861.00/12010: Telegram
The Ambassador in the Soviet Union (Standley) to the Secretary of State
[Received May 14—4:43 a.m.]
440. Third All-Slav Congress in Moscow.73 The Third All-Slav Congress held in Moscow on May 9th received almost the entire space in Pravda for May 10th.
Pravda printed an account of the meeting, the appeal of the Congress to the Slavs of the world and a leading editorial thereon, and the speeches of the Soviet and other delegates, with their photographs.
The description of the meeting emphasized the representative character of the assemblage, its symbolism of the unity of world Slavdom against Fascist Germany, and the timeliness of such a meeting on the eve of decisive battles.
The meeting was opened by Lt. General Alexander Gundorov, chairman of the All Slav Committee. His request that the assemblage rise in honor of Slavs who have fallen in the struggle against Fascist aggression underlined the central theme of the gathering.
The meeting issued an “appeal to the oppressed Slavs of Europe” and sent messages to Premier Stalin, Prime Minister Churchill and President Roosevelt in the foregoing order. These messages hailed the contribution of Soviet, British and American forces to the anti-Hitler cause.
[Here follows listing of some foreign organizations which sent messages to this Congress and the names of many speakers who delivered addresses.]
The message adopted by the Congress was in essence a summons to activization of the anti-Hitler struggle of the European Slavs. While stressing the role of the Soviet Union in stemming the German tide, it enthusiastically noted the growing Anglo-American contribution to this struggle.
The appeal made the following points: (1) It noted the favorable developments in the strategic situation since the last Slavic Congress, and called attention to the contributions not only of the three leaders of the democratic coalition, but also of the embattled Slavs. (2) Saluted the Slavic forces of the Soviets, Yugoslavia, Poland, and Czechoslovakia now fighting Hitler. (3) Declared that the grave [Page 527] crisis now experienced by Hitlerite Germany is leading the Germans to intensify their oppression of the Slavs and stressed in this connection the carrying into German slave labor of hundreds of thousands of Slavs. (4) Appealed to all Slav peoples, including the Bulgarians and Macedonians, the Slovaks and Carpatho-Ruthenians to resist labor conscription and total mobilization and to organize partisan warfare. It appealed for unity of all resistance groups regardless of ancestry, religion or party affiliation. (5) Repeated the above summons to battle with reference to individual Slavic peoples. Czechs were urged to intensify sabotage, Slovaks to desert from German units, Poles to spurn traitors advocating passivity, Bulgars to refuse to be drawn into war against Russia. Bulgarian soldiers in Yugoslavia, Macedonia and Greece were urged to desert to the partisans.
The leading editorial entitled “Slavs, to arms” paraphrased the appeal.
The speeches as reported made certain points of possible interest. In general, they emphasized the role of the Soviet Union in the struggle against Hitlerism but several of them contained generous references to Anglo-American operations. An important sub-theme was the historic partnership of Russian and other Slavs in a common effort against German encroachments.
Colonel Svoboda74 noted that the first foreign hero of the Soviet Union was a fallen member of the Czechoslovak unit in the Soviet Union, Yarosh. He urged Czechoslovak workers to sabotage production and soldiers to take up arms. He referred briefly to the period of the fall of 1938 and the spring of 1939.
The two Polish speakers, Wasilewska75 and Colonel Berling,76 hailed the establishment of the Polish Division, to fight under the Piast “eagle of combat with the Germans”. They referred bitterly to Polish advocates of inactivity and to traitors serving the Germans.
Kolas,77 the White Russian representative, in speaking of frontiers, used the expression “from Bialystok to the Vitebsk region”.
Tomov, the Bulgarian, declared: “History has eternally linked Bulgaria and Russia.” He referred to the Russians as the “Liberators” of the Bulgarians, and Germany as “our age-old enemy”.
[Page 528]Metropolitan Nikolai79 repeated his characterization of Hitler—“the most evil enemy of Christianity”. He cited German destruction of 7 churches in Sychevka, of 15 in Rzhev, and concluded his speech by asserting that the Russian Orthodox Church blessed the Slavic warriors.
- The II All-Slav Congress had been held in Moscow April 4–5, 1942; see telegram No. 292, April 8, 1942, from the Ambassador in the Soviet Union, Foreign Relations, 1942, vol. iii, p. 433.↩
- Col. Vladimir Svoboda, Commander of the Czechoslovak military unit in the Soviet Union.↩
- Wanda Lvovna Wasilewska, head of the Union of Polish Patriots, sponsored by the Soviet Union, which held its first Congress in Moscow on June 8, 1943; wife of Alexander Yevdokimovich Korneichuk, an Assistant People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the Soviet Union in 1943.↩
- Lt. Col. Zigmund Berling became head of the Polish Army in the Soviet Union after the break in Polish-Soviet relations on April 25, 1943; Commander of the Kosciuszko Division, the first Red unit formed in the Soviet Union on May 18, 1943; promoted by Stalin to Major General on August 10, 1943.↩
- Yakub Kolas, a prominent Soviet leader.↩
- Nikolay Yarashevich, Metropolitan of Kiev and Galich, Exarch of the Ukraine, in charge of the affairs of the Moscow Patriarchate before the election of a Patriarch in September 1943, See telegram No. 443, November 9, 1942, from the Chargé in the Soviet Union, Foreign Relations, 1942, vol. iii, p. 476.↩