THE PURGES AND GULAG Life under Joseph Stalin
Stalin became convinced that people within the Communist Party were trying to overthrow him. He wants to purge (rid) the USSR of anyone he even suspects of questioning his power.
MOSCOW SHOW TRIALS starting in 1934, party members, often people loyal to Stalin, were forced to confess to crimes they didn t commit they were tortured or their families threatened to get them to falsely confess to crimes against the state the trials themselves were public spectacles but people only saw the public confession, not the torture leading up to it
FOR EXAMPLE Lev Kamenev founding member of the Politburo Nikolai Bukharin Opposed forced collectivization Grigori Zinoviev Leading Bolshevik and close associate of Lenin
DISAPPEARING When a high ranking soviet official was executed, history was altered to remove him from the record entirely. It was as if that person never existed
THE RED ARMY PURGE
Beginning in 1938, leaders of the Soviet army were tried for espionage (spying) for Germany, convicted and executed. Ultimately, over 30,000 army officers were tried and deported half the officer corps
THE GREAT PURGE a wave of terror across the Soviet Union In days like these, you always have to be extra careful over 8.5 million people arrested (for virtually no reason) secret police and informants permeated Soviet life Don t gossip
DENUNCIATION WAS A COMMON THEME IN SOVIET SOCIETY Literature: How despicable is the hissing voice of spies! How disgraceful the sight of enemies among us! Shame to the mothers that gave birth To these vicious dogs of unprecedented foulness!... Demian Bedney (1937) Music: Hey you goalie, prepare for battle! You re a watchman by the gate! Just imagine that behind you The borderline must be kept safe (The Goalkeeper) Children s stories: Pavlik Morozov the story of a model pioneer who found out that his parents were involved in illegal activities. He turned them into the authorities and was a hero for doing so. All children knew this story
ARREST How do you remove that many people from society without causing mass unrest and revolt? Normally, there was a knock at the door in the middle of the night Sometimes arrests were set up as random encounters taxi driver, bank teller, etc Sometimes people taken away in trucks that read Meat or Bread on the outside
WHO WAS ARRESTED? anyone who engaged in suspicious behavior anyone who had a reasonable reason to be anti-soviet (whether they were or not) Kulaks, foreigners, people from acquired Soviet states, etc anyone who could be helpful to the Soviet state if forced to work in labor camps engineers, specialists, etc.
WHAT HAPPENED NEXT? the prison conditions were awful cells meant for 350 people held 2341 people there was no plumbing lice were everywhere there wasn t enough food, and what there was was gross
in addition, the prisoners were tortured into confessing their crimes people were beaten, burned, frozen, raped, and cut Torture by Mosquitoes in Gulag Nikolai Getman
TRIALS the trials themselves were very short after all, the result was a foregone conclusion there had been a confession heard by three judges (troika)
so many of these punishments were beyond disproportionate with their crimes a factory worker sentenced to 5 years for being 10 minutes late to work 2 times a woman sentenced to 10 years for stealing 10 loaves of bread a man sentenced to 3 years for smiling in sympathy when drunken soldiers told anti-soviet
So where were people sent when they were sentenced?
GULAG THE CHIEF ADMINISRATION OF CORRECTIVE LABOR CAMPS AND COLONIES hundreds of forced labor camps provided part of the workforce for the Five Year Plans
DEPORTATION Prisoners were sometimes sent to Siberia or labor camps the conditions on the deportation trains were terrible hardened criminals in with everyone else
LABOR CAMPS the daily routine in the camps was virtually unbearable woke up early escorted to work unless it was too cold (-41) work all day in primitive conditions return home and collapse
FOOD RATIONING Cauldron 1 Food given based on work done 300 grams of bread, 2 liters of thin soup, 1 spoonful of groats Cauldron II 500 grams of bread, 1 liter of thin soup, 2 spoonfuls of groats and a piece of spoiled fish Cauldron III 700 grams of bread, 3 liters of soup, 2 spoonfuls of groats and a piece of spoiled fish Victim of the big ration Nikolai Getman had to exert more energy than you could possibly earn in Cauldron III
So much of the work was deadly the worst was outside work cutting trees, mining, manual construction the work quota was set far too high for people prisoners had to cheat the system to survive
SELF-MUTILATION Lengths people would go to to avoid hard labor chop off hand or fingers with axe burn arm freezing the exremities chemical burns of skin intentionally reopening or irritating wounds to prevent healing or cause infection injecting soap or kerosene into the urinary tract to mimic STIs
WHY ISN T THIS COMMON KNOWLEDGE? Unlike Hitler, who was proud of his attempts to exterminate the Jews, Stalin kept these labor camps a secret Future Soviet leaders also used extreme forms of intimidation and oppression to keep people obedient Tendency (for a while) to idolize the Stalin for how he modernized Russia; people felt that the cost was worth it The USSR was basically closed to foreigners from 1928-1988 - who s going to report on these things?