Why did Khrushchev give up Crimea? This question is being asked by many today. In connection with the events of recent months, myths about the territorial affiliation of Crimea have resurfaced and swirled in the information space. The legend of Nikita Khrushchev's "royal gift" is especially actively exaggerated. Say, he gave the peninsula to Ukraine by his sole (and therefore illegitimate) decision. And since then in the mighty cauldron of the USSR the property of the fraternal republics was purely symbolic, the people remained silent - after all, everything was common, Soviet. For those who are interested in historical truth, and not in political myths, the purpose of which is the ideological justification for the entry of the autonomous republic into Russia, an analysis of the sources is carried out. Let's see why Khrushchev gave Crimea to Ukraine, whether he "gave" it, and whether this "present" was pleasant.
Facts of redrawing lands of republican subordination in the USSR
Russian historians often describe the transfer of Crimea to Ukraine as an unprecedented act. Say, Khrushchev adored this land, and used the anniversary of the Pereyaslav Rada to ensure that his beloved country "grew a land". In fact, the act of transferring the peninsula from the RUSSR to the Ukrainian SSR did not have any ideological overtones. The decision was dictated by purely economic motives, economic. And this transfer was not the only one. So, in 1924, the Taganrog district of the Donetsk province was transferred to Russia. Later it became a district of the Rostov region. But the vast majority of the population of this district, especially those living in rural areas, are ethnic Ukrainians. But back to our peninsula. Why did Khrushchev give Crimea to Ukraine? After all, this is not just a piece of land, it is an all-Union he alth resort … But was it such in 1954?
Myth 1: Khrushchev gave Crimea to Ukraine
In the 1990s, immediately after the collapse of the Soviet Union, conversations began on this topic. Some Russian politicians raised the Crimean issue "to the mountain". They found Khrushchev's son-in-law, Alexei Adzhubei, and commissioned him, a professional journalist, to write an article based on personal recollections of those events. He completed the order. But the article was titled “How and why Khrushchev gave Crimea to Ukraine. Memories on a given topic” was a disservice to political technologists. According to the journalist, in 1954 his father-in-law's position on the Soviet throne was very precarious. He, of course, was the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU, but the country was still in charge of everythingStalin's "hawks" - Malenkov, Molotov, Kaganovich, Voroshilov, Bulganin. Making serious decisions, and even those that could lead to accusations of sympathy for national minorities to the detriment of the "great older brother", would be very short-sighted on the part of Nikita Sergeevich.
Myth 2: Khrushchev GOT Crimea to Ukraine
Let's try to reproduce the events of that time. Crimea, like other lands that were under fascist occupation, suffered greatly during the war. But the most terrible were the human losses. The population of the peninsula was halved, and in 1944 it was 780 thousand people. Instead of solving the problem with labor resources, the Soviet leadership began "ethnic cleansing". Fifty thousand Germans who had lived on the peninsula since the time of Catherine II were evicted in the first days of the war. And after its completion, their fate was repeated by 250,000 Crimean Tatars, who were accused of "assisting the invaders." Ethnic Bulgarians, Greeks, Armenians and Czechs were also deported along with them. As a result of such a mediocre policy, the economy of the peninsula fell completely. In order to raise it at least to the level of pre-war indicators, the government instructed the authorities of the Ukrainian SSR to provide the peninsula with water and energy resources. After all, they were very lacking there.
Myth 3: Ukrainians came for everything ready
The Soviet government decided to fill the depopulated region with Russian settlers, who were brought mainly from the northern regions. Many of them began to live in the houses of the deported Tatars and received "ininheritance" all their homestead land. Only now the peasants from the Volga region and the Arkhangelsk region saw grapevine, tobacco, essential oil crops for the first time in their lives. And potatoes and cabbage did not germinate well in the arid Crimean climate. As a result of ten years of "managing" the economy of the peninsula has not changed for the better. Such a branch of agriculture as sheep breeding has completely disappeared. Vineyard crops were reduced by seventy percent, and orchard yields were even lower than those of wild trees. That is why Khrushchev gave Crimea to Ukraine - collective farmers from the Ukrainian SSR were accustomed to growing southern vegetables and fruits, and the climatic conditions of the Kherson and Odessa regions were not much different from the steppes of the Dzhankoy or Simferopol regions.
Backstory
And yet, Nikita Sergeevich played a certain role in the fact that in 1954 a significant event took place - the annexation of Crimea to Ukraine. Khrushchev had arrived on the peninsula six months earlier, driven by the idea of sowing the lands of the Land of the Soviets with corn. He was accompanied by his son-in-law, Alexey Adzhubey. He recalls: “Nikita Sergeevich was surrounded by a crowd of collective farmers. Since the meeting was really business, and not for the protocol, the conversation was frank. The peasants complained that the potatoes did not grow here, the cabbage withered, and the conditions were unbearable. "We were deceived," - more and more often heard from the crowd. Khrushchev left for Kyiv that evening. At a meeting in the Mariinsky Palace, he urged the Ukrainian leadership to help the suffering population of the peninsula. "Theresoutherners are needed who loves gardens, corn, not potatoes," he said.
Myth 4: Illegitimate "gift"
Some unscrupulous historians claim that the transfer of Crimea to Ukraine by Khrushchev was a simple gift on the occasion of the 300th anniversary of the Pereyaslav Rada. Therefore, such an act of alienation of the peninsula from Russian lands is illegitimate. Consequently, the current annexation of Crimea to Russia is the restoration of historical justice. But is it? Let's follow the events. In September 1953, the plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU met. The main theme is the state of agriculture. The head of the Presidium of the Central Committee and the Chairman of the Council of Ministers at that time was G. M. Malenkov. It was at this meeting that the decision was made to transfer the peninsula to the Ukrainian SSR, since the Crimean economy was already sufficiently integrated into the Ukrainian one. A month and a half later, at the end of October 1953, the Crimean regional committee reacted to the decision of the Central Committee. He came up with the corresponding "initiative from below". Throughout the winter of 1953-1954. intensive ideological work was carried out. Since nothing was done in the USSR without laying down an ideological base, it was decided to time the transfer of the peninsula from one fraternal republic to another to the anniversary of the reunification of the Ukrainian people with the Russian. After the passage of the "Crimean issue" through all legal instances, on February 19, 1954, this historic event occurred. The Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR unanimously adopted the Decree on the transfer of the region from the Russian to the Ukrainian Union Republic. Finallythis decision was confirmed only in April 1954. Therefore, the claim that Khrushchev gave Crimea to Ukraine is superficial and historically incorrect.
Consequences of the transfer
From the spring of 1954, immigrants from Ukraine began to arrive on the peninsula - Kyiv, Chernigov and southern regions. The results have been visible for the past five years. A canal was built to divert water from the Dnieper. This irrigation system made it possible to bring the agriculture of the peninsula into a good condition. The Ukrainian SSR built the world's longest trolleybus route, rebuilt Sevastopol, which was destroyed during the war, and boosted the economy of the Crimean steppe. This is recognized by the Soviet newspapers of that time - it is enough to look through the old files. Therefore, the question of why Khrushchev gave Crimea to Ukraine is purely political. History responds to it a little differently than today's television.
