[2.8. First Stalinist terror wave - all plans for
Biro-Bidjan / Birobidzhan end in smoke 1936]
[1935-1936: First Stalinist terror
wave - Biro-Bidjan / Birobidzhan is not an aim any more]
However, fate intervened. The documents themselves are meager, and we
can only rely on Rosen's cables advising JDC that difficulties had
arisen, that postponements were essential, and that negotiations were
proceeding. This, one must remember, was the period of the first great
wave of Stalinist terror, after the assassination of Kirov in December
1934.
It would seem that those who had proposed the scheme to Rosen were the
very persons who belonged to the forces that were destined to be
purged; the Stalinist bureaucracy and ideology were hardly susceptible
to the kind of argument advanced in favor of mass Jewish immigration
into the Soviet Union.
On October 21, 1935, Rosen cabled that under the pressure of certain
government departments, COMZET insisted that foreign organizations
should not carry on direct operative work in Biro-Bidjan but should
confine themselves to merely helping immigrants come to Russia; the
actual development and settlement work there should be carried on by
government agencies. "We prefer keeping out of Biro-Bidjan altogether
until attitudes are changed or substantially modified."
(End note 49: AJ 99)
[23th July 1936: Rosen reports
that Stalin instigates a process wave against Jewish immigrants]
With Biro-Bidjan no longer on the agenda, various palliatives were
considered. The negotiations dragged on throughout the spring and
summer of 1936, until they finally exploded in July. In a final letter,
dated July 23, 1936, Rosen attributes the failure to the changed
situation, internationally and internally.
One of the German Jewish doctors
whom we brought in is being accused of having been in the service of
the Gestapo, and two of (p.96)
the Polish Jewish immigrants have been exposed as informers of the
Polish Intelligence Service. These Polish Jews came in not through us,
but the effect as far as the government is concerned is the same. In
the case of the Jewish doctor, it is possible that he had been
denounced by his father-in-law, who is an Aryan and a Nazi official.
... It is true that one out of over 100 doctors is a small percentage
but, as the Russians say, "One drop of tar spoils a barrel of honey."
[Rosen's critics against JDC that
they never said "Thank you" to Stalin]
Rosen still had hopes that Litvinov's influence might change the
negative attitude of officialdom, but he also accused JDC of never
giving favorable publicity to the Soviet help for Russian Jewry. "We
have never really helped the Russians to make political capital on
their Jewish policy." He proposed to remedy this by having Herbert
Samuel express to the Soviet ambassador in London the thanks of Jews
all over the world for the immigration opportunities already afforded
to Jewish refugees;
(End note 50: Ibid. [AJ 99])
this suggestion was not acted upon. Nor did Litvinov seem to be able to
help very much.
[Stalin's persecution mania
against foreigners]
Russian suspicion of the foreigner and his works was transformed into a
collective persecution mania under Stalin, and the immigration project
was allowed to die quietly.
[10 Sep 1937: Rosen reports the
immigration plan to Biro-Bidjan / Birobidzhan is dropped]
On September 10, 1937, Rosen declared that the Russians had dropped the
idea, and he added that he himself would not have the courage to
suggest an immigration project at that point.
(End note 51: AJ 35a)
The whole affair was never made public, then or later, but it shows
clearly which way the collective mind of JDC was turning. The solution
of the Polish problem was its major preoccupation. Only the 1936/7 wave
of terror in Russia made Rosen declare that even he would not have the
courage to bring additional Jews into the Soviet Union under the
circumstances then prevailing.
