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This is some interesting history which I ran across and thought I'd share. Here's the wiki
In 1928 Stalin considered the USSR's Jewish population to be potential insurrectionists (the man was paranoid even killing loyal red army officers so why shouldn't he target Jews as well?) and there was a feeling among Soviet Jews that they were not being treated equally since they were not officially seen as Russian yet didn't have a national homeland as other Soviet minorities did. Thus Stalin created the Jewish Autonomous Oblast in the Soviet far east next to Manchuria along the Amur river. The idea was to move as many, potentially non-socialist, non-atheist Jews to the far east as possible where they would be isolated and be no threat to Stalin.
The other motivating factors were the USSR's desire to increase the European population of this section of its remote far east holdings and to counter popular Zionist ideas which motivated some Soviet Jews to (illegally) leave the country and move to British Palestine. The Soviets thought that if they could create a Soviet Zionist destination then Soviet Jews would move there instead of Palestine.
Unfortunately not many Jews agreed to move to this new Soviet Zion and even those who were forced to go there left as soon as they could. Not that this stopped the Soviet Unions propaganda arm from trumpeting what a success this new Jewish homeland was. Interestingly, the Japanese seem to have believed the USSR's propaganda and western anti-semetic claims about Jewish people's natural abilities to generate money so the Japanese government came up with "the Fugu Plan".
Wiki for the Fagu Plan: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugu_Plan
The idea of the Fugu Plan was to attract Jews who were disaffected with Soviet Communism and convince them to resettle across the border in Japanese controlled Manchuria. When few Jews decided to move to Manchuria the Japanese agreed to let them move to Japanese occupied Shanghai believing that would attract more Jewish defectors. The Japanese seem to seriously believe that Jews were natural experts at making money and generating new scientific discoveries so they wanted to harness these Jewish powers to help their empire. Funny but true.
In 1928 Stalin considered the USSR's Jewish population to be potential insurrectionists (the man was paranoid even killing loyal red army officers so why shouldn't he target Jews as well?) and there was a feeling among Soviet Jews that they were not being treated equally since they were not officially seen as Russian yet didn't have a national homeland as other Soviet minorities did. Thus Stalin created the Jewish Autonomous Oblast in the Soviet far east next to Manchuria along the Amur river. The idea was to move as many, potentially non-socialist, non-atheist Jews to the far east as possible where they would be isolated and be no threat to Stalin.
The other motivating factors were the USSR's desire to increase the European population of this section of its remote far east holdings and to counter popular Zionist ideas which motivated some Soviet Jews to (illegally) leave the country and move to British Palestine. The Soviets thought that if they could create a Soviet Zionist destination then Soviet Jews would move there instead of Palestine.
Unfortunately not many Jews agreed to move to this new Soviet Zion and even those who were forced to go there left as soon as they could. Not that this stopped the Soviet Unions propaganda arm from trumpeting what a success this new Jewish homeland was. Interestingly, the Japanese seem to have believed the USSR's propaganda and western anti-semetic claims about Jewish people's natural abilities to generate money so the Japanese government came up with "the Fugu Plan".
Wiki for the Fagu Plan: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugu_Plan
The idea of the Fugu Plan was to attract Jews who were disaffected with Soviet Communism and convince them to resettle across the border in Japanese controlled Manchuria. When few Jews decided to move to Manchuria the Japanese agreed to let them move to Japanese occupied Shanghai believing that would attract more Jewish defectors. The Japanese seem to seriously believe that Jews were natural experts at making money and generating new scientific discoveries so they wanted to harness these Jewish powers to help their empire. Funny but true.
).
Makes me kinda sorry we A-Bombed them...twice. 
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