Stalin. Myriad Ukrainian communists had begged for the peasants to be allowed some reserves for their own consumption, as well as some seeds for the next season’s crop, but he assured Stalin that he had stood firm: “We are convinced that this ‘preoccupation’ with reserves, including seed reserves, is seriously hampering and undermining the entire grain procurement plan.”23 Two days later, on 24 December, the Ukrainian Communist Party gave up trying to resist. The leadership conceded completely and gave all underperforming collective farms “five days to ship, without exception, all collective
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