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Ukraine's Contribution to the Reconstruction of Crimea (1944–1954)

Ukraine's contribution to the reconstruction of Crimea (1944–1954) was a large-scale state and economic-demographic effort to rescue and restore Crimea Oblast during the first post-war decade by drawing on the human, financial and material resources of the Ukrainian SSR, as well as the planned resettlement of nearly a million Ukrainian peasants and specialists even before the official act of transferring Crimea to the Ukrainian SSR in 1954.

Overview

After the expulsion of the Nazi occupiers and the deportation of the Crimean Tatars and other peoples carried out by the totalitarian regime in 1944, Crimea found itself in a state of total depopulation and economic ruin. The Kremlin's initial attempts to populate the peninsula with russian settlers from the interior regions of the RSFSR failed: the newcomers did not possess the skills of southern steppe and orchard (chayir) farming and in most cases left the peninsula.

As a result, the reconstruction of the depopulated Crimea was effectively placed on the Ukrainian SSR. Beginning in August–September 1944, the government of the Ukrainian SSR, in execution of the resolution of the USSR State Defense Committee (GKO), organized a massive organized recruitment and resettlement of Ukrainian households to Crimea, as well as the supply of materials, machinery, and pedagogical and medical personnel.

Key Details / Subtopics

  • The 1944 Decree on the First Resettlement from the Ukrainian SSR: In execution of the resolution of the USSR State Defense Committee No. 6372c of August 12, 1944, the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR and the Central Committee of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Ukraine adopted a decision to resettle, by October 1, 1944, into the Kuibyshevsky (now Bakhchysarai) district 3,000 households (9,000 people) from the Vinnytsia, Zhytomyr, Kyiv, Kamianets-Podilskyi, Sumy, Chernihiv and Poltava oblasts. Along with the peasants, 41 collective farm chairmen, 32 village council chairmen, 40 teachers, 3 doctors, 8 agronomists, mechanizers and combine operators were dispatched.
  • The Failed Populating from the RSFSR: Attempts to settle the most attractive regions of the Southern Coast of Crimea with settlers from the russian hinterland proved unsuccessful — the settlers ran away because they were ill-suited to the local agro-climatic conditions. In Crimea, only settlers from Kuban and Stavropol took root steadily, a significant share of whom were ethnic Ukrainians.
  • Legal Status of the Property of the Deported: The residential houses and planted lands of the resettled peoples were transferred to the settlers (into ownership only after 5 years of uninterrupted work in the collective farm, without the right to sell or lease). At the same time, the authorities obliged the settlers to buy the property and inventory of the deported, which for decades generated a negative socio-psychological tension.
  • The Ukrainian-centric Character of the Population and the All-Ukrainian Referendum of 1991: Despite the targeted post-war russification, the population of Crimea remained Ukrainian-centric. At the All-Ukrainian referendum of December 1, 1991, the following voted for the Independence of Ukraine:
  • 54.2% of the voters of the Crimean ASSR (with a turnout of 67.7%);
  • 57.0% of the voters of the city of Sevastopol;
  • 72.0% of the servicemen of the Black Sea Fleet (with a turnout of 97.0%).
  • Assessment of Economic Ties (Yegor Gaidar): In 1995, the russian politician Yegor Gaidar publicly noted that Crimea was completely "tied" to Ukraine, and that its hypothetical accession to russia would simply finish off the russian economy.