Tomorrow marks the
76th anniversary of the Supreme Soviet decree to deport
the ethnic Germans living in the Volga German ASSR, Saratov Oblast,
and Stalingrad Oblast to Siberia and Kazakhstan as special settlers.
They were dispersed across the vast and freezing expanses of Soviet
Asia by a regime whose core identity was “Anti-Fascism.” This
regime considered everybody even remotely associated or connected to
anything German as a Fascist deserving of the most brutal punishments
imaginable without even the pretense of legal process. I have already
written the details of the deportation, special settlement regime,
and mobilization into the labor army here and at other places. So I
want to continue in the vein of considering why so many people
consider this crime so unworthy of note whereas similar crimes
committed against other people are publicly commemorated in the US on
an almost daily basis.
The idea that only
certain people are “worthy victims” by virtue of being of the
correct ancestry and others such as Germans in the 1940s deserved no
human or civil rights has been widespread for around three quarters
of a century now. Part of this is that the idea of universal human
rights is a political facade with no real content. Instead it is
largely an intellectual cover for supporting certain unrelated real
politic or ideological positions and often reflects considerable
ethno-racial bias. Another part is that the perpetrators of this
particular and many other crimes still retains a very strong
international ideological credibility among intellectuals due to its
“Anti-Fascist” identity. In particular the rhetorical commitment
of the Soviet government to “anti-racism” has shielded it from
charges of racial discrimination and repression by Western scholars.
The only notable exceptions to this defense of the USSR from the
claim that it engaged in racial discrimination has been in the cases
where such discrimination was against Jews. But, the much greater
repression on an ethno-racial basis of ethnic Germans by the Soviet
government has been largely ignored or in some cases militantly
denied by US based scholars. Volga German children deported in 1941
to die in Siberia are still not considered “worthy victims” by
most US intellectuals because they shared distant ethnic ties with
the perpetrators of the Holocaust.
5 comments:
To paraphrase Madeleine Albright, do they think it was worth it?
First they came for the Volhynia Germans in July 1915, then they came for all ethnic Germans in August 1941. If this is not premeditated long-term genocide of the ethnic German people living within Russia, whether the Russian Empire or the Soviet Union, then what is?
Just because an individual has German blood running in their veins, does not justify the wholesale deportations to arctic conditions and their mass murder.
Did not Madeleine Albright says it was indeed worth it?
Can you grant me permission to repost your essay to another website?
I also want to thank you much for posting this information online. It does mean a lot to me personally.
Now this is history! I mean to say that you have insightfully applied history to improve the human condition, unlike the glut of Cultural Marxist professors calling night day and calling evil good.
Can you address all of the rioting and street battles by what is called "Antifa" or "Antifascists" in American cities particularly in university towns?
Bravo, your blog makes me think, think again, and think some more.
Are there working historians who deny that the Volga Germans were deported? It seems to me an established fact.
“It is dangerous to be right in matters on which the established
authorities are wrong.” – Voltaire
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary
depends upon his not understanding it!” – Upton Sinclair
The Semmelweis effect is the reflex-like tendency to reject new
evidence or new knowledge because it contradicts established norms,
beliefs or paradigms.
The history of medicine is littered with individuals like Ignaz Semmelweis (1818 – 1865).
We each have our cross to bear!
A
There is nobody that denies the deportation. But, there are number that deny the deportation was an example of targeted ethno-racial repression. Instead people like Francine Hirsch and Amir Weiner claim it was political and based upon legitimate security justifications and had no racial component whatsoever. This is the established orthodox academic party line in the US. If a US based historian made the same claim for the US internment of the Issei and Nissei he would be unemployed.
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