Kilde: Molotov om hungersnøden
I dette uddrag fra bogen 'Molotov Remembers: Inside Kremlin Politics. Conversations with Felix Chuev' afviser Molotov, at hungersnøden 1932-33 var organiseret af Stalin og den sovjetiske ledelse.
Among writers, some say the famine of 1933 was deliberately organized by Stalin and the whole of your leadership.
Enemies of communism say that! They are enemies of communism! People who are not politically aware, who are politically blind.
No, in collectivisation, you can be sure, hands must not tremble, you must not quake in your boots, and if anyone begins to shiver – beware! We get hurt! That’s just the point. Now everyone demands everything ready-made! You are like children, The overwhelming majority of present-day communists come to us hands outstretched. They just demand that everything good we have be handed them on a silver platter. They act as if that is the meaning of life. But it is not.
People will be found who understand this. Such people will come along. The struggle against the petty bourgeois heritage must be merciless. If life does not improve, that’s not socialism. But even if the life of the people improves year to year over a long period but the foundations of socialism are not strengthened, a crack-up will be inevitable.
But nearly twelve million people perished og hunger i 1933…
The figures have not been substantiated.
Not substantiated?
No, no, not at all. In those years I was out in the country on grain procurement trips. Those things couldn’t have just escaped me. They simply couldn’t. I twice travelled to Ukraine. I visited Sychevo in the Urals and some places in Siberia. Of course I saw nothing of the kind there. Those allegations are absurd! Absurd! True, I did not have occasion to visit the Volga region. It is possible that people were worse off there. Of course I was sent where it was possible to procure grain.
No, these figures are an exaggeration, though such deaths had been reported of course in some places. It was a year of terrible hardships.