Over the past 15 to 20 years, the number of publications about the national policy of the Soviet state has increased dramatically in the United States. The growing interest of American bourgeois historians in these issues is largely due to political motives related to the problem of orientation of the "third world", with the search for contradictions and "centrifugal forces" within our country, with the desire to obscure in the eyes of the world community racial and national conflicts in our own country.

As you know, the national policy of the state is one of the essential indicators by which the peoples of other countries (especially those fighting for their independence) judge the advantages of a particular social system. The American sociologist A. Inkeles explicitly writes that national politics is one of the most important aspects of the comparative characteristics of the socialist and capitalist systems in the course of "peaceful competition" between them, especially in the eyes of the peoples of Asia and Africa. In this regard, he calls for further development in the United States of the study of national relations in the Soviet country1 . If in the 20s and 30s, for example, Ukrainian bourgeois nationalists - emigrants and their epigones-mainly spoke in the foreign press on the history of Ukraine, now these problems are reflected in the works of authors with a solid scientific reputation; If earlier, as the American historian S. Zenkovsky notes, Soviet Central Asia was mainly interested in In the 1950s, scientists turned their attention to this area in the form of "tourists and politicians" .2 The history of national relations in the USSR attracted the attention of many US academic institutions. Harvard University and its Russian Research Center have become "the main center for Russian-Islamist studies in the country." 3 Soviet national politics is also studied at the Russian Institute of Columbia University, Yale University, the Institute of Soviet and Eastern European Studies at John Carroll University, and others .4
American historians are particularly interested in the October Revolution and the first years of Soviet power on the national outskirts

1 A. Inkeles. Social Change in Soviet Russia. Cambridge (Mass.). 1968, p. 244.

2 S. Zenkovsky. American Research on Russia's Moslems. "The Russian Review", July, 1959, p. 201.

3 Ibid.

4 In 1960 - 1968, doctoral theses on this topic were prepared at Georgetown and California Universities, at the universities of Texas, Indiana, Columbia, Illinois, New York, and others (see The Slavic Review, 1964, No. 4, p. 807; 1965, No. 4, p. 754; 1966, N 4, pp. 712-713; 1967, N 4, p. 707: 1968, N 4, pp. 696-697).

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Russia, when the beginning of those transformations that led to the flourishing of the peoples of the USSR and the establishment of truly fraternal relations between them was laid. This period is described by American bourgeois historians as a continuation of the tsarist colonial policy and the beginning of"Soviet colonialism". The label "Soviet colonialism" is an old invention, but in the works of the 50s and 60s, reactionary authors make attempts to put a scientific base under it. For this purpose, they are developing a certain concept of Soviet national policy in our country in the first post-revolutionary years.

Over the past decade, Soviet researchers have published a number of works devoted entirely or partially to the analysis of the writings of bourgeois historians, including American historians, on national relations in our country in the post-revolutionary period5 . The subject of their criticism was the interpretation of either individual issues of Soviet national policy of that period, or its implementation in different regions of our country. To a lesser extent, they concerned the coverage in American literature of the question of the formation of the USSR .6 Given that the creation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in 1922 ended one of the most important periods of our party's national policy, it seems appropriate to critically analyze the American bourgeois interpretation of our party's national policy in 1917-1922.

In the most general terms, the concept of American historians is that 1917-1922. (the years of the formation and consolidation of Soviet power in our country, the defense of the October conquests by all Soviet peoples, and the creation of the world's first voluntary commonwealth of nations, the USSR) they portray as a period of "national liberation" movement of the peoples of the Russian borderlands against the "colonizing" "Russian" Soviet power, on the one hand, and the suppression of this movement by the Soviet authorities and the forced unification of nations into a "unitary and totalitarian" state, on the other hand. At the same time, three theses are strongly emphasized: the socialist revolution was "Russian", alien to the peoples of the national outskirts of Russia and was carried out contrary to their fundamental interests; after October, the Soviet government denied the peoples living on the outskirts the right to decide their fate, and they were "forcibly kept" within the "Russian" state; within it, they were deprived of the opportunity to arrange life according to their own interests. at will, since the Soviet autonomy and federation turned out to be supposedly fictitious.

One or another of these theses is usually found in every work of American bourgeois historians. Thus, the idea of "exporting the revolution" from the center to the outskirts is most openly preached

5 G. A. Galoyan. The Socialist Revolution in Transcaucasia in the Light of Bourgeois Historiography, Moscow, 1960; R. G. Simonenko. Проти сучасних зарубі;жних фальсифі;каторі;в і;сторі;ї; Украі;ни. Kiev; V. 1960; "Foreign literature about the October Revolution", Moscow, 1961; G. A. Khidoyatov. Modern English and American bourgeois literature on the Great October Socialist Revolution and the Civil War in Turkestan. "History of the USSR", 1961, N 3; his. Truth versus lies. Tashkent, 1964; Kh. Sh. Inoyatov. Answer to the falsifiers of the history of Soviet Central Asia and Kazakhstan. Tashkent, 1962; K. N. Novoselov. Against the bourgeois falsifiers of the history of Central Asia. Ashkhabad, 1962; L. P. Nagornaya. Проти сучасної; буржуазної; фальсифі;каці;ї; наці;ональної; полі;тики Комуні;стичної; парті;ї; Украї;ни в пері;од Жовтневої; революці;ї;. "Украї;нський і;сторичний журнал", 1965, N 11: ее же. Concerning some contemporary falsifications of the Bolshevik national program. "Kommunist Ukrainy", 1966, No. 9; D. Rzayev. Development of national relations in the republics of the Soviet East. Criticism of anti-communism in the national question. Frunze. 1968.

6 In fact, only S. I. Yakubovskaya paid attention to this issue in the introduction to her book "The Construction of the Union Soviet Socialist State (1922-1925)". Moscow, 1960.

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in books about Central Asia 7 . Among the works that deny the fact of free self-determination in the post-October period of the peoples of the former Russian Empire, a significant part is devoted to Ukraine .8 The most" comprehensive " in its subject matter, as well as from the point of view of the territorial one, is the work of one of the leaders of the Russian Center at Harvard University, R. Pipes .9 His book contains all three theses in full.

The methodology of the authors of all these works is characterized by the substitution of class facets for national ones: they set the Russians against all other nationalities, thereby obscuring the opposition of the class interests of the exploited and exploiters, and distorting the class content of the October Revolution as a decisive victory of the working people over the exploiters of all nationalities. This is the core of this concept, on which all its three main theses are strung.

Considering the October Revolution as "Russian" and hostile to the interests of other nationalities, American historians contrast it with the "national liberation movement" on the outskirts of Russia10, meaning counter - revolutionary, including bourgeois-nationalist movements. The struggle against counterrevolution (for example, against the armed detachments of the "Kokand autonomy" or the Basmach movement in Turkestan) is regarded by American historians as nothing more than a speech of the Soviet government against national aspirations. Meanwhile, it was precisely the October Revolution that expressed these aspirations. The Communist Party's program on the national question received the force of state law in the very first documents of the Soviet government: the " Appeal to the Workers, Soldiers and Peasants on the Victory of the October Revolution and its immediate Tasks," the decrees "On Peace" and "On the Formation of a Workers' and Peasants ' Government," and the "Declaration of the Rights of the Peoples of Russia." Following this, an "Appeal to all Muslim workers in Russia and the East" was published, which proclaimed: "From now on, your beliefs and customs, your national and cultural institutions are declared free and inviolable. Arrange your national life freely and without hindrance. You have the right to do so. Know that your rights, as well as the rights of all the peoples of Russia, are protected by the full power of the revolution and its organs, the Soviets of Workers', Soldiers 'and Peasants' Deputies. " 11 The rights and equality of nationalities were not only established legally, but also implemented practically as a result of introducing the indigenous population of the outskirts to participate in socio-political affairs, creating their own statehood, revolutionary solidarity and cooperation of peoples. All this is confirmed by the vast amount of factual material on the basis of which Soviet historians have exposed bourgeois speculations about the" inconsistency " of the October Revolution with the interests of the Soviet people.

7 A. Park. Bolshevism on Turkestan. 1917 - 1927. N. Y. 1957; M. Rywkin. Russia in Central Asia. N. Y. 1963; S. Zenkovsky. Pan-Turkism and Islam in Russia. 1905- 1920. Cambridge. 1960; R. Pierce. Russian Central Asia. 1867 - 1917. A Study in Colonial Rule. Berkeley - Los Angeles. 1960.

8 B. Dmytryshyn. Moscow and the Ukraine. 1918 - 1953. A Study of Russian Bolshevik National Policy. N. Y. 1956; A. Adams. Bolsheviks in the Ukraine. The Second Campaign. 1918 - 1919. New Haven - L. 1963; R. Sullivant. Soviet Politics and the Ukraine. 1917 - 1957. N. -Y. - L. 1962.

9 R. Pipes. The Formation of the Soviet Union. Communism and Nationalism. 1917 - 1923. Cambridge, 1964. R. Worth, in his article "On the Historiography of the Russian Revolution", describes this book as "a fundamental work on the nationalities of European Russia and Central Asia in the early years of Soviet rule" (R. Warth. On the Historiography of the Russian Revolution. "Slavic Review", 1967, N 2, p. 262).

10 A. Park. Op. cit., p. 22.

11 "Decrees of Soviet Power", Vol. I. Moscow, 1957, p. 114.

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peoples of the borderlands, convincingly showing its national liberation character 12 .

As for the movements that American historians call "national liberation", they did not meet the aspirations of the peoples of the outskirts. The social composition of the" Kokand government " (representatives of the Muslim and Russian bourgeoisie, landowners, clergy) and its program (restoration of private ownership of enterprises and land, etc.) show that the "Kokand autonomy" could not express the interests of the population of Turkestan. 13 The anti-people, anti-national nature of Basmachism is evidenced by the connections of Basmachians with the Russian White Guards, with American and British interventionists, 14 as well as the fact that this movement was led by the leaders of the defeated "Kokand autonomy"15 .

By denying the national liberation content of the October Revolution, American bourgeois historians are trying to refute its popular character, that is, the fact that it took place in the interests of the working masses of the oppressed nationalities, who made up a significant part of the population of our country.

As is well known, the progressive realization of transformations that meet the interests of all the peoples of Russia, and the radical solution of the national question, was possible only thanks to the vanguard role of the proletariat in the socialist revolution, and its close alliance with the peasantry, both Russian and other nationalities. How do bourgeois authors interpret this question?

A. Adams, R. Pipes, and R. Sullivan dispute the reality of the Bolsheviks ' proclaimed alliance of the working class with the peasantry. They write about the "domination" of" non-Ukrainian "towns over the Ukrainian countryside, and about the" anti-Russian "and" anti-City " struggles of the Ukrainian people .16 The denial of the popular character of the October Revolution is thus closely connected with the perversion of the basic principle of the dictatorship of the proletariat.

In reality, in 1917-1922, it was not the Russians who opposed the Ukrainians, nor the working class to the peasantry, but the bourgeoisie to the working class. The outcome of the struggle between them largely depended on the strengthening of the alliance between the working class and the peasantry. V. I. Lenin pointed out that "for some time the counter-revolution could win in Siberia and in the Ukraine, because the bourgeoisie was successful in the struggle for influence among the peasants; but a very short period was enough to open the eyes of the peasants"17 . In the Ukraine at that time, the process of stratification of the countryside and the intensification of the class struggle in it was going on. The working part of the peasantry had no illusions about the ability of the bourgeoisie to resolve the land question. As a result of the implementation of the Lenin Decree

12 See the decree. works of H. Sh. Inoyatova, K. N. Novoselova, and G. A. Khidoyatova. In the same works, the bourgeois interpretation of the Basma movement is subjected to reasoned criticism.

13 See D. I. Manzhara. Revolutionary Movement in Central Asia 1905-1920 Tashkent, 1934, p. 83.

14 See L. M. Landa. American imperialism is an active organizer of anti-Soviet intervention in Central Asia. "Proceedings" of the Museum of History of the Uzbek SSR. Issue 2. Tashkent, 1954.

15 The significant scope of the Basmach movement at certain moments of the civil war in Turkestan is explained by the fact that the local population did not immediately realize the essence of Soviet power. The counter-revolutionary forces actively used this moment to confuse the dark, prejudiced people. For more information, see: A. I. Zevelev. From the history of the civil war in Uzbekistan. Tashkent, 1959; A. Kokanbaev. Fight against Basmachism and consolidation of Soviet power in Ferghana. Tashkent, 1958.

16 A. Adams. Op. cit., p. 10; R. Pipes. Op. cit., p. 116; R. Sullivant. Op. cit., p. 24.

17 V. I. Lenin. PSS. Vol. 44, p. 43.

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The Land Law, which gave the Ukrainian peasantry more than 15 million hectares of land, and other measures taken by the Soviet government in the interests of the Ukrainian people.18 The working peasants gradually inclined to the side of the Bolsheviks.

Throughout its history (as evidenced by party documents and numerous well-known statements of V. I. Lenin), the Communist Party considered the alliance of the working class with the peasantry as a necessary condition for the victory of the socialist revolution and the construction of socialism. The Soviet system was established and consolidated on the national borderlands precisely because of the alliance of the working class with the local peasant population, who joined the revolution and understood its popular character, that is, because the national liberation movement of the peoples of Russia became part of the socialist revolution.

While denying that the aims of the October Revolution corresponded to the fundamental interests of the working masses of the national borderlands and that they took an active part in the revolution, bourgeois historians cannot ignore the obvious results of this process: the establishment of Soviet power throughout Russia, the victory over the external and internal counter-revolution, and the strengthening of the political alliance between its peoples. In order to somehow explain these phenomena, they put forward the thesis that the Soviet government "violated" the right of nations to self-determination. A. Park, M. Rybkin and other "experts" on the history of Central Asia try to present the case as if the Soviet government won there not as a result of the correct national policy of the party, but was established by military force R. Pipes, B. Dmitrishin, and R. Sullivan also state that the Soviet government in Ukraine relied only on military force and did not enjoy the active support of the masses; they portray the struggle against counterrevolution as an "intervention", as the actions of the "Russian" Red Army against the Ukrainian people .19
In reality, Ukrainian workers perceived the participation of military units from central Russia in the battle for Soviet Ukraine during the Civil War as helping in the fight against a common enemy. It was a military-political union of the peoples of Ukraine and Russia, based on the unity of the interests of the working people of both republics and the need for mutual military assistance. In addition, a massive insurgent-partisan movement existed and expanded in Ukraine, the significance of which American historians are trying in every possible way to belittle. They also "forget" about the local Red Guard, the mass voluntary entry of local residents into the Red Army, and the creation of their own armed forces in Soviet Ukraine in January 1918 .20 The Red Army, Red Guard, and partisan units were instrumental in both class and national self-determination of the Ukrainian people .21 Armed defense of the Great's conquests

18 For more information, see: M. A. Rubach. Essays on the history of the revolutionary transformation of agrarian relations in Ukraine. Kiev, 1956; N. I. Suprunenko. Essays on the history of the Civil War and foreign military intervention in Ukraine, Moscow, 1966.

19 A. Park. Op. cit., p. 12; M. Rywkin. Op. cit., pp. 44 - 45; R. Pipes. Op. cit., p. 126; B. Dmytryshyn. Op. cit., pp. 38 - 39: R. Sullivant. Op. cit., p. 26.

20 See Decree of the Soviet Government of Ukraine of January 20, 1918 "On the organization of the People's Revolutionary Socialist Army". "Essays on the history of the Communist Party of Ukraine". Kiev, 1964, p. 223.

21 Numerous sources of information about this are contained in collections of documents published in Ukraine. See The struggle of the workers of Chernihiv region for the Power of the Soviets (1917-1919). Collection of documents and materials. Chernihiv. 1957, p. 69 - 70, 72 - 73, 101 - 105 et al.; " Workers of the Poltava region in the struggle for the establishment and consolidation of Soviet power (1917-1920)". Collection of documents and materials. Poltava. 1957, pp. 71, 119, 122-123, etc.; "Kharkiv and Kharkiv province in the Great October Socialist Revolution".-

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October was at the same time a defense of the path of national development chosen by the people.

The right of nations to secede proclaimed by Soviet law was confirmed both by the Soviet Government's recognition of the independence of Ukraine, Belarus, and other republics, and by the facts of the secession of certain nations (Poland, Finland). However, the overwhelming majority of nations decided to unite in a multinational Soviet state. Only the political and national self-determination of peoples can explain the fact that Soviet power has spread throughout the country and that the revolutionary solidarity of nations in the overwhelming majority of cases has proved stronger than the hostility between them generated by tsarism.

American historians deny that the unification of the Soviet republics into the Soviet Union is voluntary. R. Pipes and E. Goodman22 portray the unification movement of the peoples of Soviet Russia as a forced "integration from above", ignore the main objective reason that prompted the peoples to form a close union - the need for economic unity and joint actions to protect themselves from the capitalist encirclement. Bourgeois authors ignore the fact that Ukraine, Belarus, and other Soviet republics themselves raised the question of a federal link with the RSFSR. The recognition by the Government of the RSFSR of the independence of these republics was followed by their statements about the need for federal relations with Russia .23
The existence of contractual relations between the Soviet republics, which expressed a certain stage in the unification movement, does not, however, encourage R. Pipes to reconsider his thesis about "forced" unification "from above", although here there is clearly an agreement of equal participants. Moreover, Pipes claims that Russia allegedly deprived other Soviet republics of their People's commissariats, replaced their decrees with those of the RSFSR, and thus imposed its authority on the" conquered " states .24 This distorts the significance of the Russian nation and the Russian Federation as a whole for the peoples of other Soviet republics. The Russian people led the revolution, showed other nations an example of social transformation, and played a vanguard role in the struggle against the enemies of the revolution. The Russian Federation was the first-and successful - example of a multinational State built on new, Soviet principles. Therefore, the historical role of Russia as the center of the economic life of a certain set of republics was recognized by them without any previous distrust and with a willingness to consolidate this role in certain legal norms. The republics felt the direct benefits of the leadership role of the RSFSR, its BCIC and SNK, and their selfless, selfless help.

An important form of assistance to the RSFSR republics was the transfer of revolutionary experience to them. Proclaiming the independence of Belarus in August 1920, its government declared that this republic is built on the principles of "the dictatorship of the proletariat and the use of all the experience of Soviet Russia"25 . The declaration of the Provisional Workers 'and Peasants' Government of Ukraine in January 1919 stated: "Taking advantage of the rich

Russian Revolution (February 1917-April 1918)". Collection of documents and materials Kharkov, 1957, p. 366 - 367, 369, 386 - 387, 401 - 402 et al.; " The Civil War in Ukraine. 1918 - 1920". Collection of documents and materials. In 3 volumes. Vol. I, part I. Kiev 1967, p. 53 - 54, 57, 72, 95, 109, 281 - 287, 296 and so on.

22 R. Pipes. Op. cit.; E. Goodman. The Soviet Design for a World State N. Y. 1960.

23 " Congresses of Soviets in documents. 1917-1936"; Vol. II. Moscow, 1960, pp. 17, 187 222 232.

24 R. Pipes. Op. cit., pp. 252-253; see also A. Adams Op. cit., p. 398.

25 "History of the Soviet Constitution, 1917-1956", Moscow, 1957, p. 236.

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According to the experience and legislation of the RSFSR, the Ukrainian government nationalizes industry and confiscates landlords', kulaks', and monastic lands in order to place them at the disposal of landless and landless peasants. " 26 The declaration further stated that the Ukrainian government, using the experience of the RSFSR, "distributes in Ukraine all measures adopted in this area in Russia"27 . It was the republics that initiated the dissemination of legislative norms of the RSFSR on their territory .28 At the same time, it should be emphasized that the Central Committee of our Party and V. I. Lenin personally constantly warned against blind copying of all the details of the experience of the RSFSR, demanded that the national specifics of the republics be taken into account, and resolutely opposed any infringement of their sovereignty .29
The formation of the Union of Soviet Republics on a federal basis is considered by R. Pashts as a compromise between the "centralizing tendency" of the Bolsheviks and the desire to "neutralize the nationalist feelings of minorities". He explains V. I. Lenin's negative attitude to the project of " autonomization "as a desire to facilitate in the future"the conquest of nationalist movements on the side of the Bolsheviks in the so-called colonial and semi-colonial territories" .30 The facts tell a very different story. When deciding on the creation of the U.S.S.R., the party also took into account the objective necessity of unification and the will of the republics. There was no contradiction between these two factors - objective and subjective: the desire of the republics to create the USSR was based on the fact that the peoples of our country were deeply aware of the objective need for unification. Therefore, there can be no question of any "compromise". The fact that this was the will of the peoples was revealed at numerous crowded meetings of working people of all nationalities, 31 which bourgeois historians prefer to keep silent about.

As for V. I. Lenin's negative assessment of the project of "autonomization", it was explained by the fact that he was striving for the steady implementation of the party program on the national question, for which it was necessary to go beyond the already known model - the RSFSR. Unification on the basis of the voluntary union of republics was a convincing confirmation of the consistency in the implementation of Lenin's national policy. It is quite natural that such a policy should win over the nationalities to the side of socialism.

Bourgeois authors constantly misrepresent the leading role of the Communist Party. American Sovietologists claim that only the "decentralization" of the party would make truly federal relations possible .32 The unity of the party and the unity of all its detachments were and are determined by the tasks of the class struggle and the interests of socialism. It is therefore quite obvious that the bourgeois interpreters of Soviet national policy are not concerned with "truly federal relations". Their recommendations are clearly subversive, since they are directed against the most important condition for ensuring the success of the cause of socialism - the unity of the Communist Party.

26 Ibid., p. 184.

27 "Education of the USSR". Collection of documents. 1917-1924. Moscow-L. 1949, p. 80.

28 See, for example, D. L. Zlatopolsky. Education and Development of the USSR as a Union State, Moscow, 1954, pp. 103-105.

29 See S. I. Yakubovskaya. Edict. soch., p. 123; S. Gililov. V. I. Lenin-organizer of the Soviet Multinational State. Moscow, 1960, p. 145-146.

30 R. Pipes. Op. cit, pp. 272, 296.

31 See, for example, Izvestia for December 1922.

32 R. Pipes. Op. cit., p. 246; see also A. Low. Lenin on the Question of Nationality. N. Y. 1958, p. 101.

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Thus, the American bourgeois concept of national relations in the USSR in the post-October period is directed against the vanguard role of the proletariat, the alliance of the working class with the peasantry, the leading role and unity of the Communist Party, that is, against those principles of Marxism-Leninism, the implementation of which ensures the victory of the socialist revolution.

The unseemly goal of American historians-to prove the "colonialist" character of the October Revolution and Soviet power-also implies unscrupulousness of means. However, the transition of questions concerning national relations and national politics in the USSR from the competence of journalists and tourists to the competence of scientists required the rejection of the most crude methods of falsification, which are clearly incompatible with science, and the development of a system of evidence that has a more or less scientific appearance.

Among the argumentation techniques used by American historians, the most common is the tendentious combination of some real facts and their arbitrary interpretation. American historians have a tendency to absolutize facts, which creates the picture they need. At the same time, other, more significant, often defining facts are left in the shadows. For example, the opposition in Ukraine of Russians to Ukrainians, the city to the countryside, the working class to the peasantry is achieved by absolutizing the fact that in a number of Ukrainian cities the Russian population prevailed. In other words, it equates the "Russian population", "urban population" and "working class" in Ukraine, and does not take into account the presence of Russian and Ukrainian bourgeoisie in the city, Ukrainian and Russian landlords in the countryside. As for the working class of Ukraine, two-thirds of them were Ukrainians .33 Using the same technique and making absolute the backwardness of Turkestan and the underdevelopment of class differentiation in it, American historians make an incorrect conclusion about the patriarchal community of interests of its population34, about the" alienness "of the October Revolution for him and about the" export of the revolution " to Turkestan from the center of Russia.

Omission of crucial facts is a technique that bourgeois historians cannot dispense with when they try to accuse the Soviet authorities of pursuing a colonialist policy. Thus, they do not say that the Communist Party and the Soviet Government immediately after the revolution set out to develop the economy of Turkestan, to raise its culture, to eliminate its backwardness, and to create conditions for genuine national equality there. Numerous data on the shipment of industrial equipment from central Russia to Turkestan, on measures for the development of irrigation and cotton growing, on the sending of equipment for schools, on personnel assistance, on the opening of the first higher educational institutions in the history of Central Asia, and so on are contained in collections of documents, periodicals ,and works of Soviet historians. 35 But bourgeois authors are silent about them precisely because such information completely destroys their thesis of a "colonialist policy" Soviet power.

What do American historians base this thesis on? They usually speculate on cases of arbitrariness that some people have committed

33 See A. A. Borodin. Communist Party of Ukraine - a combat unit of the CPSU in the struggle for the implementation of its policy (1917-1945). Kiev, 1967, p. 50.

34 What common interests can we talk about if 233 thousand peasant farms in the Ferghana region had 98 thousand dessiatines of land before the revolution, and 16 thousand Bay farms-311 thousand dessiatines (V. P. Kharin. The Great October Socialist Revolution in Uzbekistan. Tashkent, 1958, p. 10).

35 "Preparation and conduct of the Great October Socialist Revolution in Uzbekistan". Collection of documents. Tashkent, 1947; K. E. Zhitov. Victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution in Uzbekistan. Tashkent, 1957, and others.

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local leaders in relation to representatives of indigenous nationalities. Such phenomena had nothing to do with the policy of the Communist Party except that it resolutely fought and overcame them. The party line was to harshly criticize those workers who had not yet abandoned the colonialist psychology inherited from the old days, or who, through inexperience, underestimated the importance of the national question. 36 Local party bodies corrected the mistakes made, constantly checking their course with the principles of the RCP (b). With the help of the Central Committee of the RCP(b), the mistake of the Third Congress of Soviets of Turkestan (November 1917) was corrected, which included in its declaration, along with the correct slogans, the wording "unacceptable inclusion of Muslims at present" in the highest authorities of the republic, reflecting the political immaturity of the congress participants, as well as its social and ideological heterogeneity .37 American historians, referring to this decision, accuse the Bolsheviks of unwillingness to share power with the "Muslims", in an effort to preserve the disenfranchisement of the latter .38 It was with the help of the Central Committee of the Party that another deviation from the line of the RCP (b), which was allowed by the First Congress of the Communist Party of Turkestan and consisted in underestimating dehkanismus as a revolutionary force, was eliminated .39 American authors, however, pass off this underestimation as a principled position of the party 40 . Thus, deviations from the party's line appear in their interpretation as its line, and mistakes of local organizations are interpreted as mistakes of the entire party. Attempts are also made to attribute to the Bolsheviks the mistakes of others and even the actions of direct enemies of the revolution.

In the first years after the revolution, both the Soviets and the party organizations of the national suburbs were often "littered" with alien elements. In his speech at the Third Congress of the Communist Party of Turkestan (1919), a representative of the Ferghana organization noted: "In Andijan, Osh, and Kokand, there were cases when former police officers, gendarmes, and many other criminal elements were present in our party organizations."41 In essence, it was a form of class struggle: realizing that the Soviet government was strong precisely with the support of the people, the enemies sought to corrupt it from within, discredit it in the eyes of the local population. However, all their attempts ultimately failed. In search of facts compromising the revolution, A. Park refers 42 to the letter of a Muslim poor man, read out at the Third Congress of the Communist Party of Turkestan, which contains really egregious examples of lawlessness towards the national poor by local authorities. But the very fact that this document was announced at the party congress shows that the party fought against such phenomena 43.

36 See the circular letter of the Central Committee of the RCP(b) to all organizations of the Communist Party of Turkestan on the next tasks of the KPT in the field of Soviet construction dated August 12, 1920. "From the history of the Civil War in the USSR", vol. III, Moscow, 1961, pp. 573-575.

37 "Materials and documents of the First Congress of the Communist Party of Turkestan". Application. Tashkent, 1934, p. 18; " To the Soviets of Kazan, Ufa, Orenburg, Yekaterinburg, the Council of People's Commissars of the Turkestan Region and others (Appeal of the People's Commissariat for Nationalities)". "The History of the Soviet Constitution. 1917-1956", pp. 120-122; Resolution of the Organizing Bureau of the Central Committee of the RCP (b) of July 9, 1919 "On attracting the native population to state activities". "Turkestan Communist", 20. VII. 1919.

38 A. Park, Op. cit, p. 13; S. Zenkvsky. Op. cit., pp. 232 - 233.

39 "Materials and documents of the First Congress of the Communist Party of Turkestan", p. 50; "CPSU in resolutions and decisions of congresses, conferences and plenums of the Central Committee". Vol. 2. Ed. 8, pp. 54-55.

40 A. Park. Op. cit., p. 379.

41 "Proceedings of the Third Congress of the Communist Party of the Turkestan Republic of the Russian Soviet Federation". Tashkent, 1919, p. 73.

42 A. Park, Op. cit., p. 37.

43 "Proceedings of the Third Congress of the Communist Party of the Turkestan Republic of the Russian Soviet Federation", pp. 105-108.

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he does not mention that the author of the letter reports on the desire of the Muslim poor to fight against the counter-revolution, in spite of everything, and on the faith with which this letter was written in the Soviet government and the party.

American historians do not want to admit that all the difficulties and complications, all the deviations from the party line that took place in Turkestan and other national territories at that time, were overcome thanks to the correct Leninist policy of our party. When bourgeois authors are unable to conceal the facts that show this, they resort to another common method of distorting the truth - to classify these facts as "concessions to nationalities." 44 For American historians specializing in Ukraine, the category of" tactical concessions " includes the elimination of excesses in the Ukrainian countryside, the development of Ukrainian culture, the fight against great-power-chauvinist deviations from the party line, and the recognition by the Soviet government of Russia of the sovereignty and independence of the Ukrainian Republic .45 But the significance of these issues for the people of Ukraine convinces us that this is not about "concessions" or "tactics", but about the party's principled line on the national question.

Along with specific methods of argumentation, bourgeois scientists resort to a peculiar selection of sources. The appearance of objectivity is created with the help of a solid reference device, voluminous bibliographic indexes containing literature of various fields. An analysis of the sources used by American authors writing about the first five years of Soviet power on the national outskirts shows that they use the evidence of foreign intelligence officers and interventionists (F. Bailey, V. Malleson, etc.), Russian emigrants, and especially bourgeois nationalists. Some works are written entirely on the basis of surveys of "refugees" from the Soviet Union .46 An" authoritative figure "for bourgeois authors is B. Khait, a native of Uzbekistan, who betrayed his homeland during the Great Patriotic War and then worked in West Germany as a "specialist" in the history of Central Asia. R. Pipes in the annotated bibliography to his book "The Formation of the Soviet Union "(section "Turkestan, Khiva, Bukhara") He calls B. Khait's work "the best study" of the early period of the revolution in Turkestan, " despite its extreme anti-Russian (read: anti-Soviet. - I. Z. ) mood". In second place in terms of "scientific value" R. Pipes puts the book of J. Castanier 47 , who in 1917-1918 was active in anti - Soviet organizations in Tashkent and was associated with British agents. In the same list Pipes has a book by the national deviator (later Trotskyist) G. Safarov " The Colonial Revolution. Experience of Turkestan" (Moscow, 1921). It is also actively used by other bourgeois authors, as it contains a selection of the facts they need. However, in their coverage, American authors go further than Safarov. If the latter writes about the "colonizing appearance" of the dictatorship of the proletariat, then modern falsifiers of history - about the same essence of it. G. Safarov blames "colonization" on the Turkestan leadership in the first period of the revolution and notes that it was outlived after the establishment of strong ties with central Russia as a result of intervention and assistance from the Central Committee of the RCP(b). American historians all their arguments lead to the fact that "colonization" is the general line of development of relations

44 M. Kywkin. Op. cit., p. 59; A. Park. Op. cit., p. 53.

45 A. Adams. Op. cit., pp. 395 - 397; R. Pipes. Op. cit., pp. 147 - 148.

46 For example, R. Bauer, A. Inkeles, C. Kluckhohn. Now the Soviet System Works. Cambridge. 1956; F. Barghoorn. Soviet Russian Nationalism. N. Y. 1956.

47 R. Pipes. Op. cit., p. 319.

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between Russia and the peoples of the borderlands (in this case, Central Asia). In addition, they reject those facts presented by Mr. Safarov that do not fit in with their scheme.

The bourgeois-nationalist literature is almost entirely based on, for example, I. Maistrenko [48] and J. Kropotkin. Reshetar (both come from white-immigrant Ukrainian families), Pipes, Zenkovsky and some other authors actively attract her. Soviet historians, especially Ukrainian historians, have convincingly proved that bourgeois-nationalist writings play an essential role in the arsenal of modern bourgeois authors who write about the October Revolution on the national outskirts .49 However, R. Pipes, A. Adams, and others do not simply repeat the bourgeois-nationalist point of view. As V. V. Lebedev and A. O. Chubaryan rightly point out, "the old primitive methods - the use of obvious forgeries and relying only on White Guard and emigrant literature - proved to be untenable and failed"50 . Therefore," respectable " American authors were forced to expand the range of their sources at the expense of Soviet publications. In bibliographic indexes to books and in references, they now often point to works published in the USSR. Of the 212 publications attracted by A. Adams, 116 are Soviet, and of the 24 collections of documents named by him, 16 were published in our country .51 R. Pipes lists 24 works as" general studies on Soviet national policy", including 13 Soviet ones. According to the section related to the October Revolution in Ukraine, of the 89 works listed by him, 63 are Soviet 52 .

However, American historians are less likely to turn to modern Soviet historical literature. Of the 36 monographs of Soviet historians included in the index, 24 were written by the same Adams in 1919-1928 .53 In Pipes ' section on the October Revolution in Ukraine, 54 of the 63 Soviet works he named were published between 1917 and 1929. All the 24 books included in the index on the October Revolution in certain regions of Ukraine also relate to the 20s54 .

Why are these bourgeois authors so willing to use our literature of the 1920s? The Soviet historiography of those years is distinguished by its special criticism caused by the struggle with various biases and the acute political situation. This was the time of the formation of Soviet historical science 55 . The half-memoir nature of the works of that time (the authors described those facts and events that they personally observed, often not being able to correctly assess their place in history).-

48 Thus, in section III of Maistrenko's book (J. Majstrenko, Borotbism. A Chapter in the History of Ukrainian Communism. N.Y. 1954) out of 49 references, 47 refer the reader to the Ukrainian bourgeois nationalists P. Hristyuk, M. Shapoval and V. Vinnichenko (R. G. Simonenko. Проти буржуазно-наці;оналі;стичних фальсифі;каці;й і;сторі;ї; Украї;ни. "Украї;нський і;сторичний журнал", 1958, N 3, стр. 159).

49 See R. G. Simonenko. Edict. op.; V. M. Samofalov. Викриття буржуазно- наці;оналі;стичної; фальсифі;каці;ї; і;сторі;ї; перемоги Жовтневої; революці;ї; на Украї;ні;. "Киї;вська обласна партийна органі;заці;я до 50-рі;ччя Великого Жовтня". Киї;в. 1967; "Соці;алі;стична ді;йсні;сть і; наці;оналі;стичні; вигадки". Киї;в. 1968.

50 V. V. Lebedev, A. O. Chubaryan. Against the anti-scientific coverage of the history of the October Revolution in modern bourgeois historiography of the USA and Great Britain, Moscow, 1959, p. 4.

51 A. Adams. Op. cit., pp. 409 - 426.

52 R. Pipes. Op. cit., pp. 305 - 306, 312 - 315.

53 A. Adams. Op. cit., pp. 417 - 420.

54 R. Pipes. Op. cit., pp. 305 - 306, 312 - 315.

55 M. V. Nechkina. On the periodization of Soviet historical science. "History of the USSR", 1960, N 1, p. 87; A. I. Zevelev. Historiography of Soviet Turkestan (Historiography and sources on the history of the Civil War in Turkestan). Tashkent, 1968, pp. 41-42.

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the lack of systematization of documentary sources and polemical exaggerations in generalizations and conclusions - all this requires a careful approach to such materials. But it is precisely these features that determine the increased interest of American authors in this literature. They are also attracted by its other characteristic feature. "In the literature on the history of the civil war, published in the 1920s by Ukrainian historical institutes," stated the Ukrainian Soviet researcher V. G. Sarbey, " the main attention was paid to exposing the enemies of the proletarian revolution, and the struggle of the working people of Ukraine against counter-revolution and intervention was given much less space. Works devoted to the participation of the masses in the struggle for Soviet power began to be published in the late 1920s. " 56 A similar flaw is inherent in the literature of those years and in Turkestan, and this is in the hands of bourgeois authors who deny the participation of the masses in the October Revolution. At the same time, many Soviet works related to the first post-revolutionary years contain a lot of factual material that contradicts the conclusions of bourgeois historians, but they prefer to "ignore" it. This is another evidence of their biased approach to the use of these works, the unscientific methods they use.

The desire of American bourgeois authors to attract Soviet publications as sources is connected with the need to use more sophisticated methods of falsifying history. Therefore, Soviet scholars who criticize bourgeois historiography should concentrate their efforts primarily on exposing these subtle methods of distorting historical truth. It also seems essential to pay special attention to the acute and complex issues that are the object of speculation in bourgeois science when working out the problems of the October Revolution on the national borderlands.

The aim of all the constructions of American bourgeois scientists dealing with Soviet national politics is to prove that the interests of national development and communism are incompatible. This juxtaposition fully coincides with the efforts of modern bourgeois propaganda to restore the peoples who are waging an anti-imperialist struggle against socialism. Bourgeois ideologues attach particular importance to discrediting communism precisely as a system that satisfies the interests of all nationalities. The propaganda needs of today, the discrediting of socialism and communism are the main goal that American bourgeois historians also set for themselves, as active participants in the ideological struggle aimed at slowing down the progressive movement of peoples. However, the bourgeois falsifiers are opposed by the very trend of historical development that has led the multinational population of our country to political, economic and cultural prosperity, to moral and political unity, and to the joint construction of a communist society.

56 V. G. Sarbey. І;спарти та і;х мі;сце в розвитку і;сторичної; науки. "Украї;нський і;сторичний журнал", 1967, N 1, стр, 9.

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