Burnt by the Sun. The Koreans of the Russian Far East - Jon K. Chang

174 Chapter 7

Koreans living and working in the Ukraine were also being arrested,

repressed, and sentenced as agents of “Japa nese espionage” at this time.^121

The fact that Koreans were being sentenced for the crime of espionage out-

side the zone of deportation and even after the deportation was over confirms

that there existed a firm categorization of Koreans as “agents of Japa nese

empire” and as vectors for espionage throughout much of the USSR during

the Terror. Despite overwhelming proof to the contrary, the Korean miners

and laborers of Chernogorsk were convicted and sentenced as “Japa nese

spies.” In the next section, I shall contrast this study’s primary argument

with that of Martin’s “Soviet xenophobia.”

“TSARIST CONTINUITIES” IN SOVIET NATIONALITIES POLICIES

In the pages that follow, my primary argument in this book will be juxta-
posed to Terry Martin’s theory that the nationalities deportations were a
“culmination” of collectivization, and hence ideological in nature.^122 Martin’s
theory proceeds as follows. Collectivization, beginning in 1930, repressed en-
tire German and Polish villages.^123 Afterwards, these nationalities began to be
stigmatized collectively as kulaks. In the 1930s, Stalinist etatism, along with
korenizatsiia, elevated nationality to become the primary marker of identity.^124
The state and its policies created primordialist views that turned the Soviet
diaspora nationalities (such as the Koreans, Germans, Poles, Finns, and others)
into “ enemy nations” and unreliables. (Some believe that the Koreans were
not an “ enemy nation.” But, their deportation took place before NKVD or-
der 00485, which targeted the Poles, was expanded to include the other di-
aspora peoples on January 31, 1938. This expansion of 00485 defined “ enemy
nations.”) However, this “new primordialism” was strictly Soviet and not a
carryover from tsarism.^125 When Stalin initiated the Terror to remove all
lines of enemies, the focus on nationality never wavered, and thus began the
nationalities deportations, as a continuum from collectivization.^126 Stalinist
etatism and its resultant primordialism combined to produce what Martin
calls “Soviet xenophobia,” which was an exaggerated (Soviet) fear of foreign
influence and ideological contamination.^127 Furthermore, the state viewed
the deportations that it carried out as being ideological rather than eth-
nic.^128 Thus, “Soviet xenophobia” posits that ethnic and racial markers served only
as “signifiers/referents” for the po liti cal ideologies that lay beneath the racial/ethnic
phenotype of each Soviet citizen and each national community.^129 The Soviet
state simply sought to identify, repress, and remove persons holding po liti cal
ideologies inimical to Soviet socialism. Po liti cal ideology was the primary
consideration. Nationality, which was now primordialized, served only as a
“marker” for one’s po liti cal beliefs, according to Martin.^130