Joseph Stalin died 65 years ago, but his personality and his policies are still the subject of fierce debate among historians, politicians, and ordinary people. The scale and ambiguity of this historical figure are so great that until now the attitude towards Stalin and the Stalin era for some citizens of our country is a kind of indicator that determines the political and social position.

One of the darkest and most tragic pages in the country is political repression, which peaked in the 1930s and early 1940s. It is the repressive policy of the Soviet state during the years of Stalin's rule that is one of the main arguments of the opponents of Stalinism. Indeed, on the other side of the coin is industrialization, the construction of new cities and enterprises, the development of transport infrastructure, the strengthening of the armed forces and the formation of a classical model of education, which still works “by inertia” and is one of the best in the world. But collectivization, the deportation of entire peoples to Kazakhstan and Central Asia, the extermination of political opponents and opponents, as well as random people attributed to them, excessive harshness towards the population of the country - this is another part of the Stalin era, which also cannot be erased from people's memory.

However, recently there have been more and more publications that the scale and nature of political repression during the reign of I.V. Stalin were greatly exaggerated. It is interesting that not so long ago this position was voiced, it seemed by those who were in no way interested in “whitewashing” Joseph Vissarionovich - employees of the US CIA analytical center. By the way, it was in the United States that Alexander Solzhenitsyn once lived in exile - the main exposer of Stalinist repressions, and it was he who owns the frightening figures - 70 million repressed. The US CIA analytical center Rand Corporation calculated the number of those repressed during the years of the Soviet leader's rule and got somewhat different figures - about 700 thousand people. Perhaps the scale of the repressions was greater, but obviously not as much as Solzhenitsyn's followers say.

The international human rights organization "Memorial" claims that from 11-12 million to 38-39 million people became victims of Stalin's repressions. The spread, as you can see, is very large. Yet 38 million is 3.5 times more than 11 million. The "Memorial" refers to the victims of Stalinist repressions: 4.5-4.8 million convicted for political reasons, 6.5 million deported since 1920, about 4 million disenfranchised under the Constitution of 1918 and the decree of 1925, about 400 500 thousand were repressed on the basis of a number of decrees, 6-7 million died of starvation in 1932-1933, 17.9 thousand victims of "labor decrees".

As you can see, the concept of "victims of political repression" in this case is expanding to the maximum. But political repression is still specific actions aimed at arresting, imprisoning or physically destroying dissidents or those suspected of dissent. Is it possible to refer to the victims of political repressions those who died of starvation? Especially considering that at that difficult time, most of the world's population was starving. Millions of people died in the African and Asian colonies of European powers, and in the "prosperous" United States of America, it was not for nothing that these years were called the "Great Depression".

Move on. Another 4 million people were deprived of the right to vote during the Stalinist period. However, can the loss of rights be considered as a full-fledged political repression? In this case, the multi-million African-American population of the United States, which in the first half of the 20th century not only did not have voting rights, but was also segregated along racial lines, is also the victim of political repression by Wilson, Roosevelt, Truman and other American presidents. That is, approximately 10-12 million people out of those identified by Memorial as victims of repression are already in question. Victims of time - yes, not always a well-thought-out economic policy - yes, but not targeted political repressions.

If we approach the issue strictly, then only persons convicted under “political” articles and sentenced to death or certain terms of imprisonment can be called directly victims of political repression. And here the fun begins. Not only “politicians” were classified as repressed, but also many real criminals convicted of ordinary criminal offenses, or who, for certain reasons (not repaid card debt, for example), tried to get away from criminals by initiating a new “political” article to the political. The former Soviet dissident Natan Sharansky writes about such a story, which only took place in the Brezhnev era, in his memoirs - an ordinary criminal was sitting with him, who, in order not to answer to other prisoners for gambling debt, deliberately scattered anti-Soviet leaflets in the barracks. Of course, these cases were not isolated.

In order to understand who can be classified as politically repressed, it is necessary to take a closer look at the Soviet criminal legislation of the 1920s-1950s - what it was like, who could be subjected to the most severe measures and who could and who could not become a victim " firing squad" articles of the criminal code.

Lawyer Vladimir Postanyuk notes that when the Criminal Code of the RSFSR was adopted in 1922, Article 21 of the main criminal law of the Soviet republic emphasized that in order to combat the most serious types of crimes that threaten the foundations of Soviet power and the Soviet system, as an exceptional measure to protect the state of workers firing is used.

For what crimes, according to the Criminal Code of the RSFSR, other union republics, was the death penalty imposed in the Stalin years (1923-1953)? Could they be sentenced to death under Article 58 of the Criminal Code?

V.Postanyuk: Crimes punishable by an exceptional measure of punishment - the death penalty - were included in the Special Part of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR. First of all, these were the so-called. "counter-revolutionary" crimes. Among the crimes for which the death penalty was due, the criminal law of the RSFSR listed the organization of armed uprisings for counter-revolutionary purposes or the invasion of Soviet territory by armed detachments or gangs, attempts to seize power (Article 58 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR); communication with foreign states or their individual representatives with the aim of inducing them to military intervention in the affairs of the Republic; participation in an organization operating for the purpose of committing the crimes referred to in Art. 58 of the Criminal Code; opposition to the normal activities of state institutions and enterprises; participation in or assistance to an organization acting in the direction of helping the international bourgeoisie; organization for counter-revolutionary purposes of terrorist acts directed against representatives of the Soviet government or figures; organizing for counter-revolutionary purposes the destruction or damage by explosion, arson or other means of railway or other means of communication, means of public communication, water pipes, public warehouses and other structures or structures, as well as participation in the performance of these crimes (Article 58 of the Criminal Code). The death penalty could also be received for active opposition to the revolutionary and working-class movement while serving in responsible or highly secret positions in tsarist Russia and with counter-revolutionary governments during the Civil War. The death penalty followed for the organization of gangs and gangs and participation in them, for counterfeiting by conspiracy of persons, for a number of malfeasances. For example, article 112 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR emphasized that execution could be ordered for abuse of power, abuse of power or inaction and negligence, followed by the collapse of the managed structure. Misappropriation and embezzlement of state valuables, unjust sentence by a judge, taking a bribe under aggravating circumstances - all these crimes could also be punished up to the death penalty.

Could juveniles be shot during the Stalin period, and for what crimes? Were there such examples?

V. Postanyuk: During the period of its operation, the code was repeatedly subjected to changes. In particular, they extended to issues of criminal liability of minors and were associated with the mitigation of liability measures that could be applied to juvenile offenders. The norms on punishment also changed: the use of execution for minors and pregnant women was prohibited, short-term imprisonment was introduced for a period of 1 month (Law of July 10, 1923), and later for a period of 7 days (Law of October 16, 1924) .

In 1935, the famous Decree "On measures to combat juvenile delinquency" was adopted. According to this regulation, minors over 12 years of age were allowed to be prosecuted for theft, violence and bodily harm, mutilation, murder or attempted murder. The decree stated that all criminal penalties could be applied to juvenile offenders over 12 years old. This wording, which was not very clear, gave rise to numerous allegations about the facts of the execution of children in the Soviet Union. But these claims, at least from a legal point of view, are not true. After all, the rule on the impossibility of imposing the death penalty on persons under the age of 18, contained in Art. 13 Fundamentals and in Art. 22 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR, has not been canceled.

Wasn't there a single case of execution of minors in the Soviet Union?

V. Postaniuk: There was such a case. And this is the only reliably known case of the execution of a teenager in Soviet times. 15-year-old Arkady Neiland was shot on August 11, 1964. As you can see, this is far from Stalin's time. Neiland was the first and only minor officially sentenced by a Soviet court to capital punishment - execution. The guilt of this criminal was that he hacked to death with an ax a woman and her three-year-old son. The request for pardon for the teenager was rejected, and Nikita Khrushchev himself spoke out in support of capital punishment for him.

Thus, we see that Soviet criminal law did indeed provide for the death penalty under the “anti-Soviet” Article 58. However, as the lawyer noted in his interview, among the “execution” anti-Soviet acts were crimes that would be called terrorist in our time. For example, one can hardly call a “prisoner of conscience” a person who organized sabotage on a railway track. As for the use of execution as the ultimate punishment for corrupt officials, this practice still exists in a number of countries around the world, for example, in China. In the Soviet Union, the death penalty was seen as a temporary and exceptional, but effective measure to combat crime and the enemies of the Soviet state.

If we talk about the victims of political repressions, then a huge part of those convicted under the anti-Soviet article were just saboteurs, spies, organizers and members of armed and underground groups and organizations that acted against the Soviet regime. Suffice it to recall that in the 1920s and 1930s the country was in a hostile environment, and the situation was not particularly stable in a number of regions of the Soviet Union. For example, in Central Asia, individual groups of Basmachi continued to resist Soviet power in the 1930s.

Finally, do not miss another very interesting nuance. A significant part of the Soviet citizens repressed under Stalin were senior officials of the party and the Soviet state, including law enforcement and security agencies. If we analyze the lists of the top leaders of the NKVD of the USSR at the union and republican levels in the 1930s, then most of them were subsequently shot themselves. This indicates that tough measures were applied not only to the political opponents of the Soviet government, but, to a much greater extent, to its representatives themselves, guilty of abuse of power, corruption or any other official crimes.

1. Stalin's repressions- mass political repressions carried out in the USSR during the period of Stalinism (late 1920s - early 1950s).

2. The scale of repression:

From a memorandum addressed to Khrushchev: in the period from 1921 to the present, 3,777,380 people were convicted of counter-revolutionary crimes, including 642,980 people to VMN, 2,369,220 to detention in camps and prisons for a period of 25 years or less, to exile and exile - 765.180 people. (Minister of Internal Affairs).

The number of prisoners in prisons:

3. Reasons:

The transition to a policy of accelerated collectivization of agriculture, industrialization and the cultural revolution, which required significant material investments or the attraction of free labor (it is indicated, for example, that grandiose plans for the development and creation of an industrial base in the regions of the north of the European part of Russia, Siberia and the Far East required the relocation huge masses of people.

· Preparations for war with Germany, where the Nazis who came to power proclaimed their goal the destruction of communist ideology.
To solve these problems, it was necessary to mobilize the efforts of the entire population of the country and ensure absolute support for state policy, and for this - to neutralize the potential political opposition on which the enemy could rely.

· The policy of collectivization and accelerated industrialization led to a sharp drop in the standard of living of the population and to mass starvation. Stalin and his entourage understood that this increased the number of those dissatisfied with the regime and tried to portray "saboteurs" and "enemies of the people" as responsible for all economic difficulties, as well as accidents in industry and transport, mismanagement, etc.

The peculiar character of Stalin

1) begins with the seizure of power in 1917 and continues until the end of 1922. The Bolsheviks' "natural allies" - the workers - did not escape repression. However, this period of repression fits into the context of the general confrontation.

2) The second period of repression begins in 1928 with a new attack on the peasantry, which is carried out by the Stalinist group in the context of the political struggle in the upper echelons of power.

Fight against "sabotage"

· Repression against foreign technicians

Fight against internal party opposition

With the beginning of the collectivization of agriculture and industrialization in the late 1920s - early 1930s, as well as the strengthening of Stalin's personal power, repressions became massive

dispossession

Repressions in connection with grain procurements

In 1929-1931, dozens of scientists were arrested and convicted in the so-called "case of the Academy of Sciences"

During 1933-34, as the Russian researcher O. V. Khlevnyuk points out, there was some weakening of repression.

3) Politicalrepressions of 1934-1938

Kirov's assassination (On the day that Kirov was assassinated, the Soviet government reacted with an official announcement of the assassination of Kirov. It spoke of the need for "the final eradication of all enemies of the working class.")

· 1937-1938 saw one of the peaks of Stalin's repressions. During these two years, 1,575,259 people were arrested on cases of the NKVD, of which 681,692 people were sentenced to death [

On July 30, 1937, the order of the NKVD No. 00447 “On the operation to repress former kulaks, criminals and other anti-Soviet elements” was adopted

· Repression against foreigners and ethnic minorities

· In the 1930s, persons of a number of nationalities were evicted from the frontier zones of the USSR, mainly foreign to the USSR of that time (Romanians, Koreans, Latvians, etc.).

Repression and anti-Semitism

· Lysenkoism

4) Repressions of the war period

Deportation of peoples in 1941-1944 (there is nothing like that)

5) Political repressions of the post-war period

Deportations 1940-1950s

Repression and anti-Semitism

· Ideological control in Soviet science, Lysenkovshchina

In the 20s and ended in 1953. During this period, mass arrests took place, and special camps for political prisoners were created. No historian can name the exact number of victims of Stalinist repressions. More than a million people were convicted under Article 58.

Origin of the term

The Stalinist terror affected almost all sectors of society. For more than twenty years, Soviet citizens lived in constant fear - one wrong word or even gesture could cost their lives. It is impossible to unequivocally answer the question of what the Stalinist terror rested on. But of course, the main component of this phenomenon is fear.

The word terror in translation from Latin is "horror". The method of governing the country, based on instilling fear, has been used by rulers since ancient times. Ivan the Terrible served as a historical example for the Soviet leader. The Stalinist terror is in some way a more modern version of the Oprichnina.

Ideology

The midwife of history is what Karl Marx called violence. The German philosopher saw only evil in the safety and inviolability of members of society. Marx's idea was used by Stalin.

The ideological basis of the repressions that began in the 1920s was formulated in July 1928 in the Short Course on the History of the CPSU. At first, the Stalinist terror was a class struggle, which was supposedly needed to resist the overthrown forces. But the repressions continued even after all the so-called counter-revolutionaries ended up in camps or were shot. The peculiarity of Stalin's policy was the complete non-observance of the Soviet Constitution.

If at the beginning of Stalin's repressions the state security agencies fought against the opponents of the revolution, then by the mid-thirties, the arrests of old communists began - people selflessly devoted to the party. Ordinary Soviet citizens were already afraid not only of the NKVD officers, but also of each other. Denunciation has become the main tool in the fight against "enemies of the people."

Stalin's repressions were preceded by the "Red Terror", which began during the Civil War. These two political phenomena have many similarities. However, after the end of the Civil War, almost all cases of political crimes were based on the falsification of charges. During the "Red Terror", those who did not agree with the new regime were imprisoned and shot, first of all, there were many of them at the stages of creating a new state.

Case of lyceum students

Officially, the period of Stalinist repressions begins in 1922. But one of the first high-profile cases dates back to 1925. It was in this year that a special department of the NKVD fabricated a case on charges of counter-revolutionary activities of graduates of the Alexander Lyceum.

On February 15, over 150 people were arrested. Not all of them were related to the above-named educational institution. Among the convicts were former students of the School of Law and officers of the Life Guards of the Semenovsky Regiment. Those arrested were accused of assisting the international bourgeoisie.

Many were shot already in June. 25 people were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. 29 arrested were sent into exile. Vladimir Schilder - a former teacher - at that time was 70 years old. He died during the investigation. Nikolai Golitsyn, the last chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Russian Empire, was sentenced to death.

Shakhty case

The accusations under Article 58 were ridiculous. A person who does not speak foreign languages ​​and has never communicated with a citizen of a Western state in his life could easily be accused of colluding with American agents. During the investigation, torture was often used. Only the strongest could withstand them. Often, those under investigation signed a confession only in order to complete the execution, which sometimes lasted for weeks.

In July 1928, specialists in the coal industry became victims of the Stalinist terror. This case was called "Shakhtinskoe". The heads of Donbas enterprises were accused of sabotage, sabotage, the creation of an underground counter-revolutionary organization, and assistance to foreign spies.

There were several high-profile cases in the 1920s. Until the beginning of the thirties, dispossession continued. It is impossible to calculate the number of victims of Stalinist repressions, because no one in those days carefully kept statistics. In the nineties, the KGB archives became available, but even after that, researchers did not receive exhaustive information. However, separate execution lists were made public, which became a terrible symbol of Stalin's repressions.

The Great Terror is a term applied to a small period of Soviet history. It lasted only two years - from 1937 to 1938. About the victims during this period, the researchers provide more accurate data. 1,548,366 people were arrested. Shot - 681 692. It was a struggle "against the remnants of the capitalist classes."

Causes of the "Great Terror"

In Stalin's time, a doctrine was developed to intensify the class struggle. It was only a formal reason for the destruction of hundreds of people. Among the victims of the Stalinist terror of the 1930s were writers, scientists, military men, and engineers. Why was it necessary to get rid of representatives of the intelligentsia, specialists who could benefit the Soviet state? Historians offer different answers to these questions.

Among modern researchers there are those who are convinced that Stalin had only an indirect relation to the repressions of 1937-1938. However, his signature appears on almost every execution list, in addition, there is a lot of documentary evidence of his involvement in mass arrests.

Stalin strove for sole power. Any indulgence could lead to a real, not fictional conspiracy. One of the foreign historians compared the Stalinist terror of the 1930s with the Jacobin terror. But if the latest phenomenon, which took place in France at the end of the 18th century, involved the destruction of representatives of a certain social class, then in the USSR often unrelated people were subjected to arrest and execution.

So, the reason for the repression was the desire for sole, unconditional power. But what was needed was a wording, an official justification for the need for mass arrests.

Occasion

On December 1, 1934, Kirov was killed. This event became the formal reason for the murderer to be arrested. According to the results of the investigation, again fabricated, Leonid Nikolaev did not act independently, but as a member of an opposition organization. Stalin subsequently used the assassination of Kirov in the fight against political opponents. Zinoviev, Kamenev and all their supporters were arrested.

Trial of officers of the Red Army

After the assassination of Kirov, trials of the military began. One of the first victims of the Great Terror was G. D. Gai. The commander was arrested for the phrase "Stalin must be removed," which he uttered while intoxicated. It is worth saying that in the mid-thirties, denunciation reached its zenith. People who worked in the same organization for many years stopped trusting each other. Denunciations were written not only against enemies, but also against friends. Not only for selfish reasons, but also out of fear.

In 1937, a trial took place over a group of officers of the Red Army. They were accused of anti-Soviet activities and assistance to Trotsky, who by that time was already abroad. The hit list included:

• Tukhachevsky M. N.
• Yakir I. E.
• Uborevich I. P.
• Eideman R.P.
• Putna V.K.
• Primakov V. M.
• Gamarnik Ya. B.
• Feldman B. M.

The witch hunt continued. In the hands of the NKVD officers was a record of the negotiations between Kamenev and Bukharin - it was about creating a "right-left" opposition. In early March 1937, with a report that spoke of the need to eliminate the Trotskyists.

According to the report of the General Commissar of State Security Yezhov, Bukharin and Rykov were planning terror against the leader. A new term appeared in Stalinist terminology - "Trotsky-Bukharin", which means "directed against the interests of the party."

In addition to the aforementioned politicians, about 70 people were arrested. 52 shot. Among them were those who were directly involved in the repressions of the 1920s. Thus, state security officers and politicians Yakov Agronomist, Alexander Gurevich, Levon Mirzoyan, Vladimir Polonsky, Nikolai Popov and others were shot.

In the "Tukhachevsky case" Lavrenty Beria was involved, but he managed to survive the "purge". In 1941, he took the post of General Commissar of State Security. Beria was already shot after the death of Stalin - in December 1953.

Repressed scientists

In 1937, revolutionaries and politicians became victims of the Stalinist terror. And very soon, arrests of representatives of completely different social strata began. People who had nothing to do with politics were sent to the camps. It is easy to guess what the consequences of Stalin's repressions were by reading the lists below. The "Great Terror" became a brake on the development of science, culture, and art.

Scientists who became victims of Stalinist repressions:

• Matthew Bronstein.
• Alexander Witt.
• Hans Gelman.
• Semyon Shubin.
• Evgeny Pereplyokin.
• Innokenty Balanovsky.
• Dmitry Eropkin.
• Boris Numerov.
• Nikolay Vavilov.
• Sergei Korolev.

Writers and poets

In 1933, Osip Mandelstam wrote an epigram with obvious anti-Stalinist overtones, which he read to several dozen people. Boris Pasternak called the poet's act a suicide. He turned out to be right. Mandelstam was arrested and sent into exile in Cherdyn. There he made an unsuccessful suicide attempt, and a little later, with the assistance of Bukharin, he was transferred to Voronezh.

Boris Pilnyak wrote The Tale of the Unextinguished Moon in 1926. The characters in this work are fictitious, at least as the author claims in the preface. But to anyone who read the story in the 1920s, it became clear that it was based on the version about the murder of Mikhail Frunze.

Somehow Pilnyak's work got into print. But soon it was banned. Pilnyak was arrested only in 1937, and before that he remained one of the most published prose writers. The writer's case, like all similar ones, was completely fabricated - he was accused of spying for Japan. Shot in Moscow in 1937.

Other writers and poets subjected to Stalinist repressions:

• Viktor Bagrov.
• Julius Berzin.
• Pavel Vasiliev.
• Sergey Klychkov.
• Vladimir Narbut.
• Petr Parfenov.
• Sergei Tretyakov.

It is worth telling about the famous theatrical figure, accused under Article 58 and sentenced to capital punishment.

Vsevolod Meyerhold

The director was arrested at the end of June 1939. His apartment was later searched. A few days later, Meyerhold's wife was killed. The circumstances of her death have not yet been clarified. There is a version that the NKVD officers killed her.

Meyerhold was interrogated for three weeks, tortured. He signed everything the investigators demanded. February 1, 1940 Vsevolod Meyerhold was sentenced to death. The sentence was carried out the next day.

During the war years

In 1941, the illusion of the abolition of repression appeared. In Stalin's pre-war times, there were many officers in the camps, who were now needed at large. Together with them, about six hundred thousand people were released from places of deprivation of liberty. But it was a temporary relief. At the end of the forties, a new wave of repressions began. Now the ranks of the "enemies of the people" have been replenished by soldiers and officers who have been in captivity.

Amnesty 1953

On March 5, Stalin died. Three weeks later, the Supreme Soviet of the USSR issued a decree according to which a third of the prisoners were to be released. About a million people were released. But the first to leave the camps were not political prisoners, but criminals, which instantly worsened the criminal situation in the country.

After the end of the Great Patriotic War, Joseph Stalin was not just the leader of the country, but the real savior of the fatherland. They practically did not call him otherwise than the leader, and the cult of personality in the post-war period reached its climax. It seemed that it was impossible to shake the authority of such a scale, but Stalin himself had a hand in this.

A series of inconsistent reforms and repressions gave rise to the term post-war Stalinism, which is also actively used by modern historians.

Brief analysis of Stalin's reforms

Reforms and state actions of Stalin	The essence of the reforms and their consequences
December 1947 - currency reform	The implementation of the monetary reform shocked the population of the country. After a fierce war, all funds were confiscated from ordinary people and exchanged at the rate of 10 old rubles for 1 new ruble. Such reforms helped to patch up gaps in the state budget, but for ordinary people they caused the loss of their last savings.
August 1945 - a special committee headed by Beria is created, which subsequently developed atomic weapons.	At a meeting with President Truman, Stalin learned that the Western countries were already well prepared in terms of atomic weapons. It was on August 20, 1945 that Stalin laid the foundation for the future arms race that nearly led to the Third World War in the middle of the 20th century.
1946-1948 - ideological campaigns led by Zhdanov to restore order in the field of art and journalism	As the cult of Stalin became more and more intrusive and visible, almost immediately after the end of the Great Patriotic War, Stalin instructed Zhdanov to conduct an ideological struggle against those who spoke out against Soviet power. After a short break, new purges and repressions began in the country.
1947-1950 - agricultural reforms.	The war showed Stalin how important the agricultural sector was in the development. That is why, until his death, the Secretary General carried out numerous agricultural reforms. In particular, the country switched to a new irrigation system, and new hydroelectric power plants were built throughout the USSR.

Repressions of the post-war period and the tightening of the cult of Stalin

It has already been mentioned above that Stalinism in the post-war years only grew stronger, and among the people the General Secretary was considered the main hero of the Fatherland. The planting of such an image of Stalin was facilitated both by excellent ideological support and cultural innovations. All films being made and books being published glorified the current regime and praised Stalin. Gradually, the number of repressions and the volume of censorship increased, but no one seemed to notice this.

Stalinist repressions became a real problem for the country in the mid-30s, and after the end of the Great Patriotic War, they gained new strength. So, in 1948, the famous “Leningrad case” received publicity, during which many politicians holding key positions in the party were arrested and shot. So, for example, the chairman of the State Planning Commission Voznesensky was shot, as well as the secretary of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks Kuznetsov. Stalin was losing confidence in his own close associates, and therefore those who yesterday were still considered the main friend and associate of the General Secretary were under attack.

Stalinism in the post-war years increasingly took the form of a dictatorship. Despite the fact that the people literally idolized Stalin, the monetary reform and repressions that began again made people doubt the authority of the general secretary. The first to oppose the existing regime were representatives of the intelligentsia, and therefore, led by Zhdanov, purges among writers, artists and journalists began in 1946.

Stalin himself brought to the fore the development of the country's military power. The development of the plan for the first atomic bomb allowed the USSR to consolidate its status as a superpower. All over the world, the USSR was feared, believing that Stalin was capable of starting the Third World War. The Iron Curtain covered the Soviet Union more and more, and the people resignedly waited for changes.

Changes, albeit not the best, came suddenly when the leader and hero of the whole country died in 1953. Stalin's death marked the beginning of a completely new stage for the Soviet Union.

Estimates of the number of victims of Stalin's repressions differ dramatically. Some call numbers in the tens of millions of people, others are limited to hundreds of thousands. Which of them is closer to the truth?

Who is guilty?

Today our society is almost equally divided into Stalinists and anti-Stalinists. The former draw attention to the positive transformations that took place in the country during the Stalin era, the latter urge not to forget about the huge numbers of victims of the repressions of the Stalinist regime. However, almost all Stalinists recognize the fact of repressions, however, they note their limited nature and even justify them with political necessity. Moreover, they often do not associate repressions with the name of Stalin. Historian Nikolai Kopesov writes that in the majority of investigative cases against those repressed in 1937-1938 there were no resolutions of Stalin - everywhere there were sentences of Yagoda, Yezhov and Beria. According to the Stalinists, this is evidence that the heads of the punitive organs were engaged in arbitrariness and, in confirmation, they quote Yezhov: "Who we want, we execute, whom we want, we have mercy." For that part of the Russian public that sees Stalin as the ideologist of repression, these are just particulars that confirm the rule. Yagoda, Yezhov and many other arbiters of human destinies themselves became victims of terror. Who but Stalin was behind all this? they ask rhetorically. Doctor of Historical Sciences, chief specialist of the State Archives of the Russian Federation Oleg Khlevnyuk notes that despite the fact that Stalin's signature was not on many hit lists, it was he who sanctioned almost all mass political repressions.

Who got hurt?

Even more significant in the controversy surrounding the Stalinist repressions was the question of the victims. Who and in what capacity suffered during the period of Stalinism? Many researchers note that the very concept of “victims of repression” is rather vague. Historiography has not worked out clear definitions on this matter. Undoubtedly, convicts, imprisoned in prisons and camps, shot, deported, deprived of property should be counted among the victims of the actions of the authorities. But what about, for example, those who were subjected to "hard interrogations" and then released? Should there be a separation between criminal and political prisoners? In what category should we classify the “nonsense” caught in petty single thefts and equated with state criminals? The deportees deserve special attention. To what category do they belong - repressed or administratively deported? It is even more difficult to decide on those who fled without waiting for dispossession or deportation. They were sometimes caught, but someone was lucky enough to start a new life.

Such different numbers

Uncertainty in the question of who is responsible for the repressions, in identifying the categories of victims and the period for which the victims of repressions should be counted lead to completely different figures. The most impressive figures came from the economist Ivan Kurganov (referenced by Solzhenitsyn in his novel The Gulag Archipelago), who estimated that between 1917 and 1959, 110 million people became victims of the internal war of the Soviet regime against its own people. This number Kurganov includes the victims of famine, collectivization, peasant exile, camps, executions, civil war, as well as "the neglectful and slovenly conduct of the Second World War." Even if such calculations are correct, can these figures be considered a reflection of Stalin's repressions? The economist, in fact, answers this question himself, using the expression "victims of the internal war of the Soviet regime." It is worth noting that Kurganov counted only the dead. It is difficult to imagine what figure could have appeared if the economist had taken into account all the victims of the Soviet regime in the specified period. The figures cited by the head of the human rights society "Memorial" Arseniy Roginsky are more realistic. He writes: “On the scale of the entire Soviet Union, 12.5 million people are considered victims of political repression,” but at the same time he adds that up to 30 million people can be considered repressed in a broad sense. The leaders of the Yabloko movement, Elena Kriven and Oleg Naumov, counted all categories of victims of the Stalinist regime, including those who died in the camps from diseases and harsh working conditions, the dispossessed, the victims of hunger, those who suffered from unjustifiably cruel decrees and received excessively severe punishment for minor offenses in the force of the repressive nature of the legislation. The final figure is 39 million. Researcher Ivan Gladilin notes on this occasion that if the number of victims of repression has been counted since 1921, this means that it is not Stalin who is responsible for a significant part of the crimes, but the “Lenin Guard”, which immediately after the October Revolution unleashed terror against the White Guards , clergy and kulaks.

Estimates of the number of victims of repression vary greatly depending on the method of counting. If we take into account those convicted only under political articles, then according to the data of the regional departments of the KGB of the USSR, given in 1988, the Soviet authorities (VChK, GPU, OGPU, NKVD, NKGB, MGB) arrested 4,308,487 people, of which 835,194 were shot. Employees of the "Memorial" society, when counting the victims of political trials, are close to these figures, although their figures are still noticeably higher - 4.5-4.8 million were convicted, of which 1.1 million were shot. If we consider everyone who went through the Gulag system as victims of the Stalinist regime, then this figure, according to various estimates, will range from 15 to 18 million people. Very often, Stalin's repressions are associated exclusively with the concept of the "Great Terror", which peaked in 1937-1938. According to the commission headed by academician Pyotr Pospelov to establish the causes of mass repressions, the following figures were announced: 1,548,366 people were arrested on charges of anti-Soviet activities, of which 681,692 thousand were sentenced to capital punishment. One of the most authoritative experts on the demographic aspects of political repression in the USSR, historian Viktor Zemskov, names a smaller number of those convicted during the years of the Great Terror - 1,344,923 people, although his data coincides with the figure of those executed. If the dispossessed kulaks are included in the number of those subjected to repressions in Stalin's time, then the figure will grow by at least 4 million people. Such a number of dispossessed is given by the same Zemskov. The Yabloko party agrees with this, noting that about 600,000 of them died in exile. The victims of Stalinist repressions were also representatives of some peoples who were subjected to forcible deportation - Germans, Poles, Finns, Karachays, Kalmyks, Armenians, Chechens, Ingush, Balkars, Crimean Tatars. Many historians agree that the total number of deportees is about 6 million people, while about 1.2 million people did not live to see the end of the journey.

Trust or not?

The above figures are mostly based on the reports of the OGPU, NKVD, MGB. However, not all the documents of the punitive departments have been preserved, many of them were purposefully destroyed, many are still in the public domain. It should be recognized that historians are very dependent on statistics collected by various special agencies. But the difficulty is that even the available information reflects only the officially repressed, and therefore, by definition, cannot be complete. Moreover, it is possible to verify it from primary sources only in the rarest cases. An acute shortage of reliable and complete information often provoked both the Stalinists and their opponents to name radically different figures in favor of their position. “If the “rights” exaggerated the scale of repressions, then the “lefts”, partly from dubious youth, having found much more modest figures in the archives, were in a hurry to make them public and did not always ask themselves whether everything was reflected - and could be reflected - in the archives " - notes the historian Nikolai Koposov. It can be stated that estimates of the scale of Stalinist repressions based on the sources available to us can be very approximate. Documents stored in the federal archives would be a good help for modern researchers, but many of them were subjected to re-classification. A country with such a history will jealously guard the secrets of its past.