How did the use of the secret police change throughout the period 1917 to 1985?

What did Lenin establish under Dzerzhinsky?

a Bolshevik secret police, the Cheka (December 1917)

What meant that the Cheka could act quickly to deal with actual and perceived enemies?

during the civil war they were given powers to act with limited legal interference

Describe the attempted assassination of Lenin and its results.

by Fanya Kaplin in August 1918 - prompted a wave of arrests

What was the Red Terror?

- between 1921-22 - period of intense terror
- Cheka intensified actions against SRs and Mensheviks
- up 200,000 opponents shot

How was the secret police reorganised after the civil war?

- Cheka replaced by GPU in 1922 and 1923 became OGPU
(1934 merged with an enlarged Interior Ministry - NKVD)

What was the significance of the changes to the secret police after the civil war?

- growing independence of the secret police of interference from other state institutions
- became a body only taking orders from the leadership of the Party

What had identified a range of opponents that had to be dealt with to ensure the successful transformation of the Soviet Union?

- Stalin's programme of rapid industrialisation under the FYPs
- kulaks and other peasants opposing collectivisation deported to Gulags

What rose after the show trial of the 16? (1936)

the number of those identified as political opponents

What resulted in widespread denunciations to the secret police?

the purges of the Right of the Party and the Red Army

Describe arrests

- undertaken by the secret police, often in the middle of the night to disorientate the accused
- then taken to the headquarters at the Lubyanka building in Moscow - tortured until confessed
- high profile victims = show trials (admit crimes and then sentenced to death)

What were parts of the deal with the accused?

- a public confession would save the victims family from prison (a promise not always kept)
- also had to name associates in plots to undermine the state 

When did Yagoda become head of the secret police?

1933

What resulted in an attempt to build up Yagoda's own empire?

keen to prove loyalty to Stalin and ambitious nature

What expanded under Yagoda?

Gulag (Chief Administration of Corrective Labour Camps) 1930 labour camps expanded under it and transformed into a vast system of forced labour

What were changes to the secret police under Yagoda?

- used influence with Stalin to remove any interference by courts (above the law)
- emphasis shift from ideology to economic considerations → pool of labour, often placed in hostile environments, death due to extreme cold and starvation (often the fate of guards and guard dogs as well)
- one of his achievements = 141 mile-long White Sea Canal

When did Yagoda's influence increase and what task was he given?

- start of Great Purges 1936
- given task of arresting Party members alleged to have links with Trotskyite opposition (recriminations eventually named after him)

Describe the removal of Yagoda.

1936 accused of incompetence in safeguarding Kirov and for not pursuing opposition with sufficient enthusiasm. removed from office. shot 1938

What was one of Yezhov's skills?

framed purges in ideological terms by accusing those arrested of political opposition to communism and the communist state

How was the process of arrest, trial and imprisonment sped up by Yezhov?

- Courts (Troikas) made up of 3 people (1 was the regional NKVD boss) dealt with cases
- September 1937 Karelian Troika processed 231 prisoners/day

Yezhov considered the Gulag to be under-used, so what did he do?

- number of inmates and deaths within camps rose considerably
- July 1937 issued orders required camps to meet quotas for executions → NKVD officers carrying them out awarded medals (often executed after)

How did the surveillance of the general public by the NKVD increase? (Yezhov)

- plain clothes police officers and system of informers used to collect information
- considerable use of Soviet criminal code to condemn people of anti-Soviet activity
- number of detectives recruited to NKVD quadruples and had to employ torture staff

What was widened under Yezhov?

- the group of people considered opponnents - included anyone who did not show sufficient commitment to the Revolution cause → clear message to the population
- under him that NKVD members also purged (no one was safe)

What was an example of Yezhov's delight in undertaking torture of suspects himself?

once attended a Politburo meeting with the cuffs of his shirt covered in fresh blood from torturing 'enemies of the revolution'

Why was Yezhov dismissed in 1938?

- Stalin concerned with demoralising impact of terror as war was looming
- Yezhov's health began to suffer from his frenetic work-rate and drinking
- Stalin accused him of responsibility for the excesses of the purges (scapegoat)

What qualities brought Beria to the notice of Stalin (even though Stalin was irritated by his excessive flattery) ?

was an energetic man of impressive organisational skills and unsavoury characteristics

How had Beria undermined Yezhov?

briefed Stalin with criticisms of Yezhov's work (to secure removal)

Why was Beria's appointment viewed with some relief by the general population?

- presented as an uncle-like figure who would reform the excessive behaviour of the secret police
- felt that indiscriminate arrests were inefficient and a waste of manpower (more productive method needed)

How was the secret police made more productive under Beria?

- reintroduced more conventional methods of police procedure
- public trials only held where solid evidence was available
- surveillance continued but only led to arrest when evidence was found

What was one of Beria's achievements?

oversaw the murder of Trotsky killed by a Stalinist agent in Mexico 1940

How did Beria make the Gulag a profitable part of the Soviet economy?

- 1939 food rations for inmates improved to get maximum work
- used technical skills of inmates for specialist tasks
- 1,000 scientists put to work on various projects → Beria boasted invented many new pieces of military hardware = dubious BUT scientists Tupolev and Kovolev played essential part in the development of the Soviet space program
- early releases cancelled so that expertise could continue to be used

Give some statistics that showed the contribution of the Gulag to the economy by the 1950s.

- Gulag economic activity = 2 billion roubles 1937, 4.5 billion 1940
- over a third of the country's gold, and much of its timber and coal, was produced through the Gulag

In 1941 what were the secret police given?

some powers of supervision of the Red Army with responsibility for monitoring disloyalty and dealing with any desertions

Who was the NKVD given control over the process of deportations of and describe the process.

- national minorities whose loyalty to the Soviet state was considered suspect (included Crimean Tartars, Volga Germans and Chechens)
- harsh forcible removal to designated areas - conducted by 3-person Troikas given powers outside normal processes of law

By 1943 what had the Red Army started to do and what happened due to this?

- started to overrun areas previously captured by the Germans
- in these areas Beria set up Special Departments to root out traitors, deserters and cowards (suspect of German co-operation = shot or deported)

Who did SMERSH deal with and give a statistic.

suspected spies - probably involved in murder of over 4,000 Polish officers at Katyn 1943

What did Order 270 do?

- treated all Soviet troops who had surrendered to the Germans during the initial invasion as traitors
- returning prisoners of war held in detention camps - some used to clear minefield by walking through areas where there had been bombs

What did Beria do to gain Stalin's favour?

- launch a fresh wave of purges targetting Leningrad branch of Party 
- 1949 over 2,000 members imprisoned or exiled (Beria gained influence)

What may have been a deliberate warning to Beria from Stalin?

Mingrelian Affair of 1951 (purge of Party in Georgia - targeted at Mingrelian nationality, a group to which Beria belonged)

What was the 'Doctors' Plot?

- January 1953 doctors arrested - evidence Stalin planning another major purge before he died
- most accused Jewish → maybe prelude to a campaign BUT more likely first step to elimination of Beria

Why was Beria's power and influence at the death of Stalin substantial?

he controlled the secret police, the network of Soviet spies throughout the world, the Gulag system and its associated links to industry

Who led the removal of Beria and why did the Politburo colleagues move so quickly?

Krushchev, due to Beria's enormous power

Who did Beria underestimate as a "moon-faced idiot"?

Khrushchev

What did the Politburo move quickly to do post-removal of Beria?

limit the independence of the secret police

What happened to the secret police after the removal of Beria?

- brought firmly under Party control
- answerable to a new organisation - the Soviet Security and Intelligence Service (KGB)

What happened to the Gulag system after the removal of Beria?

dismantled by Khrushchev → forced labour never again played a part in the Soviet economy

What happened to the Lubyanka building after the removal of Beria?

ceased to be a prison (last person held there = Gary Powers US Pilot who flew U-2 spy plane)

What was a common saying of Gulag inmates?

if only Stalin knew about their situation he would put an end to it (naive in the extreme)

What is evidence for Stalin's responsibility for the apparatus of terror?

- personally signed death warrants and added comments on lists of those arrested
- gave NKVD quotas to meet - not met, officers added own names
- accompanied Stalin's policies (peasant opposition, kulaks, failure of targets)
- historians such as Ivan Chukhin suggest the huge expansion of terror 1930s was result of the demand for slave labour to meet targets → perhaps no coincidence some top geologists arrested on the eve of a camp being set up to exploit oil reserves in Komi
- set parameters for purges, reduced after his death, reflected paranoid personality

Were Yagoda, Yezhov and Beria merely functionaries carrying out Stalin's orders?

YES
- became leaders due to willingness to follow Stalin's wishes (little/no moral conscience)
- none had major impacts on targets of terror

NO
- all added names to death lists
- had influence in implementation of terror and operation of Gulag

What joke of Stalin's embarrassed Roosevelt?

introduced Beria to him as 'our Himmler' (Hitler's head of SS)

Historian Anne Applebaum
" S S T V - A H S L A T O T O H "

"Stalin selected the victims - and his subordinates leaped at the opportunity to obey him"

What did Nove suggest in 1962?

terror was a necessary part of the Soviet Union's transformation → integral part of Stalin's policies in the conditions of the time

What did James Harris argue?

the use of terror and expansion of Gulag were consequences of the pressure exerted by the government on local Party officials and managers to meet targets for economic performance

What methods did Stalin support?

those used by Naftaly Frenkel, who applied 'rational' methods to exploit slave labour involving the distribution of food based on prisoner's capacity to work and the elimination of 'useless extras'

When did Andropov take on being head of the KGB?

1967

What was one of the most important changes that developed under the KGB?

in the words of poet Anna Akmatova people were no longer arrested for 'nothing', they were at least arrested 'for something'

Who was the term dissidents applied to?

those who criticised the Soviet state or system

Which dissidents constantly came up against restrictions and what were they expected to participate in if they wanted promotion?

- intellectuals, whose high status in society had encouraged them to develop independent ways of thinking 
- politics

Explain Andree Sakharov, and these writers: Solzhenitsyn (novelist) Medvedev (historian) and his brother Zhores (scientist)

- Sakharov = nuclear scientist, in science exchange of ideas with foreign colleagues, reading foreign research adn using foreign equipment important but was restricted → Sakharov and other leading citizens wrote letter to Brezhnev 1970 - authorities banned him from further military research
- these writers complained about restrictions on freedom - ability to work and travel restricted

What did political dissidents try to do and what were they usually concerned with?

- hold the government to the account of its own laws
- abuses of human rights that broke Soviet law and international agreements → groups established to monitor application of UN Declaration of Human Rights 1948 and Helsinki Accords

Who were often vocal dissidents and what groups existed?

nationalists → groups of Ukrainians, Latvians, Lithuanians and Georgians (called for greater status of their language and cultures, some for independence)

What celebrations did the authorities try to ban and what happened at the same time?

those of the 150th anniversary of the Ukrainian poet Taras Schevchenko 1964 (growing awareness of Ukrainians)
 a mysterious fire destroyed the Ukrainian archive at the Academy of Sciences in Kiev

When was alarm caused and why?

1974 when four Lithuanian groups joined together to form a National Popular Front, calling for Lithuanian to be the recognised language of their republic and calling for an end to Soviet colonisation - further arrests followed

How many leading nationalists did the police arrest?

20

Who did nationalist groups receive encouragement from?

their compatriats abroad

Who did religious dissidents include?

Baptists and Catholics - restrictions on worship and practices 
(Catholics prominent in Baltic republics such as Lithuania)

What was one of the most prominent religious groups?

-the refuseniks, Soviet Jews who had been denied their wish to emigrate to Israel
- had strong support of US Congress - difficult issue at US and USSR international summits

What did dissidents share?

a concern with human rights and freedom of expression

What were dissidents actions often limited to?

producing material sharing concerns and criticisms of the Soviet system → illegal, self-published materials known as samizdat and their production became a popular hobby in the 1960s

What did samizdat include?

poems, handwritten newsletters and transcripts of Voice of America radio broadcasts

What was one of the most well-known of the samizdat materials?

the 'Chronicle of Current Events → an underground newsletter that highlighted human rights abuses and treatment of dissidents

By the 1970s, what were the dissidents like?

had become more diverse, bolder and were using a wider range of methods to promote their views, including making use of foreign press

What would the secret police conduct against the dissidents?

surveillance and harassment of suspected dissidents

What actions were taken against the intellectuals?

- threatened with expulsion from their professional organisation, publishing permission possibly denied, dismissed from post
- houses searched and any material/apparatus could be used to produce/spread material was confiscated
- arrests = they claimed status of political prisoners so separated from criminal prisoners
- label of dissident marked out in civilian life - discrimination at work, failure to gain a place at university, continued surveillance

By the mid-1970s how many political prisoners did Amnesty International estimate there were?

at most 10,000 (small but not insignificant)

What did a new criminal code in 1960 do and what did Article 70 do?

- abolished night-time interrogations and limited the powers of the KGB (more liberal)
- provided authorities with the useful catch-all powers of dealing with anything considered 'Anti-Soviet agitation and Propaganda'

In 1966 why did the trial of Andrei Sinyavsky and Yuli Daniel (writers) reveal difficulties applying this new code and what was the result?

because of the necessity of proving intent when accusing someone of anti-Soviet activity = new articles added to the criminal code in 1966 dropping this requirement - those now arrested had to be dealt with by a court of justice

What was a significant development and why?

court records of proceedings were kept → allowed dissident groups to publicise their cases

What was an important development from 1967?

the use of psychiatric hospitals

What happened in 1967?

Politburo agreed the leading dissident, Vladimir Bukovsky, should be placed in a 'special mental hospital (quickly became common) also good as discredited the dissidents in the eyes of the public

Describe the special hospitals

- run by NVKD and 'patients' held until 'cured' (agreed to change views)
- refused were 'treated' with electric shocks and drugs
- conditions were overcrowded and unhygienic - did little to improve USSR's international reputation

Who were diagnosed with 'sluggish schizophrenia' and sent for treatment?

- Zhores Medvedev, writer and scientist
- Natalya Gorbanevskaya, one of the editors of 'Chronicle of Current Events'

What was another method used to limit the impact of dissidents?

- sending them into internal exile
- troublesome academics sent to out-of-the way places, a fact that accounted for the excellent academic work at the Siberian division of the Academy of Sciences
- 1980 Sakharov sent to Gorky, a city closed to foreigners = severely limited communication

What was a constant source of irritation to the government?

records of court cases smuggled out of USSR - used by human rights groups in West = bad publicity

What had Soviet leadership become increasingly concerned with and why?

- its international reputation, especially in the light of the Helsinki Accords (countries who signed agreed to respect 'freedom of thought, conscience and belief) - treatment of dissidents highlighted by human rights groups as a violation of this agreement
- growing mass communication worldwide = news of arrests could be embarrassing and damage diplomacy (international condemnation sometimes led to releases)

Were dissidents a real threat within the USSR?

No - had little support from general public (never threatened social/political stability), collection of individuals and never a movement, struggled to organise demonstrations

What is an example of a public protest that showed the limited support for the dissidents?

1968 organised public protest at Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in Red Square, Moscow - only 7 turned up (fear of secret police played a part)

By the end of the 1970s how had Andropov's measures succeeded?

- kept dissident groups small and divided
- also in a state of mutual mistrust

What had grew considerably under Andropov's leadership?

the professionalism, reputation and status of the KGB

What had Andropov served as in 1956 and what had this convinced him?

Soviet Ambassador to Hungary during Hungarian Uprising of 1956
→ convinced him dissident action could turn into a popular uprising that might threaten the state (other Politburo leaders less convinced → but he was General Secretary

What increased in 1982 and what was happening to methods of monitoring?

- Andropov's monitoring of dissident groups (members of the 'Chronicle of Current Events' recall this period as being one of the most difficult in which to operate)
- becoming more sophisticated (stereotypical image of secret police officers in long leather coats had some basis)
→ conversations recorded using tape and cassette recorders, listening devices and cameras secreted in bras and briefcases
- threat of dissidents had been neutralised

What did Andropov realise about popular discontent?

more likely to be based on economic concerns (dissidents were not the majority)

What was Andropov greatly concerned with?

the growing inefficiency of the Soviet economy (no reasonable standard of living would lead to discontent spreading)

What had sparked the popular unrest in Poland 1980-81?

a decision to raise food prices

Andropov
" W M E S, A T W W H A D "

told his doctor "We'll make enough sausages, and then we won't have any dissidents"

How did Andropov use the secret police in the workplace?

stamped down on alcoholism and absenteeism

Why did spot checks in factories to record attendance and combing streets for truanting workers upset female workers?

- they had to juggle a full-time job with queuing for food at shops
- queues partly result of cheap government-set prices = sold out quickly
- right queue at right time was an important part of Soviet mother's daily life (general public preferred queuing to higher prices)

Andropov told the Politburo that the leadership needed to 
" A A U O T S I W W L "

"acquire an understanding of the soviety in which we live"

Describe Andropov visiting factories to talk to workers.

- February 1983 visited a Moscow factory but whole event = contrived
- well-meaning and genuine but humourless, austere and lacked charisma
- workers felt restricted because they were talking to ex-head of KGB

What was a more effective method of tapping into public concerns? (1982-85)

appointing new government advisors - surrounded himself with relatively free thinkers, more often journalist/academics, in touch with discontent