Abstract
As the cold war dawned, the Soviet Union was starving. Hundreds of thousands of people died. Hardly anyone across the vast expanse of the USSR remained unaffected by this crisis. Yet the famine has continued to escape the attention of experts in the field of cold war history, even after the publication of V.F. Zima’s monograph in 1996.3 My goal in this chapter is to explain what the famine of 1946–47 adds to our understanding of the early cold war and what it meant to those who plotted the course of international politics in the postwar world, leading to a standoff between the two superpowers: the United States and the USSR.
The President mentioned the reports in the morning’s newspaper of the deficiencies in the grain crop in Russia, the Ukraine, and that there were rumors of unrest within Russia because of short rations. He said he believed this accounted, to a large extent, for the Russian attitude of intransigence on many questions; that they had taken note of the irritation and dissatisfaction manifested in this country on UNRRA [United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration], particularly the congressional attitude, and that it must have become clear to them by now that they, as well as others, would have to look to the United States as the sole source of relief on the question of food …
James Forrestal, December 19461
… Stalin said that the primary thing is the first commandment, and the first commandment was to turn in everything to the government according to the plan.…
N.S. Khrushchev, 19712
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Notes
Walter Millis, ed., with the collaboration of E.S. Duffield, The Forrestal Diaries (New York: Viking Press, 1951), 234.
See, for example, John Lewis Gaddis, The Cold War: A New History (New York: Penguin Press, 2005),
which makes no mention at all of the famine; Ralph B. Levering, The Cold War: A Post—Cold War History, 2nd ed. (Wheeling, IL: Harlan Davidson, 2005);
and Melvyn P. Leffler and David S. Painter, Origins of the Cold War: An International History, 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 2005).
See Edward C. Carter, “Russian War Relief,” Slavonic and East European Review, American Series 3, no. 2 (1944): 62. Upon conclusion of its activities, the organization reiterated that “Americans, travelling through the USSR of behalf of Russian Relief, found Russians in every walk of life well-aware of the voluntary aid coming to them and grateful not only for the aid but the friendly spirit which prompted it.” See USA—USSR. Other sources also support that Russian War Relief elicited gratitude from the people.
See, for example, Richard E. Lauterbach, Through Russia’s Back Door (New York: Harper and Brothers Publishers, 1947), 130.
Herbert W. Briggs, “The UNRRA Agreement and Congress,” The American Journal of International Law 38, no. 4 (1944): 653.
The figure is taken from Alexander Werth, Russia: The Postwar Years, With an epilogue by Harrison E. Salisbury (New York: Taplinger Publishing Company, 1971), 149. In all, 250 million dollars of relief were sent to Ukraine and Belorussia: 189 million to Ukraine and 61 million to Belorussia. See V.F. Zima, Golod v SSSR 1946–1947 godov: Proiskhozhdenie i posledstviia (Moscow: Institut rossiiskoi istorii RAN, 1996), 145.
Herbert H. Lehman, The Reminiscences of Herbert H. Lehman (Glen Rock, NJ: Microfilming Corp. of America, 1972), microform, 759.
Jack N. Behrman, “Political Factors in U.S. International Financial Cooperation, 1945–1950,” The American Political Science Review 47, no. 2 (1953): 443.
John Fischer, Why They Behave Like Russians (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1947), 54. Herbert Lehman, UNRRA director-general before LaGuardia, echoed this sentiment with regard to Poland, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary. Lehman, Reminiscences, 761–62.
See, for example, Andrew S. Natsios, The Great North Korean Famine: Famine, Politics, and Foreign Policy (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2001), 246.
Herbert Hoover, An American Epic: The Guns Cease Killing and the Saving of Life from Famine Begins, 1939–1963 (Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1964), 101.
See Nicholas Ganson, “What’s in a Famine? Implications for Understanding the Origins of the Cold War” (paper presented at the annual meeting of the Southern Conference for Slavic Studies, 28 March 2003). George Kennan, American chargé d’affaires in Moscow, and his successor Elbridge Durbrow reported evidence of agricultural crisis and food problems in the USSR throughout 1946. Durbrow characterized Stalin’s statements about capitalist encirclement as a means of manipulating public opinion at home rather than reflective of aggressive intentions vis-à-vis the United States. The evidence in the paper comes primarily from Paul Kesaris, ed., Confidential State Department Central Files: The Soviet Union Internal Affairs, 1945–1949 (Frederick, Maryland: University Publications of America, Inc., 1984), microfilm. Western efforts to extract grain from the USSR did not end after this UNRRA request. On the basis of A.I. Mikoian’s memoirs, Michael Ellman reports that, in 1947, “British Minister Harold Wilson made repeated trips to Moscow to negotiate, inter alia, for substantial grain exports from the USSR to Britain!”
Gregory Mitrovich, Undermining the Kremlin: America’s Strategy to Subvert the Soviet Bloc, 1947–1956 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2000).
See P.P. Tolochko, ed., Holod v Ukraini, 1946–1947: Dokumenty i materialy (Kiev: M. P. Kots, 1996), 27–30.
Ibid., reel 26, 121–22. Eric Roll, a British official on the Combined Food Board, states that “the United States Government had considered the possibility of making a direct appeal to Russia for the supply of breadgrains but, in the end, had decided against the course.” See Eric Roll, The Combined Food Board: A Study in Wartime International Planning (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1956), 283. In the published State Department files, there is nothing to indicate that Truman’s memo was not sent; however, Stalin’s prompt rejection of the UNRRA request may have preempted the sending of Truman’s telegram, which was likely intended to add weight to the plea of the UNRRA Central Committee. Hoover testifies in his memoirs that Stalin declined a request to contribute to UNRRA, but it is not clear whether he has in mind the UNRRA request or a personal one from Truman. In short, either Truman’s memo was delivered and declined or it was not sent because of Stalin’s quick rejection of the UNRRA enquiry. In light of Truman’s statements to Hoover, it appears that the latter occurred. See “Hoover Notes of Meeting with Truman,” May 16, 1946, <http://www.trumanlibrary.org/hoover/world.htm> (February 27, 2006).
British Foreign Office, Russia Correspondence, 1946–1948 (Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources, Inc., 1981), microfilm, 1946, reel 5 (part 2), 134. The visit was somewhat mysterious, as it appears that neither the State Department nor the Foreign Office knew about the purpose of the visit.
LaGuardia’s aide, Joe Lilly, recalled that he had gone to see Lenin lying in state while LaGuardia met with Stalin. Having emerged from his meeting with Stalin onto Red Square, LaGuardia said to Lilly: “I got from Stalin … what you got from Lenin! Nothing!” See Ernest Cuneo, Life with Fiorello: A Memoir (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1955), 204. This evidence, though anecdotal, suggests that LaGuardia might have been hoping to receive ammunition (i.e. evidence of Soviet need) in his fight to continue UNRRA shipments to the USSR.
Restrictions placed on foreign travelers to the Soviet Union betrayed an official desire to conceal Soviet reality, which was clearly grim after the war, from foreigners and especially foreign governments. See, for example, Steinbeck’s difficulties in obtaining permission to travel and the confiscation of some of Robert Kapa’s photographs before departure from the USSR. John Steinbeck, A Russian Journal (New York: Viking Press, 1948). Some observers trace this tendency to the secrecy of Russian officialdom in prerevolutionary times.
Some evidence received by Soviet intelligence supported the idea of an impending Anglo-American invasion. See Jeffrey Burds, “The Early Cold War in Soviet West Ukraine, 1944–1948,” The Carl Beck Papers in Russian and East European Studies, (Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2001), no. 1505.
Herbert H. Hoover, An American Epic: The Guns Cease Killing and the Saving of Life from Famine Begins, 1939–1963, vol. 4 (Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1964), 291. Hoover writes: “While our major interest was relief of the famine, all on our staff were concerned about the forces moving in the world and their impact upon our country—and especially with the spread of Communism.” In its meetings with foreign leaders, the Famine Emergency Committee was accompanied by American ambassadors and frequently discussed the issue of growing Communist influence.
For a brief account on the formation of the International Emergency Food Council, see S. McKee Rosen, The Combined Food Boards of the Second World War: An Experiment in International Administration (New York: Columbia University Press, 1951), 252–56. The terms for entry into the IEFC were analogous to the terms of the Bretton Woods agreements. The ratification of the Bretton Woods agreements would have forced the USSR to disclose economic information and subordinate certain domestic policies to the dictates of two American-dominated institutions.
See Harold and Marzenna James, “The Origins of the Cold War: Some New Documents,” The Historical Journal 37, no. 3 (1994): 617–22
and Jack N. Behrman, “Political Factors in U.S. International Financial Cooperation, 1945–1950,” The American Political Science Review 47, no. 2 (1953): 431–60.
For a brief analysis of American postwar position of dominance in relation to the Soviet Union, see Geir Lundestad, “Empire by Invitation? The United States and Western Europe, 1945–1952,” Journal of Peace Research 23, no. 3 (1986): 264.
Also see Melvyn P. Leffler, “The American Conception of National Security and the Beginnings of the Cold War, 1945–48,” The American Historical Review 89, no. 2 (1984): 346–81. After studying pertinent economic statistics, former Director of the Army—Navy Munitions Board Ferdinand Eberstadt reported to Navy Secretary James Forrestal: “None but mad men … would undertake war against us.”
Quoted in Melvyn Leffler, A Preponderance of Power: National Security, the Truman Administration, and the Cold War (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1992), 149. Leffler argues persuasively that Washington did not see the USSR as a military threat after the war. See ibid., 3–10. In 1946, a diplomat whom journalist Richard Lauterbach did not name but described as “a confidante of Byrnes and Bevin” said that the USSR did not want war: They carry that chip because they are afraid that appeasing us will give them a black eye at home and in the satellite states. We might take it as a sign of weakness and ask for more and more concessions. We could, too, you know. They are weak in the military sense and strong in that they have public opinion solidly behind them. … See Lauterbach, Through Russia’s Back Door, 155–56.
Matthew A. Evangelista, “Stalin’s Postwar Army Reappraised,” International Security 7 (winter 1982/83): 133–34.
A.S. Kiselev, ed., Moskva poslevoennaia, 1945–1947: Arkhivnye dokumenty i materialy (Moscow: Mosgorarkhiv, 2000), 152.
Soviet Minister of Procurements Dvinskii wrote to Stalin on September 7, informing him of the dim prospects of the procurement campaign and suggested a series of extreme measures to speed up procurements. Stalin did not accept these measures until a second plea on September 23. See Andrea Graziosi and O.V. Khlevniuk, eds, Politbiuro TsK VKP(b) i Sovet Ministrov SSSR, 1945–1953 (Moscow: ROSSPEN, 2002), 222.
V.I . Pasat, ed., Trudnye stranitsy istorii Moldovy: 1940–1950 (Moscow: Terra, 1994), 280.
See, for example, E.Iu. Zubkova, Poslevoennoe sovetskoe obshchestvo: Politika i povsednevnost’, 1945–1953 (Moscow: ROSSPEN, 2000), 72 and RGASPI, f. 17, op. 123, d. 810, l. 69. The question about exports was one of those most frequently posed to agitators and other Party officials by Soviet citizens in 1946–47.
See M.A. Vyltsan, Krest’ianstvo Rossii v gody Bol’shoi Voiny, 1941–1945: Pirrova pobeda (Moscow: Rossiiskii nauchnyi fond, 1995), 25–43 and “Arkhiv. Golodnaia vesna 45-go,” Kommersant-Vlast’, May 4, 2001, <http://dlib.eastview.com.libproxy.lib.unc.edu/sources/article.jsp?id=3202789> (February 26, 2006). Famine plagued almost all of Chita oblast in 1944–45. People resorted to consuming dead animals and even to cannibalism. In 1945, the Uzbek SSR, Tadzhik SSR, Buriat-Mongol ASSR, and Kabardinian SSR also experienced extreme bread shortages that led to deaths from starvation.
See Michael Ellman, “The 1947 Soviet Famine and the Entitlement Approach to Famines.” Cambridge Journal of Economics 24, no. 5 (2000): 606–7. The drought and harvest clearly played a role in Stalin’s export policy. In 1947, he made a promise to export grain to Britain contingent upon favorable climatic conditions. In March 1947, American Ambassador to the Soviet Union Walter Bedell Smith wrote to Secretary of State Acheson that Stalin offered “to furnish grain to [the] British provided no further drought.” See Kesaris, ed., Confidential State Department Central Files, reel 29, 819.
Other authors have stressed the political effect of grain export in Soviet decision-making on this issue. See the summary of a Ukrainian Insurgent Army pamphlet, written in 1946: Peter J. Potichnyj, “The 1946–47 Famine in Ukraine: A Comment on the Archives of the Underground,” in Famine-Genocide in Ukraine, 1932–1933: Western Archives, Testimonies and New Research, ed. Wsevolod W. Isajiw (Toronto: Basilian Press, 2003), 187–88.
On American ties with the Ukrainian insurgency, see Jeffrey Burds, The Early Cold War in Soviet West Ukraine and Petro J. Potichnyj, ed., Litopys UPA: English Language Publications of the Ukrainian Underground, vol. 17 (Toronto: Litopys UPA, 1988), 12–13 and ibid., vol. 16, 565–68. On British ties, see GARF, f. 9401, op. 2, d. 136, ll. 425–26. Representatives of resistance movements and their Western contacts are likely the “spies” that Stalin referred to in his interview with Alexander Werth on September 17, 1946. See Kiselev, ed., Moskva poslevoennaia, 191.
Ibid., 59–60. It appears that officials in Moldavia used the same approach. See Mihai Gribincea, Agricultural Collectivization in Moldavia: Basarabia during Stalinism, 1944–1950 (Boulder: East European Monographs, 1996), 74.
On the reaffirmation of the importance of grain deliveries according to the state’s plan in 1947, see V.N. Malin and A.V. Korobov, eds., Direktivy KPSS i sovetskogo pravitel’stva po khoziaistvennym voprosam: Sbornik dokumentov (Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo politicheskoi literatury, 1958), 192. On the improvement in compensation see p. 150. It appears that, in essence, Stalin and the Central Committee accepted Andreev’s analysis of the agricultural situation, as well as most of his solutions. See the discussion of Andreev’s report to Stalin in October 1946 in Chapter 1.
See Klaus Gestwa, “Technik als kultur der zukunft: Der kult um die ‘Stalin-shchen grossbauten des kommunismus,” Geschichte und Gesellschaft 30, no. 1 (2004): 37–73
and Nikolai M. Dronin and Edward G. Bellinger, Climate Dependence and Food Problems in Russia, 1900–1990 (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2005), 160.
Peter J. Potichnyj, “The 1946–47 Famine in Ukraine: A Comment on the Archives of the Underground,” in Famine-Genocide in Ukraine, 1932–1933: Western Archives, Testimonies and New Research, ed. Wsevolod W. Isajiw (Toronto: Basilian Press, 2003), 185–86.
For this reason, Tauger’s suggestion that peasants worked harder in years following bad harvests and thus avoided repeated crop failures is unconvincing. The case of 1946–47 suggests that the outcome had more to do with the state’s measures (such as the timing of food relief, increased seed loans, and mobilization of urban dwellers for work in the countryside) and climatic conditions. While the situation may have been different in the 1930s, it appears that the relief schemes were a tried and true method of avoiding repeat harvest failures, and these measures were likely employed before the war. This oversight causes Tauger to overestimate the degree of adaptation to the collective farm system. See Mark B. Tauger, “Soviet Peasants and Collectivization, 1930–1939: Resistance and Adaptation,” Journal of Peasant Studies 31, no. 3–4 (2004): 440.
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© 2009 Nicholas Ganson
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Ganson, N. (2009). The Famine, the Dawn of the Cold War, and the Politics of Food. In: The Soviet Famine of 1946–47 in Global and Historical Perspective. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230620964_5
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