Editorial by Anatol Ţăranu
The Day of Remembrance for the Victims of the Famine, marked annually in the Republic of Moldova on the third Saturday of April, was established by a parliamentary decision only in 2022. But it is not enough. Institutional accountability, historical education, preserved and promoted testimonies in society are needed about the most tragic chapter in our national history of all times. A people who forget their martyrs have no future.
A forgotten tragedy that shattered a nation and stole its roots
In the history of the Republic of Moldova, there is an open wound, unhealed, that continues to hurt almost in silence. It is about the organized famine of 1946-1947. A collective tragedy, in which nearly 200,000 people died – victims of the greatest humanitarian disaster in the Romanian-speaking area east of the Prut River.
It was a famine with premeditation. A silent act of genocide. A form of masked repression under the guise of “drought”. In reality, the drought was just a pretext. While Moldovans were dying of hunger in villages devoid of any support, Moscow was exporting over 2.5 million tons of grain. Another million tons rotted in storage due to negligence. In the meantime, Soviet authorities imposed “mandatory quotas” on Basarabian peasants in the midst of a severe drought, depriving them of vital food reserves. And those who dared to hide a part of their harvest for their own families were arrested, beaten, deported.
Hunger did not discriminate. It struck mercilessly at the old, women, and children. Villages were emptied, households were looted, schools were closed. People sacrificed their animals, fled across the Prut River, and in extreme cases – documented in archives and testimonies – there were numerous cases of cannibalism. This was not just a food crisis, but a policy of destroying a people.
Famine as a weapon of domination
For the Soviet regime, Bessarabia was a newly annexed territory, a hostile space that had to be pacified through Sovietization. And the famine became the perfect instrument for breaking the Romanian spirit, for defeating any resistance. Hungry people do not protest. The desperate do not resist.
It was the beginning of a deep identity rupture. The famine was followed by mass deportations, forced collectivization, aggressive propaganda, and cultural russification. This is how Soviet “Moldovenism” spread over Bessarabia – a construct meant to replace the authentic Romanian identity of the Basarabians.
Unlike the territories in Romania, where the drought was just as severe, it did not lead to the mass extermination of the population. While in Bessarabia, people died in large numbers, and this was no coincidence, but a sign that the Soviet regime had deliberately exacerbated the crisis. It was a test of loyalty, a lesson given to those who were supposed to bow down quickly to the new regime.
Silence – the continuation of the crime, through other means
For years, this chapter in history was covered in oppressive silence. In the USSR, the famine was a taboo subject. It was not discussed in schools, in the media, or even within families. Silence became state policy. It was only during perestroika that testimonies began to appear, archives began to open up, and the truth began to come out.
And yet, in today’s Republic of Moldova, this topic remains on the periphery. There is no national consensus on this tragedy. The Soviet policy of starvation has not been officially condemned. There is no national monument dedicated to the victims of the famine. It is only present as a chapter in textbooks, not commemorated in its true magnitude.
In 2007, an initiative to officially condemn the famine was blocked in Parliament by the communist majority. This episode shows how powerful historical amnesia can be when coupled with political calculations.
The Ukrainian lesson and our mirror
In Ukraine, the Holodomor of 1932-1933 was embraced as a defining moment of national memory. It became the cornerstone of a post-Soviet identity that had the courage to break with its colonial past. In Moldova, however, the 1946-1947 famine is almost invisible in the public sphere. This forgetting perpetuates the Soviet mentality, which always denied the truth.
The famine was more than a humanitarian tragedy; it was a rupture of identity. It marked the beginning of the dismantling of the Romanian national consciousness in Bessarabia. It instilled fear, obedience, and confusion. Ignoring this history turns us into a rootless state. With an amputated past. With the dangerous reflex of justifying our executioners, of adopting the Stockholm syndrome on a national scale.
Truth – a form of liberation
It’s time to face our history. To say it clearly: the famine of 1946-1947 was an act of genocide. A Moldovan Holodomor. Let us commemorate those who were lost. Let us say their names. Let us light a candle for them. Let us transform their suffering into a lesson for the