Stalin’s purges and the Show Trials In some Communists party members criticised Stalin’s collectivisation policy and his wife committed suicide. This made Stalin fearful and paranoid. He felt people were plotting against him and seeking to remove him from power. At the 1934 Party Conference Kirov received lots of support. He was assassinated later that year, probably by Stalin who saw him as a threat to his leadership. It was claimed that the death was part of a plot by people led by Trotsky to overthrow the revolution and destroy the USSR.

THE GREAT TERROR - AIMS Stalin used this event as an excuse to start a campaign of arresting and either killing, or sending to the slave labour camps, people who were accused of being “enemies of the people”. Stalin wanted to get rid of any of the “Old Bolsheviks” who had been part of the party in Lenin’s time. This would only leave the people who had moved up in the party because of Stalin and who owed him and looked up to him.

THE GREAT TERROR - AIMS Anyone who Stalin considered a threat to his position could be arrested on false charges and killed or sent to the Gulags. Stalin could also blame other people for the failure of his policies and say they were the fault of spies or traitors who were working with foreign countries to wreck the economy and weaken the USSR. Stalin’s main aim was to establish complete domination over the Communist party and eliminate any potential threats to his rule.

THE PURGES The NKVD (secret police) arrested millions of people and encouraged informers. They especially arrested people like old nobles, priests, people with connections abroad, industrial managers and the most important group targeted was the “Old Bolsheviks”. These NKVD was run at first by YAGODA, but he was replaced in 1936 by Yezhov and more and more people were sent to the camps or killed. Unlike Lenin, Stalin used terror against the Communist party itself.

THE PURGES – VICTIMS Between million people were arrested and one million were put to death. The rest were sent to forced labour camps where 90% died of over-work, malntrition, cold or violence. In 1939 Stalin said that the purge was “Unavoidable and its results on the whole beneficial”.

The Show Trials - AIMS During the purges there were three show trials held in Moscow of former high ranking communists or “Old Bolsheviks”. Stalin picked on members of the party from before the revolution and people who had opposed him in the past. He wanted to eliminate any possible threats to his position and they were all accused of plotting with the exiled Trotsky and with Hitler or other foreign countries to kill Stalin, destroy the USSR and overthrow the revolution. (Counter revolutionaries)