Soviet purges of 1937–1938

The Soviet purges of 1937–1938, commonly known as Great Purges or Yezhovshchina,^[a] were a series of large-scale purges, trials and executions that took place in the Soviet Union in response to increasing bureaucracy, sabotage against the Soviet economy, terrorism, and the discovery of infiltration by reactionaries and traitors inside the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Red Army^[1]^[2]^[3] after the murder of Sergei Kirov. Initial investigations revealed little about the Great Conspiracy due to sabotage by People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs chief Genrikh Yagoda and the lack of sufficient vigilance by the Soviet authorities to the threat of infiltration and internal treachery due to lacking oversight.

Although the term "purge" is commonly used to refer to the events of 1937–38, the Soviet usage of the term referred to a periodic clean-up in the party ranks to get rid of inefficient officials which would hamper party work.^[4] Hundreds of thousands of members were expelled from the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1937 and 1938.^[5]

Background[edit | edit source]

In 1st December 1934, Sergei Kirov, a respected Bolshevik leader with close political affiliation to Stalin, was murdered by Leonid Nikolaev, a former party member who had been expelled from the party.^[6] In 1936, the Fourth International led by Leon Trotsky advocated for overthrowing the Soviet Union, and Nazi Germany and Japan formed the Anti-Comintern Pact.^[5] In 1937, Marshal Tukhachevsky of the Red Army was executed for organizing a conspiracy to overthrow Stalin and install a pro-German government.^[7]

Executions[edit | edit source]

The purge began on 2 July 1937, and 681,692 people were sentenced to death^[5] even though Stalin and Molotov set a limit of only 72,950 executions to be carried out by three-person tribunals (troikas) and limited these executions to known criminals, kulaks, and counterrevolutionaries.^[8] Only 300,000 people were arrested during this period because many people who had been sentenced to death avoided capture. In addition to the troikas, military courts passed 30,514 death sentences and regular courts passed 4,387. Overall, under 200,000 people were executed during the Great Purge.

A number of people were falsely arrested or executed due to the infiltration of the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs, by traitors and foreign agents, the foremost being Nikolai Yezhov and his immediate subordinates, who had the task of causing a popular insurgency against the Soviet government by causing an excess of arrests and executions.^[5]

By late 1938, Beria believed that Yezhov was effectively helping the Nazis. The Central Committee and Sovnarkom ordered him to stop mass arrests and executions on 11 November 1938.^[8]

Imprisonment[edit | edit source]

From 1936 to 1939, the number of people imprisoned in gulags rose from 839,406 to 1,317,195, including many common criminals. 115,922 people died in gulags during the purges.^[8]

References[edit | edit source]

↑ “From the reports and the debates on these reports heard at this plenum, it is evident that we are dealing with the following three main facts. First, the wrecking and diversionist-espionage work of agents of foreign countries, among whom a rather active role was played by the Trotskyists, affected more or less all, or nearly all, of our organizations-economic, administrative, and Party. Second, agents of foreign countries, among them the Trotskyites, penetrated not only into lower organizations, but also into certain responsible posts. Third, some of our leading comrades, both at the center and at the periphery, not only failed to discern the face of these wreckers, diversionists, spies, and killers, but proved to be so careless, complacent,and naive that at times they themselves assisted in promoting agents of foreign states to responsible posts.”

Joseph Stalin (1937). Report to the Plenum of the Central Committee of the RKP(b). [MIA]
↑ “The evidence suggests that the Ezhovshchina [...] was not the result of a petrified bureaucracy's stamping out dissent and annihilating old radical revolutionaries. In fact, it may have been just the opposite. It is not inconsistent with the evidence to argue that the Ezhovshchina was rather a radical, even hysterical, reaction to bureaucracy. The entrenched officeholders were destroyed from above and below in a chaotic wave of voluntarism and revolutionary puritanism.”

J. Arch Getty (1987). Origins of the Great Purges (p. 206). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780511572616 [LG]
↑ “The actual purge was decided upon after the revelation of the Tukhachevsky military conspiracy. The discovery of such a plot at the head of the Red Army, a plot that had links with opportunist factions within the Party, provoked a complete panic”

Ludo Martens (1996). Another view of Stalin: 'The Great Purge; The 1937–1938 purge' (p. 163). Editions EPO. ISBN 9782872620814 [LG]
↑ “Western students have applied the word "purge" to everything from political trials to police terror to nonpolitical expulsions from the party. The label "Great Purges," which encompasses practically all party activities between 1933 and 1939, is an example of such broad usage. Yet the Communist Party defined and used the word quite specifically. The term "purge" (chistka – a sweeping or cleaning) only applied to the periodic membership screenings of the ranks of the party. These membership operations were designed to weed the party of hangers-on, nonparticipants, drunken officials, and people with false identification papers, as well as ideological "enemies" or "aliens." In the majority of purges, political crimes or deviations pertained to a minority of those expelled.”

J. Arch Getty (1987). Origins of the Great Purges (p. 38). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780511572616 [LG]
↑ ^5.0 ^5.1 ^5.2 ^5.3 Austin Murphy (2000). The Triumph of Evil: 'The Documented Facts about Eastern Europe and Communism: A Refutation of Popular Myths about the True Good Guys' (p. 74). [PDF] Fucecchio, Italy: European Press Academic Publishing. ISBN 8883980026
↑ “Leonid Nikolaev was a former Leningrad communist who had been expelled from the party but whose party card had not been confiscated. In December 1934, he was able to present his card at the gate to Leningrad party headquarters, secure free entrance to the building, walk upstairs, and shoot Politburo member Serge Kirov to death in his office.”

J. Arch Getty (1987). Origins of the Great Purges (p. 41). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780511572616 [LG]
↑ Ludo Martens (1996). Another View of Stalin: 'The Great Purge' (pp. 150–152). [PDF] Editions EPO. ISBN 9782872620814
↑ ^8.0 ^8.1 ^8.2 Ludo Martens (1996). Another View of Stalin: 'The Great Purge' (pp. 164–169). [PDF] Editions EPO. ISBN 9782872620814

Notes[edit | edit source]

↑ Russian: Ежовщина

[2] “From the reports and the debates on these reports heard at this plenum, it is evident that we are dealing with the following three main facts. First, the wrecking and diversionist-espionage work of agents of foreign countries, among whom a rather active role was played by the Trotskyists, affected more or less all, or nearly all, of our organizations-economic, administrative, and Party. Second, agents of foreign countries, among them the Trotskyites, penetrated not only into lower organizations, but also into certain responsible posts. Third, some of our leading comrades, both at the center and at the periphery, not only failed to discern the face of these wreckers, diversionists, spies, and killers, but proved to be so careless, complacent,and naive that at times they themselves assisted in promoting agents of foreign states to responsible posts.”

Joseph Stalin (1937). Report to the Plenum of the Central Committee of the RKP(b). [MIA]

[3] “The evidence suggests that the Ezhovshchina [...] was not the result of a petrified bureaucracy's stamping out dissent and annihilating old radical revolutionaries. In fact, it may have been just the opposite. It is not inconsistent with the evidence to argue that the Ezhovshchina was rather a radical, even hysterical, reaction to bureaucracy. The entrenched officeholders were destroyed from above and below in a chaotic wave of voluntarism and revolutionary puritanism.”

J. Arch Getty (1987). Origins of the Great Purges (p. 206). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780511572616 [LG]

[4] “The actual purge was decided upon after the revelation of the Tukhachevsky military conspiracy. The discovery of such a plot at the head of the Red Army, a plot that had links with opportunist factions within the Party, provoked a complete panic”

Ludo Martens (1996). Another view of Stalin: 'The Great Purge; The 1937–1938 purge' (p. 163). Editions EPO. ISBN 9782872620814 [LG]

[5] “Western students have applied the word "purge" to everything from political trials to police terror to nonpolitical expulsions from the party. The label "Great Purges," which encompasses practically all party activities between 1933 and 1939, is an example of such broad usage. Yet the Communist Party defined and used the word quite specifically. The term "purge" (chistka – a sweeping or cleaning) only applied to the periodic membership screenings of the ranks of the party. These membership operations were designed to weed the party of hangers-on, nonparticipants, drunken officials, and people with false identification papers, as well as ideological "enemies" or "aliens." In the majority of purges, political crimes or deviations pertained to a minority of those expelled.”

J. Arch Getty (1987). Origins of the Great Purges (p. 38). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780511572616 [LG]

[:0-6] 5.0 ^5.1 ^5.2 ^5.3 Austin Murphy (2000). The Triumph of Evil: 'The Documented Facts about Eastern Europe and Communism: A Refutation of Popular Myths about the True Good Guys' (p. 74). [PDF] Fucecchio, Italy: European Press Academic Publishing. ISBN 8883980026

[7] “Leonid Nikolaev was a former Leningrad communist who had been expelled from the party but whose party card had not been confiscated. In December 1934, he was able to present his card at the gate to Leningrad party headquarters, secure free entrance to the building, walk upstairs, and shoot Politburo member Serge Kirov to death in his office.”

J. Arch Getty (1987). Origins of the Great Purges (p. 41). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780511572616 [LG]

[:02233-8] Ludo Martens (1996). Another View of Stalin: 'The Great Purge' (pp. 150–152). [PDF] Editions EPO. ISBN 9782872620814

[:022332-9] 8.0 ^8.1 ^8.2 Ludo Martens (1996). Another View of Stalin: 'The Great Purge' (pp. 164–169). [PDF] Editions EPO. ISBN 9782872620814

[1] Russian: Ежовщина

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