Red Famine

Stalin's War on Ukraine

By: Anne Applebaum

Narrated by: Suzanne Toren

Length: 17 hrs and 46 mins

Publisher's summary

From the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Gulag and the National Book Award finalist Iron Curtain, a revelatory history of one of Stalin's greatest crimes - the consequences of which still resonate today.

In 1929 Stalin launched his policy of agricultural collectivization - in effect a second Russian Revolution - which forced millions of peasants off their land and onto collective farms. The result was a catastrophic famine, the most lethal in European history. At least five million people died between 1931 and 1933 in the USSR. But instead of sending relief, the Soviet state made use of the catastrophe to rid itself of a political problem. In Red Famine, Anne Applebaum argues that more than three million of those dead were Ukrainians who perished not because they were accidental victims of a bad policy but because the state deliberately set out to kill them.

Applebaum proves what has long been suspected: After a series of rebellions unsettled the province, Stalin set out to destroy the Ukrainian peasantry. The state sealed the republic's borders and seized all available food. Starvation set in rapidly, and people ate anything: grass, tree bark, dogs, corpses. In some cases they killed one another for food. Devastating and definitive, Red Famine captures the horror of ordinary people struggling to survive extraordinary evil.

Today, Russia, the successor to the Soviet Union, has placed Ukrainian independence in its sights once more. Applebaum's compulsive narrative recalls one of the worst crimes of the 20th century and shows how it may foreshadow a new threat to the political order in the 21st.

©2017 Anne Applebaum (P)2017 Random House Audio

A thorough view into Stalin's regime in Ukraine

Anne Applebaum’s book Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine gives a thorough view into a very tragic moment in the history of Ukraine and its people. The story of famine in Ukraine is presented in this book in the context of historical events that took place during 1917-1930th. Without understanding of what was happening in Ukraine in the post-revolutionary and during the civil war years in the beginning of the 20 century, the whole account of the man-made famine, deliberately aiming to destroy one nation or one class of a nation (the peasants), would be hard to believe. Applebaum made this story to speak for itself by bringing to the light archive materials, personal stories and pictures that undeniably prove the existence of the state-created and successfully executed by the communist regime famine in Ukraine that still hunts the country down in present time.
Destruction of the national political elite (arrests and killing of the national leaders), removal of the active peasants (“dekulakization" and massive deportations of Ukrainians from their land) created the political vacuum in towns and subdued the rather stubborn national movement in the countryside. Banning the Ukrainian language, literature, music, cultural and spiritual rites and customs (churches, holidays, social structure in villages, council of the elderly) effectively depressed the national identity of Ukrainians. Destruction of the established free market system, collectivization and following confiscation of the land, machinery and livestock, removal of grain (prodrazverstka) and the ultimate removal of all grain and food (preserved as a seed or for the personal consumption) led to the catastrophic events in 1932-1933. All of that can be associated with the humanitarian crisis deliberately created in order to subdue the once proud and free willing people into slavery and obedience to the regime. As a result, people started to distrust the state and the fellow villagers, became indifferent and mostly hostile to the collective farms that in turn caused the diminishing production of grain and other farm products. The deepest human vices were unleashed: impunity of the members of the ruling party started to flourish, killing fellow villagers in order to obtain their possessions or even some food, became new norm. In the once rich and prosperous land, diseases and starvation spread rapidly leading to death of both the weak and strong.
As a child of the soviet time, I was raised on the beliefs about the internal and external enemies of the Soviet motherland that we had to uncover and fight by any means. Total propaganda... My grandparents, who survived to see me grow, were reluctant to tell me anything about that time. But I always sensed some distrust and even fear to the state or to strangers. Either during family gatherings or while listening people talk at a store on a countryside or in a farm (kolkhoz), one would never speak openly about any complains or injustice in the society.
The Red Famine book, though in a highly emotional tone, helped me to place that tragic period of time deep in my heart. It helped me to understand what circumstances shaped the people who were born in the early 20th and late 30th of the 20th century. Now I deeply regret I haven't asked enough questions to the survivors of the holodomor. Once you’ve read about the Stalin created famine in Ukraine, this part of the human history could not be forgotten or ignored.
I hope this book is translated to both Ukrainian and Russian language. It would be a great addition to the already existed score of this events.

A political anecdote from the 1980s:
A grain collection officer: the people of Ukraine are crying that there is no more food left.
Stalin: if they cry, they still have some left to part with. Proceed as I said until they start to laugh.

a must listen/read for everything

if you want to know more about current events all you have to do is learn about the past. this was very eye opening.

The Holodomor was Awful

If you have never heard of word Holodomor, stop reading this review right now and browse a couple of articles. It is the worst genocide that most people didn't know happened, for reasons outlined in the book. This book is not a fun read, in fact some of it will probably give me actual nightmares, but it is necessary to understanding the true evil that was the Soviet Union. Pair this with the Gulag Archipelago and you will see why the citchey teens wearing the sickle and hammer are every bit as awful as those who wear swastikas.

Great

A great book that provides much needed context for evaluating what is happening in Europe today.

The best book I have read all year

I highly recommend this title if you want to learn more about this chapter in Ukraine's history. I really enjoyed the narration and the content of the book. I learned a lot I had not before, and I feel that the writer of this book has links to Canada, so the Canadian content aspect was also of interest. I simply loved learning what I learned and feel that everyone should know more about the genocide and famine of 1932-1933.

A Masterpiece of Historical Work!

What an absolutely timely publication this was as we consider the tragic, yet typical in the history of Ukraine over the centuries, invasion by the Russian forces under the leadership of 'dictator' Putin. To be clear, the current invasion was not the focus of the book nor mentioned until the last chapter; however, the author weaves an incredibly well-researched and presented tome of materials that demonstrate that Ukraine has taken a beating through its tumultuous history by focusing on the period that eventually constituted the Holodomor of 1932-33 under the knuckles of Josef Stalin. True to form, the Soviet system had no room for nationalism or independent-thinking peoples within its realm directly after the Bolshevik Revolution (1917), nor under the reigns of Stalin who strong-armed and murdered his way to the top spot, and by his hand, single-handedly forced a famine of biblical nature upon the Ukrainian people that lead to one of the greatest human tragedies of all time.

This book should cement in the minds of readers why the ideology of Marxism has laid waste to more nations and peoples than at any other time in history through the abuse of power, reckless policies, and absolute inhumanity. To be fair, all governments are corrupt at some level, it's just that Marxism defines the term to a fine point. Any serious reader will come to vividly understand through this exceptional work the nature of how the 'State and Party' under Marxism will control all aspects of property, living standards, and who gets to live and die; there are no exceptions under the ideology...period! What is revealed within the pages is a horrific reflection of the worst of humanity in unabashed detail - and it is important to provide those details regardless of how provoking they may be taken. We must learn from these details the tell-tale signs of such madness and vow to limit the repetition of such atrocities even though we have signs and accounts that China is doing just that in the name of 'State and Party' against undesirables known as the Uighurs.

What's more, and of major concern for those that have ears to hear, the same language used by Stalin and his cohorts of destruction during this time, specific terms such as Nationalist/Nationalism to associate peasants with counter-revolutionary or treasonist activity, and even the use of Nazi and Fascist to identify undesirables within the peasantry, is in circulation today among Leftist elites and disciples of all stripes to control political narratives worldwide. We hear the exact same terminology used to describe Conservatives on the Right in the United States. (Note: let us remember that Nazis and Fascists were also on the Left even though modern interpretations put them on the Right, which is diametrically impossible as they were all based upon Socialist frameworks - it's just that each of these political entities was in direct conflict with each other within an ideological power struggle.)

Please, pick up the book or the audiobook, and learn from history!

Long but worth it.

if you are looking for a quick history of the Ukrainian famine that claimed upwards of 4 million people, this isn't your book. Rather. this is a well researched and detailed, with many primary sourced accounts of the man made 1930's disaster. My only issue is keeping straight all the key players, only due to the fact that i have no background in Russian or Ukrainian. but that shouldn't stop you from reading.

Very detailed description of a tragic event.

The Ukraine Genocide depicts how far human evil can go in order to sustain a bad idea, like Communism.

Important book!

This was very well written and researched. Such an important story to be told! We need to know the dangers of totalitarian attempts to silence such crimes against humanity.

history reviled,

I drew Many parallels to the common dahmedei tactics of Communist society. I'm adding words too meet these minimum requirements