Seventy One Years Since the Deportation of the Kalmyks

On 27 December 1943 the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet issued Ukaz 115/144 ordering the deportation of all Kalmyks from the Kalmyk ASSR and the liquidation of the administrative territory. Known as "Operation Ulusy" the NKVD forcibly resettled over 90,000 Kalmyks on 28-29 December 1943 from their home on the shores of the Caspian Sea to Siberia. In less than five years some 17,000 of these deportees had perished from a lack of material goods. They lacked proper food, housing, and clothing. The Soviet government imposed special settlement restrictions upon the deported Kalmyks that severely limited their freedom of movement and residency. In 1948 the Stalin regime declared that the exile of the Kalmyks along with other deported nationalities was to be "forever." After Stalin died on 5 March 1953 things improved gradually for the Kalmyks. On 17 March 1956 the Soviet government released them from the special settlement restrictions and after 1957 they were allowed to return to their ancestral homeland. On 11 February 1957 the Soviet government recreated the Kalmyk Autonomous Oblast. They upgraded this territory to the Kalmyk ASSR on 29 July 1958.