Ukrainian Crimea

On this day in 1954—72 years ago—the Soviet Politburo (Communist USSR's highest ranking authority) transferred the territory of Crimea to Ukraine.  The transfer was a formal recognition of the traditional cultural links between Crimea and the Ukrainian people.  Furthermore, it was known that Nikita Khrushchev, the leader of the Communist Party, had a particular fondness for Ukraine, his favorite region.  There also is a theory that the Crimea transfer helped to simplify the administration of a hydroelectric dam on the Dnieper River, which runs from Russia, through Ukraine and Crimea to the Black Sea.

Ten years earlier, in 1944, the Soviet Union (on Joseph Stalin's orders) had performed a brutal ethnic cleansing of Tatars in Crimea, deporting nearly 200,000 people in cattle cars to Uzbekistan (then a part of the Soviet Empire).  Nearly half of them died in the process.  The Tatars were Sunni Muslims with nomadic roots, as shepherds, throughout parts of Crimea,  Russia and the Turkic Soviet territories.  By the 20th Century, however, most Tatars had integrated and settled into modern, industrial life.  The Soviets accused the Crimean Tatars of collaborating with the Germans in World War II—and sought to punish them in 1944.  As the Soviets did in many other places, they began to relocate ethnic Russians and Ukrainians into Crimea (to boost their numbers and dominance in the region).  Today, the deportation of Tatars is widely viewed as a genocide.

In 1991, when the Soviet Union collapsed, Ukraine declared its secession from Russia and independence as a free nation.  For two decades, Ukraine's possession of Crimea was not challenged.  However, in February 2014, under Vladimir Putin, Russia declared its annexation of Crimea and sent soldiers (who wore no insignia) to take key locations.  This was followed by the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February of 2022.

Why does this matter?  After the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, its satellite European territories—for example Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia—all became successful, independent democracies.  East Germany reunified with West Germany.  If Ukraine falls to Russia, the fear is that Russia will not stop there.  It is believed that Russia will continue its expansion—hungry to reconstitute the glory (and the landmass) of its former world superpower status.

Shown above, a collection of ceramics reminiscent of the Ukrainian flag.  Of further interest is the fact that these pieces represent a union of allied nations: England, France, West Germany, and the United States.  May these critical alliances hold-strong—and continue to do good things for Democracy.

Click on the photo above to learn more about the center-left piece.