The need to furnish himself with a new historical alibi was doubtless among the reasons that impelled Stalin to launch the purges of party cadres he had long been contemplating in 1937. He needed to erase a whole historical period and rid himself of those who had witnessed it and who knew who had done what in those heroic years. But this carefully nurtured, calculated revenge was not always cold-bloodedly conducted. At various stages, it unfolded in a state of extreme tension.
The liquidation of a figure like Bukharin – politically weak, but intellectually greatly superior to Stalin, and guilty of having been (despite his young age) a ‘founding father’, ‘the party’s favourite’ – sheds light on Stalin’s approach and his state of mind. It unfolded in accordance with a precise script, beginning with a protracted phase of mental torture, proceeding to public degradation, and terminating in a show trial and execution.
The initial manoeuvring began in 1936. Anguished but defiant, Bukharin’s reaction illuminates one aspect of the drama. At first, he thought he still had friends at the top and wrote a desperate letter to Voroshilov, asking for his help and support. He asserted his innocence, concluding: ‘I embrace you because I am guilty of nothing.’ Voroshilov was not the right man to turn to. He immediately showed the letter to Molotov, who instructed him to return it to Bukharin with a note saying: ‘You would do better to confess your vile deeds against the party.’ If Bukharin did not comply, Voroshilov would consider him ‘a scoundrel’. Voroshilov did as he was told.
Desperate, and conscious that he was the victim of a deadly plot, Bukharin then wrote to Stalin on 15 December 1936. Using his Georgian nickname, as in the good old days, Bukharin addressed him as ‘Dear Koba’. He said that he had just read an article in Pravda against the ‘Right’ (i.e. against him) which ‘knocked me off my feet’. The letter ended: ‘I’m perishing because of scoundrels, human scum, loathsome villains. Yours, Bukharin.’
Supposedly directed against anonymous scoundrels, this curse-like tirade fitted Stalin perfectly. It is unlikely that Bukharin, however distressed, did not know who was pulling the strings. Stalin certainly understood that the expression ‘loathsome villain’ was directed at him personally. His vengeful response to Bukharin’s appeals for help and indirect accusations came during a carefully planned ‘spectacle’ – the Central Committee meetings of February—March 1937. The way Stalin conducted these puts one in mind of a half-crazed actor, bent on driving a sane audience (the Central Committee members) into a state of collective insanity and forcing them to share his own fantasies. What he had to say was incoherent. But the aim of the meeting was not only to destroy ‘his’ enemy. In addition, it had a hidden agenda: to test Central Committee members through a barely concealed stratagem. Three versions of the resolution on Bukharin’s ‘guilt’ were to be put to the vote. The first – ‘arrest and consignment of the matter to the NKVD’ – was clearly Stalin’s preference (it betokened a death sentence, possibly preceded by torture); the second involved not proceeding to an arrest, but requiring the NKVD to pursue its investigation; while the third envisaged releasing Bukharin. This was a trap for Central Committee members, as most of them probably appreciated. No one dared declare for the third option, although several did choose the second – and paid with their lives for it.
This is just one small illustration of the incredible nightmare of the purges in 1937–8. ‘Human scum’ is the appropriate term to describe those responsible for this orgy of arrests, show trials, and sentencing without trial, conducted on an unprecedented scale. And there are good grounds for thinking that the events of these atrocious years had been being carefully prepared for a long time, possibly since 1933. As Khlevniuk has indicated,2 the supposed ‘re-examination of reality’ on the agenda of the Central Committee in February-March 1937 is strongly reminiscent of a point addressed during the Central Committee session in January 1933. Then numerous speakers had said things they virtually repeated in 1937, in the hope of proving their lucidity and vigilance. It seems likely that Stalin was ready in 1933 to declare war on society and, one might add, the party, with the support of his acolytes and repressive apparatuses. But there were probably reasons preventing him (we have suggested some); and he opted for the ‘interlude’ despite his resentment at the ‘termite-like’ methods of his enemies – especially the ‘respectable cereal-growers’ of whom he had spoken to Sholokhov.
When it came to preparing the launch of the terror, certain measures were required apart from administrative spring-cleaning like checking the rolls of party members and validating membership cards. Above all, it was necessary to prepare the secret police, its leadership and personnel, for the gruesome task ahead. Ideological and moral inducements were applied along with material incentives. While propaganda extolled their valour, the new Interior Minister Yezhov increased the wages of NKVD functionaries at every level. An NKVD head at republican level received 1,200 roubles a month (as did other higher ranks), while an average worker’s wage was 250 roubles. But the NKVD’s top brass now received up to 3,500 roubles a month. Having previously had access to collective dachas and sanatoria, where they mixed with other party activists, they were now accorded individual dachas and significant bonuses.3
The infamous NKVD order no. 00447 of July 1937, approved by the Politburo on 31 July, contained the order to act and an action plan. It singled out two categories of victims and prescribed the punishment to be meted out to them: 75,000 people were to be shot and 225,000 sent to camps. There are different drafts of this order and the figures vary somewhat. But the documents in our possession demonstrate that in the event the ‘norms’ were fulfilled at least twice over. A budget of 85 million roubles was allocated for the operation. The pampering of the NKVD reached an even higher pitch when, in a speech, Stalin bestowed upon his security apparatus the lofty status of ‘armed detachment of our party’.4 ‘The cult of the NKVD,’ writes Khlevniuk, ‘the special extralegal status of the secret police, attained its apogee.’ Stalin used the heads of the NKVD and rewarded them for their services, while controlling them with an iron hand. He distributed material rewards and severe punishments with equal arbitrariness. Several authors have seen an analogy here with the way that Ivan the Terrible used the oprichnina (his militia) in his struggle against the boyars.
This dual attitude is Stalin all over. Chekists – the historical term of honour that is still used today – were now separated from other party members, including socially, since they had their own dachas, clubs and other leisure facilities. In December 1937, huge ceremonies were held throughout the country to celebrate the glorious tradition of the Cheka-GPU-NKVD. The Kremlin called on regional party committees to organize public trials of ‘enemies of the people’ in agriculture and the NKVD was instructed to ‘unmask’ – in fact, supply – them. Likewise, on the third anniversary of Kirov’s assassination (29 November 1937), Stalin telegraphed local party authorities and ordered them to ‘mobilize party members mercilessly to eradicate Trotskyite–Bukharinite agents’. Khlevniuk concludes that the whole apparatus, as well as the wider society, was in the grip of a truly psychotic hunt for enemies, punctuated by the descent of the secret police, usually in the early hours, to knock at the door, seize their victims, and transport them in sinister black vans to meet their fate.
As we have already indicated, the NKVD’s symbolic incorporation into the party – in other words, its attachment to Stalin personally – elevated it above all other institutions. The party now possessed its own iron guard, its crusaders, on whom Stalin lavished favours and honours. The Stalinist party – especially its own apparatus – itself became a police agency, with the qualification that the secret police deferred exclusively to Stalin and no one else in the party. It was therefore above the party and a powerful weapon with which to bludgeon it. Here an impertinent question is in order: if the chekists were a valiant detachment in the service of morality and ideology, why were its leaders paid ten times more than a worker? The real chekists of the Civil War, who risked their lives, were poorly paid. Was it really necessary to pay those charged with representing the country’s ideological vanguard in cash, material goods and privileges? Lenin would have turned in his grave – had his embalming not prevented him …
The irony of history extends still further. Praised to the skies, the NKVD was a bureaucracy with its own routines. An internal inspectorate was assiduous in watching over its smooth functioning. Its reports reveal an institution characterized by innumerable irregularities, professional ineptitude, shortcomings and thievery; and we find long lists of criminal acts that had been investigated and reported to higher bodies, with demands for severe sanctions.
A few examples may shed light. In a memo to the head of the NKVD’s cadres department, comrade Veinshtok, who held the rank of major of state security, inventoried the misdemeanours and crimes committed by NKVD agents in 1935. The data supplied by agencies at all levels (from republics to regions) for the first ten months of the year indicated a total of 11,436 offences and crimes. The memo also contained a list of the measures taken by way of sanctions. According to Veinshtok, something was wrong with the administrative policies of regional and local NKVD agencies and the problem should be discussed. The total number of criminal cases was 5,639, of which 3,232 were accounted for by urban sections. But what most worried the major was the fact that 2,005 of those had been committed by section heads themselves.
A breakdown of the punishments by rank indicates that all categories in every branch were committing offences and crimes – whether in the military or transport units – and at every administrative level (heads, their deputies, and junior staff). Thus, of the 3,311 leading personnel at the level of district and town sections, 62 per cent (2,056) received penalties. As Veinshtok commented, it had to be admitted that this was a very high percentage indeed. Sixty per cent of the sanctions against regional agents were for negligence, poor work, drunkenness, debauchery, and other acts bringing the NKVD into discredit. Of these, particular attention should be paid to the high percentage of penalties imposed for disobeying orders and instructions (13 per cent), for breaches of discipline (8.5 per cent), or for infringement of procedural norms (5 per cent). The list also contains cases of embezzlement and misappropriation, concealment of social origins (67 cases), ‘anti-party and anti-Soviet’ attitudes (17), suicides and rapes (78 in total), lack of the vigilance expected of a chekist and party member (76), as well as false statements.
Most of the penalties fell on younger agents, mainly from auxiliary services like signals. But the number of sanctions against the hard core of NKVD personnel with twelve or more years of service was also deemed too high (1,171).5
A further report from the cadres department for the period 1 October 1936–1 January 1938 provides information on ‘departures’ from the GUGB (an independent agency within the NKVD). Among the reasons for these ‘departures’, we find 1,220 arrests, 1,268 dismissals and 1,345 transfers to the reserves. To these must be added 1,361 cases of punishment for membership of counter-revolutionary groups, or contact with counter-revolutionaries (Trotskyists), right-wing nationalists, traitors or spies; 267 for ‘workplace disruption’; and 593 for ‘moral turpitude’. Finally, we have 547 individuals who were ‘socially alien’, or in contact with such people, or who had served in the past with the Whites. Among the other various causes for departures from the GUGB were illness (544), death (138), or transfer to other agencies (1,258).
The reports indicate that things did not change until after Stalin’s death. The inspection agencies carried on doing their work and a separate branch, with responsibility for financial controls, also had a lot to say about the high frequency of theft and embezzlement, counterfeit receipts, and false accounting. It paid particular attention to what was going on in warehouses and storage facilities.6 In addition, there are annual accounting reports for use by the authorities (and by today’s researchers), for the Stalinist period at least. In short, in terms of professionalism, respect for the law, and honesty, the security services were no better than the rest. Efforts were made to improve the quality of the personnel by bringing in thousands of cadres from the NKVD’s own schools. But it took a long time for positive results to emerge.
Such documents on the party’s own security force, poised to save the country from the enemy within, highlight a further dimension of this dark episode: the security services were packed with morally and professionally dubious elements. Commanders were pampered, but were nevertheless demoralized and disoriented by the very character of the task assigned them. They did not have to prove anything, they were simply required to fulfil quotas and, as throughout the USSR’s planned system, to surpass them to obtain bonuses, promotions and wage increases. But the sword they suspended over the head of the country also hung over their own heads – and not for drunkenness or debauchery. All the security services, including foreign intelligence, constantly lived on the brink of a catastrophe lurking within their own regime – and which was much more dangerous than spying or catching spies, combating smugglers or bandits, or facing the other risks associated with their work.
Many details about the mass arrests and executions first became available from a committee headed by the party secretary, Pospelov, which was set up by Khrushchev in 1955 prior to his ‘secret speech’ of 1956. In fact, the policy of rehabilitation had already begun in 1954. It is worth starting with this committee’s disclosures, if only in order to appreciate how little was known about these horrendous events not only by the wider public, but even by the political elite itself.7
The Pospelov committee received documents from the archives of the secret police, as well as depositions from many interrogators-executioners who recounted how they had obtained confessions from their victims. The Prosecutor’s Office also supplied the committee with a wealth of material. Stalin’s personal role was clearly documented. Other documents showed that the ‘troikas’ (composed of the local party secretary, the head of the secret police, and the local prosecutor), which were responsible for the terror at the local level, kept pressing Moscow to increase the ‘execution quotas’, knowing full well that it was disposed to do so.
When Pospelov presented his committee’s findings to the Party Presidium, a ‘terrifying picture emerged that shocked all those present’. We may surmise that this reaction was not feigned. Few people could fully have imagined the mechanics and scope of what were basically secret operations. The statistics supplied principally concerned party leaders accused of treason, as well as the broad category of people arrested for ‘anti-Soviet activity’, who were mainly party and state cadres. On the other hand, Pospelov said nothing of the enormous category of ‘socially alien elements’. For the fateful years of 1937–8, the report gave the figure of 1,548,366 persons arrested for anti-Soviet activity, of whom 681,692 were shot. Leading personnel in the state and party had been decimated at all levels. Those who replaced them had succumbed in their turn, as had their replacements, and so on. The majority of delegates to the 1934 Seventeenth Congress (the ‘Congress of the Victors’) – 1,108 of them – had been arrested and 848 shot.
The report also cited NKVD orders instructing agents how to conduct the repression and provided an idea of its methods: the outright confection of all manner of anti-Soviet organizations and centres; gross violations of the law by investigators; phoney plots invented by NKVD agents themselves; a total failure by the Prosecutor’s Office to exercise due oversight over the NKVD; judicial arbitrariness on the part of the Military Collegium of the USSR’s armed forces, which condoned ‘extra-judicial procedures’.
According to the report, the source of the whole venture lay in the Executive Central Committee’s authorization in December 1934, following Kirov’s assassination, of action outside the law. Stalin and Zhdanov’s telegram to Kaganovich and Molotov preparing the ground for the February–March 1937 Central Committee plenum was cited as the direct trigger for mass repression. Stalin’s personal responsibility for the widespread recourse to torture of the accused was stated in numerous testimonies, including those of officers from the Internal Affairs ministry (MVD) who were themselves victims of the repression, and by three documents appended to the report: a telegram from Stalin dated 10 January 1939 reaffirming the validity of ‘physical methods’; a memo giving his approval for the execution of 138 high-ranking officials; and the letter he received from P. I. Eikhe (Politburo member) prior to his execution. Between 1937 and 1939, Stalin and Molotov personally signed around 400 lists of people to be executed (a total of 44,000 names).
The aim of Pospelov’s report was not simply to take stock of the past. Its content was also a burning issue in debates about policy and strategy, which we shall study in Part Two. The overall toll of the terror was much heavier, since the verdict of the 1950s mostly dealt with victims from the party’s ranks.