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3 . The Role of Personality in the First (1914– 1915) Russian Occupation of Galicia and Bukovina
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3 The Role of Personality in the First (1914–1915) Russian Occupation of Galicia and Bukovina PETER HOLQUIST The Russian army during World War I engaged in a wide range of anti-Jewish measures. In occupied Galicia and Bukovina—where Jews comprised 11 percent and 12 percent of the population, respectively—its conduct was particularly brutal.1 Of course, there were institutional, cultural, and political reasons for the Russian army’s conduct .2 Indeed, in certain respects the army’s antisemitic violence was overdetermined . There were a variety of factors impelling the Russian army to engage in violence against Jews; any one of them would suffice to explain such conduct. In this article, however, I want to highlight the role of individuals in this process during the army’s first occupation of Galicia. I will focus on two individuals in particular: General Nikolai Ianushkevich, chief of staff for the Supreme Commander in Chief, Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich; and Court Chamberlain Valer’ian Nikolaevich Murav’ev, the Foreign Ministry’s attaché on occupation issues in Bukovina. Despite the structural foundations for violence against the region’s Jewish population, it is nevertheless important to weigh the role of specific individuals on policy. Ianushkevich and Murav’ev were key figures in formulating a far-ranging and programmatic antisemitic agenda in Galicia and Bukovina. They failed to realize this agenda, however, due to the resistance of the region’s military governor-general, Count Georgii Bobrinskii , and the lack of coordination within the Russian government. The case of the Russian army’s conduct in occupied territories also underlines the fractured and polycratic nature of state policy under Nicholas II during the war years. Tellingly, the proposal leading to punitive measures against the Jewish population in Bukovina originated not in the normal chain of command, but through the emperor’s endorsement of the extreme program of a low-ranking consular official. PERSONALITY IN THE OCCUPATION OF GALICIA AND BUKOVINA 53 Much of the information in this article comes from the diary of Vladimir Grabar’, appointed by the Russian Foreign Ministry to General Headquarters (Stavka) to oversee issues of international law. He had been born in Vienna in 1865 to a Ruthene family—Hrabar—committed to pro-Slavic and anti-Habsburg politics.3 Forced to emigrate, the family found a home in Russia and Russianized their name to “Grabar’.” Vladimir pursued a degree in international law at Moscow University. In 1893 he received the appointment to the chair of international law at Iur’ev University. While impeccably qualified, his opportunity came as a result of Russification policies. The imperial government, seeking to accelerate Russification in the Baltic provinces, required that the German university of Dorpat—one of the three oldest in the entire Russian Empire—be called “Iur’ev” and insisted that the faculty should lecture in Russian. (Under Estonian rule it became, and remains, Tartu University.) Grabar’ occupied the chair of international law previously held by scholars who wrote and lectured in German. In addition to his academic duties, for twenty-five years he served as a corresponding editor for and contributor to the prominent Brokhaus-Efron encyclopedia as well as the Novyi entsiklopedicheskii slovar’, thus widely disseminating his views on international law to the Russian educated public. He held liberal views and protested against reactionary policies in the universities. During World War I, Grabar’ put his training in international law to practical effect, when the Ministry of Foreign Affairs appointed him as legal adviser to the Diplomatic Chancellery at General Headquarters. One of his main tasks at Headquarters was to compile accounts of German atrocities— as he noted, “meaning, of course, only German and Austrian atrocities.”4 Soon officials at Headquarters were coming to justify their own cruel conduct as sanctioned by “military necessity” and by considerations of “security .” Grabar’ suspected that this argument served simply as a pretext to justify persecution. Ordered by General Ianushkevich to compile an account of German atrocities, Grabar’ felt compelled to indicate cases where German conduct had been praiseworthy. Ianushkevich was so outraged by this action that he immediately had Grabar’ dismissed. In April 1915, just as Russian forces were being driven from most of Galicia, Grabar’ formally resigned his post “on grounds of health.”5 His account is especially interesting because Grabar’ was himself a Ruthene and thus had a special interest in the Russian occupation of eastern Galicia, where Ruthenes comprised the bulk of the population. Equally significant, however, is his principled stand on issues of international...