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Stalin's Great Purges: A Historical Overview

Stalin launched a series of purges in the 1930s to eliminate all opposition and secure his power in the USSR. The purges began in the early 1930s when Stalin faced challenges to his policies from within the Communist party. Stalin responded by purging party members, having many prominent Bolsheviks arrested and executed without trial based on fabricated charges. Over the course of the 1930s, the purges expanded dramatically until by 1938 over 8 million Soviet citizens across all levels of society had been arrested, exiled, or executed as Stalin consolidated his totalitarian control over the country.

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Zaki Subehi
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36 views3 pages

Stalin's Great Purges: A Historical Overview

Stalin launched a series of purges in the 1930s to eliminate all opposition and secure his power in the USSR. The purges began in the early 1930s when Stalin faced challenges to his policies from within the Communist party. Stalin responded by purging party members, having many prominent Bolsheviks arrested and executed without trial based on fabricated charges. Over the course of the 1930s, the purges expanded dramatically until by 1938 over 8 million Soviet citizens across all levels of society had been arrested, exiled, or executed as Stalin consolidated his totalitarian control over the country.

Uploaded by

Zaki Subehi
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

STALIN AND HIS PURGES

Intro
-1930, challenges to Stalin’s policies
-Led to him purging all opposition to secure power in the USSR
-Reasons include personal ambition, internal party conflicts over policies and etc.

Riutin Platform
-Early 1930s challenges to Stalin’s policies
-Most serious one being Riutin platform
-200 page document which was critical of Stalin, requested his removal
-Stalin responded by requesting death penalty but overruled by Politburo

Potential Rival
-Many thought Kirov would be a better replacement for Stalin
-1934 congress, K argued that it was time to end Stalin’s harsh rule
-Speech was warmly received
-During election for CC, S received fewest votes while K, highest.

Kirov’s assassination
-S learnt through secret police that party member favoured Kirov and S removal from SG post
-Dec 1934, Kirov assassinated in his office
-S used this as excuse to hunt enemies in party
-Introduced Extraordinary Law, allowed those accused of terrorist activity to be executed
without trial
-49 of Kirov’s associates executed without trial
-Half million accused of being involved and sent to concentration camps w/o trial
-End of 1934 ushered in a period known as the Great Purges, lasted for 4 years!!!

Moscow Trial
-Series of trials in Moscow in the 1930’s
-1st of trials Aug 1936 involved Zinoviev, Kamenev and 14 prominent Bolsheviks
-Accused of building a terrorist centre and immediately shot

Trial of 17
-Took place in 1937
-NKVD arrested Radek and 16 other leaders who helped against Zinoviev and Kamenev
-Radek put on trial,sent to labour camp and shot in 1939

Trial of Red Army’s Top Brass


-Jun 1937, sudden trial and execution of top army leaders took place
-3 of 5 marshalls accused of various crimes, incl. Trotskynism and conspiracy with Ger and Jap.
-Of 17, 13 of them death sentenced

Trial of 21
-Final Trial in 1938, involved 21 surviving Oppos. Members
-Included Rykov and Bukharin
-Communist Leaders from national republics as well as former head of NKVD, Yagoda also
trialled
-Yagoda accused of organizing murder lab to exterminate top Soviet Leaders

Party Members
-Elite organs of CP also punished
-70% of CC electd at 1934 congress arrested and shot, 56% fo delegated were arrested and
80% of government ministers were purged

RED ARMY and NKVD


-Badly affected, even lower levels of army not spared
-40% of senior officers arrested and either shot or sent to concentration camp
-35k officers executed
-Nearly gave Hitler victory in 1941 invasion of Russia
-More officers have been killed by Stalin than in battle during the 2 nd world war
-NKVD was purged following replacement of Ezhov by Beria in Dec. 1938

Ordinary People + Church


-Ordinary Ppl like technical managers and experts are also killed/purged
-Contributed significantly to economic slowdown and decline of labour productivity
-Impact of the economy was the result of purging the cream of the crop in Soviet Industrial
Management
-The Church was also harassed and 40 bishops were executed
-Peasants were sent to concentration camps or executed if they opposed Stalin’s idea of
collectivisation

End of the purge


-Only in 1938 did Stalin decide to halt his Great Purge
-He felt that his power over the SU had been fully secured
-He managed to keep his reputation intact because the terror was blamed by his officials
instead
-By then, an estimated figure of 8 million people have died as a result of the Purges

Scope on the Great Purge


-It affected all sections of society
-Accusations ranged from acts of disloyalty to telling unacceptable political jokes regarding him
-Trivial incidents could result in serious punishments

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