1954 transfer of Crimea

By a decree issued February 19, [1954]] of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, the Crimea was transferred from the RSFSR to the Ukrainian SSR. This decree was passed amid solemn circumstances. There were many speeches, which as far as one could tell had one purpose: to explain to the peoples of the USSR the reasons which made this act essential. According to the speakers the chief reasons were these: 1) The Crimea's economy is closely linked with the economy of the Ukrainian Republic; 2) The Crimea forms, as it were, a natural extension of the southern Ukrainian steppes. Thus the reasons were given and the transfer accomplished. It was all carried out quietly and calmly, without any great publicity in the newspapers. One might even think that this act actually had only the significance assigned to it by certain commentators in the West: "It makes absolutely no difference to the owner in which of his many pockets he is accustomed to carry his valuables."

The Soviet government, not having widely publicized this matter in the press, betrays more by its silence than it could have expressed through "solemn meetings" and all the publicity which the USSR creates even for less important events.

The point is that it is disadvantageous and even dangerous for the Soviet government to publicize this matter, precisely because inordinate attention to this subject might cause the people to search for the actual reasons which impelled the government to take this step. Actually, did the Crimean economy just now become closely linked with the economy of the Ukraine, or the Crimea just now become a natural extension of the southern Ukrainian steppes? These factors existed far earlier—have always existed. Why then was the Crimea transferred to the Ukraine only now, in 1954? One might think that considerations of military administration could have required this transfer: an attempt to end the inconvenience resulting from the fact that the Tavriya Military District was situated on the territory of two republics, the Crimea (RSFSR) and the Ukrainian SSR, and that this compelled the military organs to be administratively responsible to the governments of two different republics. But this reason is unfounded precisely for the reason that this situation had existed for ten years, and the military authorities had gotten along with it.

There are other more important reasons, ones which made this transfer essential. As is known, the Crimean Autonomous Republic was liquidated on February 23, 1944 (the decree, incidentally, was not actually promulgated until June 26, 1946), and its native population, the Tatars, deported from the Crimea to Central Asia and the northern districts of the USSR. A great many Russians and Ukrainians were deported along with the Tatars. In general, they deported everyone who had shown the slightest trace, not just of collaboration, but even of tolerance toward the German occupation. It is known that during the war a partisan movement developed on a large scale in the Crimea. Consequently the Soviets regarded as loyal to Soviet authority only those who had been connected with this partisan movement to some degree. Neutrality was regarded as collaboration with the Germans.

Thus, when we speak of the deportations from the Crimea, we cannot in any case regard them as deportations of Tatars alone. The process of deportation embraced a huge proportion of the entire Crimean population. At the present time it is hard to say exactly how many people remained, but in any case there were not many. The Soviet government sent streams of new settlers into the "liberated" Crimean lands. It transported whole villages from the central provinces of the RSFSR, together with their individual and kolkhoz property. Likewise, thousands of persons evacuated during the war, but now homeless, received a new area in which to settle—the Crimea. As a result, the Crimea was re- populated, but since it had lost its native Tatar population it no longer had a lawful basis for being a republic. In this manner the RSFSR lost the Crimean Autonomous Republic, but acquired the Crimean Province.