peasants wereusually those whosurvivedlongenough to have a large family, and the next generation would start out as poor or middle peasants, in a pattern that A. V. Chaianov termed "cyclic mobility."!" In principle, therefore, other"poor"or"middle" peasants werepotentiallyjust as competentfarmers asthe"kulaks." Dekulakization,therefore, wouldnothaveremoved allthebestfarmers, even if officials applied the policy to remove the "well-off' farmers. Such peasants had been subjectedto such high taxation since 1927thatby 1930--1931 most of them wereifanything poorer thantheirneighbors; consequently, officials exiledmanyordinary peasantsas "kulaks,"and somewereevenreturned to theirvillages. no Dekulakization also did not remove all these peasants from farming. The regime settled many dekulakized peasants, perhaps as much as one-third, in special collective or state farmsand providedthemwithequipment,draftforces, and technicalsupport.I 'I This supportwas inadequate,livingconditions wereextremely severe,and approximately 25 percentof thoseexileddied in theseyears. Ultimately, however,many if not most of the kulaks workingin agriculturemanagedto recoverand produce crops, in some cases by 1932-1933 and in most cases by the later 1930s. Consequently it is difficult to argue that dekulakization removed all the competent farmers fromagriculture. It reduced thetotal numberof farmers andreduced the output of some of the better farmers. It does not account, however, for all of the declinein farm laborthatfollowedfromcollectivization. The period saw tremendous movement out of the villages. More than 1 millionpeasantsfled the villages during collectivization in 1930--1931 because they feared being tagged as kulaks ("selfdekulakization"); millionsmore left simply to escape the villages and the collective

24

"

fanns for the towns,in an intensified versionof traditional labormigrationor otkhod. The total number of peasantswholeftis uncertain, buthasbeen estimatedat between 9 millionand 12million.112 Givena rural Sovietpopulation in 1930of approximately 110million, this suggests anoverall lossto villages intheyearsleadingup to andduring thefamine of approximately 10percentofthepopulation. WhiletheStalinistleadership may have calculated that the "overpopulated"villagescould absorb the loss ofthe kulaks, the loss of 10 percent of households was more significant. After the 1931 drought,many peasants fled their villagesto find food, making 1932the year of the greatest decrease in rural population in theVolga region duringthe firstfive-yearplan. OttoSchillerdescribedthisprocess, whichhe observedin theVolga regionandSiberia, as a "flight from the land" Observersnoteda similarprocess in Ukraine."! In 1932 thisflight affected farms unevenly: some kolkhozy stillhad surplus labor and had to organize suchlargebrigadesthattheyhad"unemployment" withinthe brigade,while . others had labor shortages. One kolkhoz in Ukraine had so few people that each able-bodiedpeasant was responsiblefor 5.5 hectares, considered an extraordinarily largenonn; one sovkhoz in Ivanovo oblast had 100workers,but needed 414 for the harvest and could recruitonly 50 fromoutsidethe farmby mid-July!" Overall,theeffectsofthissubstantial population movementon agriculture are uncertain: it reduced "agricultural overpopulation" in many areas, but some scholars, suchas Theodore Schulz,havedisputed thevalidity of theveryconceptof agricultural overpopulation, whichSchulztermed "thedoctrine ofagricultural laborof zero value." Using as an example the 1918influenza epidemic in India, Schulz argued that the decline in grain production the followingyearresultedfrom disease-caused deaths and illness andinteIpretedthisto mean that in traditional agricultural economieswith low labor productivity,the ostensibly"surplus"labor is in fact necessary.us On the other hand, during WorldWarI, Russialost almost 11million draft-age men and 10 percentof work horses from the villages,andequipmentimports nearly ceased, but the crop area did not correspondingly decline. While landlord estates suffered a drastic decline in croppingof some 10milliondesiatinas (27 million acres), peasant croplandincreasedby9 million desiatinas (24.3 million acres). The peasants apparently expandedtheircrop area primarily for subsistence purposes, becausecrops normally produced for urban markets declinedin favor of crops that peasants consumed In some provinces during the war peasants and landlords together farmed more land thanbeforethe war,and croplandincreasedin manyregionsin 1917after declinesin previousyears. In the complexsituationof the war,crop areafluctuationsdepended notonlyon laborand draft, butalsoonsocialcircumstances andeventhepsychological attitudesof the peasants. In thecaseof collectivization, the situationwas even more complex,becausewhilemanypeasants leftthevillages and many work animals died, the regimeincreasedthe availability of equipment, especiallytractors, throughboth 25

importsanddomestic production, and managedto increase the area undercrops in 1930-1931. It is alsoimportant to remember thatSovietfarmsproducedmorefood in 1933-1934 than in 1931-1932, despite the famineand the vast loss of life and workcapabilityit caused. In general,the lossof laborforces,whether throughthe tragedy of dekulakizationor the desperationof otkhod, appears to have played a secondary rolein reducing theharvestin 1931-1932, butin certainlocalities orregions thelaborlossesmayhavebeenmoreimportant thaninothers.

Peasant Resistance Peasant resistance and unwillingness to work in the collective farms are fundamental themesin discussions of the famineandSovietagriculturegenerally. Memoiraccotmtsrecallthatlocal officials blamedthefamine onpeasants' unwillingness to work. Archival documents andpublished sources describe peasantswhorefused to work or worked slowly. In a letter to MikhailSholokhovin April 1933, Stalin accusedpeasants in theNorthCaucasus andelsewhere ofcarryingout a slow-down strikeor ital'ianka against theworkers andRedAnnyandimplicitly against theSoviet regime.l" Ukrainian scholars fromDmytro Solovei in the 19508,in Canadian exile,to S. V. Kul'chyts'kyiin the 19908,in Kiev, haveidentifiedpeasants'lackof incentives and unwillingness to work as factors that reducedharvestsin this period. Several morerecentworksby westernscholarsdocument peasantresistancefrom archival sources."? My researchon Sovietfarm laborpoliciesandactualpeasantpracticesand myreading ofthisliterature, however, hasmademeskeptical oftheargumentforlabor resistance asthe exclusive orevendominant causeofthelowharvestsandfaminein theearly 19308.118 First,whilesomepeasants (asI discuss below)weresoresentful of collectivization andprocurements thattheyattempted to sabotagethe farms,for peasantresistance tohavebeensufficient to causethelow 1932 harvestanextremely large number of peasants would have had to act this way,that is, to have avoided workandattempted to destroythe harvest In otherwords, theargumentassertsthat the majorityof peasantsattemptedto deprivetheirfamilies and fellow villagersof sufficient food to lastuntilthenextharvest. Thisinterpretation, therefore, requires us to believethatmostpeasants actedagainsttheirownandtheirneighbors' self-interest 119 This viewpointisdifficult to acceptbothongeneral human termsandparticularly when appliedto peasants in RussiaandUkraine. Thegreatmajority of thesepeasantshad lived for centuriesin corporatevillagesthat had instilledcertain basic cooperative values,and the kolkhozy perpetuatedbasicfeatures of thesevillages.P' Second, theargument is reductionistbecause itattempts toexplain everything thathappened in thiscrisisby humanactions, specifically by theconflictbetweenthe

26

~

.,-

Sovietgovernment andthepeasants, withanemphasis on peasantresistance as a kind of heroicstruggleagainstthe oppressive regime. Suchreductionism is problematic becauseit does not accountfor actionsthat do not fit the pattern of resistance, that tookplaceoutsidethe nexusof resistance. Hthe situation hadbeen as conflictualas thisinterpretation implies,if thegreatmajority of peasants didlittleor no farm work and performed the work they did do neglectfullyand poorly out of spite, then the harvestin1932wouldnothavebeeneven50million tons butpractically nothing. This criticismcannotbe explained by arguing thattheresistance was limited to the ''famine regions"; as I will document below,the patterns of resistance were not limited to UkraineortheNorthCaucasus. Somepeasants musthavedonesomeworkreasonably wellor nothingwould havebeen producedat all. The reductionist argument is also problematic becauseit doesnot allowfor alternative explanations of the problemsit identifies, suchas theenvironmental disasters discussed above. Finally, theargument hasextremedifficulty in showing thatpeasantresistance was so muchgreaterin 1932as to havereducedthe harvestto faminelevels only in that year. Penner, in her recent articles on the famine in the North Caucasus, for example,arguesthat the faminecrisisresultedmostdirectlyfromoverly high grain procurements in 1931, whichdemoralizedthepeasants anddeprivedthemof sufficient food and seed in 1932. Peasantsexpressedtheirangerand resentmentagainst this and againstcollectivization generallywithslowand shoddywork,outright strikes, widespreadtheft,abandonment of fann workandflightfromthe villages,resistance which theregime suppressed!" According tothatstudy, however, theNorthCaucasus region had a record harvestin 1931,which,giventhe study's emphasis on peasant resistance, mustmeanthatatleastsomepeasants worked morewillingly orintensively in 1931 than in 1932. To document a large harvest in 1931, Penner cites grain production and procurement data for 1928, 1930, and 1931 in the region from a recent study by the Russian scholarE. N. Oskolkov, but does not use these data to calculate whatthevillages retained fromprocurements, thevillage remainder, in those or otheryears. Oskolkov'scalculations showedthatgrainprocurements leftmore or lessthesameamountof seed andfoodin theregion fromeveryharvestexceptthatof 1932,andleftthelargestremainderafterthe 1931 harvest(seetable8).This implies that the region should have had more seed, fodder,and food grains in winter and spring 1932thaninprevious years, which would appear tocontradictPenner'sargument thatexceptionally severefoodshortages intensified peasant resistance infarmworkin spring1932.

27

Thble 8: Production, Procurements, and Remainder of Grain Crops in the North Caucasus, 1928-1932 (million centners) Gross Production 1928 1929 1930 1931 1932

Procurements

49.3 52.5

10.7 17.6 22.9

60.1 69.7 35.6

30.6

18.3

Vtllage Remainder 38.6

34.9 37.2 39.1 17.3

Source: E. N. Oskolkov, Golod 1932/1933 (Rostov-on-Don: Izd. Rostovskogo Universiteta, 1991),65.

In fact, onlytheprocurement data (which were basedonactual measurements) andto a lesserextenttheharvestfor1932inthistable are even approximately accurate. Oskolkov derivedtheharvest figure for 1932fromthe 1932collective farmannual reports fortheregion; hisestimate is highbutprobably notfaroff.122 The"harvest" figures for 1928-1931, however, arein factpreharvest projections thatsubstantially overstate theactual yield 123 Agricultural conditions intheNorthCaucasus in 1930 and1931 in particularweremuch worse thanthefigures inthistableimply. As noted above, somedistricts in 1930hadcropfailures andneeded seed loansfromoutside theregion. In 1931 a late,coldspring delayed sowings, duststorms blewpartof the sowingsaway, and arid weatherin May caused winterand spring crops to ripen simultaneously. Duringtheharvest, rainflattened crops andspurred weedgrowth that coveredthe cropin manyareas(thetypical Russian patternof latesummerrains). This preventedmany sovkhozyfrom usingthefew combineharvesters they had, forcing them to resortto horse-drawn reapersand allowing themto produceonly half the yieldin 1931 thatthey hadin 1930, 8.4centners versus 16centners per hectare. 124 Theuncertainties ofthese statistics andtheunfavorable weatherconditions of 1930-1931makeit difficult to escapetheconclusion thatthe NorthCaucasus and Dondidnothaveaslarge a harvest in 1931 asOskolkov andlaterPenner assert. This tablesuggests thattheregimeusedtheprojections asa basisfor highprocurement quotas, butthatweatherandotherfactors in 1930 and1931 reduced production well below those projections andleftthepeasants much less ofa village remainder than the tableindicates. Clearly, however, thehighprocurement quotas in 1930-1931 andthe high level ofcollectivizationreachedby1931, in this version of the resistance argument, shouldhavediscouragedpeasants andledtoresistance, andconsequently lowharvests, 28

in those years as in 1932. Penner also argues that in 1933,when peasants were enduringthe famine, theyworkedhardin orderto feedtheirfamilies, but does not explainwhytheydidnotactinthiswayin 1932. In otherwords, circumstances that gaveriseto resistance in 1932alsoprevailed in otheryears when, theauthorargues, peasants did notputupthesamelevelof resistance. Previous discussions of peasantresistance have invariablyassumed that resistance meantonlyactions directed against work, usually withthe aim ofreducing production, and withtheinevitable resultof a reduced harvest.F' In the following discussion, I arguethattheimpact ofpeasant laborandresistance onthe 1932harvest andtheresultantfamine was much morecomplex andambiguous than such an approach allows. In ordertoevaluate theextentto which thisresistance reduced theharvestin 1932,and therebycontributed to the famine,it is necessary to determinewhether peasants' actions wereinfactresistance, whether they intendedtoreducetheharvest withtheseactions, whether theiractions didleadto substantial losses,and whether suchactions tookplacesignificantly morefrequently in 1932thanin otheryears. To answer these questionsthe following sectionattempts to categorize the types of resistance described intheOGPUreports onagriculture during 1932heldintheNKZ archive, andin certainotherformerly secretdocuments. These documents do have somebiasbecause theyfocus onproblems andmalfeasance andalmostneverreport on farmsor agencies thatdidnot haveproblems, andbecausetheygeneralizefrom isolated cases, so it is impossible to determine whether the cases they cite are representative. Vutually allsources on resistance areanecdotal, however, soin that sensethesesourcesarenoworsethanothers. Ontheotherhand,thesereportshave theadvantage thattheytakeintoconsideration manysidesof thecasestheydiscuss, refeningforexamplenotonlyto theactions ofPeasants butalsoto mismanagement by officials andsupplydelays fromoutside theregion. In orderto determine theroleof peasantresistance inthiscontext, wecananalyze theevidence in thesources in three categories-factorsexogenous to workinthefarms, theroleofmanagement, andthe actions ofpeasants; evaluate theextenttowhich eachmight havereduced theharvest; anddetermine theextentto which suchactions wereunique to 1932. The influenceofexogenousfactors onthefanns derives from the Sovietregime's attempt to increasefarm production bymeans ofcollectivization.126 This goalrequited substantial allocations ofequipment, personnel, education, food andfuel, andtransport, which added to the already extremely strained conditions in these sectors. Collectivization thus tiedSovietagriculture toalltheproblems ofthefive-year planconstantchanges inplans, unpredictable supplies, arbitrary officials, uncertain wages andotherreimbursement to workers---and indirectly to thefood shortages themselves. Factories sentfarms defective products, suchascombine harvesters without motors, or refusedto acceptorders forspareparts,which ledto thecollapse of tractorrepair.

29

Imported equipment sat atportsforprolonged periods, asdiddomestic equipmentin storehouses, andthenbothwereoften misallocated, sothatsomeregions hada surplus of items that otherregionsneeded. Poorlybuiltor repairedtractorsconsumedtoo much fuel whenfuel was in short supply. These mishapsresulted from industrial difficulties whichin tum werepartly theresultofthefoodsupplycrisisanditseffects onindustrial workers. Thus,the 1931 cropfailure andhighprocurements notonlyleft animalsweakandfarms withinsufficient seed,evenaftertheregimeallocatedseed fromreserves,it alsocontributedto a declineandworsening of outputof machinery andparts for agriculture by workers in townsandhampered theirdistribution in the agriculturalsector by transportworkers. This in tum reinforcedthe deteriorating agriculturalconditions. As a result of these processes,farmers had less seed and fewerdraftforces andconsequently sowedlessseedthanideal amounts, overa smaller area, and often by hand, whichreducedseed germinationand left it vulnerableto pests.121 In theareaoffann management, regional andlocalofficials oftenbeganwith inaccurateandinsufficient infonnationon localconditions; as a resultthey delayed planning, issued incorrectplans, and altered plans repeatedly in response to new infonnationfrombelow orneworders fromabove. 128 Manylocalandkolkhoz officials haddifficulties managing farmwork, evidencedbysowing onunweeded landor with seed that had not beentreatedfor smut,shiftingof workersfromjob tojob, delays betweenharvesting andthreshing, negligentor lackadaisical recordingof the work done,failure to recordit at all or to informworkers of how much they had worked, anddelaysin settlements withworkers. One sovkhoz intheNizhnii Novgorod region owed surrounding kolkhozy 5,000rubles for workdone in spring, so the kolkhozy refused to provide laborfor harvesting. In somecases kolkhoz and local officials wereapparently alcoholic, abusive, orcriminal types, whosometimes subjectedworkers to beatingsfor various offenses in a mannerreminiscent of setfdom. In othercases, agronomists andothertechnical specialists triedto stayintheiroffices indistrictcenters and avoid their responsibilities for managingfann work.l 29 S. V. Kul'chyts'kyi describedfarmworlcin Ukraine in 1932aschaos andanarchy, andOskolkov described similar conditionsin the NorthCaucasus.P" Someof these actionsclearly caused lossesboth directlyandindirectly, discouraging workers. Onereporton collective farms of dekulakizedspecial settlers in Kazakstan connected serious mismanagement with the failure of 48 percent of the crops.!" Elsewhere, the experience of high procurements andstarvation of kolkhozniJd evokeddiscouragement andfatalism on thepartof manyfarmpersonnel. They made statements to theeffectthattherewasno point in harvesting,or that there was nothingto harvest,and attempted to conceal sowings andunderstate Yieldestimates. 132 Suchefforts on thepartof kolkhoz officials to preservefoodfor kolkhozniki couldhaveincreased the actualamountharvested. 30

' ...

r

Although observers atthetime argued, as do somescholars today, thatpeasant resistance tookformsthatdiminished theharvest, theevidencediscussedbelowleads to a more ambivalentconclusion. Somepeasants' actionsclearlyindicatedthat they sought to do as much as possibleto save the harvest; in other cases their actions or manner of work tended to decreasethe harvest, thoughthis was probably not their intention. Only in certain types of actionscan we discern a clear,consciouseffort to reducefood production. Peasants' effortsto decollectivize the kolkhozyprovidetheclearestexamples of resistanceaimed at increasing production. The OGPUreportsfor 1932repeatedly notedemandsandactions bypeasants todivideup thefields so thattheycouldharvest them individually. In somecasespeasantssubmittedapplicationsto leave the farm and reclaim collectivizedanimalsand equipment. In many other cases, the whole membership of a farm wouldrequest or demand from the board that the fields and equipmentbe dividedandharvested individually, "whileit is stillnot too late." In one kolkhoz in Ivanovo oblast' a "kulak" summoned a meeting which decreed, "let us dividethe kolkhoz into edinolichnik(non-collectivized) farmsbecause edinolichnik fanning is moreprofitable and edinolichniki can givemoreto the government" This man, unfortunately, wasarrested, butmanyotherfannsdidinfactdo whathe proposed. Often sucheffortswereinspired by rumorsthat kolkhozy in other areas haddissolved: sixtypeasantfamilies leftthree collective farms in one stanitsa (cossackvillage) in the North Caucasus withtheirlivestock, saying: "In Ukrainethere is famine, kolkhozy there are dispersed,but youhereforce us to sow; dividethe sowings among us and we will workindividually."133 In somecasespeasantswholefta kolkhozreturnedand attacked kolkhozniki workingin the fields in order to induce them to join with the leaversand divideupthefann. Some kolkhoz and sovkhozmanagerstookadvantage of this idea and arrangedfor kolkhomiki andevennoncollectivized peasantsto fann part of their lands in "a edinolichnik manner." Some reports specified that these arrangements were made on a sharecroppingbasis. According to OGPU reports, these and similar cases of decollectivization were not concentrated in particular "resistant"regionssuchasUkraineor theNorthCaucasus, but tookplacethroughout the country. These effortsto decollectivize clearly were directed at insuring what peasants thoughtwouldbe moreefficientharvesting of thecrops,in somecases with theobjectiveofincreasing theamountof foodthattheywouldhaveforthemselves and possiblykeepingit from theregime, butin othersat leastovertlywiththe intentionof fulfilling procurementquotas. Finally, in somecases peasants restoredkolkhozy (reports referred to cases in the Middle Volga, Nizhnii Novgorod, and Moscow regions), apparentlyalso in partto increasethe harvest134 On the other hand,in some actionspeasantsclearly expressed outrage and aimed to take revengeontheregimeby reducingtheharvest. The mostobvioussuch

31

actionswere arson attackson kolkhoz buildings andfields. In the Middle Volga, NizhniiNovgorod, Ivanovo,and Northern regions, arsondestroyedthousands of hectares of unharvested grainandhundreds oftonsofharvested grain,in addition to hundreds of thousand of hectares of forests, cut timber, housing, and fuel. In some placespeasants attacked officialsandotherpeasants involvedin harvestworkand destroyedharvestmachinery, according totheOGPU, withthegoalofhindering the harvest l35 Widespread strikes andrefusals towork, while lessdestructive, often had similareffects on theharvest Frequently kolkhozniki andnoncollectivized peasants expressedwhatofficials tenned "dependent" attitudes-"ifthegovernmentgives seed, thenwe will sow"--;mdwhattheycalled"antisowing attitudes"-"why sow, they will take it allaway anyway" or "edinolichniki arenotfools toincrease theirsowings, they already learned" Insomecasesofficial actions prompted suchrefusals: onedistrict agronomist in UkraineinstIUetedlocal soviets to''takeawaylandfrom theedinolichnild, because thisyeartheywillnotsow." Somesoviets actedon this, others discussed itat publicmeetings, andas a result edinolichniki abandoned 7,799hectares of land 136 In manyothercases, largenumbers of kolkhozniki, apparently without such overtstatements, simply refusedto workat sowing, cultivation, or harvesting. The documents, which almost nevercalledthese actions strikes, usually gavetworeasons for them: that the kolkhoz or sovkhoz had not paid the workers for the previous seasonor year,and that, as a result, they lackedadequatefood. In one kolkhoz in Ukrainein May 1932,95percentof themembers refused to workbecausetheyhad not been paidfortheirworkduring theprevious year: the kolkhozowedthem17,000 rubles. In othercasespeasants"boycotted"harvestworkor refusedto workuntil theyreceived food. Peasants alsosenttheiradolescentchildren to workinthekolkhoz while the adults workedon their private plots or sold goods in the bazaars. The reports often specifythe extent of these protests: in some kolkhozy 70 percentof peasants worked, in others 50 percent, 30 percent, or 12 percent. Penner cites Sholokhov's descriptions of Cossackpeasants in the North Caucasus wandering around the villages,singing,and avoidingharvesting the ripening fields.!" The consequences ofthese actions dependedoncircumstances. If mostof the kolkhozniki worked, OGPUmayhavemisinterpreted as a protest whatmayhavebeensimply a fannwithmore laborthan itcouldemploy, asdiscussed above. When mostkolkJwzniki refusedto work, however, harvests musthavedecreased: an OGPUsummary from Augustreportedcases fromall overthecountry of grain fields unharvested, with seed shedding andgenninating, of grain cutandleftonfields in therain. 138 Kolkhozniki oftenworkedslowly andcarelessly, butthisreflected anumber of different attitudes. Insomecasespeasants were demoralized-there is nopointin harvesting, theywilltakeit allaway, orthatthereis nothing to harvest-which may havebeenanunwittingrecognitionoftheeffects ofinfestations. Somereports attributed 32

to peasants"attitudes inclinedtowardstrikes." In othercases peasantswere weak with hunger or disease and foundit difficultto workintensively; in one village in UlaainekolkJwzniki refused to work, saying ''we arestarving, ourchildren areswelling withhunger. Give bread,we willwork." In yetothercasesslow andcarelesswork concealedefforts by peasants andeven kolkhoz staffto reducethe amountsof grain turnedover to the regimeandretainmorefor themselves by leavingunharvestedor unthreshed cropson fields. 139 Regional andcentral authorities issuedseveraldecrees regarding the extremely slow andflawed work in sowing, failures to show up for work,andabuse andneglectof livestock andequipment. In July 1932,for example, in response to reportson inadequate workin weeding cropsin CentralAsia,Ukraine, the North Caucasus, the Central BlackearthRegion, and the Urals, the Politburo orderedadditional payments to kolkhozniki of advances in moneyand grain, butonly inreturnfor workthatfulfilled outputnorms. 140 Thepressreportedslowandcareless wOIkin 1932. Whatthe regimecalledtheft andhiding of grain werefrequent throughout thecountry, despiteStalin's7 August decree requiring capitalpunishment for theftof "socialist property." According to severalreports,groupsof peasants would walk onto the fields, ignore or attacklocalguardswho were sometimes present, and fill bagswithgrain,takingamounts estimated in the tons.!" Such actions, however, did meanthatthosefieldswereat leastpartlyharvested. The OGPUreportedmanystatements by peasants hostileto collective farms andtheSovietsystemgenerally. Manyrumors circulated amongpeasants thatJapan wouldsoonattackanddestroy theSoviet regime; theUSSRwasatthetimein a tense borderstandoffwithJapanoverthelatter's occupation of Manchuria. 142 Cairnsand Schiller, traveling by train withordinary Sovietcitizens andnotaccompaniedbyofficial guides, encounteredmanyopenlyhostile andrebellious peasantswhoadmittedtheir resistance in the kolkhozy andwhodirectly confronted theirbosseswiththedifference betweenthe promisesand realitiesof collectivefanning. Officials acknowledged widespread peasantresistance andunwillingness to work. 143 It isextremely difficult to estimatetheeffects ofthesetypes ofresistant actions on theharvest. Gleaning, or whatSovietofficials termed theftsfromthefields, might haveincreasedtheharvest, butpeasants' unwillingness andinability to work, hostility andrebelliousness, musthavecausedlarge losses. Aswillbe shownbelow, peasants' effortstoretaingrainby ostensibly careless harvesting backfiredin certaincases. The argumentthatthepeasants resentedcollectivization andtherefore worked poorly, however, oversimplifies thesituation in the kolkhozy in theseyears. Despite thecommon turn of phrasedescribing collectivization as havingforcedthe peasants "into" kolkhozy, collectivizedpeasants werefanningthe samelandas before,buton larger plots and in groups, and sometimesthe changes were not even that great. Kolkhoz workin 1930-1932wasnotorganized as the regimeintended,but this was 33

in part the result of the fact that the peasants often appliedtheir own methods of ·"-"~07n" 144 orgCUUL.CIUon.

Moreover, whilemanypeasants didfarmcarelessly, othersworkedat leastas wellastheycouldgiven thecircumstances. Official investigators whowentto villages in Ukrainein 1933to determinethe extent of the faminefound that most starving peasants haddonelittlework,earnedfewlabordays, andconsequently had received insufficientfood from their kolkhozy. In manycases,however,peasants who had workedhard andearnedmany labordays hadalsohadthemoresubstantialin-kind incometheyhadearnedtakenawayfromtheminprocurements. Thesetragic reports showthat at leastsomepeasantsworkedhard,andthis situationwas not limitedto Ukraine. Even those whoearned fewerlabordaysmay not have worked less: the character of kolkhoz work was such that peasants who worked in important jobs suchasharvesting oftenearnedfewerlabordays thanthoseinlower-leveljobssuchas storehouseworkers,because the latter workedall year; this was an inequity and disincentive thatNKZofficials tnedrepeatedly to solve.l4S Oneofthemaincomplaints madeaboutgrainprocurements in 1932,as in 1931,wasthat whenpersonnelwere unableto get an unproductive kolkhoz to meetitsquota,theyreturnedto productive onesthathadfulfilled their first quotaanddemanded more in thefonnofa"counterplan." The Soviet leadershipattackedthis practicefor destroyingincentives; prohibited counterplans in 1933,and prosecutedofficials who appliedthem.146 It does show, however, thattherewereenoughproductivefarms forthisto be considereda problem. Fmally, all theselaborproblems plaguedSovietfarming in otheryearsaswell. A remarkableOGPUsummaryreporton kolkhoz construction in 1931documents manyofthesameproblems in 1931 asin 1932. Kolkhoz managers plannedpoorlyor not at all, transferredbrigades from place to place because of lack of labor or left workers idlebecauseof surpluslabor, keptpoorrecords or none,anddid notinform peasants oftheireamings orpaythem. Income distribution in kindin somecaseswas below subsistence levels. Managers went on drinking binges, or together with kolkhomlki followeda patternthe documenttermed"collectivedrunkenness"for days on end. Official abuses of kolkhozniki also took place in 1931 as in 1932. Some farmsendedupin debt, and the Sovietagricultural bank (in a strangeecho of eventsin theUnitedStates in thisperiod) foreclosed onseveral kolkhozy andauctioned theirproperty. Peasants, meanwhile, developed "unhealthy attitudes"as a resultof disorder, mismanagement, andinadequatefood distribution: theyconducted"organized non-turnoutsfor work (strikes)," left kolkhozy in hundredsof groups, demanded food, threatened kolkhoz staff, and spreadrumors,for example, that the Japanese (whooccupiedManchuriain 1931) haddefeated theSovietUnion, takenoverSiberia, anddissolved allthecollective fanns there. 147 Such problems, along with drought, reduced the 1931 harvest. Official 34

statements andpressreports blamedthelow 1931 harvest partlyon poorfarmwork, especially in sowingandharvesting. Onearticlecontrasted thedifferentharvestsof sovkhozy, kolkhozy, andnoncollectivized peasantfarms locatedside by sidein very similar environmental conditions, and argued that the drought did not explain everything. l48 Gosplan chairman Valerian Kuibyshev saidthatonly76 percentof the sownareawasharvestedontimein 1931 andestimatedlosses fromthisconservatively at 3.6million to08. 149 Evenin 1933, during the peak ofthefamine, whilePennercites sources indicating thatpeasants hadchanged theirattitudes orhadevensaidthatthey feltdefeated bytheregime andwerereconciled to thekolkhoz system, working harder than in 1932,other sourcesindicatethat peasantsagainshowedresistanceto fann work. Iakovlev, travelingin the Uralsin Apriland May 1933,noted that inducing kolkhozy to sow wasverydifficult andrequired overcoming the stubbornresistance ofsomedistrict and kolkhoz personnel, whosaid, "Giveusbread, wewillsow. Without bread we willnot work"-the sameattitude expressedin 1932. 150 Moreover, increasedgrain production in 1933 (asnotedabove) maynothave beentheresultoftheregime's suppression of peasant resistance asmuchas a rational responseto famine. Pennerargues thatSovietrepressive measures in 1933gavethe peasants no alternativeto stayingin the kolkhozy and working. Some repressive measuresshe identifies, however, seemto havehad limitedeffects. The Ukrainian Central Committee found thatthe"blacklisting" ofvillages (closing down trade outlets for consumer goods) for failureto meet procurementquotas had had little effect, becausethecountryside was"saturated" withconsumer goods. Peasants alsocould circumventthe passportsystemrelatively easily, thoughperhapsmore easily after 1933.151 Penneralso argues, however, thatpeasantsworkedharderin 1933in order to keep theirfamilies alive. Sennoteda similarpattem inthe 1943 Bengal famine. He considersit "remarkable" thatBengalproducedthelargestricecrop in its historyin 1943 and conducted agricultural operationson a "giganticscale" despite deaths, disease,andmigration for food. 1S2 Yet it wouldmakesensethat facedwithfamine, peasants stillableto farmwould dotheirutmost to overcome it byproducing more. In other words,the famineitselfmayhavemotivated peasants to greaterefforts,in an inverseversion ofthefeedback effects mentioned above. Suchattitudes mayexplain why in 1932somepeasants workedhardandsomefarmshad goodharvests, Overall, human actions certainly contributed to thesmall harvests of 1932and 1931. Not all such actions, however, had deleteriouseffects, and because these actionswerefar from uniform throughout thecountry, the scaleof theseeffectsand theirconsequences defyquantification. Perhaps themostthatcan be saidis that draft shortages, lackof labor, systemic economic problems, mismanagement, andpeasant resistance exacerbatedthecropfailures already created bynatural disasters. Oskolkov interpretedthe causesof thesmall 1932harvestin the NorthCaucasusin this way 35

even without knowledge of the infestations: "Because of curtailed sowings by edinolichniki, a decline in theinterest of kolkhoznild inworkin thesocialized sector, shoddy cultivation ofthefields, violations ofsowingnorms andof procedures forcare of fields and,mainly, becauseof unfavorable weatherconditions at the momentof maturation of grain andharvesting, theharvest inthe [NorthCaucasus] tenitoryturned outmuchlowerthanwas expected/''"

The Interaction of Man and Nature Whilecertain environmental conditions affected theharvest independently of human actions, andsomehumanactions harmed theharvest independently ofnature, in the following caseshuman actions andnatural factors combined to reduce theharvest further. Eachofthecasesbelowinvolvedadifferentcategoryofhuman action: planning in the case of soil exhaustion, mismanagementin the case of weeds, and peasant resistance in thecaseof rodents, andineachcasetheyexacerbatednatural processes thatdevelopedindependently.

SoD Exhaustion Asdiscussed above, oneofthemain reasons forcollectivization wasto increase production byexpanding theareaundercrops.P' Theplans for this involvedexpanded sowings ofgrain, especially in eastern regions thathadnotbeencultivatedextensively before. Officialsrecognizedtherisks thisentailed, notonlyfromdrought butalsofrom repeated grain sowings, buttheycalculatedthatthesoilwould withstandthefiveyears of suchsowings thatwouldbenecessary toproduce enough of a surplus to overcome the "grain problem." Sovietplanners derivedthisapproach in greatpartfromexamples

of nonrotational cropping inforeign countries, especially theUnitedStates. ISS According tocertain SOUICeS, soilexhaustion fromrepeated sowings ofgrain in the samefieldsandlackof croprotations causedserious declines in yieldin some regions by 1932. TheKolkhoz Scientific-Research Institute, an investigative armof NKZ, sent specialists to the NorthCaucasusdistrictof the Kuban,one of the main regions withdifficulties in 1932. Thesereports noted large weedinfestations andlow yields;localpeople, both kolkhoz officials andordinary peasants, toldthemthatthe problemwaslackof crop rotations. One investigator said, "It isjust enragingthat people expendedsuch time and energy on work, and wheat was two vershki [3.5 inches] from the groundand with weeds." Local peoplereported that sowingson fallowproduceddouble or triplethe yieldsof sowings on land sown withgrainthe previous season, andinsomeareasgrainhadbeensownover grain fiveto nineyears 36

in a row. 156 MiddleVolga regional leaders wrotetheCentral Committeein Augustto attribute persistent low harvests to "the totalabsence intheseregionsof correctcrop rotations," with wheat sown over wheat for five to seven years or longer, which exhausted thelandandallowed weedsto flourish. Theregion hadexpandedsowings so muchthattheonlyavailable fallowedlandswerelocated in regions with verylow draft resources. 157 Onereasonforthelackof rotations derived fromthepeasants' ownconcerns forsubsistence andfairness. In the Kuban kolkhozy visitedby the KolkhozInstitute specialists, the farms and Machine-Tractor Station(MTS)whichprovidedtractors andotherequipmentto thefarms,dividedand workedthe fieldsin such a way as to ensure thatbrigades hadequal allotments ofeachcrop, which oftenpreventedrotations. This wasan egalitarian pattern commonin kolkhozy throughout the SovietUnion.ISS Another reason, however,was the above-notedeffort to increase the area under crops. Sincethis goal remainednecessaryin lightof thefamine,regionaland local authorities attempting tointroducecroprotations faceddifficulties in finding enough fallow land In the North Caucasus,for example,the cropped area in 1931-1932, 12.7 million hectares, alreadyexceeded the area in 1913, which may have been a peak levelforthat period, 11.4millionhectares. Localofficials haddifficulty finding additional fallow landandconsidered bringing pasture intotherotationin order to be ableto sow at leastone-fourth of winter 1932 crops,a relatively small share of total . sowings,over fallows.159 This situation reflecteda generalproblem in the Soviet Union: despite itsvastsize, thecountry hadsurprisingly littlegoodagricultural land; at thistimetheUnitedStateshadmorelandundercropsthanthe SovietUnion.160 Soil exhaustion andlackofcroprotations, therefore, wereindirectresults of the grain crisis andfamineconditions thatledupto collectivization inthefirstplace. On theotherhand, in summer1932Cairns andSchillersaw largestretches of landpreviously in cropsandnow growingweeds,apparently abandoned. Archival documents contain similar reports. 161 Thesesources donotexplain theseobservations. Cairns andSchillerattributedtheseunsown lands to themassive tlightof peasants, and certainlysomeregionslacked draft and labor. Noneof the sources, however,ever used the termfallow. If theseunusedlands hadbeenfannedin 1931, thentheirusein 1932 mighthaveexacerbated the soilexhaustion problem, and thecriticalobservers may have mistakenfallows as abandonedlands. If they had been fallow in 1931, however, theirusein 1932mighthaveincreased foodproduction.

Weeds

The massiveweedinfestations of 1932 reflected the interactionof a natural disaster,poor management, and resistance. Weeds can have a disastrouseffect on 37

any crop. Weedsgrow faster than most crops and can cover them, reducing or preventingswilightfrom reachingthem, andtheirroots compete withcropsfornutrients andwater. In earlytwentieth-century America, before thepervasive mechanization of the 192Os, weedsannually reducedgrainyields5 to 15Percent In theUSSR losses coulddouble that; fannsin the Uralsoblast' reportedly lostannually up to 30percent of theirharvestto Weeds. 162 On the otherhand,weeds areusuallyeasy to eliminate, particularly if farmshaveaccessto abundant labor. Weeds werea majorproblemthrough thefamine period. Iakovlevnotedthat in 1931weedshad chokedcrops on millionsof hectares. 163 In 1932,however,the fields were weedyto an unprecedentedextent, Cairnsand Schiller,who observed tensofthousands ofhectares during theirtravels thatsummer, sawenonnousweediness everywheretheywent Bothabandonedfields andfields undercultivation werecovered withweeds. Theyevenobservedfarmsstoringweeds in silosto be used as fodder. Theonlyfarmthatwasfree of weeds wastheGennanagricultural concessionDrusag, whosedirectors hadtakenadvantage of the lowprevailing wagesto hire peasantsto weedthefields. l64 Archival documents confirmunprecedented weedinfestations. l6S The unusually warmand wet weatherin 1932greatlystimulatedthis weed growth, as NKZacknowledged in numerous decrees, directives, and articlesin the central press. In AugusttheCommissariatconnecteddifficulties inthe grain harvestin NorthCaucasus sovkhozy withthe"completely impermissible" weediness of fields causedby twentyrainydaysin July.l66 The pressreportedthatmonththat weedsin Ukraine weresmothering crops,serving asbreeding grounds forinsects, andcausing the shortfall in that year's harvest. The article describedweeds as a disaster and urgedextraordinary measuresand mobilization of all forces to cope with it.167 As notedabove, insomeregions repeated sowings of grain overgrain alsocontributed to rapidandwidespread weedinfestations. As thecondition of thefieldsdeteriorated andthepressreportedinadequate progress in weeding, it becameincreasingly evident thattheweedinfestation derived bothfromtheunusual weatherconditions andfromdifficulties infarmwork, including weakness ofdraftforces, shortages ofequipment thatcouldhaveallowed mechanized destructionof weeds,the peasants' frequentunwillingness to work, and the often inadequateefforts by kolkhoz staffto organize andmotivate themeffectively. Iakovlev exaggeratedsomewhatwhen he claimed in early 1932that weeds were not from "God" or from climatebut from "our own scandalousattitude," because his own commissariat connected the extraordinary infestations of 1932 with weather conditions. l68 Nonetheless, published andarchival sources documentnumerous cases of peasants refusing to weedcropsandof kolkhoz staffandlocalofficials neglecting weeding tasks. l69 As archival sources show,severe weediness reduced harvests drasticallyin manyareasand againcasts doubton memoiraccountsof a favorable 38

harvest. Despite the proliferationof weeds, however, they may not have been the worstproblemin many other farms. ThoughDrusaghad few weeds,its managers expectedlow wheat yieldsin 1932 becauseof rust,170

Mice In the mice infestations of 1932-1933, one common pattern of peasant resistance exacerbated yet another natural disaster. In 1931 specialists observed increasing numbers of mice and other small rodents in south European Russia, Transcaucasia, the Urals,Siberia,andKazakstan. Duringthe followingmonths the animalsmultipliedand spreaduntilby fall 1932 theyencompassedthe steppe from Bessarabia to theDon andthe Caucasus Mountains, as wellas theLower andMiddle Volga regions,theCentralBlackearth region, Bashkiria, Moscow oblast, Belorussia, and4 millionhectaresin Kazakstan. Theseinfestations reacheddensitiesas high as 20,000 nests per hectare. In one stanitsain the North Caucasus, "the huts boiled overwithmice,in streetsandbushesoneheardwithout interruption the cracklingof moving mice." Themiceconsumed thegrowing fallgraincrop, seed, produce,shoes, and more. By January 1933 the miceinfestedan areaof 3.8 million hectares in the NorthCaucasusalone.!" TheexplanationsofferedbySovietagronomists forthisvastinfestationinvolved bothhumanandnaturalfactors: On theone hand, theyemphasizedthatthe mice had beenleft abundant''fodder'' in the fieldsin the formof unharvestedand unthreshed cropsand weedsand poorlyplowedfields. Theseabundantfood sources decreased the mortalityrate of the mice and strengthened theirresistanceto disease. Weather conditions,especiallydeep snowcoverin winter 1931-1932, also helped the mice survive. On theotherhand, specialists alsonotedthatmouseinfestations hadoccurred in 1892-1893, 1904, 1913-1914, 1921-1922, and again in 1932-1933, in a cycle of approximately ten years, similar to the cycles of lemmings in Scandinavia. 172 Government agencies didtakemeasures to alleviate thisinfestation. UkrainianNKZ Personnel notedthatmiceweredestroying grainin stacksand storageearly in 1932, described thesituation asa natural disaster, andissuedordersto localofficialsto take allmeasures necessary todestroy themice. In someregions theyweresuccessful, but inothers local personnel greatly underestimatedthescale oftheinfestation: inKrivorozh regionthe localMIS assumedthemicehad made80nestsper hectarewhere central investigators found3,000. Themiceconsumed somuchfodderthatlivestockin some sovkhozy were threatenedwith starvation. In one sovkhoz, agronomistsfound that micehad gatheredin theirholes500puds(eighttons)of grain.173 Thus certain aspectsof peasants' resistance, especiallytheir postponing of harvest work in order to leave grain in the field to harvest later for themselves, or 39

"carelessly" leavingears on the field to be gleanedlater, backfired.These actions promotedtheproliferation ofmice-apparently atthepeakofa natural growth cycle--whoconsumed thehiddenreserves.

Soviet Leaders and the Harvest Soviet leaders' understandingof, and attitudetoward,the harvest and the faminearecomplicated subjects andstillnotfully documented despitenew archival access. Thefollowing section does notattempt to analyze theirviewsexhaustively, but rather to illustratetheirbiases and inconsistency. Toreducetheir views to Stalin's assertionaboutthe ital'ianka oversimplifies theirunderstanding of the events and theirresponses to them. Sovietleadershadlimitedawareness and understanding of theenvironmental conditions ofagriculture in 1932. Central authorities, it is true,had manysources ofinformation, including partyandstateagencies and theOGPU,and top officials traveled to trouble spots.!" These sources, however, had serious inadequacies in theinfonnation theyprovidedonharvests, particularly in 1932. First, official agencies had difficulty obtaining accurate harvest data.175 Agricultural statisticians in Sovietgovernment agencies distrusted thepeasants'low estimates of theirharvests, on whichthesestatisticians hadto rely duringthe 1920s becauseoftheinadequate official networkofstatistical agents. Duringtheearly19308 theseagencies established severalnetworks of localofficials to projectharvests, the last of whichwasthe notoriousbiological yieldsystemin 1933,mentionedabove. Theseagencies changedthemethodforprojecting harvests fromthevisual observation on whichpeasants hadreliedto whatofficials considered a moresystematic method, samplingcrops beforethe harvestsusinga square-meter boxcalled a metrovka. In particular, a decree in May 1932 established district and regional "interagency accounting-control commissions"undertheCentralAdministration of Economic Accounting (TsUNKhU, the statistics-processing branch of the State Planning Committee, Gosplan) whose tasksincluded working withcollective andstatefarms to organizepreliminarymeasurements ofharvests through sample threshings employing the metrovka method.176 In general, thesecommissions inflated harvest data. Valerian Osinskii, thedirectorofTsUNKhU, wroteinearly 1933 that theagency hadestablished thesecommissions in partbecause local officials andfannpersonnel hadtried to "deceive theSovietgovernment"; consequently thedistrict andregional commissions in 1932 hadcorrectedprimary harvestestimates fromfarms upwardcumulatively morethan 20 percent,'" This was almostthe amountby whichthe biologicalyieldestimates laterwouldexceedthe ''bam yields." Thecommissions' projections alsoexceeded thoseby NKZ,anda dispute developed between theseagencies overthe 1932harvest that reached the Politburo in October 1932.178 The Politburo commission set up 40

WIder Molotov to deal withthis, however, seemsto haveresolved itonlyinSeptember 1933,when Stalin and Molotovagreedthat the officialfigure for the 1932harvest shouldbe69.8million tons, theofficial figure sincethattimeandapproximately halfway between the NKZ andTsUNKhU estimates. 179 Only afterStalin'sdeathdid officials takeintoconsideration theannual farmreports which, as notedearlier, implya much smallerharvestthanofficial figures in 1932as wellasin lateryears.ISO Second, thegovernment's main sources onagricultural conditions werebiased andlessthanfullycompetent OGPUreports on agriculture during 1932completely missedtherust, smut, andmiceinfestations thatqualifiedagronomists detectedand didnotevendiscusstheagronomists' publications.lSI Theofficial reporton theNorth Caucasus cited in the articlediscussed abovealso apparently did not mentionthese infestations in theNorthCaucasus;l82 neither didtheKolkhoz Institute investigations ofcroprotations citedabove. TheOGPUreports focused on the mostvisibleevents, suchasinsectinfestations, andondevelopments thatappeared to threaten politicalor economic goalsin themostobvious ways, suchas decollectivization. Moreover, the OGPUwasfullycapableofdistorting andinflating minorlocaleventsintoostensibly serious onestosupportlargerpolitical goals. Theyhadrecently doneso in theShakhty trial,relyingon flimsyevidence andfalse confessions obtainedby force,and wereto do so again on a much larger scale in the great purges in the later 1930s. I do not mean to imply that all the OGPUreports, such as thoseon agriculturecited above, were falsified. Most of those descriptions can be confirmed in other archival and published sources. Many sources,for example, document efforts by peasants to dismantle kolkhozy and restoretraditional fanning practicesduring the process of collectivization in 1929-1930 andrepeatedly thereafter; the OGPU reportson this cited aboveconfirmthesereports andprovide important details.lS3 Yetif the OGPU deemphasized or overlooked crucial environmental factors in the deteriorating agricultural conditions of 1931-1933 andinsteadreported peasants'efforts toconduct farmworkin a mannerthepeasants considered to be moreefficientas thoughthese efforts representedresistance andrebellion, thenSoviet leaders relying onsuchsources wouldreceivea biasedandincomplete impression of theactualcircumstances. Even if the various networks hadreported on allthe infestations objectively andcompletely,this informationaboutthe agronomicproblems would have been swampedby the sheervolumeandmagnitude of crisesin every aspectof the Soviet system. The Sovietleadership andtheSovietpopulation hadto contendwithsevere andgrowing food shortages throughout thecountry, shortages of laborinconstmction andmanyothercmcialindustrial sectors, anddeclining industrial outputthatdisrupted theentireeconomy. The worsening internal situation gaverise to laborprotestsand strikes, massivelaborturnoverandchaotic movement of peoplearoundthe country thatfintherdistuptedproduction, andoppositionistsentiments andorganizations among 41

middle-level officials andspecialists. Internationally, Sovietleadersfaceda military threat in theFar Eastthat hadresultedfrom theJapaneseinvasionof Manchuria,an extremely tense situationinGennany astheNa7i partyrosetopower, distrustful relations with Poland,anda serious balance ofpayments deficit thatputtheSovietUnionunder intense pressure to export commoditiesand to curtail imports of producer goods, both desperately neededinternally. All these problemswere at least complex and oftenintractable, and all demanded attention anddecisive action fromthe leadership. The protocols of Politburo sessions and even the letters between Stalin and other Sovietofficials overflow withdiscussions evidencing the desperate natureofthecrises, the severelimitations thegovernmentfaced, andtheharshmeasures officialsthought theyhad to take in response. Agriculture, whileimportant, wasnot alwaystheirfirst priority. In thiscontext, Stalinoftenviewedthereports of natural disasters thathedid receiveas minorandunimportant For example, he responded to the Crimeanparty secretary'sletterinlatesummerI932abouttheregion'sdrought-inducedcropfailures withthe written comment"unconvincing."I84 As I have attemptedto show,the 1932harvest was reduced by a complex combination ofevents, theunderstandingofwhich requires acertain open-mindedness, a sensitivity to a widearrayof agricultural processes. Sovietleaders,however, were constrainedby stereotypical viewsregarding thecausesof famine, in particularthat drought wastheonlyenvironmental factorthatcouldresultinfamine (asnotedabove, mostscholarstodaystillholdthisview). MostSovietleaders, I suspect,did notread agronomic publications; theyoften hadlimitededucation andmaynothaveunderstood thesignificance of themanyenvironmental problems discussed above. I notedabove, forexample,Stalin'sassertion inJanuary1933, inhispublished works,thatthe 1931 harvestwasreducedbydrought, but thatthe 1932harvestwasnot,becauseno major drought occurred that year.Stalin's favorableimpressionof the 1932 harvest was based not only on his assumptions about the lack of a drought in 1932, but also on misleading statistical information, asnotedabove. In a letterto LazarKaganovich in July 1932(Stalin wasin theCrimeaforseveral months thatyear), he wrote thathehad sent an authorization to curtailthe grain procurement planfor particularlysuffering farms in Ukraine,but predictedthatat the end of Augustit wouldbecomeclearthat the Soviet Unionhad had a good harvestwhichwouldallowthe provisionof aidISS OtherSovietleaders wentalongwiththisviewpoint Kosior, forexample, in a speech to a Ukrainian Central Committee plenumin February 1933, insisted that"Bolsheviks neverdeny andneverrejectobjectivecauses." Against claimsby localofficials that the harvestwaspoor,he argued: Even if one believes completely the figures of our statistical institutions, and these figures are based on significantly underestimated data of actual threshings, then it turns out that the harvest by these data on 1 October [1932)

42

was on average 7.3 centners per hectare, but last year by those data it was lower-7 centners perhectare.... Even if one considers that in fall 1931 we had an undersowing of 2 million hectares and 1 million hectares of grain failed in spring (1932], which overall gave a decrease in the gross harvest of21 million puds [340,000 tons], just to compare these figures~ million puds and 255 million puds [7.2 million tons and4.18 million tons, grain procurements for 1931 and 1932] shows that the issue is not in objective causes. l86

Kosior,in other words, noticedthe discrepancy between the largeharvest that the statisticiansreportedin 1932-a figure that appearedin officialstatistical tables from that time to the present-and the smaller procurementsthat year, the discrepancythat led recent scholarsto revise their estimates of the 1932harvest downward, asdiscussed above. Kosior, however, assumed thatbecause thestatistical dataderivedfrom actual threshings, it wasan underestimate, andhe concludedthat thedeclinein procurements didnotresultfrom"objectivecauses,"thatis, a natural disaster, becausein hisview, andaccording to thestatistical reports he hadreceived, no naturaldisastertookplaceinUkraine thatcouldhavecauseda smallharvest On thebasisofthese considerations, Stalin, Kosior, andotherleaders blamed theprocurements crisisandfamine conditions onmismanagement ofprocurement by localofficials. Stalinasserted thisin hisspeechat theJanuary1933plenum, which was published, and in lettersto his associatesin 1932. In a letter to Molotov and Kaganovich of 18June 1932, forexample, Stalinwrote: "Wewereright: the grain procurement planshouldnot be allocated rigidlyby districtand village-the main errorinUkraine, theUrals was preciselyinspontaneous, mechanical equalizing, without consideration of thesituation ineachkolkhoz-as a resultdespitea reasonably good [neplokholl harvestaseries ofgoodharvest regionsin Ukraine arein a condition of ruinandfamine."I87 Kosiorreached similarconclusions in hisFebruary 1933 speech, andsomewestern scholars havetaken a similarview. 188 Yet despitesuchconvictions, Sovietleadersdid not excludethe possibility thata lowharvest wasoneoftheproblems in 1932. TheissuethatledStalin andother leadersto consider this possibility wasthe plan to increasesharply the area under crops, which asnotedabove wasoneoftheprime objectives behindcollectivization in 1929-1930. 189 NKZ undertook the largestincrease in sown area in this period in 1931,butthetargets were too high to befulfilled within theoptimal sowing period that year. As a resultof thelow 1931 harvest, theoverallgoalof expandedsowings, and theagronomist N.M. Tulaikov, itsmainexponent, cameundersharpcriticism at the All-Union DroughtConference in October 1931,particularly becausetheplansdid notallowfor adequate croprotations. Thecommissariat moderated the 1932 sowing plansomewhat, thoughitwas still high, andalso orderedfanns to preparecroprotations. By summer1932, however, complaints fromregional officials regarding expanded 43

sowings andtheconsequentdifficulties inintroducing rotations, of thesortdiscussed above, hadreached Stalin, whowroteto Kaganovich on7July: Wholesale expansion ofarea in all crops means squeezingout ofthe government as much money as possible-but raising harvest yields, improving cultivation, reducing expenditures-this they [NKZ personnel] do not work on. While doing this, NKZ does not understand that with wholesale expansion of area, and uncontrolled issuance of incredible sums, personnel can have neither the desire nor the time not only to improve work and raise harvest yields, but even to think about this seriously. NKZ has not even worked out what types of fertilizer are necessary for particular crops. Large expenditures, lots of technology, but worsening cultivation ofland, insignificant economic effectand the great danger: [this could] force peasants to depart from kolkhozy as from a loss-making organization. We have to concentrate on improving cultivation of fields, raising harvest yields. 190

In a letterof 5 August 1932, Stalinreturned to thisissue,urgingthat NKZbe reorganized, witha separate commissariatforsovkhozy, so thatNKZcouldconcentmte on thespecific organizational problems of kolkhozy andMTS.191 A fewweeks later, in September 1932 thePolitburo formeda commission underIakovlev to prepare measures to raisecropyields andcombatweeds. Stalin andMolotov themselvesjoinedthiscommission, andtheresultwasthe decree of 29 September"on measures for raisingharvestyields." This decree orderedthat all party, state, andeconomic organizations focus theirworkonraising harvest Yields "as the centraltaskof agricultural development at thepresentmoment"and specified measures to increase grain sowings attheexpense oftechnical cropsand to introduce crop rotations. 192 Also, on 1 October a government decree reorganized NKZ, separating off from it a new commissariat of grain and livestock state farms, NKSovkhoz. ThePolitburo protocols donotinclude thereports andotherdocuments that servedas the basisforthe agency'sdecisions. The characterandcontentof these decrees, however, andthepointsthatStalinemphasized in his letters, indicatethat thesedecreesat leastpartlyreflectedthe influence of reportsthat reachedcentral agricultmal authorities about soil exhaustion, weedinfestations, andrelated problems. Thetextofthedecreeonraising Yields atleastimplied that 1932 harvest yields, andby furtherimplication the 1932 harvest, werenot whattheyshouldhavebeenandthat this situationwasreIatedin partto agricultural andenvironmentalconditions. Additional letters andgovernment decrees, apparently mostly secret, thatreduced procurement quotas in summerandfall 1932 forparticular districts, regions, andeventhewhole republic of Ukraine, furtherindicated thatSovietleaders knewthatat leastin some places theharvest waslow. l93 Thisawareness, onthepartofStalin andotherofficials,

44

ofa smallerharvestappears to beatleastpartly inconsistent withtheiracceptance of official harveststatistics indicating a reasonably goodharvest in 1932. It is probably impossible togobeyondspeculation astowhyofficials didnottmderstandthis. Perhaps the closestwe can get to an explanationis the fact that thesedecrees, and Stalin's letters, stillemphasizedbadplanning andmismanagement, aboveall by NKZ, as the rootcause ofthecrisis. Noneofthese sources indicated anyawareness ofthecomplex of natural disasters thathadreduced harvest Yields independently ofanyhuman action. Sovietleaders, then, didnotactually believe thattheUSSRwasexperiencing a famine in thetraditional sense of a massivecropfailure causedbydrought, because in theirviewnomajordrought hadoccurred; theharvest wasnotexceptionally small, at leastno smallerthanin 1931; andtheevidenceof seriousmismanagement at all govemmentallevels andin all thestages offann workfromplanning to procurements seemedto accountfor alltheproblems thesystemfaced. Stalin'sfamous statement aboutthe peasants canying out an ital'ianka is in part a statementabout the 1932 harvest, oneof hisexplanations fortheinconsistency between statistical reportsof a reasonably adequateharvestandthe nonfulfillment of procurement quotas. Their viewsreflectedignoranceofagricultural conditions, anoverly credulous attitudetoward official statistics, andlong-held assumptions, almost prejudices, regarding the causes offaminesin theUSSR.

Conclusions On the basisof the abovediscussion, I contendthatan understanding ofthe Sovietfamineof 1932-1933 muststartfromthebackground of chronicagricultural crisesin the earlySovietyears, theharvestfailures of 1931 and 1932, andtheinteraction ofenvironmental andhuman factors thatcausedthem. In 1932, extremely dry weather

reduced cropsin someregions, andunusually wetandhumidweatherin mostothers fosteredunprecedentedinfestations. These conditionsfrom the start reduced the potentialyield that year, as droughthad in 1931. At the same time, the regime's procurements from the 1931 harvestleftpeasantsand worklivestockstarving and weakened. Cropfailures, procurements thatreduced fodder resources, peasant neglect, overuseof the limitednumberof tractors, and shortagesof spareparts and fuel all combined to reduceavailable draft power. Farmworkconsequently wasperformed poorly inmany kolkhozyand sovkhozy, oftenevenwhenpeasants werewilling to put in theeffort. Finally, fanning activities combinedwith otherenvironmental problems-soilexhaustion, weeds, andmice-to further reduce the 1932 harvest tofamine levels. Theevidencepresented heresubstantially discredits memoirs or testimonies that describethe 1932 harvestas large. Even if the authorsof thesesources wrote whattheyactually sawor considered to be the truth, agricultural conditions and the 45

limited agronomicknowledge of most people at that time prevented them from perceiving andunderstanding thesituation: weatherconditions thatappeared favorable actually gaveriseto massive andwidespreadinfestations, andcropsthatsuperficially appeared healthy produced onlyafraction ofnormal amounts. l94 Anystudythatasserts thattheharvestwasnotextraordinarily lowandthatthefamine wasa political measure intentionallyimposedthrough excessiveprocurements is clearly basedonaninsufficient sourcebase and an uncriticalapproachto the officialsources. The evidence cited abovedemonstrates thatthe 1932-1933famine wastheresultof a genuineshortage, a substantial decline intheavailability offood (to useSen'stenninology) causedby a complex of factors, each of which decreased the harvest greatly and which in combination musthave decreased the harvestwellbelowsubsistence. This famine thereforeresembledtheIrishfamine of 1845-1848,butresultedfroma litanyof natural disasters thatcombined tothesameeffectasthepotato blighthadninetyyearsbefore, andina similarcontextof substantial foodexports. TheSovietfamineresembles the Irishcasein anotherwayas well: in both,government leaders wereignorantof and minimized theenvironmental factorsand blamedthefamines on humanactions(in Ireland, overpopulation, in the USSR, peasant resistance) much more than was warranted. This interpretation of the 1932-1933famine as theresultof the largestin a series ofnatural disasters suggests analternative approach totheintentionalist viewof thefamine. Someadvocates ofthepeasantresistance viewarguethattheregimetook advantage of the famine to retaliate against the peasantsand force them to work harder. 19S Famineanddeathsfromstarvation, however, beganin 1928 in townsand somerural areasbecause of lowharvests andofsomepeasants'unwillingness to sell theirsurpluses, Thefoodsupplygenerally deteriorated overthenextfew years,due not only to exportsin 1930-1931 but also to the crop failuresof 1931-1932. The harshprocurements of 1931 and 1932havetobeunderstood in thecontextof famine thatprevailedin townsas wellas villages throughout theSovietUnionby late 1931; by 1932-1933,asnotedabove, workersas wellaspeasants weredyingof hunger. 196 If we are to believethatthe regimestarvedthepeasants to inducelabordisciplinein thefarms,arewetointerpret starvation in thetowns astheregime'stool to discipline blue and white collar workers and their wives and children? While Soviet food distribution policies arebeyondthescopeofthisarticle, itisclearthatthesmallharvests of 1931-1932createdshortages that affectedvirtually everyonein the countryand thattheSovietregime didnothavetheinternal resources to alleviate thecrisis. Moreover, whileStalin's famous letterclearlyattackedsome peasantsfor refusing to worktoproduce foodforthecountry, theregime's actions duringandafter the famineindicatedthat theydid not see thepeasants exclusively as enemies. For example, the politicaldepartmentsformed in MTS and sovkhozy in early 1933to 46

organize{annworkduringthefamine conductedpurgesthatremovedmanyfarm and local officials and personnelformalfeasance, sometimes unjustlyand arbitrarily. The political departments replacedthem,however, by promotingthousands of peasants.197 Suchactionsindicatethat the regimeblameditsownofficialsfor thecrisisas much as rank-and-file peasants, if not more so, and that it relied on the peasants to overcome thecrisis. Finally,this essay shows that whilethe USSR experiencedchronic drought andothernaturaldisastersearlier, thosewhichoccurredin 1932were an unusualand severecombination of calamitiesin a countrywith heightenedwlnerability to such incidents. In this sense, my analysis of the famine as a result of a complex of environmental and humanfactors does not"normalize"thefamine,in the senseofthe German historians who attempted to normalize the Holocaust by minimizing its uniqueness and scale. The evidenceandanalysis I havepresentedhere show that the Soviet famine was more serious and more important an event than most previous studies claim,includingthoseadhering totheUkrainian nationalist interpretation, and thatitresultedfrom a highlyabnormal combination of environmental and agricultural circumstances. By drawing attention to these circumstances, this study also demonstrates the importanceof questioning acceptedpoliticalinterpretationsand of considering theenvironmental aspects offamines andotherhistoricaleventsthat involve humaninteraction withthenatural world ThattheSovietregime,throughitsrationing systems, fedmorethan50 million people, including manypeasants, duringthefamine, howeverpoorly, and that at leastsomepeasants facedwithfamineundertookto work withgreaterintensity despitetheirhostility to theregimein 1933,andto someextentin previousyears as well, indicate that all thoseinvolved in some way recognized the uniqueness of this tragicevent

47

Notes The International Researchand ExchangesBoard (IREX), theWestVIrginia HumanitiesCouncil, and West Vlfginia University supported my research for this study. James C. Scott and the participantswho attendedmy presentationof an earlier versionof this paper at the YaleProgram in AgrarianStudiesin 1994 providedvaluablecommentsandsuggestions,as did Robert Danbom of Iowa State University; Kurt Leonard and Alan Roelfs of the Cereal Rust Lab, University of Minnesota and the USDA, biologist Joseph Morton, Estension Specialist Susan Poland; and historiansRobert Blobaum,StephenZdatny,and RobertMaxon,all of WestVlI'ginia University; Eva Segert; andthe three anonymousreferees for the Carl Beck Papers. 1. The first viewpointcan be foundinRobertConquest,TheHarvestofSorrow (New York: OxfordUniversityPress, 1986); JamesMace,"Politychni prychyny holodomoro v Ukraini (19321933 m)," Ukrainskyi istorychnyiVzumall995, no. 1:34-48, and in Commissionon the Ukraine Famine, Reportto Congress (Washington, D.C.: OovemmentPrintingOffice, 1988). The second viewpoint can be found in such works as Moshe Lewin, "TakingGrain," in The Making ofthe SovietSystem (New York: Pantheon, 1985), 142-77; SheilaFitzpatrick, Stalin ~ Peasants (New York: Oxford UniversityPress, 1994),69-76; Nicolas Werth,"La Grande Famine," in Robert Courtois, ed., 1.£ livre noire du communisme (paris: Laffont, 1997), 178-88, and two essays by D'AnnPenner, TheAgrarian "Strike" of1932-33, KennanOccasionalPaper 269 (Washington, D. C.: WoodrowWilson International Center for Scholars, March 1998), and "Stalin and the ltal'ianka of 1932-1933 in the Don Region," Cahiersdu Monde russe 39, nos. 1-2, (JanuaryJune 1998): 27-68. Stephan Merl also views the 1932-1933 famine as unique "because the harvest in the famine regions in 1932 was in no way so catastrophicas not to provide for local subsistence"; see "Entfachte Stalin die Hungersnot von 1932-1933 zur Ausloeschung des ukrainischenNationaiismusT' JahrbUcherjUrGeschichte Osteuropas 37 (1989) no.: 4,569. 2 On rural famine outside Ukraine,the Russian scholar V.V. Kondrashin, "Golod 19321933 godov v derevne Povolzh'ia " (Diss.,Moscow,Instituteof History, 1991), documents very clearlytheextentof faminein the Volga basinandexplicitly rejectsConquest'sargumentregarding the famine's alleged focus on Ukraine (150). The UkrainianhistorianS. V. Kul'chyts'kyi in "Do otsinky stanovishcha v sil's'komu hospodarstviURSR," Ukrainskyi istorichnyi zhuma11988, no. 3: 15, acknowledges that the famine affected not only Ukraine and the North Caucasus but also the Volga basin,the CentralBlackearthoblast', Kazakhstan, the Urals,and other regions. On urban famine, Andre Liebich, "Russian Mensheviks and the Famine," in Roman Serbyn and Bohdan,eds., Famine in Ukraine (Edmonton: crus, 1986),101-02, documents famineconditions in Soviet cities on the basis of reports that reached the Menshevik press; Iu. M. Ivanov, "Polozhenierabochikh Rossiiv 2O-kh-nachale 3G-kh godov," Voprosy istorii, 1998, no. 5: 28-43, argues that "the workers starved" during the famine; Jeffrey Rossman, "The Teikovo Cotton Workers' Strike of April 1932," RussianReview 56 (January 1997): 44-69, documents a major strike undertaken in great part in response to food shortages; and Elena Osokina, Ierarkhiia potrebleniia (Moscow: MGOU, 1993),29-30, presentsachivalestimatesof some four hundred thousand deaths in thetowns in 1932-1933 in theRussianRepublic andUkraineand acknowledges the existence of famine in the towns. Roger R. Reese, Stalin ~ Reluctant Soldiers (Lawrence: UniversityPress of Kansas, 1996),49, reports that the famine broughta 30 percent cut in rations for soldiers and officers. See also Merl,"Entfaehte Stalin," 580-8 1.

48

3. The magnitudeof the 1932 harvestis a matterofdispute and may never be settled. In an earlierarticle,I showed that data from the kolkhoz annual reports for 1932 implieda harvest ofat most50 milliontons, and probablyless:"The 1932 Harvestand the SovietFamineof 1932-1933," SlavicReview 50, no. 1 (Spring 1991): 70-89. The validityof this estimate derives from the fact that Soviet statisticians employed data from kolkhoz annual reports to correct "biological yield" harvestsfrom 1933 on (see below)as wellas otherconsiderationsexplained in the article. Robert Davies and Stephen Wheatcroft project higher figures for the 1932 harvest, but their estimates are based primarilyon rainfalldata, whichhascertainproblemsI shall discuss below;see Davies, Wheatcroft, and J. M. Cooper, "Soviet Industrialization Reconsidered: Some Preliminary Conclusions AboutEconomicDevelopmentBetween 1926 and 1941," Economic HistoryReview, 2d ser., 39, no. 2 (1986): 282-83; Daviesand Wheatcroft,"Agriculture," in Davies, Wheatcroft, and Mark Harrison, eds., The Economic Trans/ormation 0/ the Soviet Union, 1913-1945 (Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press, 1994),115,286. In a recentarticle, DaviesandWheatcroft rejectedmy lower estimateof the 1932 harvestand presentedestimatesoftheirown ranging from 53 million toos to 65 million tons, withouttaking into consideration the kolkhoz annual reports; see "Diskusiia I obsuzhdeniia: Sovremennye kontseptsiiagramogo razvitiia," Otechestvennaia istorii,no. 6 (1998): 97, 129 fn. 8. Theirlowerestimateapproachesthe estimateI derivedfrom the annual reports, but the wide range of their estimates implies so much uncertainty as to make it little more than an educated guess. On yieldsin 1933 see Tauger,"The 1932 Harvest," 80. Some scholarsstillhave notconsideredtheevidence fora smallharvestin theseyearsand its implications for an explanation of the famine: see Stephan Merl, Bauem unter Stalin (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot,1990),36,40, and AndreaGraziosi, TheGreatSovietPeasantWar(Cambridge: Harvard Institute of Ukrainian Studies, 1996), 60. On Soviet harvest statistics generally, see Tauger, "StatisticalFalsification in the Soviet Union:AComparativeStudy," forthcomingin The Donald ~ Treadgold Papers (Seattle: Universityof Washington). 4.

SeeTauger,"The 1932 Harvest," 88.

5. On the rationing system,see RobertDavies, Crisis and Progressin the Soviei Economy, 1931-1933 (London: MacMillan, 1996),530-31, and Elena Osokina, Za/asadom "stalinskogo ;zobUiia" (Moscow: Rosspen, 1998), passim; on food allocations to towns and villages, see EzhegodnikkhIebooborota1932-1933, whichlists food allocations by region and by type. On the reserves, see Robert Davies, Mark Tanger, and Stephen Wheatcroft, "Stalin, Grain Stocks, andtheFamineof 1932-1933," SlavicReview 54 no. 3 (Fall 1995): 642-57. ForMikoian'sestimate of grain needs in 1928, see Roberta T. Manning, "The High and Low Politics of the First Grain Procurements Campaign,"The CarlBeckPapers, 1504,2001. 6. CecilWoodham-Smith, TheGreatHunger (London: NEL, 1968); Connac 6 Gracia, The GreatIrishFamine (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998),68; PeterSolar,"The Great Famine Was No Ordinary Subsistence Crisis," in E. M. Crawford, eds., Famine: The Irish Experience, 900-1900 (Edinburgh: John Donald, 1989), 112-33. On the general scholarly acceptance of Solar's findings, seeMaryDaly, "Revisionism andIrishHistory: The Great Famine," in D. G. Boyce and Alan O'Day, eds., TheMaking 0/Modem Irish History (London: Routledge, 1996),79-80.

7. By far the best studyof prerevolutionary naturaldisastersand faminesis E. R Borisenkov and V. M. Pastetskii, Tysiacheletniaia letopis' neobichainykhiavleniiprirody (Moscow: Mysl', 1988), especially the chronology, 236-478; other studies that discuss this are Arcadius Kahan, "Natural Calamities and Their Effect Upon the Food Supply in Russia (An Introduction to a

49

Catalogue)," Jahrbiicher jUrGeschichte Osteuropas 16, no. 3 (September 1968): 353-77, and William A. Dando, The Geography o/Famine (NewYork: Wtley, 1980), ch, 9. Examples of studies of harvests includeA. S. Ermolov, Nashi neurozhaii prodovol'stvennyi vopros (St, Petersburg: Tip. V. Kirshbauma, 1909); A. V. Chaianov, ed., Problemy urozhaia (Moscow: Izd. "Ekonomicheskaia zhizn' ,It 1926); Ill.L.Rauner, Klimat i urotltainost' z.emovykh kulblr (Moscow: Nauka, 1981), anda collectionof prerevolutionary studies, N. A. Maksimova, ed., KlassikiRusskoi agronomii v bor'be s ZllSukhoi (Moscow: Izd. Akademii Nauk, 1951). 8. AmartyaSen,PovertyandFamines(Oxford: ClarendonPress, 1981),57-63,88-93,11723, 137-39. PeterBowbrickquestioned Sen'sminimization ofshortage inthe 1943 Bengalfamine in "The Causes of Famine: A Refutation of ProfessorSen's Theory," Food Policy, May 1986, 105-24, followedby Sen's reply, 125-32, and see additional comments by otherreaders,August 1986,259-63; see alsoDavidArnold'scriticismof Sen's argument on this famineand others in Famine (Oxford: BasilBlackwell, 1988),42-46. Stephen Devereux questioned Sen's viewson the sameissuein the Ethiopian famineof 1972-1974 in "Entitlements, Availability and Famine: A Revisionist ViewofWollo, 1972-1974," FoodPolicy,August 1988,270-82. 9.

See Conquest, HarvestofSorrow, 265; Tauger, "The 1932 Harvest,"70-71.

10. See Mace, "Politychni prychyny," 36-37. A collection of formerly secret Ukrainian documents which Mace cites on other points, shows that on both a national and a local level procurementquotasweremuchsmallerthanin 1931, thattheycouldnotbe fulfilled, and thattheir partialfulfillment left kolkhozy, peasants,towndwellers, andevenpartyofficialsin muchworse condition than had the larger procurements in 1930-1931; see Holod 1932-1933 rokiv na Ukraini: Ochyma istorykiv, movoiudokumentiv (Kiev, 1990), e.g., 311-14, 350-70. 11.

Daviesand Wheatcroft, "Agriculture," and"DiskusiiaI obsuzhdeniia," 99-101.

12 Penner, The Agrarian "Strike," and "Stalin and the Ital'ianka" Penner inaccurately assertsin these writingsthatmy article,''The 1932 Harvest,"attributed thesmall 1932 harvestto weatherconditions,specifically drought (TheAgrarian "Strike," 1,4, and 37 fn. 4; and "Stalin and the ltalianka," 28). Penner attemptsto refute the argument that the famine resulted from droughtby arguing that no majordroughtoccurredin 1932, at leastin the NorthCaucasus (The Agrarian "Strike," 5-6; "Stalinandthe ltalianka," 29-30). In factI did notidentifyany specific causesfor the low harvestin that article; I wrotethat the lowharvestresultedfrom a complexof factors and that I was Preparing a study of this question (''The 1932 Harvest," 84 and fn. 40). Penner did not discuss the assertions by Davies and Wheatcroft cited above that did in fact blamethe famine in parton drought. 13. Among the abundantsourceson this, the best study is Lars Lib, Bread and Authority in Russia (Berkeley, andLos Angeles: University of CaliforniaPress, 1990). On the Russian's modelling of theirpolicies on GermanKriegsozializmus, seeGeorgeYaney, The Urgeto Mobilize (Urbana: University ofll1inois Press, 1982),424.

On the Bolshevikrequistions, see Lib, Bread and Authority; on the Whites, see Peter 14. Kenez, Civil War in South Russia (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1977),26-27,93-100,205,289-91, andJonSmele,CivilWarin Siberia(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), ch. 4, esp. 361-75, 385-93. Mennonite peasants in Ukrainewereamong

50

the groups vicitimzed by one group of Greens,Nestor Makhno's peasant army; see P.C. Hiebert and O. O. Miller, Feedingthe Hungry: RussianFamine, 1919-1925 (Scottdale, Pa.; Mennonite Central Committee, 1929),199,245. 15. On thepersistenceof famine, see MarcusWehner, "00100 1921gg. v Samarskoigubernii i reaktsiiaSovetskogopravitel'stva," Cahiers du Monde Russe 38, nos. 1-2 (Ianuary-June 1997): 237; on the continuation of requisitions, see Iu. V. Strizhkov, Prodovol'stvennye otriady v gody grazlulimskoi voiny i inostrannoiimervemsii (Moscow: Nauka, 1973),288-89; on requisition measures employed to collect the tax in kind, see Iu. A. Poliakov, Perekhodk nepu i sovetskoe krest'iDnstvo (Moscow: Nauka,1967),296. The American ReliefAdministration (A.R.A.) provided reliefin Moscowand Petrograd; see H. H. FISher, The Faminein Soviet Russia; 1919-1923 (New York: Macmillan,1927),55rr57. The insufficiency of relief is a largerissue than can be dealt with here; as an example I cite an appeal from the Crimean okrug party committee to the Central Committee in fall 1922 for more food becausethe number of people starving far exceeded those provided for by the rations from the A.R.A., the Catholic Mission, and the Soviet organization Posledgol, which provided more rations than the A.R.A.; (Rossiiskii Gosudarstvennyi Arkhiv Sotsial'noii PoliticheskoiIstorii(henceforth citedas RGASPI,formerlyRTsKhIDNI), 17.84.346,l. 22. 16. On the 1924 famine, see the collection of articles on famine relief measures edited by Sovnarkomchairman A. I. Rykov, V bor'be s zasukhoii golodom (Moscow, 1925); on the 1928 faminein Ukraine, MarkB. Tauger, "Grain Crisisor Famine? The UkrainianStateCommissionfor Aid to Crop Failure Victims and the UkrainianFamine of 1928-1929," in Donald Raleigh, ed., Provincial Landscapes: Local Dimensions of Soviet Power (University of Pittsburgh Press, forthcoming). See also the reports on faminerelief in Visty, for example 25 October 1928, 3, and preceding and subsequent issues with additionalreports on relief measures. S. V. Kul' cbyts'kyi also refers to this famine, Komunizm v Ukraini: Pershe desiatirichchia (1919-1928) (Kiev: Osnovy,1996),354, wherehe writes: "Unfortunately, in historiographythis topicremainsa 'white spot'." 17. On the 1928-1929 faminein Ukraineand itsrelationto the graincrisis,seeTauger, "Grain Crisis or Famine." On the connectionbetweenthe grain crisis and collectivization as a measure to increase food production, see Tauger,"The People's Commissariat of Agriculture," in E. A. Rees, ed., Decision·Makingin the Stalinist CommandEconomy (London: MacMillan, 1997), 151-55. 18. The evidence for this is a protocolof a meeting of North Caucasus representatives with Kolkhoztsentr on 1 February 1931,foundin RGASPI. Becausethisdocumentwillbe published in Russia in a forthcoming collection of documentson collectivization, for copyright reasons I am not allowed to give a full citation in publicationsat this time. Regional party secretaries referred to crop failures in Kazakstan and the Volga region in telegrams to Stalin and Iakovlev,Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhivekonomiki 7486.37.154,11.49-51,219-20 (hereafterRGAE). 19.

Osokina, Za fasadom "stalinskogo izobiliia," 37.

20. On the great southern drought, see Nan Elizabeth Woodruff,As Rareas Rain: Federal Reliefin the GreatSouthernDrought(Urbana: Universityof Illinois Press, 1985); on the famine in China, see Reportofthe NationalFloodReliefCommission, 1931-1932 (Shanghai: Republic

51

of China, 1933); on FrenchWestAfrica,FinnFuglestad~ "Lagrande faminede 1931dans l'Ouest Nig6rien~" Revuefranfaisd'histoired'Outre-Mer61 (1974):no. 222~ 18-33. Mortality in West Africa, partly due to rigid French taxation policies, was proportionally greater than in the Soviet Union, although it affected a much smallerregion with a muchsmallerpopulation.

21.

Kahan, "Naturalcalamities."

22. Joseph Stalin, Works (Moscow, 1955), 13: 22o-21~ speechof 11 January 1933; Mace, Reportto Congress, x,citingA. L Rudenko, ed., ZasuJchi v SSSR (Leningrad: Gidromet. izd., 1958), 168; Penner, The Agrarian "Strike, "4-6. Penner's main sources include reports to the British governmentby AndrewCairns,an experiencedfarmerand university trainedagronomistworking for the Canadian government, hired by the British EmpireMarketingBoard to travel throughout the grain regions of the USSR in summer 1932, published in Marco Carynnyk et al., eds., The ForeignOjJice and the Famine (Kingston,Ontario: LimestonePress, 1998);Kondrashin, Golod 1932-1933 godov; and Stalin~s statement cited above.

23.

Davies and Wheatcroft, "Agriculture," 125, 291; Wheatcroft, "The Significance of Climatic and WeatherChange on Soviet Agriculture," SIPS paper 11 (Birmingham, England: University ofBirmingbam, 1977). See A. M. Alpat' ev and A. I. Trofimova, "Povtoriaemost' zasukb v raionakb osvoeniia tselinnykbi zalezhnykhzemel' Kazakstanai zapadnoi Sibiri," in Rudenko, ed., Zasukhi v SSSR, esp.l00. 24.

25. In WesternSiberia,for example,the weatherbureauhad existedonly a year in 1931,and vast regions had no monitoring points; see V. K. Ivanov, "Tezisy k dokladu: Analiz pricbin, porozhdaoiushchikb zasukbu i vukbovei Zapadnoi Sibiri," in Tezisy i materialy vsesoiuznoi konferentsiipo bor'be s zasuJchoi (Moscow, 1931), 19.

26.

Rudenko, ZasuJchi v SSSR, 164, 168-69 (tables); for averagerainfall, see Naum Jasny,

The SocializedAgricultureofthe USSR: Plansand Performance (Stanford~ Cal.: Food Research

In$titute, 1949),106.

Zl.

Istoriia Sovetskogo krest'ianstva: lstoriia krest'ianstva SSSR (Moscow: Nauka,

1986)~2: 2S5.

28.

Carynnyket al., ForeignOffice, 36~ 53, 54, 56, 64; on Cairns,see liv.

29. N. Popov,"Tezisydoklada: 0 zasukbena Ukrainei 0 bor'be s nei," in Tezisyi materialy vsesoiuznoikonferentsii, 187-89. 30.

Tauger,"The People's Commissariat of Agriculture," 157.

31. N. fa.Gushchin, c'Kollektivizatsiia vSibiri(nekotorye problemy i uroki)," inN. fa. Gushchin, ed., Razvitie form sotsialistichesko! sobstvennosti v Sibirskoi derevne: Istoricheskii opyt i sovremennost' (Novosibirsk: AkademiiaNauk,1991),93. Scbiller'sdescription is in Carynnyket al., Foreign OjJice~ 260.

52

32

Carynnyket al., ForeignOffice,42.

33. RGAE7486.37.154, I. 158. Biriusova, a sovietofficial,describedKazakhwomenswollen with starvationholding frozen children and wandering in search of food, children alone in a sled screaming "kishketkoi," "give bread," and whole groups of Kazakhs coming to district party headquarters asking for bread. 34.

Holod 1932-1933 rokiv, 121, 133, 144,160.

35. Speechesfrom the drought conferencewerepublishedin Tezisy i materialy vsesotuznoi konferentsii•. A report issued in 1932by the People's Commissariatof Agriculture (NKZ) on the strugglewithdroughtand the economiceffectsof irrigationincludeselaborateplansfor irrigation construction andother antidroughtmeasures. RGAE7486.19.112, II. 6-18, 24-29.

36. Izvestiia, 17 February 1932, p. 1, for the notification of seed and food loans to the drought regions; Kollektivizatsiia sel'skogo khoziaistva v Srednem Povolzh'e (1927-1937 gg.): Dokumenty i materialy (Kuibyshev,1970),329. 37. Iu. V. Moshkov,Zemovaia problemav godysploshnoikollektivizatsii (Moscow: MGU, 19(6),191. 38. RGASPI 17.162.11, Osobie papki Politbiuro, 10 Sept 31-3 March 32, session of8 January 1932, item 27; RGAE 7486.19.112, II. 5, secret directive to purchase drought resistant seed from abroadfor 500,000 gold rubles. 39. Carynnyk et al., Foreign Office 167. Cairns mistakenly spelled Tulaikov's name as "Tulikov." 40.

RGAE7486.3.50595,1.1-8.

41.

RGAE7486.37.1S4,I.224-26.

42 Sel'skokhoziaistvennaia thim, the periodical of NKZ RSFSR during ~ reported extensivelyon the infestationsof locusts,mice,andother pests during the famine years. See, for example, 9 December 1922, p. 23, reporting locust infestations in the south in 1920-1922; 19 February 1923,p. 5, reporting pests and plant disease in 1922over an area of nearly 20 million hectares; and 4 April 1923, p, 11, reporting that locusts and field crickets infested more than 3 millionhectaresand gophers more than 10millionhectares. 43. Davies and Wheatcroft, "Agriculture," 125;"Diskusiia i obsuzhdeniia," 101-02. Both articles rely on calculations that Wheatcroft made on the basis of published rainfall reports; archival and published agronomic evidence presented below shows that these data give a misleadingimpressionof the extremediversityof climateconditionsin 1932. 44.

Penner, The "AgrarianStrike, .. 4-6.

45.

Jasny, SocializedAgriculture, 552ff.

53

46. Kahan, "Natural Calamities"; A. S. Ermolov, Narodnaia sel'skokhoziaistvennaia mudrost' v poslovitsakh; pogovorkakh i primetakh, vol. 2, Ysenarodnaia agronomiia (St. Petersburg: Tip. V. Kirshbauma, 1905). 47. Sotsialisticheskaia rekonstruktsiia sel'skogokhoziaistva, 1933, no. 1: 140; Carynnyk et al., Foreign Office, 163; Sotsitllisticheskoe zemledelie, 14February 1932, p.2; RGAE7486.37.235, ll.I64-68.

48. N. A. Naumov, ed., RzhavchinIJ khlebnylch zlakovv SSSR (Moscow: Sel'lchozgiz,1939), 46,245. Regionalreportsconfirm this; see forexampleMTS i eepolhotdel(Moscow, 1934),22223, reportingon relativelymoistand rainyconditionsin 1932as against1933 in Odessa oblast' in Ukraine,and also Carynnyket al., Foreign OjJice, 167(statementby an officialfrom the Central Statistical Administration in Moscow), 142, 180,190(localofficialsand farmpersonnel). 49.

Carynnyketal.,ForeignOffice, 112; RGAE7486.37.237, I. 319-21, 351.

so.

RGAE 260.1.217,reportsofa meetingof instructorsof the ScientificKollchoz Institute

51.

DavidGrigg, TheDynamics ofAgricultural Change (NewYork: St Martins, 1982), 84-

[NIKI) on harvestsin Kuban kolkhozy in 1932, I. 12-13.

85. 52 Biologicaland Environmental Factors AffectingSovietGrainQuality(U): A Research Paper, CIA SI 78-10057/AIU (NationalForeignAssessmentCenter" December1978). 53. W.R. Bushnell,"StructuralandPhysiologicalAlterationin SusceptibleHost Tissue," in Wtlliam R. Bushnell,Alan ~ Roelfs,eds., TheCerealRusts(Orlando, Fla.: AcademicPress, 1984), 1:478,491-92,497-98;S.Grushevoi, ''Rzhavchinazemovykh khIebov," SbomikVlZRa (Leningrad) 1933,no. 6: 51-54. On grain rusts see also K. Starr Chester, The Natureand Preventionofthe CerealRusts as Exemplifiedin the LeafRust of Wheat (Waltham, Mass.: Chronica Botanica, 1946); Ernst Lehmann et al., Der Schwarzros: (Berlin and Munich: Lehmanns Verlag, 1937); Naumov, ed., RzhavchinIJ khlebnykh zlakov: Larry J. Littlefield, Biologyofthe Plant Rusts: An Introduction (Ames: Iowa State UniversityPress, 1981),7, has a photographcomparing wheat grainsfroma rusted plantwith normal wheat: the contrastresemblesthat betweensmall grainsof polished white rice and plump kemals of hominy. According to the Soviet agronomist S. E. Grushevoi, stem rust of wheat produced small and underdeveloped grains, crown rust of oats producedsmall grainswithexcessivehusk,and leaf rustof wheatproducednormal-sizegrain but reducedthe number of grains in the ear (Na zashchitu urozhaia, 1933,no. 10 (October): 14-16.) 54.

Biological and Environmental Factors, 2.

55. On rust infestationsgenerally,see G. L. Carefoot and E. R. Sprott, Faminein the Wind (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1967), 42. On rust in the United States, R. Douglas Hurt, American Agriculture: A BriefHistory (Ames: Iowa State University, 1994),52; A. ~ Roelfs, Estimated LossesCaused by Rust in Small Grain Cerealsin the UnitedStates -1918-1976, USDA ERS Miscellaneous Publication 1363(Washington, D.C., 1978); D. GaleJohnsonandRobertGustafson, Grain Yields andthe American FoodSupply (Chicago, 1962), 120. OnU.S.Armysporeproduction, see NormanM. Covert,"CuttingEdge: The Historyof FortDetrick,"January 1997,websitehttp:!

54

1140. 139.13361debicklhistory/chapter5.htm,citingtheReportto Congress,1977,US Anny Activities in the US Biological Waifare Program, v.2, The U.S. militarydestroyed these stockpiles in 1973. According to Dr. Covert, while Soviet preparation of these bioweapons is still classified information,contacts between U.S. and Russian specialistsand certain classified documents he has seen confirm that the Soviet Union did produce rust and other anticrop agents (personal conversation, 1 May 1999).

S6. Norman Borlaug, Haldore Hanson, and R. Glenn Anderson, Wheat in the Third World (Boulder, Colo.: Westview, 1982),31.

51. Chester, Nature and Prevention, 18, refers to losses from wheat leaf rust reaching 71 percentin AsiaticRussiain 1921. See RGAE7486.10.178, ll.37-40, for the protocolof theFar East territorycommission for estimating harvest yields. Nachrlchtenblattftir den Deutschen Pflanzmschsuzdienst (Berlin) 12, no. 10 (October 1932): 79-80; 12,no. 11(November1932): 89-90; 14,no.2 (February 1934):9-11.

58.

Dr.Tr.Savulescu,"RoumanianBlackRust of Cerealsin 1932and the MeasuresTaken to 59. Prevent Future Outbreaks," International Bulletin ofPlant Protection, (1933): 7,29-32; U.S. NationalArchives,economic report on Romania,October1933,State Department Record Group 59,M 1198,roll33, 871161fl2. . 60. Nachrichtenblattftir den Deutschen Pflanzenschutzdienst (Berlin) 13, no. 1 (January 1933):5-6; Lehmann et al., Der Schwarzrost, 380, 390-91. Soviet archives contain data drawn from western published sources, according to which wheat yields in Poland in fell from 12.5 centners per hectare in 1928 to 7.8 centners in 1932,and in Romania from 9.8 centners to 5.3 centners (RGAE437233.747, I. 52). 61. See Naumov,Rzhavchina khlebnykh zlakov, 225-26 and his bibliography,and Lehmann et al., Der Schwaruost, 372-94, and esp. Meteorological Factors Affecting the Epidemiology of Wheat Rust, WorldMeteorological OrganizationTechnical Note99,WMO No.238.TR130(Geneva, 1969),43-47.

62 Cairns wrote that a Romanian diplomat told him that the rust spread from the USSR to Romania(Carynnyket al., Foreign Office, 117). Recentagronomicand metereologicalstudiesof the 1932infestatioinand others indicate,however, thatwindpatternswent from the Mediterranean north and east 63.

Carefoot and Sprott, Famine in the Wind, 56.

64. 190.

Carynnyketal., Foreign Office, 135,137-38, 141, 145-47, 150-51, 155-56, 163,167,175,

65. For example, Sotsialisticheskoezemledeliereportedthat wheat and rye losses from rust in 1932reached 322 million rubles, much morethan fromany other cause (9 February 1933,p. 4). 66.

Na zashchituurozhaia, 1933,no. 10(October): 14-16.

55

67.

RGAE7486.37237,l. 388,OGPUspecialreport, 11 October 1932.

68. The Storyofu.S. Agricultural Estimates, USDAMiscellaneous Publication1088,April 1969(Washington, D.C.: USDA,1969), 73. (I). V. V. Kondrashin, personal conversation, July 1993; N. A. Naumov, Bolezni sel'skokhotiaistvennykh rastenii (Moscow and Leningrad: Gos. Izd. Selskokhoziaistvennoi Literatury, 1952),283.

70. See Cairns's numerousdescriptionsin Carynnyket al., Foreign Office, 49,61, 110,and passim. 71.

Sbomik VlZRa, 1933,no. 7: 88-92; Nazashchitu urozhaia, 1933,no. 10 (October): 13.

72

Sbomik. VIZRa, 1933,no. 7: 88-92; no.6, 51-54.

73.

Naumov, Rzhavchina khlebnykh zlako», 225.

74.

Ibid.,5.

75.

GeorgeN. Agrios, PlantPathology (NewYork: AcademicPress, 1978),396-408.

76. Sel'skokhoziaistvennaia zhizn', 2S February 1923,pp, 11-12; P.Proida, "Intensify the strugglewithsmut!" Sbomik. VIZRa, 1933,no.5: 73-78; RGAE7486.41.4, I. 10. 77. On methods for combattingsmut, see G. C. Ainsworth, Introduction to the Historyof PlantPathology (Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press, 1981),122ff. 78.

Sbomik. VIZRa, 1932,DO. 3:68-69; 1933, DO. 5:73-78; 1933, DO. 6, articlebyD.Rudenko.

79.

S. E. Grushevoiand G. F. Maldakova,Rzhavchina zemovykh /cuI 'tyri mery bor' by s nei (MoscowandLeningrad: Gos.Izd Kolkhoznoi i Sovkhoznoi Lit, 1934),~. 80. See, for example, AndrewNikiforuk, The Fourth Horseman: A ShortHistory ofEpidemics, Plagues, andOtherScourges (London: Phoenix,1991),119.

81. Sel'skhokhotiaistvennyi biulleten'SSSR, 10November1932,p. 15; RGAE7486.37.104 1. 56, 7486.37.237, 11. 346-47, 348-50. Ergot is another fungal disease of plants that forms characteristicpurple horns on the grains. While not as common or widespreadas rust, ergot is more dangerous.

82.

S. Predteehenskii, in SbomikVIZRa, 1933,DO. 5, 140-48.

83. RGAE7486.37.237,U.178-81, 187-89,196,208-13,268-71, 272-75; Holod1932-1933 rokiv,217; Carynnyk et al., Foreign Office, 135, 140, 145, 170. Skalyga, an official of the Commissariatof Agricultureresponsible forsugarbeets, DOted in a meeting withCentral Committee membersthat "1932 was the year of the worstharvestof sugar beets," though he did not mention theinsectproblem(RGASPI 17.120.88, 86).

56

84.

RGAE 7486.37.135,II.68-80. Therodentinfestationsare discussedbelow.

85.

RGAE7486.41.4,D.IO-13.

86.

Sotsialisticheskoe zemledelie, 16April 1932,p. 3.

st.

RGAE7486.37.205,D.I-17; Sel'skokhoziaistvennyibiulletenSSSR,31 July 1932,p.14.

88. RGAE7486.37.237,1. 286,OGPUreport, August1932,whichdoesnot specify howthey determinedthe weight of the caterpillars.

89.

RGAE7486.3.4484,D. 10-12;7486.19.185,1. 1.

Naumov, Rzhavchina khlebnykh zlakov, 145; P. K. Artemov, "K voprosu 0 porazhaemosti sortov zemovykh kul'tur gribnymibolezniami," Trudy po ptikladnoi botanike, genetike i selektsii, Seriia A: Sotsialisticheskoe rastenievodstvo 7 (Leningrad, 1933),75.

90.

91. Ainsworth, Introduction to the History ofPlant Pathology, 122ff, has a photograph of fanners treating seed with formalin; Chester,Nature and Prevention ofCereal Rusts, 190-91 on rust prevention studies. 92 Lynn Viola discusses the various motives for peasants' actions in Peasant Rebels Under Stalin (NewYork: OxfordUniversity Press, 1996),69ft'.

93. Penner documents examples of this from the North Caucasus and connects it to procurements("Stalin and the Ital'ianka." 34-5). 94. Holod 1932-1933 rokiv, 148-50; RGAE7486.37.154,11.238-42,255-56. Accordingto Daviesand Wheatcroft,the availableforagein 1932may havedeclined from 23.3 million tons in 1927/28 to 13.8milliontons in 1932(UDiskusii i obsuzhdeniia,").

95.

Sel'skoe khoziaistvo SSSR (Moscow, 1936), 199.

96. Goloshekinwroteto Iakovlev inearly1932thataccordingto the five-year plan Kazakstan should have received tractors equivalent to 37,000 horsepower in 1931 but had received only 16,500horsepower's worth; by the planthe regionshouldreceive 64,000 horsepower's worth in 1932,including40,000 in spring,but NKZhadcut those targets to 30,000 and 20,000respectively. This lack of draft forces, he warned, preventedKazakstan from utilizing its most valuable lands and fulfilling its potential as a primary wheat-producing region as set by the Sixteenth Party Congress (RGAE748637.154,D. 49-51).

CJ7. RGAE 7486.37.135, II. 26-8. The document reports that Soviet officials met with representatives of these companies, who acknowledged the problems and made efforts to send new parts. 98. Holod 1932-1933 rokiv, 150(Kosior), 134,162,178-79(decreesfromPolitburo protocols sending300 tractors,400 tractors,andan unidentified numberof tractors with 12,500horsepower capacity,all above planned levels).

57

99.

Carynnyket al., Foreign Office, 162.

100.

RGAE 7486.37.237, I. 373.

101. A. N. Antsiferov et al., RussianAgriculture Duringthe War (NewHaven,Conn.: Yale University Press,1930), 117-18.

un. Gosplan and the Central Statistical Administration (TsSU) estimatedhorse numbers declinng from25million in 1920to between 18.9million and20.2million by 1922, withrecovery, dependingon the source,beginningin 1923 or later; see R. W.Davies,ed., From Tsarism to the NewEconomic Policy(Ithaca, N.~: Cornell University Press, 1990),278. 103. ROAE7486.37.237, 11.271-68; Schillerhad spoken to Sovietagricultural officials in Moscowwhopredicted similarlevelsforthewholecountry(Carynnyk et al., Foriegn Office,71). 104. TeodorShanin,Russiaas a "Developing Society"(NewHaven, Conn.: YaleUniversity Press, 1985),140-41, discusses some of the specialists' viewsand evidenceon this point, See alsoAntsiferov et al., Russian Agriculture During the War. On Sovietofficials' viewsof agrarian overpopulation as a labor resourceand of collectivization as a meansfor tappingit, see Moshe Lewin, Russian Peasants andSovietPower(NewYork: Norton, 1974),30. One lateexamplefrom the Sovietperiodis A. S. Libkind,Agramoe perenaselenie i kollektivizatsiia derevni(Moscow: Izd,Agramogo Instituta Kommunisticheskoi Akademii, 1931).

las. ROAE 7486.37.107, I. 12. On other issues discussedat this importantmeeting, see Tauger, "ThePeople'sCommissariatof Agriculture," 155ff. 106.

N. A. Ivnitskii, Kollektivizatsiia i raskulachivanie (nachalo 3O-khgodov) (Moscow:

Izd. Magistr, 1996),192-94; Wheatcroft and Davies,"Population," in Davies,Wheatcroft, and MarkHarrison, eds., The Economic Transformauon o/the SovietUnion, 1913-1945 (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press,1994),68. 107. Seeforexample WheateroftandDavies "Agriculture," 119, 122; Penner, "Stalinand the Itlll'ianka" 31; James Mace, "The komitetyIUl.1.QJnOzhnykh selyan and the Structure of Soviet Rule in the UIaainianCountIyside, 1920-1933," Soviet Studies 35,110. 4 (1983); 487-503; Kondrashin, Golod,36.

1m. See, for example,MosheLewin,"Who Wasthe SovietKulak?"in The Makingofthe SovietSystem(NewYork: Pantheon, 1985), 121-41. lW. A. V.Chaianov, The TheoryofPeasant Economy (Madison: University of Wisconsin, 1990); TeodorShanin,The AwkwaniClass(Oxford: Clarendon, 1972). 110. According to CalvinHoover, a DukeUniversity economics professor whospent 19291930in the USSR and whospoke to severalpeasants, the regimehad required localofficials to designate certain peasants as kulaks even though they did not differ from the others; see The Economic LifeofSovietRussia (NewYork: MacMillan, 1931),74-75. Indirectives fordekulakization in 1931,western oblast' authorities orderedofficials to use data from 1928to determine which peasantswere kulaks becauseit was impossible to tell at the time;see Kollektivizatsiia sel'skogo

58

khoziaistva v zapadnom raione RSFSR (1927-1937 gg.) (Smolensk, 1968), 358. See also Gushchin,"Kollektivizatsiia v Sibiri,"83.

111. Ivnitskii, Kollektivizatsiia i raskulachivanie, 192-94, 226-62; Wheatcroftand Davies, "Population,"68. Accordingto Fitzpatrick,Stalin ~ Peasants, 83, about 60 percentof dekulakized peasants were employed in industry. Some were sent to cut timber, but many others were set up as farmers. 112. Fitzpatrick, Stalin ~ Peasants, 83, cites a figure of 12 million, Wheatcroftand Davies, "Population," 69, cite Soviet statistics that implya net movement to towns of more than 9 million in 1930-1932 113. Kondrashin, Golod,78; Otto Schiller, "Agriculturein the Soviet Unionin 1931,"Public RecordOffice,(London),F037116335 N3569/1179/38; Holod 1931-1932 rokiv,34l. 114.

Sotsialisticheskoe zemledelie, 3 April1932,p. 2; RGAE7486.37.27,11.204-05,240-32.

115. Theodore Schulz, Transforming Traditional Agriculture (New Haven, Conn.: Yale UniversityPress, 1964). 116. An exampleof such a memoir accountis Orest Pidhainy et al., eds., The Black Deeds of the Kremlin, v. 2 (Detroit: GlobePress, 1955),540; archival accounts include the GPU special reports in RGAE 7486.27.237,to be discussedbelow. Stalin's exchange ofletters withSholokhov was published in part by KPSSFirst SecretaryNikita Khrushchevin Pravda, 8 March 1963, p. 2, and apparentlyin completeform in Voprosy istorii, 3 (1994): 13-22. 117. Dmytro Solovei, &'80100 u systemi kolohiial'noho panuvannia TsK KPSS v Ukrami," Ukra'iskyizhimyk 15(1958):27-29; S. V. Kul'chyts'kyi, Tsina ffVelikoho perelomeu (Kiev: Vyd. "Ukraina," 1991),196-97,229-30. See also Fitzpatrick,Stalin ~ Peasants, 69-76; Viola,Peasant Rebels Under Stalin, ch. 7; Penner, "Stalin and the ltal'ianka" II

118. Tauger, Commune to Kolkhoz: Soviet Collectivization and the Transformation of Communal Peasant Farming, 193~1941, Ph.D. dissertation (UCLA 1991). 119. Fitzpatrick, for example, asserts that "the peasants ... were doing their best to find out what was the lowest level of deliveries theycould get away with-if necessary,by lowering total production" (Stalin ~ Peasants, 70). 120. On thelinkbetweenthe traditional corporatevillage(mir inRussia, hromada in Ukraine), and the kolkhoz, see Tanger, Commune to Kolkhoz, ch, 2-3; Fitzpatrick, Stalin ~ Peasants, Lllff. Ukrainian peasants, it should be noted, also lived in corporate villages and approximatelyhalf of these repartitioned their lands like the traditional Russian village; see Tauger, Commune to Kolkhoz, ch. 1. 121.

Penner The "Agrarian Strike," and "Stalin and the ltal'ianka,"

122. E. N. Oskolkov, Golod 1932/1933 (Rostov-on-Don: Izd. Rostovskogo Universiteta, 1991), 21, obtained the annual report yield estimate from recently published Soviet sources and

59

simply multipliedit by the official sown area. Some kolkhozy did not complete annual reports, however, and those that were sufficientlyorganized to do so were probablybetter run and more productivethanthose whichdid not; seeTauger,"The 1932Harvest," 83-84. Also, much of the regionwasfarmedby sovkhozy, whichhadaverageyieldsof2.9 centnersin 1932,even lowerthan kolkhozy (I. E. Zelenin,"ZernovyesovkhozyDona i SevernogoKavkazav gody vtoroi piatiletki [1933-1937gg.]," Istoriia SSSR, 1958,no.2: 51), and by noncollectivized peasants,the yields of whose farms are highly uncertain. 123. Data from the 19208are preharvestprojectionsby peasants, which statistical officials then inflated substantiallyout of distrust of the peasants and under political pressure to report large harvests. Data from the early 19308 were also preharvestprojectionsprepared in a manner similar to the "biological harvest," which, as discussed above, overstated actual harvests substantially. See A. Yezhov [sic], Soviet Statistics (Moscow: Foreign Languages Publishing House,1957),20-25; Wheatcroft andDavies,'The CrookedMirrorof SovietEconomicStatistics," in Economic Transfo171Ultion, 27-28; Tauger, "The 1932Harvest,"71ff, andbelow. 124. Sotskllisticheskakl rekonstrulasiia sel'skogo khoziaistva 1932,no. 1,60-61; Zelenin, 'CZernovye sovkhozy,"51.

125. The model for such approaches is Iames Scott, Weapons of the Weak (New Haven, Conn.:YaleUniversity Press, 1985). 126. SeeTauger, "People'sCommissariat of Agriculture," 153-55, whichdiscusseshow NKZ SSSR and other agenciesraised agricultural plans during the process of collectivization. R. W. Davies, The Socialist Offensive: The Collectivization of Soviet Agriculture, 1929-1930 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980), presents substantial evidence of Soviet leaders' and officials' views regarding the inherently low productive potential of traditional peasant farming and the great increases in productivityand production that would follow from collectivization; see,forexample,pp. 170-72.

lZ1. RGAE748637.237,ll.78-93, 132-35,156-61,199-205,217-19,232-45,268-71. Ontbe famine and the transportcrisis, see E. A. Rees, Stalinism andSoviet Rail Transport, 1928-1940 (London: MacMillan, 1995). 128. RGAE7486.37.237, U. 137-42. Anotherexample: Lower Volga partysecretaryPtukha appealed to Stalin in Ianuary 1932 to be allowed to follow the sowing plan received on 19 Novemberratherthanthe newoneftomNKZ,which was170,000hectares larger(RGAE748637.154, 1.45). 129.

RGAE748637.237,ll. 215-16,220-21,247-63,268-71,32S-42.

130.

Kul'chyts'kyi, "Do otsinka"; Oskolkov, Golod 1932/1933.

131.

RGAE748637.104,I. 64.

132

RGAE7486.37.237, II.232-45.

133.

RGAE7486.37.237, ll.I99-205.

60

134.

Ibi~,D.78-93,174-75,247-63,277-83,287-309,325-44.

135. Ibid.,11. 31~ 15, 3~2. In thearchives I oncemetan older man who,whenI mentioned my workon the famine, replied dismissivelythat Trotskyistshad caused the famine by burning the fields. 136.

Ibi~, D. 78-93, 137-42.

137. RGAE7486.37.235,11.64-68; 7486.37.237, D. 286,287-309,325-42; Penner, "Stalinand the Ital'ianka," 38-40. 138.

RGAE7486.37.237, D. 325-42.

139.

Ibi~, U. 232-45, 286-309, 325-42;

140.

RGAE7486.37.154,D.200-02.

Kondrashin, Golod, 83-85.

141. Kondrashin, Golod, 88-90; RGAE7486.37.237, 11.325-42; U.9-12, an OGPU special report on grain theft in kolkhozy and sovkhozy, 28 November1932,notes that theft continued on a massivescale despite issuance of advancesof income earned in kolkhozy and application of repressivemeasures againstthieves,in Ukraine, thecentralagricultural regions,Moscow oblast', the Volga, and elsewhere. 142 RGAE7486.37.237, U. 199-205. On theSoviet-Japanese standoff, see G.A. Lensen, The Damned Inheritance: The Soviet Union and the Manchurian Crisis, 1924-1935 (Tallahassee, PIa.: Diplomatic Press, 1974). 143.

Carynnyketal., Foreign Office, 40,42,46, 71,95,106,107,109.

144. As lateas 1935,whenthe Sovietregimeundertook a majorlandreform in the kolkhozy, nearly half still had the same land use difficulties as the old communes: interstripping,distant land, land intermingled between separate farms, etc. See for example Sotsialisticheskaia rekonstruasiia sel'skogo khoziaistva; 1935, no. 8: 4ff. On kolkhoz labor organization, see Tauger, Commune to Kolkhoz, chs. 4-6. 145. Holod1932-1933 rokiv,forexample,378-80,429-32; RGAE7486.19.179,1I.1-9,NKZ report on kolkhoz labor day evaluations in 1932and 1933.

146. The Agriculture Commissariat of the RSFSR issued directives for organizing counterplans at least for sowing in spring 1932(Sel'skokhoziaistvennyi biulleten' RSFSR, March 1932, pp. 23-29). For examples of counterplans being imposed on productive farms, see Sotsialisticheskoe zemledelie, 12September 1932, p.2; 14September, p. 1. TheCentralCommittee decree replacing the contract system of procurements with a system of per-hectare norms, and prohibitingcounterplans, was issued on 19 January 1933 (P; N. Sharova, ed., Kollektivizatsiia sel'skogo khoziaistva: Vazhneishie postanovleniia Kommunisticheskoi Partii i Sovetskogo Pravitel'stva, 1927-1935 [Moscow: Izd. Akademii Nauk,1957],441-45). Forexamples of officials punishedin 1933for imposingcounterplans, see lzvestiia, 3 July 1933,p. 3,23 July,p. 1.

61

147.

RGAE7486.37.235

9U.7-26;

Kondrashin, Golod, 34,38.

148. Izvestiia, 12 February 1932, p. 3; Sotsialisticheskaia rekonstruktsiia sel'skogo khozitlistva, 1932 no. 1: 160-61. 9

149. Moshkov, Zemovaiaproblema, 190. In the UnitedStatesin the 1950slate harvesting andinadequate storagecausedlossesof 10percentof thegraincrop;seeCarlHall, DryingFarm Crops (Reynoldsburg9 Ohio: Agricultural Consulting Associates, 1957), 79 10. 150. RGAE7486.37.154, 11. 299-305. Forexpressions of defeat,seePenner, "Stalin and the Ital'ian1ca," 46.

151. A reportby the Ukrainian Communist PartyCentralCommittee to the All-Union Central Committee specified that blacklisting villages had had an insignificant effect because villages were saturated with goods and everything could be obtained in raion centers (Holod 19321933 rokiv, 284). On the passportsystem, Fitzpatrick summarizes her findings by stating that with the exception of 1933, when the regime made a reasonably successful effort to control peasantmobility, it wasrelatively easyforemployable peasants to leavecollective farms,and the regime actually encouraged such mobility in years of labor shortages (Stalin's Peasants, 96). Removal of peoplewithoutpassports fromtownsin 1933, moreover, has to be seen mostlyas a response to famine conditions in the townsratherthanexclusively as an antipeasant measure. 152

Sen, Poverty and Famines, 78.

153.

Oskotkov, Golod1932/1933,21.

154.

Tanger, "ThePeople'sCommissariat of Agriculture," 55ff.

155. On theseconsiderations seeibid.,15Off. Theplansforcollectivization derivedfromthe program undertaken in 1928to establish somedozensof largegrain sovkhozy in the eastern and southeastern regions, where agronomists calculated it would be possible to rely on the soil's natural fertility forfivetoten years ~ Grekov, "Planorganizatsii krupnykh zemovykh sovkhozov i kontrol'nyetsifry na 1928-1929god," Ekonomicheskoe obozrenie, 1928,no. 9: 49). On the model of foreign and especially U.S. farming, see Tauger, "The People's Commissariat of Agriculture," 151-52,andthecrucialarticle from1927 bytheSovietagronomist N.M. Tulaikov, "Bessmennyi kul'tury na saratovskoi oblastnoi sel'skokhoziaistvennoi opytnoi stantsii," in Tulaikov, ltbrannye proizvedeniia (Moscow, 1963), esp. 31-36. 156. RGAE260.1.217, reportsof meeting of instructors of NIKI on the harvest in Kuban kolkhozy in 1932, 11. 1-11.

157.

GARFr-5446.13a. 259,1-12.

158.

RGAE260.1.217, I. 8.

159.

RGAE7486.10.152, II. 56,58.

62

100. This was noted, for example at a crucial NKZ meeting in June 1930 to discuss plans for the newly collectivized agricultural sector (RGAE7486.37.107,1. 2). Davies andWheatcroft provide additional evidence regarding the limited reserves offree land in certain regions, such as Ukraine and the North Caucasus, and the consequent difficulties local authorities had in introducting crop rotations e'Diskusiia i obsuzhdeniia," 98-99). 161.

Carynnyketal., Foreign Office, 56,61, 71,105,111,120,128,131,133,135,146,161.

162 M. S. Kipps, Production of Field Crops (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1970), 208; Sotsialisticheskoe zemledelie, 12 February 1932,4. 163.

Sel'skokhoziaistvennyi biulleten' SSSR, 29 February 1932, p. 12.

164. Carynnyketal., Foreign Office, 57,68, 105, 128,131,133,134-47,150-51,161,162,174, 178-79; on Drusag, 160. 165.

RGAE4372.30.870a, 1. 37ft, Gosplan survey ofagricultural conditions for August 1932.

166.

Sel'skokhoziaistvennyi biulleten' SSSR, 20-30 August 1932, p. 2.

167.

Sotsialisticheskoezemledelie, 21 August 1932, p. 2.

168.

Sel'skokhoziaistvennyi biulleten' SSSR, 29 February 1932, p. 12.

1(9. Holod 1932-1933 roki», 190-93,214; RGAE 7486.37.235, U.194-95, 7486.37.237,11. 199-205,208-13,268-71,281-309; for press reports, see Sotsialisticheskoe zemledelie, 12 June 1932, p. 1; 12 August, p. 2; 30 September, p. 4.

170.

Carynnyketal., Foreign Office, 156.

171.

Sbomik VlZRa, 1933, no. 1: 26-27; no. 5: 149-53; no. 7: 77-82.

172

Ibid., no. 5: 149-53.

173.

Ibid.,no.4:

101~.

174. Penner emphasizes the existence ofa network ofagencies providing information e'Stalin and the Ital'ianka," 44). Kalinin headed an investigation to the Volga in early 1932 (lstoriia Sovetskogo krest'ianstva, 2: 197). Molotov and Kaganovich traveled to Ukraine in July 1932, and whole groups oftop and mid-level officials were sent to Ukraine, the North Caucasus, and the Lower Volga in fall 1932; see Tanger, Commune to Kolkhoz, ch. 6.

Tanger, "AComparative Case Study of SovietStatisticalFalsification," Donald Treadgold 175. Papers, University of Washington, forthcoming. 176.

Sobranie Zakonov (SZ) SSSR, 1932, pt, 1,no. 31, art 192.

117.

Izvestiia (Moscow), 5 April 1933, p. 2.

63

178. A NKZreportsummarizing thedisputebetween theagencies is in RGAE7486.37.230, 11. 33-36. It refers to thenewmethodforestimating harvests in thecurrentyear,basedon reports by kolkhozy and sovkhozy, whichclearlyrefers to the systemestablishedin May 1932and dates thedocumentfromlate 1932,whenbothagencies haddata. The firstPolitburodiscussionof the disputebetweenthe twoagenciesis notedinRGASPI 17.3.982. itemno. 118. 179. RGASPI17.3.906. itemno. 122; LarsLibet al., Stalin:r Lettersto Molotov, 1925-1936 (NewHaven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1995),234, letter79, 12September 1933. UI). M. A. Vyltsan, "Metodyischisleniia proizvodstva zernav 1933-1940gg.,"I. E. Zelenin, "Osnovnyepokazateli sel'skkokhoziaistvennogo proizvodstva v 1928-1935 gg.," pp. 480-81, and pp. 471, 473, both in Ezhegodnikpo agramoi istorii vostochnoi Evropy 1965 g. (Moscow: Nauta, 1970).

181. One report noted widespread cases of gribok in two Ukrainian provinces; OGPU SpecialReport11October 1932,RGAE7486.37.237,1. 388. Gribok is a generic term for a fungal plant disease and might refer to rust; see B. N. Ussovsky, Comprehensive Russilln-English AgriculturalDictionary (Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press, 1967),71. But theGPU sourcedoes not indicateawareness of the magnitude of the problemin the countryat large. 182.

Penner, "Stalinand the ltal'ianka," 29.

183.

See Communeto Kolkhoz, esp. chs, 2, 3, and 8; Viola Peasant Rebels Under Stalin.

184. Reference fromthe Kremlin archive; I amgrateful to N.I. Ivnitskii forsharingwithme his noteson this source,but the archivedid not allow himto identifythe file. 185. RGASPI81.3.99, 1. 116. Thisandallsubsequent references to thisfileof Stalin's letters insummer 1932I received fromGaborRitterspom, to whomI expressmyappreciation forsharing his notes withme. 186.

Holod 1932-1933 rokiv, 352-53.

187.

RGASPI813.99,D.6S-66.

188. See MerI, Bauem Under Stalin, 222, where he asserts that the total 1932 harvest corresponded to that of 1931,but its regional distribution was unfavorable, and that timelyacts bycentralorgansinMoscowcouldhavealleviated theproblem. Merlwasnotawareof theextent to whichthe regimereducedprocurement quotasin the regionswherehe consideredthe harvest to be unfavorable, especiallyUkraineand theNorthCaucasus, anddoes notquestiontheofficial harvest data. 189.

Thefollowing is basedon Tauger, "ThePeople'sCommissariat of Agriculture," 157-58.

1~.

RGASPI 813.99,D. 97-101.

191.

Ibid., 11. 125-28.

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192. Ibid., 17.3.899, item 11; 17.3.901, item 14/8; Sharova, 00., Kollektivizatsiiasel'skogo khoziaistva,425-26. 193. For cutbacks in procurement quotas, see Tauger, "The 1932 Harvest," 73, and Stalin's letter authorizing one set ofreductions in July 1932,RGASPI 81.3.99, 1. 115. 194. The new data on the harvest suggest that at least some of the Ukrainian sources on which the "Ukrainian famine" argument is based either consciously did not tell the truth or unconsciously made errors in their accounts, which were all written or presented decades after the events they purported to describe. See Elizabeth F. Loftus, "The Reality of Repressed Memories, "American Psychologistvol. 48, no.5, (May 1993),518-37, esp. her discussion ofthe substantial evidence that traumatic memories are as imperfect as other memories and that people can unconsciously change or even fabricate them, 530-33. 195. See for example Penner, "Stalin and the Ital'lanka" 42ff, Conquest, HarvestofSorrow, 260-61. 196.

See Osokina, Ierarkhiia potrebleniia, 29-30, and ftnote 3, above.

197. On the political departmens, see I. E. Zelenin, "Politotdely MTS (1933-1934)," Istoricheskie zapiski 76 (1965): 42-61; V. ~ Danilov and N. A. Ivnitskii, eds., Ocherki istorii kollekitivizotsii sel'skogo khoziaistva v soiuznykh' respublikakh (Moscow, 1963), 139,208.

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