This year, the world celebrates the 65th Week of Enslaved Nations. This initiative arose at the height of the Cold War. Back in 1959, the US Congress passed a special resolution calling on the President to hold events dedicated to enslaved nations every year during the third week of July until freedom and independence were achieved for the enslaved nations of the world.
The then US President Eisenhower signed the corresponding law. In those days, the list of enslaved nations included first of all people that came under communist occupation, primarily the countries of Eastern and Central Europe, occupied after the end of World War II, as well as annexed countries that, as colonies, were part of the so-called republics of the Soviet Union. The list was expanded by countries that fell under the influence of Soviet communist imperialism already after the end of World War II, such as North Korea, North Vietnam, Tibet and others.
Significantly, in the first resolution, Idel-Ural and Cossackia were included in the list of enslaved territories – territories of the former Russian Empire, which maintained a stable identity and regional autonomy. A total of 23 enslaved nations and territories entered the first list.
The week of enslaved nations became a manifestation of the implementation of the strategy of soft power, the promotion of evolutionary changes within the nations occupied by Russia, which should lead to the peaceful liberation of these nations from Russian imperialism in the form of Bolshevism and not involving the West in a direct military confrontation with the USSR, which could end in a nuclear war.
This initiative was a response to the active pressure of American society, especially from among emigrants from the countries occupied by the USSR, regarding the need for more active actions in the liberation of enslaved nations and occupied countries.
Lev Dobryanskyi, head of the Ukrainian diaspora organization of the Ukrainian Congress Committee, was the key lobbyist and initiator of the adoption of the relevant resolution. A favourable circumstance for the adoption of such a resolution was the tragic events in Hungary, occupied by the Soviets in 1956. Lev Dobryansky managed to create an effective coalition of Eastern European diaspora groups and conduct an effective lobbying campaign in Congress. Therefore, the law received unanimous bipartisan support. However, it was not without a bitter pill. Some editorial changes were made to the resolution text written by Lev Dobryansky during its adoption. Thus, instead of “Russian communism” and “communist Russia”, the blurred formula “nations under Soviet domination” appeared. These actions effectively removed from the list of enslaved nations the nations that were occupied by Russia and were part of the so-called Russian Soviet Republic. Noticing this change, Lev Dobryansky during his speech in the Senate accused the State Department of changing concepts and that the latter underestimated the power of “non-Russian nationalism, hostility and resistance of nations conquered by Russia.” Lev Dobryansky prophetically said that Marxism and Communism are only a smoke screen that hides the age-old tyranny of Muscovy and that “the support of such aspirations on the outskirts of the empire and close to its heart should be the main priority of our efforts.”
In the future, this editorial change played an ominous role in the fate of the nations enslaved by Russia, which ended up as part of the so-called Russian Federation.
In general, the week of enslaved nations has become a convenient diplomatic tool and an effective propaganda platform for drawing the attention of the inhabitants of the free world to the fate of enslaved nations. It was also a signal to the citizens in the territories occupied by the Soviets about at least moral support and understanding of their situation. The annual proclamation of the President of the USA gave these events a special status and support.
After national liberation revolutions in Eastern and Central Europe, most of the original list of enslaved countries gained independence. Therefore, the question of reformatting the event arose. Of course, the recognition of the right to self-determination and freedom of all nations enslaved by Russia would be ideal. The transition from the struggle against Soviet colonialism to overcoming Russian colonialism. Concentration of efforts after the collapse of the Soviet colonial empire on its successor – the newly created Russian colonial empire called the Russian Federation.
While the American administration of George Bush Sr., in the first proclamation after the collapse of the Soviet Union, triumphed over the liberation of Eastern European nations and called for the commemoration of those who died in the struggle against tyranny, Russian colonialism and imperialism gained momentum and appetites.
Part of the nations enslaved by Russia, who took advantage of their natural and constitutional right to self-determination and sovereignty, and also believed in Yeltsin’s “take as much sovereignty as you can master,” held referendums and proclaimed state sovereignty. Chechnya, which has never voluntarily joined any form of Russian statehood, waged a liberation struggle for decades, survived genocide and deportation, and went the furthest. She took advantage of the legislation of the USSR and Russia and declared full independence.
Unfortunately, this just and completely legal struggle of the enslaved nations, not receiving the necessary support, suffered another brutal wave of Russian colonialism and was suppressed. Moreover, in the case of Chechnya, this was done as a result of two unprovoked genocidal wars, as a result of which the majority of the population suffered war crimes on the side of the Russian colonial occupation regime. It is symbolic that the independence of Chechnya (which was also based on the basic principles of the UN) was recognized by two countries: Georgia (by the decision of the deposed leader Zviad Gamsakhurdia) and, later, Afghanistan, led by the Taliban. The rest of the enslaved nations who exercised their right to sovereignty, after flattering attempts to sign federal treaties with Russia, year after year were deprived of any national, self-governing, and even autonomous rights of federal entities, supposedly enshrined in the constitutional order.
Enjoying the hegemony of the “end of history” in its liberal form, the “brave new world” actually closed its eyes to the continuation of the terrible colonial policy and the slavery of the nations enslaved by Russia.
When the American government came to its senses, and in 2001, in the address of George Bush Jr., it was said that more than 2 billion people in the world live under totalitarian regimes, the proclamation once again forgot to list the nations enslaved by Russia, leaving the right of Russia to conduct colonial policy within the empire at its own discretion.
Even in 2008, when Russian colonialism moved beyond officially recognized territories and violated the territorial integrity and state sovereignty of independent Georgia, authoritarian regimes included Belarus, Burma, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Sudan, Syria, and Zimbabwe. The last nomadic empire, Russia, and the situation of nations enslaved by Russia were not discussed again.
Russia’s impunity in her understanding meant permissiveness. In 2014, Russia attacked and started a war against the largest European country – Ukraine. President Obama’s 2016 proclamation pledged to strengthen support for freedom and democracy anywhere in the world, whether in Ukraine, Syria or Cuba.
Before the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the new President Biden hatched plans to change the long-standing tradition of proclaiming the week of enslaved nations to the week of “free and open societies.”
These plans crossed out the aggressive actions of Russia and the transfer of aggression against Ukraine from the phase of a hybrid war under foreign flags to an open full-scale conventional war in the heart of Europe.
Thus, Biden’s new proclamation stated that repressive regimes (among which Russia finally appeared) seek to subjugate not only the population within their borders but also those in other countries.
The Russian-Ukrainian war once again put on the agenda the need to overcome colonialism, which is developing into conquering imperialism, primarily from Russia and its satellites, and China, which are trying to destroy the existing world order with their hands.
Here again, two strategies are fighting. The first involves pacifying the aggressor and preserving the Russian colonial empire within its current borders. Its basic principles are either to compromise with Putin and freeze the war through territorial concessions, while at the same time betting on the cultivation of “good Russians”. The second is the liquidation of Russia as an empire and its reformation into the space of independent states of nations and territories enslaved by Russia.
Before the hot phase of the war, the topic of the liquidation of the Russian empire, which is the only possibility to overcome Russian colonialism and ensure the natural right to freedom of the nations enslaved by Russia, was taboo and pushed to the margins. Currently, this concept is gaining the right to life, at least as an alternative, along with the intensive fanning of yet another elephant, the impotent idea of a “good Russian”.
The topic of the collapse of Russia has ceased to be taboo, and representatives of enslaved nations are repeatedly given prominent rostrums of international organizations, including the UN, and become participants in expert discussions at the level of senior government officials of Western countries.
Of course, Ukraine plays a leading and leadership role in this work. The question of the struggle for the rights and sovereignty of the nations enslaved by Russia is a question of the existential survival of Ukraine, a country that itself survived a terrible, several hundred years stage of Russian colonialism and is single-handedly waging war with the Russian Empire. The mighty imperial Goliath can only be defeated by the collective efforts of many Davids.
It is worth realizing that the future of the nations enslaved by Russia, including their physical survival, depends on the outcome of the war in Ukraine, but the possibility of our victory also depends on the extent to which the nations enslaved by Russia will be able to impose a struggle against Russian colonialism.
Currently, Ukraine has already become a kind of hub for coordinating the efforts of nations enslaved by Russia. Both, unfortunately, extremely unsystematically and with delay on the part of official authorities, and more systematically on the part of public institutions.
The creation of national formations of the nations enslaved by Russia in the Ukrainian army is a prototype of the future national liberation armies of the nations enslaved by Russia. On the basis of the adopted legislation, the Ukrainian Parliament should establish provisions on unconditional recognition of the right to sovereignty and self-determination of all enslaved nations and unconditional recognition of their statehood in the event of declaration. In the case of the existence of exile authorities or representative bodies of the nations enslaved by Russia, Ukraine should establish official relations with them and form a policy towards these nations based on the positions of these bodies. The parliament of warring Ukraine is obliged to lay a long-term unified legislative foundation for the support, recognition, and protection of nations enslaved by Russia.
The Ukrainian state should provide long-term, systematic, institutional and project support to both representatives of enslaved nations and Ukrainian coordination initiatives such as the Anti-Imperial Block of Nations, the League of Free Nations and the Forum of Free States of Post-Russia.
Such initiatives as the University of Free Nations, created by the efforts of the Anti-Imperial Block of Nations, whose goal is the formation of a national liberation and state-building elite of the nations enslaved by Russia, should be scaled up and receive state support. Systemic studies require the study and support of the identities of enslaved nations.
Special attention should be paid to implementing a systematic information policy regarding the coverage of the national liberation struggle of nations enslaved by Russia in various languages on all key social platforms.
In general, as one of the directions of foreign policy, Ukraine should declare systematic support for the anti-colonial struggles of all nations enslaved by Russia without exception and not stop this work until every nation and every person in the Russian Empire becomes free, i.e. until the liquidation of the Russian Empire.
As part of this year’s Week of Enslaved Nations various initiatives, Ukrainian diaspora organizations, in particular ABN branches, plan to hold dozens of actions around the world to draw attention to the plight of nations enslaved by Russia, Russian imperialism and chauvinism. At the same time, the week of enslaved nations should grow into years of systematic work, which will certainly bring the necessary results.
