Operation Lentil (,
Chechevitsa) was the
Soviet expulsion of the whole of the native
Chechen and
Ingush populations of the
North Caucasus to
Kazakhstan and
Kyrgyzstan during
World War II.
The expulsion, preceded by the
1940-1944 Chechnya insurgency, was ordered on 23 February 1944 by
Lavrentiy Beria after approval by
Joseph Stalin, as a part of
Soviet forced settlement program during
World War II (see also
Population transfer in the Soviet Union). The deportation encompassed the entire nation, over 500,000 people. 20-50% of them were killed or died as a result of the Soviet action and the others were not allowed back to
Chechnya until 1957.
Background
The forced expulsion of
Chechen people was a part of
Stalin's program designed for suppression of potential
national liberation movements in the Soviet Union. In October 1943, a group of
NKVD officers led by
Bogdan Kobulov was sent to Chechnya to prepare materials for justification of repressions. In November, they sent a letter to Beria claiming that "there are 38 religious groups in Chechnya with membership of at least 20,000 people, who conduct active anti-Soviet work, help the bandits and German saboteurs, and call for armed resistance to the Soviet power".
Alexander Nikolaevich Yakovlev Time of darkness, Moscow, 2003, ISBN 5-85646-097-9, pages 205-206 (). Then Beria ordered to prepare the operation.
The
Chechen-Ingush republic was never occupied by the German army. Therefore, the repressions were officially justified by "an armed resistance to Soviet power"
Execute everyone who can not be transported (Russian) Novaya gazeta "The Soviet War against ‘Fifth Columnists’: The Case of Chechnya, 1942–4" by Jeffrey Burds, p.16, 26 In 1940
another insurgency, led by
Khasan Israilov, started in Galanchozh. In February 1942 Musa Sheripov's group rebelled in
Shatoi,
Khimokhk and tried to take
Itum-Kale. They united with Israilov's army relying on the expected arrival of the German
Wehrmacht. The key period of the Chechen guerilla war started in August-September, 1942 when the German troops approached Chechnya and ended in the summer-autumn of 1943 with the Soviet counter-offensive that drove the Wehrmacht from the North Caucasus. About 5,000 Chechens and Ingushes served in the Soviet Army.
The operation
By February 29,
Lavrenty Beria reported to Stalin that 91,250 Ingush and 387,229 Chechen people (478,479 altogether) had been loaded onto trains for deportation. Many people from remote villages were executed per Beria's verbal order that any Chechen or Ingush deemed 'untransportable should be liquidated' on the spot.
"The Soviet War against ‘Fifth Columnists’: The Case of Chechnya, 1942–4" by Jeffrey Burds, p.39 More than 300 civilians, mostly women and children, were
burned alive in the village Khaibakh oi. An eyewitness recalled the actions of the
Soviet secret police soldiers:
Edvard Radzinsky Stalin: The First In-depth Biography Based on Explosive New Documents from Russia's Secret Archives, Anchor, (1997) ISBN 0-385-47954-9, page 503
Chechen-language libraries were destroyed and many Chechen books and manuscripts were burned.
Act of genocide
Forced deportation constitutes an act of
genocide according to the
IV Hague Convention of 1907 and the
Convention on the prevention and repression of the crime of genocide of the
UN General Assembly (adopted in 1948) and in this case this was acknowledged by the
European Parliament as an act of genocide in 2004.
Европарламент: депортация вайнахов - геноцид
Memorial
A memorial to the victims was constructed in
Grozny in the 1990s during the rule of
Dzhokhar Dudayev who had fought the Russians, but it was dismantled in 2008 on the order of President
Ramzan Kadyrov.
Russia's Chechnya moves memorial, citizens complain,
Reuters, June 3 2008
See also
References