Paul
Goble
Staunton, April 26 – The worsening
of relations between the US and the Russian Federation because of Moscow’s
actions in Ukraine has led some in the Russian Federation to demonize Americans
and all things American, including calls to boycott McDonald’s restaurants and
to not drink Coca-Cola.
There have been some exceptions to
this trend but none more interesting than an article in the Moscow newspaper “Bolshoy
Gorod” describing the massive assistance the American Relief Administration
provided to the people of Soviet Russia even before Washington recognized the
USSR (bg.ru/society/kak_amerikanskij_ministr_trudivshijsja_inzhenerom-21561/).
Given that this story has not
appeared on a “round” anniversary, either its author Pavel Gnilorybov or his
editors or those behind them have decided that it is important to tell ordinary
Muscovites, the readers of this paper, about the enormous contribution the ARA
and its leader, Herbert Hoover, made to the Russian population.
As the article points out, the ARA
saved hundreds of thousands of Russian lives from famine. It was created by Herbert Hoover, who had
headed US assistance programs during World War I, was at the time US commerce
secretary, and later became president of the United States.
Hoover had had extensive experience
in Russia. Before World War I, he had worked as an engineer in Siberia. And, as Gnilorybov points out, he was no
friend of the Bolsheviks who he said had engaged in terror and “murders on an
order” far exceeding “the most reactionary tyrants” of the past.
But those attitudes and the fact
that Washington did not at the time have diplomatic relations with the Soviet
government, the “Bolshoy Gorod” journalist says, did not mean that he could not
distinguish between “the political system and the impoverished position of
simple people.”
“Twenty million people are starving,”
Hoover said at the time. “Independent of politics, they need to eat.”
The article describes the food and
medical assistance the American people provided between 1920 and 1923, the
extraordinary gratitude of the peoples of that country whose lives were saved
as a result, and the subsequent efforts of the Soviet authorities to “minimize”
the American contribution.
The article then goes on to describe
the growth of American-Soviet trade in the succeeding decade prior to US recognition
of the USSR in 1933. And then it concludes
with these words: “Even under conditions of the absence of diplomatic relations
between the USSR and the US large-scale economic cooperation was carried out.”
Consequently, “Bolshoy Gorod” says, “all
current calls for a total mutual boycott do not have any serious basis.”
It would be easy to dismiss this
article as simply another Russian argument that Western sanctions won’t work
because economic interests will lead to continued trade regardless of what
happens. But the praise the article
gives to the ARA and Hoover suggests another conclusion that may be more
important.
This article suggests that there is
real resistance among ordinary Russians to the Kremlin’s current demonization
of all things American, a resistance that is based on memories that the
American people have been willing to help the Russian people even as Americans
opposed the government in Moscow.
And the appearance of this article
now suggests that many Russians hope that the United States and the West more
generally will be able to maintain that distinction even if Vladimir Putin does
everything he can to undermine any distinction between the peoples and the
governments of the West.
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