Yeschovina Complete Flashcards
What was NKVD order 00047?
Drawn up by Yezhov and approved by the Poliburo eho ordered the establishment of small NKVD committees at regional levels as well as Republic levels to search out ‘former Kulaks’
Role of NKVD committes?
Classify Kulaks and other anti Soviet elements into 2 categories
Subject first category to death by shooting
Send second to gulag camps
Work to a system of quotas- upper established by area and social classes
Who did the arrest list of NKVD include?
Artists, musicians, scientists and managers
Within a month how many had been arrested?
100,000
How many sent to Gulags?
14,000
Impact of pressure to arrest people?
NKVD started targeting individuals at random- targeting those who might confess most easily
What type of individuals were considered dangerous to society?
Gypsies and members of other political parties
What did NKVD rely on to make arrests?
Informers
Recent historians say for every 400 people there was 1 informer
What was the conveyor belt?
A victim was passed from one interrogator to another until they were physically and mentally broken
Show trial 17th Jan 1937?
17 prominent communists were accused of plotting with Trotsky who was living in exile abroad, spying and sabotaging the industry. After delivering their confessions 13 were sentenced to death
Military Purge May-June 1937?
Stalin ordered the arrest of Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky- Deputy Commissar for defence- accused of espionage and plotting with Trotsky and along with 6 other top military commanders were executed in June 1937
Impact of military trial?
Opened the way for the ‘Great Purge’ of Red Army
Victims of Red Army purge?
2 further Marshals, 11 war commissars, 8 admirals and all but one of senior air force commanders
What percentage of officer corps were either executed or imprisoned?
50%
In 1937-1938 what were 74 million officials shot for?
Refusing to approve the execution of people whom the officials believed were innocent
21st March trial 1938?
Trial of B and R and Yagoda
Group of old Bolsheviks faced wild and fabricated claims for example plotting to kill Lenin in 1918 and conspiring with Germans and Japanese to dismember the USSR
17 were executed
Why was B a tough opponent for NKVD?
He held out for 3 months- sent 34 personal letters to S
Threats to his wife and young son eventually wore him out
B would only admit to the sum total of crimes and refused to confess to specific allegations
What did purges provide opportunites for?
Settle old scores, remove those who stood in the way of a promotion, to show an individuals devotion to S
By 1938 how many party members had been purged?
1/3
Gulag numbers in 1935?
800000
Gulag numbers by 1938?
Between 5.5 and 9.5 million
What disappeared in gulags?
Prisoners being able to reeducated or released early for good behaviour
Conditions in Gulags?
Meagre rations - which could be further reduced on slightest provocation, inadequate clothing, poor and overcrowded accomodation, no health care’ medical provision
Death rates in Gulags?
4 times higher than any where else in USSR
How did anti sematic attitudes revive during times of Yeschovina?
When 2 million Jews were incorporated into USSR in 1939 many rabbis and religious leaders were arrested- potential saboteurs
When did pace of purges slow down?
1938
Downfall of Yeshov?
S used him as a scape goat accusing him of zeal and 18th party declared that mass cleansings were no longer needed
Yeshov was arrested, tortured, secretly tried and shot in Feb 1940
Downfall of Trotsky?
August 1940- tracked down by Stalinist agents and in May hired assassins broke in and opened fire by Trotsky escaped unharmed
Mercador= successful assassinator, posed as an admirer but drove an ice pick in to Trotsky’s head- recieved 20 year prison sentence
What was Mercador mother awarded?
Order of Lenin to honour her sons service
Influence of S in terror?
Earliest B days he was a man of action
Did Stalin’s wife lead to intensified purges
Influence of personality?
Suspicious, vindictive and even paranoid
Obsessed with reinforcing his own position and eliminating rivals and getting revenge of political rivals
How did people view purges?
Many who were anxious about excesses during terror persuaded themselves that Stalin was not responsible- he was a heroic leader protecting his people from traitors
