American Relief Administration (ARA)
미국 구제청(ARA)
A relief agency created by the US Congress in 1919 and headed by Herbert Hoover. During the 1921–1923 Soviet Russian famine it mounted the largest relief operation of the era, feeding over 10 million people daily at its peak while also delivering medical aid and mass vaccination. The ARA supplied some $78 million in food, medicine, and clothing before withdrawing in June 1923.
In depth
Founding and European Operations
The ARA was created by the US Congress on February 24, 1919, under the European Famine Relief Act with a $100 million budget. President Woodrow Wilson appointed Herbert Hoover, who had previously led the Commission for Relief in Belgium feeding seven million people during World War I. Between 1919 and 1922 the ARA delivered over four million tons of relief supplies to 23 European countries, with Poland receiving the largest share.
Soviet Russian Famine Relief (1921–1923)
The ARA's Soviet mission began when Hoover responded to Maxim Gorky's plea for help in the summer of 1921. An agreement was signed in Riga on August 20, 1921, with Deputy Commissar for Foreign Affairs M. M. Litvinov, and the first relief ship, the Phoenix, arrived in Petrograd on September 1, 1921. Colonel William N. Haskell directed operations inside Russia.
Initially limited to child feeding, the program expanded to adults after a further agreement with Commissar Leonid Krasin in December 1921. At its peak in the summer of 1922, the ARA employed 300 Americans and over 120,000 Soviet citizens, operating more than 15,000 kitchens and feeding 10.5 million people daily. Of the roughly $78 million spent, $28 million came from US government appropriations, $13 million from the Soviet government, and the remainder from private donations and charitable organizations.
Beyond food, the ARA supplied medicine, clothing, and footwear, and ran a medical division that helped combat the typhus epidemic. It maintained offices across 38 gubernias of the RSFSR and imported some 36.3 million poods (approximately 595,000 tons) of relief goods.
Termination
After discovering that the Soviet government had resumed grain exports, the ARA shut down all Russian operations on June 15, 1923. Gorky wrote to Hoover that his aid "will be inscribed in history as a unique, gigantic achievement, worthy of the greatest glory, and will long remain in the memory of millions of Russians whom you saved from death."
Sources
- Wikipedia (RU) Russian Wikipedia: founding, leadership, Riga agreement, scope of operations, peak feeding numbers, budget breakdown, termination date
- Wikipedia (EN) English Wikipedia: Congressional creation February 1919, Hoover's role, European operations, Russian famine relief 1921–1923, 10.5 million fed daily at peak
- hoover.org Hoover Institution: ARA as private relief organization under Hoover, Lenin-Hoover ideological antithesis, scale and significance of the mission
- archives.gov National Archives exhibit: nearly 11 million fed daily by summer 1922, 21,000 kitchens, 125,000 medical packages, 16,000 hospitals supplied