USSR’s first collective farms and Ukraine’s outstanding young painter made this day in Russian history.
The Battle of Austerlitz
The legendary battle took place near Austerlitz, in what is now the Czech Republic, and is often regarded as Napoleon’s greatest victory. The anti-Napoleon coalition disintegrated, but the war went on.
It wasn’t until 1812 that Napoleon suffered his first crushing defeat at the hands of Russia. After winning the battle of Borodino, Napoleon marched east to take Moscow, only to find it had been evacuated and was ablaze. By the time he made it to Poland, only a small fraction of his troops remained.
Launch of Collectivization
Stalin declared the start of agriculture collectivization on December 2 in 1927, at the annual Communist Party Conference.
The goal was to consolidate all privately-owned land and labor in the USSR into collective farms.
However, it devastated the Soviet agricultural industry and led to vicious efforts to destroy kulaks, or rich landowning peasants, as a class.
Most historians agree that the disruption caused by collectivization consequently led to the Great Famine of 1932 in Russia and Ukraine.
Outstanding little artist born in Ukraine
On this day in 1977, the outstanding child painter Sasha Putrya was born in the Ukrainian part of the USSR.
Sasha’s life lasted only 11 years before she died of leukemia. In that time, however, she managed to create more than 2,000 pictures.
These have been displayed all over the world. Many of them were dedicated to faith, love, family and India. Sasha had never been there, but she was fascinated by its culture. The girl received several awards for her painting.
KGB against terrorists
Eight terrorists captured a school bus with children and a teacher on board in 1988 in South Russia.
They drove the bus inside a cargo plane which, according to their demand, then left for Tel Aviv. They chose Israel because at that time the country didn’t have any diplomatic ties with the USSR.
The bandits didn’t consider, though, that there was already an extradition agreement.
That’s why their plan of bribing Israeli forces with $2 million, which were given by the KGB as a ransom, didn’t work out.
The terrorists were captured and soon transferred back to the Soviet Union.