Another factor that played into Stalin's hands was
that during previous years, the intellectual elite
had been destroyed through repression,
especially the "alims" - Islamic spiritual leaders
and educators. A total of 10 thousand alims were
killed. They were replaced by Muslim clerics,
often simultaneously agents of Soviet
intelligence (Prokhvesora, 2023b). They
persuaded the people to submit to deportation.
During the forced resettlement, the Chechens
faced hunger, cold, disorganization, and
humiliation. Mass deaths began on the way.
According to Mayrbek Taramov's estimates, the
deportation claimed the lives of about half of the
Chechen people. During his years in exile in
Kazakhstan at the age of six, he barely survived.
He was saved by the recently invented drug at the
time, penicillin (Prokhvesora, 2023b).
As a talented writer and the author of several
books on the history and modernity of Chechnya,
Mayrbek Taramov left poignant memories of his
childhood in Kazakhstan (in the town of
Mikhaylovka, Jambul region) in the book
"Nothing is Forgotten, Nobody is Forgiven!"
Among other things, the publication includes a
story about how the hero's family's cow,
Chernushka, was abducted – the only nurse for
nine children. The search for the cow brought
together all local Chechens led by elders.
Gypsies living nearby also joined them. "The
tragic news instantly spread throughout the
village, and all Chechens from the same village
began to gather in our yard, led by the elders.
Gypsies from the camp in the valley also joined.
The elders suggested creating three groups of
people who should go in three directions. The
southern side was bordered by a river that the
cattle thief was unlikely to cross. Somewhere
after noon, messengers started returning. One of
the groups brought the stolen cow and the cattle
thief" (Prokhvesora, 2023b), the author noted.
In turn, the homes abandoned by the warm
previous owners were often resettled by other
unfortunate people – forcibly deported ones. It is
worth noting that Stalin mixed the indigenous
peoples of the Caucasus as he pleased. The
Kumyks – a Turkic indigenous people who lived
in separate areas of Chechnya, Ossetia, and
Ingushetia – were settled massively in place of
the Chechens. In April 1944, the Kumyks began
to be resettled in the villages from which the
Chechens had been expelled (Prokhvesora,
2023b).
April 1944 became tragic for another freedom-
loving indigenous people of Crimea – the
Crimean Tatars, also broadly accused by the
Stalinist regime of collaboration with German
Nazism. In the 1930s, Crimean Tatars were one
of the nations most systematically subjected to
repression, but the worst was yet to come. On
May 11, 1944, Stalin signed a special decree of
the State Defense Committee of the USSR No.
5859 titled "On the Crimean Tatars," which
envisaged the eviction of the indigenous
Crimeans under the pretext of their "betrayal of
the homeland" (Hrabovskyi, 2008).
The next day, Red Army units occupied the entire
territory of the peninsula, and on May 18, the so-
called "special operation" began, during which
191 thousand Crimean Tatars were deported
from Crimea in just two days. Their new,
unwelcome destinations were Uzbekistan,
Kazakhstan, the Mari Autonomous Republic, and
six other regions of Russia. The elderly, women,
and children were transported in freight cars, and
once again, the relocation was accompanied by
mass deaths (Hrabovskyi, 2008).
The deportation of Crimean Tatars followed the
patterns of scenarios tested a few months earlier
in Kalmykia and the Caucasus. Upon arrival at
their destinations, the evacuees were given the
status of "special resettlers" and were placed in
special "ghettos" or "special settlements," where
leaving the territory was prohibited without a
special pass. The indigenous Crimean Tatars
were forced to work in logging, construction,
mines, and local collective farms. Demobilized
soldiers and officers returning from the Red
Army front also obtained the aforementioned
status. The incredibly harsh living conditions of
the deported people led to the death of
approximately half of those forcibly removed
from Crimea. The tragedy of the Crimean Tatars,
in which about 46% of the indigenous people
perished, received the name "Sürgün" (from the
Crimean Tatar "Sürgün" – "exile") (Hrabovskyi,
2008).
Simultaneously, the diabolical "Stalinist mixer"
was at work. In the fall of 1944, 64 thousand
collective farmers from Russia, Ukraine, and
Belarus were hastily settled in place of the
deported Crimean Tatars (Hrabovskyi, 2008).
As noted by the well-known Crimean activist
Ayder Muzhdabaev, the forced deportation of his
people in 1944 became a reliable "vaccination"
against any "charm" and longing for Soviet
times. It was the Crimean Tatars, allowed to
return to Crimea in the late 80s and early 90s,
who became staunch supporters of
independence, voting massively for Vyacheslav