The Leningrad affair, purges and Doctors Plot

Question 1

Why was Stalin careful to prevent politicians with a power base in Leningrad from becoming too powerful?

Answer 1

as it was the former capital of Russia

Question 2

There was many reasons why Zhandov was pushed aside in 1948, but what was a main reason?

Answer 2

his power-base in Leningrad

Question 3

Why did Stalin resent Leningrad after the war?

Answer 3

because of the pride it took from its heroic role in the great siege of 1941-44

Question 4

How did Stalin follow up the removal and death of Zhdanov in 1949?

Answer 4

he purged Leningrad Party

Question 5

What year did Stalin purge the Leningrad party?

Answer 5

1949

Question 6

How did the Leningrad affair escalate?

Answer 6

from purging those in senior posts to a major purge of all leading officials

Question 7

Who organised the accusations against the Leningrad officials in 1949?

Answer 7

Beria and Malenkov

Question 8

When were the Leningrad officials purged?

Answer 8

1950

Question 9

By 1950 how many officials from Leningrad had been dismissed from their posts, exiled and replaced with pro-Stalin communists?

Answer 9

over 2000

Question 10

What was Leningrad declared after the war?

Answer 10

a hero city for lasting the long siege

Question 11

Why did Stalin resent the fact that Leningrad was held to be the hero city after the war?

Answer 11

as the view of many in Leningrad was that it was the great victory of the defenders of the city, not the USSR as a whole who had largely left them to their own devices.

Question 12

What was the first major purge since the Party purge in 1938?

Answer 12

the Leningrad affair of 1949

Question 13

In reality, the Leningraders were never a direct poltcial threat to Stalin, but what was his default approach regardles?

Answer 13

to set rival elements within the regime against each other

Question 14

What was the purge after the Leningrad affair?

Answer 14

the Mingrelian Case of 1951

Question 15

What year was the Mingrelian Case which was the next purge after the Leningrad affair of 1949?

Answer 15

1951

Question 16

What was the Mingrelian Case (Purge) of 1951?

Answer 16

this targeted Party officials in Georgia who were accused of collaboration with Western Powers and suppressed non-Russian nationalities

Question 17

Why was it significant that the Mingrelians were accused of collaboration with Western Powers in 1951 and purged?

Answer 17

as they were followers of Beria, and was himself of Mingrelian origin

Question 18

The Mingrelian case rumbled on until when?

Answer 18

1952, and continued into 1953

Question 19

What purpose did the Mingrelian case serve?

Answer 19

to limit the power of Beria who was of Mingrelian origin

Question 20

How did the Mingrelian purge of 1951 have anti-Semitic overtones?

Answer 20

because the Mingrelians were charged with having conspire with Jewish plotters

Question 21

How in 1952 was anti-Seminitism a driving force in the most menacing purge of Stalin’s last years (which purge)?

Answer 21

in the Doctors Plot

Question 22

What had triggered the Doctors Plot in 1952?

Answer 22

a revealed conspiracy by a female doctors who wrote to Stalin that the Jewish doctors who treated Zhdanov in 1948 used sloppy methods contributing to his death

Question 23

What year was the Doctors Plot?

Answer 23

1952

Question 24

How did Stalin use the evidence of the female doctor who accused Zhdanov’s doctors of sloppy methods contributing to his death in 1948?

Answer 24

he used this to make an issue of anti-ZIonsm (against Jewish state of Israel) claiming that Jewish doctors were in the pay of Israel and the US to abuse their positions to harm the USSR

Question 25

Who was mysteriously killed in a car crash in 1948, almost certainly arranged by the secret police?

Answer 25

director of a Jewish theatre in Moscow

Question 26

what happened to the director of a Jewish theatre in Moscow in 1948?

Answer 26

he was mysteriously killed in a car crash, almost certainly arranged by the secret police

Question 27

The Jewish wives of which 2 party officials were arrested in 1949?

Answer 27

Molotov and Kalinin

Question 28

What year were the Jewish wives of Molotov and Kalinin arrested?

Answer 28

1949

Question 29

What was the Doctors Plot of 1952 an excuse for?

Answer 29

for political action against the Party

Question 30

Who was the Minister of State Security whom Stalin threatened to execute if he did not obtain confessions for the Doctors Plot 1952?

Answer 30

Ignatiev

Question 31

How many were arrested in the Doctors Plot purge 1952?

Answer 31

hundreds were arrested, and thousands of Jews were rounded up and deported to gulags

Question 32

How many senior Jewish doctors were condemned to death as a result of the Doctors Plot 1952 but survived due to Stalins death?

Answer 32

9

Question 33

By 1953 what had Stalin done?

Answer 33

he paralysed the Soviet Union, a country waiting for one ma to die in order to allow any hope of change