There was no famine in Soviet Ukraine in 1932–33
| There was no famine in Soviet Ukraine in 1932–33 | |
|---|---|
| FALSE | |
| "Reports of mass starvation in Soviet Ukraine in 1932–33 were exaggerated propaganda; people were hungry but not starving." | |
| Domain | History |
| Tactic | Propaganda Technique Fabrication |
| Era | Historical |
| First seen | 1933 |
| Origin | Soviet government denials, echoed by New York Times Moscow correspondent Walter Duranty in March 1933 |
| Last reviewed | 2026-10-30 |
| Further reading: books on History | |
In 1932–33, millions of people died of starvation in Soviet Ukraine and other grain-growing regions after forced collectivization and grain requisitions under Joseph Stalin. Ukrainians call the famine the Holodomor ("death by hunger"). The Soviet government denied it was happening.
When Welsh journalist Gareth Jones reported in March 1933 on starvation he had seen in Ukraine, Walter Duranty of The New York Times, a Pulitzer Prize winner, answered with an article headlined "Russians Hungry, But Not Starving."
What the evidence shows
- Death toll. Historians estimate roughly 3.5 to 5 million deaths in Ukraine, with millions more in Kazakhstan and other regions.
- Soviet records. Archives opened after 1991, including census data the Soviet government suppressed in 1937, confirmed the scale of the famine.
- Duranty. The New York Times later called Duranty's work "some of the worst reporting to appear in this newspaper." The Pulitzer board reviewed his prize in 2003 and declined to revoke it, saying his 1931 articles did not meet the standard for deliberate deception.
- Jones. Gareth Jones was discredited at the time. He was killed by bandits in Inner Mongolia in 1935.
Why it matters
Denying a famine while it was happening, and discrediting those who reported it, is a historical example of gaslighting the world. Many countries now recognize the Holodomor as a genocide.
Gaslighting Denying a famine while millions starved, and discrediting the reporter who saw it, is state gaslighting on a massive scale. The word comes from Patrick Hamilton's 1938 play Gas Light and the 1944 film Gaslight, in which a husband dims the gas lamps and insists his wife is imagining it. Where the word comes from · More gaslighting cases
Sources
- Walter Duranty, "Russians Hungry, But Not Starving," The New York Times, March 31, 1933.
- Anne Applebaum, Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine, Doubleday, 2017.
- The New York Times, statement on Walter Duranty's reporting and the Pulitzer Prize, 2003.