The European Parliament passed a resolution that declared Holodomor — the starvation of millions of people in Ukraine in the 1930s under Soviet leader Joseph Stalin — a "genocide".
As far as I know it's the number accepted by historians who aren't fascists. It really was a very bad famine. There was a bad drought that year. Efforts to sabotage collectivization caused serious problems. Large portions of arable land weren't even seeded, and large parts that were weren't harvested. Grain quotas were way off because the local administration was lying to the central administration, causing the central admin to requisition a much larger percentage of grain based on the false numbers. Poor communication existed at every level, and meant that the central government didn't understand the scope of the famine until it was already well under way. Relief efforts were hampered by poor organization at the local level.
It was a complete clusterfuck top to bottom. The general consensus is that the Soviet government had the resources to avert the worst parts of the famine, but due to a variety of factors failed to react appropriately to do so. Credible socialist and neutral historians tend to agree that the government was criminally liable for what happened as they had a responsibility to use available resources to help, but failed in their responsibility to do so. The consensus is that it was a crime akin to manslaughter; Unintentionally causing a death that the perpetrator could reasonably be said to have prevented if they had acted differently.
However their actions were not intended to kill anyone and there was no plan or deliberate action to exacerbate the famine. When the scope of the famine eventually became clear to the central government they did take action to provide relief, however imperfectly. The whole concept that it was deliberate is ridiculous anyway; It requires one to uncritically believe that the Ukrainians in the lower levels of the Ukrainian SSR conspired in planning and implementing a genocide against themselves. And to the best of my knowledge there's no real motive attributed to the alleged genocide. Why the Soviet government would want to kill a fraction of the Ukrainian peasantry is never really explained.
It's indisputable that the process of collectivization and mechanization of agriculture caused a great deal of hardship for several years, but the goal was obviously and unquestionably to end the periods of famine and poor harvests that had plagued the region for centuries, and once the projects were actually implemented they were very successful and there wasn't another famine except 1945-46 in the context of the devastation of WWII.
deleted by creator
As far as I know it's the number accepted by historians who aren't fascists. It really was a very bad famine. There was a bad drought that year. Efforts to sabotage collectivization caused serious problems. Large portions of arable land weren't even seeded, and large parts that were weren't harvested. Grain quotas were way off because the local administration was lying to the central administration, causing the central admin to requisition a much larger percentage of grain based on the false numbers. Poor communication existed at every level, and meant that the central government didn't understand the scope of the famine until it was already well under way. Relief efforts were hampered by poor organization at the local level.
It was a complete clusterfuck top to bottom. The general consensus is that the Soviet government had the resources to avert the worst parts of the famine, but due to a variety of factors failed to react appropriately to do so. Credible socialist and neutral historians tend to agree that the government was criminally liable for what happened as they had a responsibility to use available resources to help, but failed in their responsibility to do so. The consensus is that it was a crime akin to manslaughter; Unintentionally causing a death that the perpetrator could reasonably be said to have prevented if they had acted differently.
However their actions were not intended to kill anyone and there was no plan or deliberate action to exacerbate the famine. When the scope of the famine eventually became clear to the central government they did take action to provide relief, however imperfectly. The whole concept that it was deliberate is ridiculous anyway; It requires one to uncritically believe that the Ukrainians in the lower levels of the Ukrainian SSR conspired in planning and implementing a genocide against themselves. And to the best of my knowledge there's no real motive attributed to the alleged genocide. Why the Soviet government would want to kill a fraction of the Ukrainian peasantry is never really explained.
It's indisputable that the process of collectivization and mechanization of agriculture caused a great deal of hardship for several years, but the goal was obviously and unquestionably to end the periods of famine and poor harvests that had plagued the region for centuries, and once the projects were actually implemented they were very successful and there wasn't another famine except 1945-46 in the context of the devastation of WWII.