Читать книгу The Slaughter of the Jews in the Ukraine in 1919 - Elias Heifetz - Страница 8

THE political fight against the Soviet power was carried on not only in the Ukraine, but also in Great Russia, in many cases under the cover of anti-Semitism. The press of the Black Hundred of all shades is never weary of enumerating the Jewish commissars, Jewish Popular commissars, Jewish members of the Central Executive Committee, etc. The Soviet power, they say, is a Jewish power. The Russians who belong to the Soviet Government do so as a result of a misunderstanding, and there are very few Russians in it. As for the Russian masses, the good natured Ivan allows himself to be taken in by the shrewd Jew, who is aiming for world rule. The dull, obtuse and ignorant masses for the moment follow the Jewish leaders, who turn their heads, unchain their passions and show themselves complacent to their lower instincts.

Mamontov in Great Russia, Petlura and Denikin in the Ukraine, together with their followers, drew from this theoretical postulate the practical conclusion that the armed fight against the Soviet power must be supported and strengthened by Jewish pogroms. The Soviet Government was obliged to strike at the root of all anti-Semitic agitation, for such agitation was the unmistakable sign of opposition to the Soviet. The agitations of the anti-Semites were in the great majority of cases the precursors of hostilities against the Soviet power. Anti-Semitic agitation was therefore regarded in Great Russia as a counter-revolutionary act. The guilty were brought to account before the revolutionary tribunal and condemned to severe penalties in the form of hard labor.

To the nightmare of Jewish pogroms in the Ukraine belong also the anti-Jewish excesses and pogroms by bands calling themselves "Reds" and belonging at the moment in question to the Ukrainian Red Soviet army.

In proportion to the entire number of Jewish persecutions the excesses of these people play an insignificant role. They concern themselves mainly with robbery and theft, although, as for example in Theophipol, some deaths must also be laid at their door. Of all the violence done the Jews the following instances only are attributable to them.

1. Pogrom in Rossovo (March 3). After the shameful deeds committed by Petlura's men, the city was occupied by a Bolshevist "mounted advance guard" who freed the city from the bands of Petlura's men. Later Makhno's bands entered the city and robbed and killed the Jews. Makhno's men were followed by the first Ducat cavalry regiment of Zolotonosha. After the cruelties perpetrated by Makhno's men, the Jews did not receive the regiment in a friendly way. The soldiers, however, quieted the population, condemned the conduct of their comrades who had come before, promised a strict investigation of the affair, instituted a search in the houses of suspected persons, took away from them what they had plundered of the Jews and gave it back to their owners. This regiment soon left. Peasants from the neighborhood of Rossovo killed the commander of a certain Red troop. A division sent from Mironovka (it is not certain what division it was) instituted a pogrom among the Jews. They were accused of being enemies of the Soviet power "We must avenge on you the murder of our commander. " Then came the demands, "Give money, gold, silver, etc." The Jewish population was plundered, beaten and killed.

2. Pogrom in Korosten (March 12). Excesses were committed by members of the Red Army, who even demanded the delivery of their own officer who had defended a Jewish woman from a soldier who had taken away from her twenty pounds of sugar.

3. Pogrom in Cherniakhov, Government of Volhynia. On the 18th of April the 9th Soviet regiment passed the unfortunate spot which had suffered any number of pogroms. There was much pillage, in which peasants also took part. The soldiers justified their conduct by alleging that the Jews supported Petlura. There were none killed.

4. Annopol, Government of Volhynia. In the complaint addressed to the Section for Social Relief, the Jews of the place speak of plunder and excesses by the Taraschan regiment. There were no death victims.

5. Volochisk, Government of Volhynia. In the complaint to the Revolutionary Committee the Jewish population report excesses by members of the Red Army. No cases of death are reported.

6. Pillage by a Soviet regiment in Vasilkov, in April.

7. Pillage by the Sumsky regiment in the town of Gorodische (May 31st), in which Jewish members of the Red Army also took part. There was robbery but no murder.

8. Uman. Here the eighth Soviet regiment of freebooters carried on its activities twice. On the 22nd of March the freebooters instituted a great predatory expedition. On the 22nd of May after a terrible pogrom made by bands, the same regiment came again to Uman, and began to plunder the population, especially the Jews, en masse. There was murder and rape of women and girls. Many Jewish freebooters belonged to the regiment, who were known in the city as professional thieves.

From the detailed minutes of a meeting of party functionaries and public men of the city of Uman it can be seen that the local authorities were trying to fight these excesses. Orders were issued making participation in the pogrom punishable with death, and about ten of the less important bandits were shot. But the military authorities did not succeed in checking the anti-Semitic sentiment that prevailed in the regiment. Up to the first days of July this regiment was not replaced by another despite the urgent request and categorical demands of the authorities of Uman, who repeatedly made appeals orally and in writing to the authorities at Kiev. The regiment could not be relieved because of the critical situation on the outer and inner front, and also for the reason that authorities held the eighth regiment, which was reputed to be an important body of fighters, in readiness to keep down the insurrectionary movement in the precinct of Uman. It is clear from the same minutes that the eighth regiment did in fact prove itself a dangerous opponent in defending the cities against the insurrectionary forces who made the district unsafe the whole time and attempted again and again to take possession of Uman. The troops of Tiutiunik, Popov and Klimenko were defeated, and their arms, equipment and munitions were taken away from them. As long as the eight regiment remained in Uman there was no fear of its being occupied again by the insurrectionists with a possible repetition of the first terrible pogrom.

It was relieved later by the first Ukrainian Soviet Cavalry Regiment. With the departure of the eighth regiment the plundering also ceased. To be sure, this regiment too was not very friendly to the Jewish population, but plundering happened only occasionally. A company of this regiment which committed acts of violence in the villages demanded among other things that the people give up the "communists and the Jews." In a certain village the soldiers of this company were on the point of killing a Jewish girl because according to their opinion she turned the heads of the men by her beauty.

On the fifth of July the regiment proceeded from Uman to Poltava. In its place came the Fourth International Soviet Regiment. This regiment was the first disciplined body of Soviet soldiers that the people of Uman saw. No more robbery, no more murder took place on account of national or class divisions. The population of the town was able to breathe freely again.

9. Jewish pogrom in Zolotonosha.

10. Pogrom in Obuchovo (May 7; 6th Soviet regiment).

11. Pogrom in Pogrebische (May 18; 8th Soviet regiment).

12. A violent pogrom in Theophipol, Government of Volhynia.

According to a brief report of A. Wertheim, authorized agent of the Red Cross for the support of the victims of the pogroms, the Fourth Taraschan Soviet Regiment and the second cavalry brigade, having defeated a Petlura company of 120 peasants and 27 Jews, entered the town without the slightest offer of resistance by the population. Directly after the occupation of the place, the soldiers began to rob, plunder and set houses on fire. About 300 persons were killed, about 150 houses were burned, and a number of women and girls were violated. Further details are wanting.

All the pogroms and excesses were expressly military in character. Before we go on to show how the Soviet power fought politically and by means of agitation against the anti-Semitic spirit of the troops, how they fought against it from the first day of their appearance in the Ukraine we will describe the constitution and character of the military bodies belonging to the Red Army.

The overwhelming majority of the Soviet troops consisted at the time in question of insurrectionist bands of freebooters. Some of these were formed independently, others went over during the fight from Petlura to the freebooters after the second occupation of Kiev by the Soviet troops. Finally there belonged to them also in part the bands of Makhno and Grigoriev who remained loyal to the Soviet government. These troops consisted of Ukrainian peasants. Like all Ukrainian freebooters they were radical in sentiment. One characteristic of theirs is antipathy to strangers, especially Jews. They are therefore easily accessible to anti-Semitic agitation, especially in moments of doubt when they are not clear what attitude they should assume toward the Soviet power. They are always vacillating in their loyalty to the Bolshevist government. Again and again they go from the Soviet power to the side of Petlura or the Batki. After a defeat or an unsuccessful uprising they go back to the Soviet troops. Often it happens that certain portions of the troops declare themselves "independent," retaining the entire revolutionary phraseology and watchwords. They still call themselves Soviet troops but are in reality in the service of the enemies of the Kiev Soviet government. Such troops are in many cases under the influence of the so-called "Independent Ukrainian Social Democracy." This party has played a momentous role in the history of the Soviet power in the Ukraine. After they broke with the official social democratic party (Vinnichenko and, Petlura), they took into their program the principle of the Soviet power, instead of that of the social democracy, and joined the Soviet organ in the Ukraine. In consequence of their close relations to the freebooters, they began, after they had broken with the Soviet power also, to incite these people against the communistic-Jewish government. They are opponents of Denikin, but they are also opponents of a false commune. They are also against the power of the Jews, but are for a "Ukrainian Independent Socialistic Republic." This party was led by Mazurenko, the Batko of all Batki, mentioned in the last chapter. The proclamations of these people are so significant that it seems useful to quote one of them in full.

"Comrades, Red Cossacks! ask yourselves. Were you not the first to rise against the force of the Germans, have you not shed your blood for a better lot and life of the Ukrainian working people? Where are these rights that we fought for? We see, comrades, how we must fight our way through, while those who do not work hang on our necks and lead and enslave us.

"Comrades! can we not arrange our own life in our own house better, in the interest of the working people?

"What are we waiting for? Why don't we get these Jews out of the way? Why don't we take into our own hands this matter, which is so important for the working people?

"Comrades, we have fought against the Hetman, we have learned the injustice of the Directory, we fought and are still fighting against Denikin and the reactionary officers. But if we see injustice on the side of the communists, Jews and similar people, are we not in duty bound to say, Out of our house! You have done us harm! Liberate therefore, Comrades, our land from the Jews and other communists.

"Long live the Soviets of the working peasantry, and the laboring population!

"Long live the local and central power of the Batki!

"Long live the Ukrainian independent socialistic Soviet republic!

"Death to General Denikin!

"Down with the false commune!

(Signed) The Council of the Insurrectionary Troops of Ukraine on the Left Side.

The Hetman of the Troops, LOPATKIN.

The Chief of Staff, ZAVGORODNY."

These troops, who call themselves Soviet troops, were guilty of excesses. The pogrom in Rossovo was also according to all probability the work of such a band. The sentiment of the troops who enacted these pogroms can be seen from their watchwords.

The acts of violence in Zolotonosha (see above No. 9) were perpetrated under the cry, "Ah! you are a communist, we will teach you!" In Vasilkov (No. 6), the soldiers of the "Red Hundred" cried, "Down with the Jewish commissars!"

It is clear that when such troops as these proceed against Jews, they are under the influence of another party hostile to the Soviet power, with which they are sometimes even united in the same organization.

The bands of freebooters consisting of deserters were the cause of the instability and insecurity of the Soviet power at Kiev. They prepared its fall while ostensibly acting in its name and under its flag.

The great majority of the freebooting troops finally fell away from the Soviet power and went over to the side of their enemies amid the enactment of horrible blood baths (Grigoriev and his people). It must be openly and honestly admitted that the effect of the Soviet government upon the troops must have been extraordinarily great, for as long as they were actually subject to the Soviet government at Kiev, they were scarcely guilty of any excesses. We see here at any rate that two opposite political systems (the Kiev Soviet government fighting against pogroms, and the opposite party making use of them) working on the same basis, namely the anti-Jewish feeling throughout the Ukraine, and on the same human material, led to entirely opposite results.

The freebooters were not the only troops on which the Soviet government supported itself. In their fight against the unreliable troops and the excesses committed by them, the Soviet government supported itself on not large but loyally devoted associations of communists, the so-called "International Division." To the communistic troops belonged members of the mobilized Ukrainian communistic party as well as workmen of other socialist parties, who were called to the service of the army, as a result of a resolution of the Soviets, by the union and trade councils. To prevent a dissolution of the insurrectionist troops and to maintain their firmness, communists were assigned to the several military associations. In this way a disciplined Red Army was formed.

The international divisions (whose appearance, as mentioned before, was greeted so gladly by the Jewish representatives in Uman) were small and very reliable units made up of groups of Hungarian, Austrian and German prisoners, who were under the leadership of their Soviets. They were sent by the government to relieve politically unreliable troops and to fight against the excesses committed by the latter. At the time of the fight against the volunteer army of Denikin, troops appeared also from Great Russia in consequence of a resolution of the Central Executive Committee of the Ukraine that the military leadership of the two republics should be uniform.

In connection with the excesses mentioned above it should be stated that the constantly vacillating and unreliable freebooters were under the influence of certain agents whom they trusted and thus betrayed the Soviet government. We have already referred to Grigoriev and Mazurenko. Beside these prominent men there are a number of less important ones, whom we shall name.

In Cherniakov, Davidenko, the president of the revolutionary committee, who was at the same time commissar for military affairs, was in connection with the bands of Sokolovsky. The result was a Jewish pogrom. In Matusovo, Government of Kiev, the following thing happened. A few days before the beginning of the excesses, the Executive committee (the highest Soviet organ in the place) received from Shpola a provocatory letter, purposely signed with a Jewish name (Goldstein if we are not mistaken), reading as follows: "The churches should be sealed and the church furniture and fixtures brought to Shpola." On the tenth" of May some riders brought to Matusovo a manifesto of Grigoriev, which was read on the same day to an assembly of the inhabitants called for the purpose, by Kesser, the Secretary of the Executive Committee. Whether that which Kesser read was actually contained in the copy of the manifesto handed to him, or whether he read something of his own making (which is more likely), we shall have to leave undecided. At any rate Kesser told the assembled peasants that an order had come to destroy the Jews. A terrible blood bath followed, due to a treacherous government official, who stood under the protection of the government and inspired confidence by his official position and the assurance that he was acting in the name and interest of the Soviet power.

From the beginning the Soviet government in the Ukraine carried on a decisive battle against the lust for pogroms, by preventive measures and the development of agitation, propaganda and organizing activity to that end, as well as by threats and strict penalties.

In the first order issued by Rakovsky in Kharkov, which was repeatedly confirmed by the Soviet government of Kiev, the penalty of death is threatened for pogrom excesses of any kind, and heavy punishments are laid down for all anti-Jewish agitation.

"The Jewish proletariat and the poor population are our confederates. The Jewish bourgeoisie is as good as any other. The order to fight against the Jews is a provocation by the enemy who wants to introduce into the Red Army the spirit of demoralization and betray the interests of the workers and peasants to their enemies." So reads a government pamphlet. At the same time the fight against anti-Semitism took an important place in the pages of the People's Commissariat for military affairs and in their political activity. The anti-Semitic propaganda of the enemies of the government became a dangerous factor in the formation of disciplined military associations. The idea of the government and the people's commissariat for military affairs was to supplement the peasant bands of insurrectionists with workmen. For this purpose they intensified the above mentioned mobilization through the unions and trade councils, and prepared the military education of the workmen. In addition to this the People's Commissariat for Military Affairs, in the months of March and April, turned to the Jewish socialist parties of the Labor Bund, to the United Socialists and to the Poale Zionists with the request that they make serious efforts to mobilize the Jewish socialist workmen, pointing to the fact that all of the experiences of the Red Army during the last months showed that even the most backward and anti-Semitically prejudiced peasants became more sensible after living with the Jewish workmen for any length of time, and were accessible to appropriate influence and enlightenment.

The political administration of the People's Commissariat for Military Affairs formed besides a special Jewish section for propaganda, the purpose of which was to distribute the Jewish workmen, called to the service by general decree, among the several military units and thus to influence the troops so as to make the Jew-baiting propaganda ineffective.

This section, which had branches in all parts of Ukraine, received reports from various sides concerning the relation between the Jewish workmen and the other members of the army. According to existing information backward troops received the Jews with the greatest distrust and even animosity. Here and there there were also excesses. The Jewish "intruders" sometimes had to overcome the greatest difficulties. It happened sometimes that the sections were urgently entreated to transfer the Jews to a part of the army that was more tolerant.

The second phase of the mutual relations ended almost always, even in the case of the most prejudiced parts of the army, with the admission, "They are no Jews, they belong to us." This was usually connected with discussions about Jews and anti-Semitism. This part of the work was hard, but it produced political results. Living together gradually led to a removal of the anti-Semitic feelings which had been implanted in the character of the Ukrainian peasant in the course of centuries of historical development.

In addition to the political and cultural work, the government employed force and inflicted penalties. The perpetrators of anti-Jewish excesses and the authors of propaganda were tried and condemned as being counter-revolutionists. On the other hand those troops that were incurably anti-Jewish were isolated, relieved and their constituency changed.

Thus at the end of May in Kiev a whole regiment refused to obey an order to fight, given by the chief military officers, and gave out the watchword, "Down with the Jewish commissars!" The rebels were surrounded by the loyal portion of the regiment and forced to execute the order. The instigators were arrested.

In June an open rebellion broke out in another regiment that was quartered in Kiev. They were burning to plunder the Jews, and announced a similar watchword. In both cases the agitation came from obscure elements, which were supported by some officers of the old tsarist army.

In this last case the regiment was disarmed by the Kiev communistic reserve regiment and dissolved.

An objective study of the investigations of the authorized agent of the relief committee of the Red Cross and of the annals of the Jews in the Ukraine leads to the conclusion that the Soviet troops preserved the Jews from complete annihilation. Retirement of the Soviet troops signified for the territory left behind the beginning of a period of pogroms with all their horrors. On the other hand the advance of the Soviet troops meant the liberation from a nightmare (Zhitomir, Yelisavetgrad, Novo-Mirgorod, Proskurov, Gorodische, etc.).

The watchword of the Jew-haters, identifying Judaism and communism, had terrible consequences for the Jews. On the retirement of the Soviet power the Jews abandoned their homes and possessions and followed the Soviet army, being exposed to an uncertain existence and the prospect of dying of hunger or meeting death in some other way in the civil war that was raging. At the time of the second pogrom in Zhitomir the Jewish youth followed the retiring Bolshevist army. In Tarascha (Government of Kiev) the retiring Soviet regiment was followed by almost the entire Jewish population (4,000 persons). The tragedy of the situation can only be fully realized when we consider that a very great part of the Jewish middle class are skeptical in their attitude to the Soviet power, and the Jewish bourgeoisie is decidedly hostile to it. Certain death forced the Jewish bourgeoisie to flee under the cover and protection of Bolshevist divisions.

In Lebedin (Government of Kiev) a Bolshevist armored car came in while a pogrom was being instituted by bandits, fetched the surviving Jews, who had concealed themselves in the cellars and lofts, and took them along, thus saving them from certain death.

It is no wonder therefore that the Jewish youth, especially in the pogrom districts, tried to enter the Red Army without regard to their sympathies otherwise in regard to the Soviet power. They entered their ranks, seeing therein the only possibility of saving the lives of their nearest and the honor of their wives and daughters.