THE ANATOMY OF A CATASTROPHE

In Kazakhstan, the same Kremlin policies were implemented, but additional factors simultaneously significantly worsened the situation. Consequently, the famine began earlier in Kazakhstan—it was already underway in 1931—and lasted longer, until 1933, leading to a national catastrophe of unprecedented scale.

In 1928, the secretary of the Kazakh Kraikom, F.I. Goloshchyokin, launched a campaign to abolish the feudal system in the country. It was the national version of the all-Union struggle against the kulaks, essentially targeting prosperous and hardworking peasants. However, in 1929, the abolition of the feudal system was complemented by a policy of sedentarization, forcing nomads to adopt a sedentary lifestyle on collective and state farms.

Sedentarization was a necessary tool for Soviet authorities to increase cultivated areas in Kazakhstan. Nomadic husbandry required significantly more land than agriculture, and preserving the nomadic way of life hindered the expansion of cultivated areas. Goloshchyokin hoped to quickly establish many agricultural farms and supply the country with more grain, thus generating more funds. However, these hopes were completely in vain.

The factors that led to the disaster of the AsharshylyqiThe famine was known in Kazakh as Asharshylyq, which in Kazakh means ‘hunger’grew over time, exacerbating each other until irreparable damage took place. When the feudal system was abolished, many once-well-off Kazakhs suddenly lost their livestock and property and were exiled to other regions. Also, due to the efforts of illiterate activists, not only the wealthy but also the ‘middle’ class—skilled and industrious farmers, the backbone of any agricultural community—were targeted for dispossession and property confiscation. Those who miraculously avoided confiscation sold their livestock to preserve what little they could, while entire villages in border areas fled to neighboring countries and republics, and the Soviet authorities did not at first interfere with this exodus. Thus, traditional society was disorganized, and the Kazakhs, overall, became poorer and more vulnerable.

Amid the cattle confiscation in the spring of 1928 in the western regions of Kazakhstan, the first signs of drought emerged, followed by a severe drought that destroyed young grass and grain crops.i Лубакин. Өлкелік партия комитетінде // Еңбекші қазақ. – 1928. – 15 март. – №62.Although the government allocated funds to aid those affected, the question of how these funds were distributed remains questionable. Hay was also brought in from other regions, but because it was not distributed in a timely way, huge numbers of livestock died.iТ.Н. Жұтпен күресу туралы // Еңбекші қазақ. – 1928. – 27 май. – №117.

From 1929 onwards, along with forced sedentarization, collective farm construction began in the Kazakh Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic (Kazakh ASSR), which was almost immediately and thoughtlessly accelerated. The nomadic and semi-nomadic populations of Kazakhstan were simply supposed to transition to settlement points. The first step was to take Kazakh families’ livestock away and drive them to these points, and the Kazakh herders had no choice but to follow their livestock. They were driven from their nomadic lifestyle and left in unfamiliar places to the whims of fate. However, when large herds gathered in one place, they couldn't sustain themselves, and many animals were slaughtered.

The authorities initially planned to proceed gradually but later announced that they would complete the sedentarization of Kazakhs by the end of 1932. At the same time, they intended to force at least 2 million Kazakh herders into these giant collective farms. Concentrating people in settlement points and then in collective farms allowed for them to be exploited much more brutally.

A significant portion of the livestock was collectivized, and individual households were burdened with numerous taxes: each had to provide two poodsiA pood is a unit of weight traditionally used in Russia and other Slavic countries. It is equivalent to approximately 16.38 kilograms or 36.11 poundsof old bones and one dog hide, along with milk, wool, and more. Additionally, there were taxes for industrialization, a water tax, collection of the seed fund, and others. The authorities even hoped to obtain grain from nomads and semi-nomads, who would usually exchange it for livestock. As a result, grain prices skyrocketed while livestock depreciated. Livestock numbers among the Kazakhs decreased even faster as the state's excessive plans for meat procurement also took their toll. In 1930, the state had officially planned to seize 30–35 per cent of the available livestock in Kazakhstan, but in practice, even more was seized.

Inevitably, the population grew restive, and the government-appointed representatives and militia widely employed physical methods to suppress dissent. They not only confiscated livestock but also took away meat reserves, which were then distributed among district officials. People, intimidated by the threats from false activists, slaughtered their livestock, buried supplies in the ground, or hid them at the bottom of rivers. Moreover, militia representatives also sheared camels in peasant yards during the winter, taking away the wool, and it is not difficult to imagine the fate that awaited these animals.

At the same time, the country also demanded exceeding the grain procurement targets. In April 1930, collective farms in Kazakhstan were instructed to deliver between 33.1 and 39.5 per cent of the grain harvest.i Ивницкий Н.А. Голод 1932–1933 годов: кто виноват? // Голод 1932–1933 годов: Сб. статей / Отв. Ред., вступит. Статья Ю.Н. Афанасьев. М.: Российский гос. гуманит. университет, 1995, 44-b.]Any failure to meet the goal entailed legal consequences.iОсколков Е.Н. Голод 1932–1933: Хлебозаготовки и голод 1932/1933 года в Северо-Кавказском крае. Ростов н/Д, 1991, p. 24, 25It is clear that if even a portion of this grain had remained in Kazakhstan, the fate of many starving people would have been different.

A summary sent by Goloshchyokin to Stalin and the Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars Vyacheslav Molotov reported that in February 1931, 128 collective farms had been organized in Kazakhstan, including 21 grain farms, 86 livestock farms, and 21 technical farms.i ҚРПМ. 141-қ., 1-т., 4824-іс. 66-п

But another, more terrifying, statistic was accumulating. Over the years of collectivization, animal husbandry in Kazakhstan—the foundation of the nomadic way of life—suffered irreparable losses. For example, in just one year, from 1930 to 1931, the livestock population decreased by more than half from approximately 20,365,000 heads to 8,848,000. If the number of cattle in the Kazakh ASSR was 6,509,000 heads in 1928, by the next year, 1932, there were only 965,000 left.i Қозыбаев М.Қ. Тарих зердесі (Замана асуы). 1-кітап. – Алматы: Ғылым, 1998, p. 224]

By 1930, the population of Kazakhstan had decreased by 317,400 people, and by 1932, by 769,100.i Қозыбаев М.Қ. Тарих зердесі (Замана асуы). 1-кітап. – Алматы: Ғылым, 1998, p. 253]According to documents from the Joint State Political Directorate (abbreviated as OGPU) dated 27 February 1931, there was an increase in cases of exodus of collective farm workers as they abandoned their farms and migrated to other regions of Kazakhstan, Russia, Central Asian republics (Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan), and even China. Incomplete data suggests that during this period, 2,638 households from the Almaty and Semipalatinsk districts moved to China.i719-қ., 3-т., 719-іс. 120-п

In 1931, the Batpakkarin district had 21 collective farms, comprising 3,981 households with a total livestock count of 10,492 animals. By early 1933, the mass migration of Kazakh communities from this district to other regions of Kazakhstan and neighboring republics had begun. Within a short period, ten villages ceased to exist, and those who remained began to starve. From April 1932, the number of starvation deaths in this district steadily increased, and in 1933, out of 46,000 residents in the 23 former villages, only 14,934 remained.

In villages numbers 8 and 9 of the Batpakkarin district, people abandoned all their property and migrated elsewhere or became victims of famine. According to the report by the State Political Directorate, the number of deaths in the district reached 4,000. The secretary of the district committee, Ibrahimov, concealed mass starvation deaths in the district and cheerfully reported at the regional party conference on 15 June 1932 that ‘the situation in the district is favorable and there are 8,000 hectares of crops’.iҚРПМ. 141-қ., 1-т., 5086-іс. 1,3, 6-пп

In the years from 1929 to 1931, Kazakhstan saw 372 mass uprisings involving around 80,000 people. The insurgents targeted government representatives or attempted to cross the border, engaging in skirmishes with border guards. However, each time, this scattered protest was brutally suppressed, including once using planes and armored vehicles.

Both in Almaty and Moscow, the authorities completely ignored the situation. Even when it became evident that famine was beginning in the Kazakh ASSR, Moscow continued to insist on the fulfillment of the plan at any cost and threatened repression. The dishearteningly low quality of planning itself evidently exacerbated the deepening disaster. For example, in 1929, 14.8 per cent of the entire Kazakh livestock was requisitioned.iОгайон И. Седентаризация казахов СССР при Сталине. Коллективизация и социальные изменения. (1928–1945 гг.). Алматы, 2009. С. 23.In 1930, 46.9 per cent of the remaining livestock was taken, and in 1931, another 68.5 per cent of what was still available to Kazakh farms was requisitioned. In the midst of the famine in 1932, when roads and villages were already strewn with corpses and cases of cannibalism were multiplying, Kazakhstan still had to supply more meat to the largest industrial cities of the USSR than any other republic: again, this amounted to over half of its entire livestock.iПьянчола Н. Сталинская «иерархия потребления и великий голод 1931–1933 гг. в Казахстане.// Ab imperio, # 2, 2018. C. 103

Despite the numerous complaints sent to higher authorities, including the Kazakh Kraikom in Almaty and Moscow, the issue of famine was suppressed, and no information was published about it in the newspapers. Such news simply wasn't allowed to be printed, and those who spread it were persecuted. Meanwhile, people were dying in villages, and cities, towns, stations, and sections along the railways were overflowing with the destitute desperately seeking food.

To survive, collective farmers and nomads were forced to slaughter their remaining livestock. But what awaited them when the meat ran out? They had no strength to think about tomorrow. Moreover, if they tried to keep their livestock, it would most likely be stolen by marauding gangs. At this time, the OGPU also reported human hunters. They killed, ate, and sometimes even sold human flesh at the market. Everything was plunged into darkness and uncertainty.

Amidst the worsening famine, the newly established collective farm villages continued to collapse. In 1932, a telegram from Ushtobe reported that three villages near Balkhash had been deserted, and of 4,417 households in the remaining six villages, only 2,260 remained. In 63 per cent of these, people were starving, with unconfirmed reports suggesting about 600 deaths from hunger, where most had been consuming meat from dead domestic animals.

Lines of hungry people, driven by necessity, were increasingly moving from one area to another. A letter from the first secretary of the West Siberian Kraikom M. Zaitsev, dated 9 February 1932, addressed to the Kazakh Kraikom, stated that since the fall of 1931, there had been a surge in cases of mass migration of Kazakhs from Kazakhstan to the West Siberian regions. The majority were collective farmers, with occasional wealthy peasants. He noted that in the Slavgorod district, their numbers had reached 10,000—all of them were starving and many had resorted to consuming carrion. Deaths from hunger and frostbite were also on the rise. Additionally, Kazakhs were breaking into houses in groups, demanding food, and even stealing horses (nine such cases were registered from 15–20 January, 1932). Some parents had also abandoned their children on the streets. With children's homes and hospitals in Slavgorod overcrowded with these children and the local district organization unable to help, urgent measures were requested to halt forced migration and provide food assistance to migrants from Kazakhstan.iҚРПА. 141-қ., 1-т., 5192-іс. 21-п. ҚРПА. 141-қ., 1-т., 5192-іс. 21-п.

Goloshchyokin claimed that the refugees weren't starving but rather were wealthy peasants fleeing socialism. However, on 9 March 1932, R. Eykhe, the secretary of the West Siberian Kraikom, wrote to him stating that thousands of refugees couldn't be considered wealthy peasants. He noted that while the West Siberian Kraikom provided food assistance to Kazakhs whenever possible, he urged the Kazakh Kraikom to repatriate the refugees and prevent further migration.iНасильственная коллективизация и голод в Казахстане 1931–1933 гг. Сборник документов и материалов. Алматы, 1998, pp. 117–118]

In a report of the Children's Commission at the All-Russian Central Executive Committee (abbreviated as VTsIK) in 1932, it was noted that from 21 March to 10 April, 30 per cent of the 50,000 people fleeing famine in Kazakhstan to 11 districts of the Yaik region (mostly from the Urals and Aktobe regions and from the Caspian Sea coast) were children. It was reported that there were 35,000 Kazakh refugees near Orenburg, the majority being children again—barefoot, exhausted, swollen from hunger—and that the mortality rate among adults and children was increasing every day. In March, the mortality rate from starvation among adult Kazakhs in Orenburg reached 49 per cent; for preschoolers it was 31 per cent, and for school-age children it was 4 per cent. 85 per cent of them died of exhaustion.i РФММ. 2306-қ., 70-т., 5287-іс. 71-73-пп.According to data from 1 August 1933, the number of orphaned children in Kazakhstan had reached 61,000.iРФМА. 2306-қ., 70-т., 5302-іс. 7-8-пп. In the Kazakh ASSR, epidemics of typhus and plague broke out, and medical intervention was unable to stop them from spreading. However, measures were taken to prevent infection.iҚРПМ. 141-қ., 1-т., 5205-іс. 13-п.

The authorities in Moscow were aware of the famine in Kazakhstan. But throughout almost all of 1932, with manic determination, they demanded grain deliveries and constantly threatened repressions. The problem was that significantly lower grain was harvested in the USSR in 1932 than had been the previous year, which affected both export revenue and food supplies to cities. By the summer of 1932, meat consumption norms had to be significantly reduced as Kazakhstan was already unable to meet its meat procurement targets. By the end of the year, a terrible famine had begun in Ukraine, the Middle Volga Region, and the North Caucasus. Despite the unfolding catastrophe engulfing the entire country, the USSR continued to export grain until April 1933. Stalin and his circle, of course, refused to admit that the catastrophe was a result of their cruel and short-sighted decisions.

Those responsible for the famine were not held responsible in Moscow either. In August 1932, the Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the Kazakh ASSR, Oraz Isayev, wrote a letter to Stalin, blaming all the ‘distortions’ of party policy in Kazakhstan and asking for the removal of Goloshchyokin,iКазахстанская правда. 1989. 17 января. which finally happened in February 1933. Goloshchyokin was transferred to Moscow and appointed to a minor position as the chief state arbitrator at the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR. Turar Ryskulov, a prominent Kazakh statesman who had written to Stalin twice about the disastrous situation in Kazakhstan, became the head of the commission set up to overcome the crisis. Slowly, the situation in the Kazakh ASSR began to improve from the summer–autumn of 1933.

Turar Ryskulov was executed in 1938, and Oraz Isayev, who had filed a complaint against Goloshchyokin, met the same fate later that year, shortly after Ryskulov. Goloshchyokin outlived them both, but not for long—he was arrested in 1939 and executed in 1941. However, he was posthumously rehabilitated in 1961.

The famine of 1931–33 had catastrophic consequences for the demography of Kazakhstan, and it's safe to say that few families remained untouched by this tragedy. The population of Kazakhstan was halved, with several million deaths taking place and about a million people leaving the country. Historians still dispute the exact figures, but one fact remains clear: almost every household experienced loss and grief. Some families simply ceased to exist. The Asharshylyq has remained in the collective memory of the Kazakh people as one of the most harrowing and severe trials ever endured.