Source: The Telegraph
The writer and Soviet dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn predicted the current situation in Ukraine almost half a century ago.
In The Gulag Archipelago, the Nobel laureate wrote: “With Ukraine, things will get extremely painful.”
Even during Soviet times, Alexander Solzhenitsyn prophetically did not rule out the idea that Ukraine may break away, although “a referendum may be required for each region”, given the Bolshevik way of lumping together lands that had never historically belonged to Ukraine.
The Gulag Archipelago, Part 5, Chapter 2
… It pains me to write this as Ukraine and Russia are merged in my blood, in my heart, and in my thoughts. But extensive experience of friendly contacts with Ukrainians in the camps has shown me how much of a painful grudge they hold. Our generation will not escape from paying for the mistakes of our fathers.
To stamp one’s foot and shout: “This is mine!” is the easiest option. It is far more difficult to say: “Those who want to live, live!” Surprising as it may be, the Marxist teaching prediction that nationalism is fading has not come true. On the contrary, in an age of nuclear research and cybernetics, it has for some reason flourished. And time is coming for us, whether we like it or not, to repay all the promissory notes of self-determination and independence; do it ourselves rather than wait to be burnt at the stake, drowned in a river or beheaded. We must prove whether we are a great nation not with the vastness of our territory or the number of peoples in our care but with the greatness of our deeds. And with the depth of ploughing what we shall have left after those lands that will not want to stay with us secede.
With Ukraine, things will get extremely painful. But one has to understand the degree of tension they feel. As it has been impossible for centuries to resolve it, it is now down to us to show good sense. We must hand over the decision-making to them: federalists or separatists, whichever of them wins. Not to give in would be mad and cruel. The more lenient, patient, coherent we now are, the more hope there will be to restore unity in future.
Let them live it, let them test it. They will soon understand that not all problems are resolved through separation. (Since in different regions of Ukraine there is a different proportion of those who consider themselves Ukrainians, those who consider themselves Russians and those who consider themselves neither, there will be many difficulties there. Maybe it will be necessary to have a referendum in each region and then ensure preferential and delicate treatment of those who would want to leave. Not the whole of Ukraine in its current formal Soviet borders is indeed Ukraine. Some regions on the left bank [of the River Dnieper] clearly lean more towards Russia. As for Crimea, Khrushchev’s decision to hand it over to Ukraine was totally arbitrary. And what about Carpathian (Red) Ruthenia? That will serve as a test, too: while demanding justice for themselves, how just will the Ukrainians be to Carpathian Russians?)
Written in 1968; published in 1974.
April 1981. Extract from a letter to the Toronto
conference on Russian-Ukrainian relations, Harvard
Ukrainian Research Institute
I totally agree that the Russian-Ukrainian problem is one
of the major current issues and, certainly, of crucial
importance to our peoples. Yet, it seems to me that the
red-hot passion and the resultant sizzling temperatures
are pernicious to that cause.
…I have repeatedly stated and am reiterating here and now that no one can be retained by force, none of the antagonists should resort to coercion towards the other side or towards its own side, the people on the whole or any small minority it embraces, for each minority contains, in turn, its own minority… In all cases local opinion must be identified and implemented. Therefore, all issues can be truly resolved only by the local population rather than in remote arguments in émigré circles, whose perceptions are distorted.
...I find this fierce intolerance in the discussion of the Russian-Ukrainian problem (fatal for both nations and beneficial only for their enemies) particularly painful because I myself am of mixed Russian-Ukrainian origin, grew up under the joint influence of both these cultures and never saw and do not see any antagonism between them. I have on numerous occasions written and spoken in public about Ukraine and its people, about the tragedy of the Ukrainian famine; I have many old friends in Ukraine; I have always known that Russians’ and Ukrainians’ suffering were of the same order of suffering caused by Communism. In my heart, there is no place for a Russian-Ukrainian conflict, and if, God forbid, things get to the extreme, I can say: never, under any circumstances, will either I or my sons join in a Russian-Ukrainian clash, no matter how some hotheads may be pushing us towards one.
Published in Russkaya Mysl, June 18, 1981. In Russia, published for the first time in Zvezda magazine, No 12, 1993.
Address to Ukrainians and
Belarussians
To separate Ukraine today means to cut through millions of
families and people: just consider how mixed the
population is; there are whole regions [in Ukraine] with a
predominantly Russian population; how many people there
are who find it difficult to choose which of the two
nationalities they belong to; how many people there are of
mixed origin; how many mixed marriages there are (by the
way, nobody has until now thought of them as mixed). In
the thick of the general population, there is not a hint
of any intolerance between Ukrainians and Russians.
Of course, should the Ukrainian people really decide to secede, nobody would dare to try and keep them by force. But, this vastness is diverse and it is only the local population that can decide the fate of their locality, of their region, while each newly formed ethnic minority on that locality should be treated with the same non-violence.
Written and published in 1990 in Rebuilding Russia.
