Activity of the russian soviet procurement agenciesin Ukraine in the 1920-ies

Abstract

The research objective is to study the forms, the methods and themeans of implementing the food dictatorship by the Soviet authorities and to characterize the activities of Russian food-requisition detachments in Ukraine in the 1920-ies. The research methodology is based on the general scientific and historical approaches and principles, which made it possible to study various documents, to systematize theempirical material, to analyze the statistical data, to carry out a content analysis of documents. The scientific novelty of the study is as follows: for the first time in the domestic historiography the peculiarities of the implementation of the Soviet food dictatorship in the 1920-ies in Ukraine were determined, the activity of Russian Soviet food-requisition detachments was described, the factors that caused the food crisis were analyzed, its permanent character in the USSR during the above-mentioned periodwas proved, using a wide range of archival and published documents. Conclusions.Using the difficult situation in Ukraine in 1919 – 1920, the Bolsheviks decided to turn it into its food colony and to preserve their revolutionary conquests. The desire to secure the Soviet regime with thematerial benefits, the fulfillment of the international treaties obligations and the destruction of the political activity of the Ukrainian peasantry prompted the Soviet leadership to pursue an active grain procurement policy in Ukraine. The food apportionment in Ukraine was implemented violently. The Soviet food policy in Ukraine in the 1920-ies caused the famine of 1921 – 1923.