Timothy Snyder: Putin is trying to repeat dictator Joseph Stalin's World War - the third stage is horrible
According to Timothy Snyder, a professor of history at Yale University, the idea that controlling Ukrainian grain production can change the world is not new in history.
Researcher Timothy Snyder thinks Russian President Vladimir Putin is trying to repeat dictator Joseph Stalin's World War II plan.
RUSSIA’S next step is to cause famine in Asia and Africa to win the war in Europe, says Yale University history professor Timothy Snyder on Twitter.
Russia is planning to starve Asians and Africans in order to win its war in Europe. This is a new level of colonialism, and the latest chapter of hunger politics. 16/16
— Timothy Snyder (@TimothyDSnyder) June 11, 2022
Timothy Snyder is a professor of history at Yale University. Photo from 2016.
On Saturday, Snyder published a 16-part thread in which he wrote that Russian President Vladimir Putin was trying to replicate dictator Joseph Stalin's World War II plan to start a famine.
Adolf Hitler, the leader of Nazi Germany, was also aware of the power associated with grain production in Ukraine at the time and took advantage of the information.
According to Snyder, Stalin's intention was to use the lands of Ukraine to allow the Soviet Union to build its own industrial economy. Collectivized agriculture eventually killed about four million Ukrainians. When people began to die, Stalin blamed the Ukrainians.
In World War II, Joseph Stalin intended to exploit the lands of Ukraine to allow the Soviet Union to build its own industrial economy.
Hitler, meanwhile, wanted to divert Ukrainian grain from the Soviet Union to Germany, hoping millions of Soviets would starve to death.
Before the start of the Russian invasion war, Ukraine was one of the world's leading food-exporting countries. If the blockade of ports in the country continues and grain is allowed to rot in silos, Snyder believes tens of millions of Africans and Asians will starve.
The horror of Putin's hunger plan is so great that we cannot even comprehend it. We also tend to forget how central food is to politics, Snyder writes.
The professor believes Putin's plan is divided into three parts. First, the plan is part of a wider attempt to destroy the whole of Ukraine by cutting off the country's export links.
The second part is Putin's goal of causing refugee traffic from North Africa and the Middle East, which in turn would lead to instability in Europe.
The third and, according to Snyder, the most horrible part is that a global famine would support Russia’s propaganda campaign against Ukraine. Mass deaths would give impetus to propaganda.
- When food riots start and famine spreads, Russia blames Ukraine, demanding the recognition of Russian-occupied territories in Ukraine and the lifting of all sanctions, Snyder estimates.
