Great Purge

The Great Purge is the name given to campaigns of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union during the late 1930s which included purges of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

Introduction

The term "repression" was officially used to denote the prosecution of people recognized as counter-revolutionaries and enemies of the people. The purge was motivated by the desire on the part of the leadership to remove dissident elements from the Party and what is often considered to have been a desire to consolidate the authority of Joseph Stalin. Additional campaigns of repression were carried on against social groups which were believed or were accused, for ulterior political motives, to have opposed the Soviet state and the politics of the Communist Party.

Related Topics:
Enemies of the people - Joseph Stalin

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Also, a number of purges were officially explained as an elimination of the possibilities of sabotage and espionage, in view of an expected war with Germany. Most public attention was focused on the purge of the leadership of the Communist Party itself, as well as of government bureaucrats and leaders of the armed forces, the vast majority being Party members.

Related Topics:
Germany - Purge

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However, the campaigns affected many other categories of the society: intelligentsia, peasants and especially those branded as "too rich for a peasant" (kulaks), and professionals . A series of NKVD (the Soviet secret police) operations affected a number of national minorities, accused of being "fifth column" communities.

Related Topics:
Kulak - NKVD - Fifth column

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According to Khrushchev's 1956 speech, On the Personality Cult and its Consequences and more recent findings, many of the accusations, including those presented at Moscow show trials, were based on forced confessions and on loose interpretations of articles of Article 58 (RSFSR Penal Code), which dealt with counter-revolutionary crimes. Due legal process, as defined by the Soviet law in force at the time, was often largely replaced with summary proceedings by NKVD troikas.

Related Topics:
Khrushchev - 1956 - On the Personality Cult and its Consequences - Moscow show trial - Confession - Article 58 (RSFSR Penal Code) - NKVD troika

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Millions of people died in the purges. Several hundreds of thousands were executed by firing squad and millions were forcibly resettled or sent to gulags where many of them died due to starvation, disease, exposure and overwork. The height of the campaigns occurred while the NKVD was headed by Nikolai Yezhov, from September 1936 to August 1938; this period is sometimes referred to as the Yezhovshchina ("Yezhov era"). However the campaigns were carried out according to the general line, and often by direct orders, of Party politburo headed by Stalin.

Related Topics:
Firing squad - Forcibly resettled - Gulag - Nikolai Yezhov - 1936 - 1938 - Party politburo

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In particular, in 1937 the Politburo issued an order to apply "means of physical coercion" to the accused, which translated into torture and extra-judicial murders. Towards the end of the purges, Yezhov was relieved from his post, later arrested on charges of espionage (proved to be false) and treason, tried, found guilty, and shot.

Related Topics:
Espionage - Treason

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Large-scale politically-motivated killing of this type gave rise to modern terms, such as "democide" and "politicide".

Related Topics:
Democide - Politicide

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