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Communist Government in the USSR - Stalin in power 1928-53, the numbers…

- - - - people were tried for contact with foreigners, not cutting pictures of Trotsky from textbooksi
  - - - This is where the NKVD came in useful
        
        They based their reports on information they heard whilst hanging around outside, perhaps in a shop queue for example
        
        They also relied heavily on reports from individual to tell them what was said behind closed doors
        
        'There were no "neutral" channels of communication' between citizens and state, so it is very difficult for historians to know what people "really" though
- - - - executed in March 1938 for 'wrecking'.
      - Trotskyism and for failing to arrest enough 'enemies of the people'
      - had overseen the show trials and execution of Kamenev and Zinoviev
      - the head of the NKVD (Soviet intelligence agency)
    - - Some historians suggest that the murder suggests that the murder was planned by Stalin/ the state and was an excuse for the Great Purge
      - Bolshevik party leader in Leningrad
      - killed in December 1934, this sparked mass arrests and repression increased after this
  - - - were executed in in August 1936 after a show trial during the Great purges
        
        they were blamed for killing a Communist party official, Kirov and for attempting to kill Stalin
        
        reportedly pled guilty to avoid execution, but executed anyway
      - Kamenev's sons were exectued in 1938
      - 1939 his wife
  - - - Terror was a 'systematic characterisation of Stalinism the 1930s'
  - - - these were the communists who had been in the party in the early days of the Russian revolution of 1917
  - - - they made examples of people who Stalin disapproved of
    - - the script was written in advance for show trials and everyone knew what the outcome would be
      - most ordinary people were not given the right to a trial
        
        they were for high profile Russians
      - films of the 1936-38 show trials were released around the world
    - - they were made to confess to aiding the now-exiled Trotsky in terrorist activities
      - Zinoviev and Kamenev's trial took place in 1936
      - Bukharin then received his show trials in 1938
      - Stalin had fully eliminated all of his former rivals
    - - people often confessed to crimes they had not committed in the hope of mercy, in an attempt to protect their loved ones and because of their fear of torture
      - they created the impression of the existence of a real threat to the USSR from internal enemies
      - many workers actually supported the show trials, because it gave them a way to denounce their bosses for personal reasons and to get them fired or arrested as a result
- - - - restricted the rights of citizens
        
        only Communist Party candidates were allowed to run in elections (a single party state)
      - effectively, the SU was a dictatorship
      - whilst seemingly democratic was thoroughly undemocratic
      - audience of the Soviet Constitution wasn't only Soviet population but also foreign powers. S wanted to persuade countries such as Britain and the United States that the SU was truly democratic
    - - 'The constitution of the USSR is the only thoroughly democratic constitution in the world'
    - - was passed in 1936
      - Constitution enfranchised (having to vote) all citizens in the SU
        
        previously, bourgeois (middle) classes were disenfranchised
      - Constitution also included
        
        freedom of press
        
        freedom of organisation
        
        freedom of religion
        
        guaranteed employment
  - - - tried to limit his power or call him out on his terror attacks
        
        arguably efforts were minimal (on occasion & not hugely effective
      - some of Stalin's advisors did take advantage of the power Stalin gave them and use it for their own agenda
        
        eg historians point out how the head of the NKVD (secret police) Yezhov behaved during the Great Purge
      - commonly, they were presented as meek and passive for letting Stalin get away with whatever he wanted
    - - Stalin was critical of these zealous party members who implemented collectivisation too enthusiastically
      - there could be conflict between local communities
      - the USSR forced international enemies
    - - Comunist Party did try and limit Stalin's personal power
        
        members of the Politburo voiced fears over Stalin's brutality for example Ordhzkonikidze openly expressed opposition to Stalin's use of terror in a meeting
        
        members of the Politburo were cautious of Stalin's Second 5YP targets and forced him to lower them
        
        Politburo refused to agree to the execution of Ryutin (a member of a faction against Stalin who had denounced him in 1932)
    - - if he felt local party members were threatening his power, he executed them
      - increasingly controlled through terror and personal control
  - - - Stalin made the Politburo full of his loyal friends
        
        eg Molotov and Lazar Kaganovich
      - Manipulating the Politburo in this way meant Stalin was not faced with oppostion and could easily force through his own agenda
      - Stalin first purged the Politburo in the 1920s
        
        members such as Trotsky, Bukharin and Zinoviev had all been removed over disagreeing views of economic policy
    - - the counterpart this was that political institutions had little power
      - Communist Party consented to his policies without challenging
      - as a dictator, S had significant political freedom to run the USSR how he liked
    - - political power became condensed and given to smaller groups outside of the Politburo
      - S personally styled himself as an intimidating ruler. Politicians feared that if they disagreed with him they would be executed
      - the frequency with which political bodies, such as Politburo, met reduced over the 1920s
- - - - he transformed it into the Presidium and expanded it from 10 to 36 letting him isolate Malenkov and Beria and promote younger politicians who supported him
  - - - eg doctors arrested and accused of a plot to assassinate him
      - believed this would be a pretext to start purging Jews in USSR
      - others argue it would be used to remove Beria as a political threat
      - the purge did not come to being as Stalin died in 1953
  - - - looking at the loves of people in the indutrial city of Magnitogorsk, Catkin argues that for them, Stalin took one the image of 'a warm father figure' from the mid 1930s. His image was everywhere, a reassuring constant in the period of immense social change and disruption
      - photographs of Stalin cut out from magazines and newspapers were pinned on the walls of people's homes