History Commons^™

“Genocide Of The Soviet People”: Putin’S Russia Waging Lawfare By Means Of History, 2018–2023, Anton Weiss-Wendt

Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal

This article exposes the political underpinnings of the term “genocide of the Soviet people,” introduced and actively promoted in Russia since 2019. By reclassifying mass crimes committed by the Nazis and their accomplices against the civilian population—specifically Slavic—as genocide, Russian courts effectively engage in adjudication of the history of the Second World War. In the process, genocide trials, ongoing in twenty-five Russian provinces and five occupied Ukrainian territories, present no new evidence or issue new indictments, thus fulfilling none of the objectives of a standard criminal investigation. The wording of the verdicts, and a comprehensive political project put in place …

Knocking On Europe's Door: A Comprehensive Analysis Of The European Response To The 2015 Refugee Crisis And The Ukrainian Refugee Crisis, Jacob J. Mckim

Global Studies Senior Capstone

Europe is, and has long been at the center of refugee reception for many areas of the world due to its geographical position and general security. However, the European response to refugees has varied drastically in different situations. This paper examines the European response to both the 2015 Refugee Crisis and the Ukrainian Refugee Crisis. The focus being on what factors, whether political, racial, or religious, has led for some individuals to be received more favorably in Europe than others. Through examining this, the conditions for successful and long-lasting refugee reception hopefully be more clearly seen.

Decolonizing Kyiv’S Politics Of Memory: Current And Potential Implications Of Russia’S 2022 Invasion Of Ukraine On Ukrainian Monuments And Toponyms., Camilla Gironi

The Journal of International Relations, Peace Studies, and Development

History is the basis of our identity, but it sometimes represents a trap. As well explained by Keith Lowe, monuments are representative of our values, and every society deludes itself that its values will be everlasting. However, in a world changing at an unprecedented pace while we move on, urban furnishment such as monuments or streets’ names remain frozen in time. Statues and toponyms that were erected and chosen a long time ago may no longer be representative of the values we now treasure. While Russia’s aggression is still raging, a lot has been written on the potential implications of …

Suppression Of National Identities: Ukrainian And Baltic Cultures In The Soviet Union, Jonathan H. Mastman

Master's Theses

This thesis defines the formation and consummation of Soviet Bolshevism as another imperialist force rather than its stated objective of freeing the people of the United Soviet Socialist Republics from the clutches of an inequitable elite. Through the policies and objectives of the Soviet government the workers and citizens of Ukraine and the Baltic republics were not liberated or given autonomy over their lives and labor, as Marxist-Leninism would have them believe. I review the Russification efforts found first in the Tsarist Russian Empire and then continued by Soviets in the nature of pursuing or denying cultural, political, and economic …

Socialist Legality On Trial: The Purge Of The Ukrainian Nkvd, 1938-1943, Reide Petty

Honors Theses

In the winter of 1938, Grigorii Iufa was put on trial in a Soviet court for the violation of socialist legality, a charge alleging that he had manipulated Soviet legal processes and undermined the rule of law during his work. Prior to his arrest, Iufa had worked in the Moldavian division of the NKVD, the Soviet Union’s state security agency. In that capacity, he had played a significant role in the Great Terror, which was a highly concentrated campaign of mass violence conducted by the Soviet Union between 1937-1938 against perceived enemies among its own citizenry. This campaign primarily consisted …

Blood Cries Out From The Ground: The Einsatzgruppen And The Holocaust In Ukraine, Lauren R. Letizia

Student Publications

After the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, the Wehrmacht occupied much of the western Soviet regions. The Third Reich deployed special killing squads known as the Einsatzgruppen to protect its military and ideological interests. These units were responsible for murdering over two million Jews from 1941 to 1944, primarily through mass shootings. Ukraine was one of the most afflicted countries by this “Holocaust by Bullets.” Because of the efficient genocidal techniques of Einsatzgruppen units operating in the region, one in four Jews who perished in the Holocaust was Ukrainian. The scale on which these killings …

U.S. Government Information Resources For Accountability On U.S. Assistance To Ukraine, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

Provides detailed coverage of U.S. Government information resources documenting accountability for U.S. civilian and military assistance to Ukraine. Includes U.S. laws, agencies involved in U.S. arms export policy, Defense Department resources and data, Defense Dept. Inspector General reports, Government Accountability Office reports, congressional committee hearings, a letter from a congressional committee to the Secretaries of Defense and State and U.S. Agency for International Development administrator, congressional debate, and congressional recorded votes.

The Commonwealth Of Independent States: A Symbolic Union Or Another Ussr?, Luka Donovan Linich

Senior Projects Spring 2023

Senior Project submitted to The Division of Social Studies of Bard College.

Christian Denominations On The Territory Of Ukraine In The First Half Of The 20th Century (1900-1939), Fedir Prodanyuk

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article examines the state of Christian denominations in the territory of Ukraine in the first half of the 20th century. It has been established that the Christian religion occupied an important place in the life of Ukrainian society. However, the period of prosperity and oppression simultaneously fell in the first 40 years of the 20th century. The confessional policy of the Soviet Union, which came to replace the tsarist authorities, gave a limited privileged position for some Christian churches while creating harsh conditions for other denominations. As a rule, these were Protestant movements, but the Orthodox Church also experienced …

Strategy And Tactics Of Soviet Security Bodies In The Fight Against Religion And Religious Communities On The Territory Of Ukraine, Olha Shakurova, Oksana Vysoven, Yuriy Figurnyi, Natalia Varodi

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article analyzes the strategy and tactics of state security agencies in the fight against religion and religious Protestant communities on the territory of Soviet Ukraine. It was revealed that the communist totalitarian system, in order to maintain its dominant position in society and master fully the consciousness of its population and influence its spiritual life (strategic task), shortly after the end of the Second World War, in 1946 in the system of the newly formed Ministry of State Security of the Soviet Union of the Socialist Republics and its republican departments created new special operational departments endowed with extraordinary …

"The War Factor" In The History Of The Late Protestantism In Ukrainian Lands Via The Policy Of The Russian Autocracy, Roman Sitarchuk

Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe

The article explores the impact of war on the movements of late Protestantism on the territory of Ukraine. The study is based on the three largest Protestant denominations in Ukraine: Baptists, Pentecostals, and Adventists. Due to the refusal of the Protestants to do military service and fight with weapons, the Russian autocracy suppressed and created difficult conditions for believers of the Protestant denominations on the territory of Ukraine. Before the First World War, the refusal of Protestants to engage gave the state an argument for why the Protestants were not reliable members of society. This study uses as a basis …

A Summer Of Mass Murder: 1941 Rehearsal For The Hungarian Holocaust, George Eisen

Purdue University Press Books

Most accounts of the Holocaust focus on trainloads of prisoners speeding toward Auschwitz, with its chimneys belching smoke and flames, in the summer of 1944. This book provides a hitherto untold chapter of the Holocaust by exploring a prequel to the gas chambers: the face-to-face mass murder of Jews in Galicia by bullets.

The summer of 1941 ushered in a chain of events that had no precedent in the rapidly unfolding history of World War II and the Holocaust. In six weeks, more than twenty thousand Hungarian Jews were forcefully deported to Galicia and summarily executed. In exploring the fate …

Russia's Agenda For Ukraine: An Examination Of Putin's Media Propaganda Narratives, Gillian Grace Littleton

Honors Theses

This thesis explores Russian discourse about Ukraine as reflected in Russian popular media since 2014’s Euromaidan Revolution. The thesis provides an overview of Russia’s historic denial of Ukrainian statehood and it argues: Russian historians and politicians have seen Ukraine as a “little-brother” nation to Russia, with a shared Slavic heritage, and that any attempts by Ukrainians to separate themselves from Russia are Western influence movements. The thesis examines three types of mass media in order to demonstrate the interaction between history, politics and popular culture. Chapter 1 explores the public speeches of key Russian political figures including Vladimir Putin himself, …

​​​​From Repression To Appropriation: Soviet Religious Policy And Reform, 1917-1943, Andriy Dyachenko

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis analyses the dynamics of religious reform in the USSR from 1917 to 1943. It argues that the early Bolshevik policy of persecution was increasingly substituted by state co-optation. This dynamic was shaped primarily by Stalinist concerns with state security and problems of ideology.

‘Phantom Limb’: Russian Settler Colonialism In The Post-Soviet Crimea (1991-1997), Maksym Dmytrovych Sviezhentsev

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Where does the myth that ‘Crimea has always been Russia’ come from? How did the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union ‘make’ Crimea Russian? This dissertation shows how the they applied settler colonial practices to Crimea, displacing the indigenous population and repopulating the peninsula with loyal settlers and how Crimean settler colonial structures survived the fall of the Soviet Union. It argues that this process defines post-Soviet history of the peninsula.

For centuries Crimean existed within the discourse of Russian imperial control. This dissertation challenges the dominant view by applying settler colonial theory to Crimea’s past and present for the …

Western Influence In The Cover-Up Of The Holodomor, Michael Galka-Giaquinto

Theses and Dissertations

This paper discusses how the Holodomor (Ukrainian Genocide of 1932-1933) was effectively covered up by Stalin with the help of compliant actors in the West. A confluence of media, political, and economic interests in the West was critical in successfully covering up Stalin's crimes against the Ukrainian people.

The Baltics And Ukraine: Geopolitical Hotspots, Bert Chapman

Libraries Faculty and Staff Scholarship and Research

Provides detailed historical overview and contemporary analysis on why the Baltics and Ukraine are historical and remain contemporary geopolitical hotspots. Provides analysis of cultural economic, environmental, and security factors influencing long-standing contentiousness over these regions. Places emphasis on how Russian behavior and policies influence this contentiousness. Concludes by noting that differences between the U.S. and its allies and conflicts within the U.S. Government may limit the ability of the U.S. to effectively respond to events in these disputed regions.

Forgive, Forget Or Feign: Everyday Diplomacy In Local Communities Of Polish Subcarpathia, Iuliia Buyskykh

Journal of Global Catholicism

The paper is based on my ethnographic fieldwork in Przemyśl, Poland and several surrounding villages in 2015-2017. While conducting my research on a set of religious practices and pilgrimages in confessionally and ethnically mixed localities, I faced many challenges that changed the main course of my initial research plan. During my interaction with people here themes came to light that seemed little related to religiousness. My status as a researcher from Ukraine and even more so, my being a young single woman from Ukraine, gave rise to a number of other topics that my interlocutors, both of Polish and Ukrainian …

Unwritten: The Hidden History Of The Holodomor, Amy Whisman

Masters Theses

Between 1930 and 1933, Joseph Stalin unleashed an assault on Ukraine that resulted in the starvation of 5 million people. Their story went untold for decades. The fact that Soviet propaganda was largely successful in suppressing the truth speaks less to its sophistication than to the gullibility and complicity of Westerners. Although there were truth-tellers from Great Britain, the United States, and even Europe who accurately reported on the Ukrainian famine, Stalin understood that such voices could be effectively neutralized. Because the story of the Holodomor remained essentially unwritten, the West did not recognize it as the legitimate offspring of …

Bmu-Description, Mark Polczynski

BMU - Base Maps of Ukraine

No abstract provided.

Bszlak-Czarny-Shp, Mark Polczynski, Michael Polczynski

BSZLAK - Beauplan’s 17th Century Szlak Routes Across the Pontic Steppe

No abstract provided.

Bmu-Rivers-Shp, Mark Polczynski

BMU - Base Maps of Ukraine

No abstract provided.

Bmu-Water-Shp, Mark Polczynski

BMU - Base Maps of Ukraine

No abstract provided.

Bmu-Land-Shp, Mark Polczynski

BMU - Base Maps of Ukraine

No abstract provided.

Bmu-Ruggedness-Tif, Mark Polczynski

BMU - Base Maps of Ukraine

No abstract provided.

Bmu-Elevation-Tif, Mark Polczynski

BMU - Base Maps of Ukraine

No abstract provided.

Battle For The People: Ideological Conflict Between Soviet Partisans, The German Military, And Ukrainian Nationalists In Nazi-Occupied Ukraine, David L. Heim

Student Publications

Soviet historiography discusses the People’s War during the Second World War, the idea that all of the Soviet people rallied to the cause and fought off the Nazi invaders, but this is far from the truth. Within the western borderlands of the Soviet Union multiple conflicting groups fought for control of and support from the people. This was especially true in Ukraine where the German Army, Soviet Partisans and Ukrainian nationalists all fought ‘for the people’ and for their own ideologies. This paper is an attempt to discuss the ideological conflict between the Nazis, the Soviets, and the Ukrainian nationalists, …

Ukraine’S Euromaidan: Broadcasting Through Information Wars With Hromadske Radio, Marta Dyczok

History eBook Collection

How can you counteract an information war?

Hromadske Radio, Public Radio Ukraine, decided to provide accurate and objective information to audiences – free of state and corporate censorship and any kind of manipulation. They broadcasted throughout Ukraine’s Euromaidan, and beyond. This book brings together a series of English language reports on the Ukraine crisis first broadcast on Hromadske Radio between 3 February 2014 and 7 August 2015. Collected and transcribed here, they offer a kaleidoscopic chronicle of events in Ukraine. Bookending the reports, purpose written introduction and conclusion sections contextualize the independent radio project within the larger picture of Ukraine’s …

The Fall Of Kiev, Kevin S. Morrison

Montview Journal of Research & Scholarship

The Fall of Kiev, is the story about a great city, which on, 6 December 1240 A.D. would fall to the Mongol Hordes. The paper expounds upon the time frame of the prelude, the climax, and the afterward, of Kiev's fall. This paper utilizes scholarly resources from the present day and a very old source, The Hypatian Codex, which is the chronicle of the time period for Rus.

Nationalizing States Revisited: Projects And Processes Of Nationalization In Post-Soviet States, Rogers Brubaker

Rogers Brubaker

This paper analyzes Estonia, Latvia, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan as nationalizing states, focusing on four domains: ethnopolitical demography, language repertories and practices, the polity, and the economy. Nationalizing discourse has figured centrally in these and other “post-multinational” contexts. But nationalizing projects and processes have differed substantially across cases. Where ethnonational boundaries have been strong, quasi-racial, and intergenerationally persistent, as in Kazakhstan, nationalization (notwithstanding inclusive official rhetoric) has served primarily to strengthen and empower the titular nation. Where ethnonational and linguistic boundaries have been blurred and permeable, as in Ukraine, nationalization has worked primarily to reshape cultural practices, loyalties, and identities, thereby …