«Sentenced to Belarusization»: Smolensk Belarusians in the 1920s (to the Question of Their Number)

Abstract

In 1921, based on decisions of the 10th Congress of the RCP(b), the country would begin to implement a national policy that received the common name –korenization (nativization). In Belarus and in the Russian regions bor-dering the republic, it would be called belarusization. The active phase of this policy would continue until the end of the 1920s. For residents of the BSSR, it would mean the development of Belarusian culture (schools, universities in the Belarusian language, Belarusian literature, the publication of Belarusian books, etc.), the nomination of Belarusians for the party, Soviet, professional and pub-lic work, the transfer of party and stateapparatus and parts of the Red Army to the Belarusian language.During the first half of the 1920s, the young Belarusian republic would significantly grow in the former territories of Russia. As a result of these trans-formations, a large number of border territories appeared between the RSFSR and the BSSR, where, at different periods, the population included both Russian and Belarusian. It is Russian-Belarusian and Belarusian-Russian society that would have difficulties in adaptation to the official Belarusian state policy initi-ated by Moscow and declared by Minsk. Due to its historical development, Smolensk Governorate was just one of those Russian territories that, like the Belarusian border counties, were «sen-tenced» to the policy of belarusization throughout the 1920s.Not all of the Belarusian population of the governorate enthusiastically joined in the implementation of this policy. However, before talking about whether it was necessary and needed for the Belarusians living in Smolensk Governorate, oneshould first decide on the question, what was the size of this Belarusian «interlayer» of the population lived in the Smolensk region, and how many Smolensk Belarusians should be affected by belarusization.