HISTORY ESSAY OUTLINETO WHAT EXTENT DID THE PURGES LINK TO THE FIVE-YEAR PLANS?

I. Introduction:

Stalin’s “Great Turn” was the first true revolution in the USSR

Five-Year Plans ran parallel with the purges

State the research question and link to the body part

II. Body:

Explain why the 1st Five-Year Plan is the most notorious and its consequences

Link between the Five-Year Plans and the collectivization of agriculture

=> Historian Roy Medvedev and his statistics on number of deaths of peasants

The 1st Five-Year Plan led to discontent and horror among party members

=> The “chitska” 1932-1935: approx. 20% of party members expelled

Challenge to Stalin’s leadership developed at a higher level

=> Ryutin openly criticized Stalin but was protected by Kirov and Ordzhonikidze

=> Death of Kirov and mass purging outside of the party and show trials.

=> 2nd stage of the purges linked with the Five-Year Plan through Kirov.

=> Historians from “Totalitarian line” argued that the show trials had more to do with Stalin’s personality than any practical needs.

The “Yezhovschina” 1937-1938 had more to do with Yezhov and the position of the NKVD

III. Conclusion:

Historiography debate

=> Totalitarian line (R. Conquest and R. Tucker): Stalin’s personality, intentional use of purges to defend and promote his economic policies.

=> Revisionist school (J.Arch Getty and R. Manning): conflict between Moscow and the local regions due to the Five-Year Plans

=> Conclude that the Five-Year Plans to a great extent were causes of the purges.

HISTORY ESSAYTO WHAT EXTENT DID THE PURGES LINK TO THE FIVE-YEAR PLANS?

It has been argued by many that Stalin was the first to launch a “true revolution” in the Soviet

Union in 1928 by taking the “Great Turn” in which he decisively abandon the NEP and launch a

program of rapid industrialization and collectivization in agriculture. The results were three

Five-Year Plans which completely changed the “Soviet machinery”. But just as the first Five-Year

Plan concluded, a process of “cleansing” in the Communist Party also commenced. In fact, the

process of purging in the Soviet Union ran parallel with the Five-Year Plans and mass purging

outside of the Party only started after the “breakneck” first Five-Year Plan in 1934. Was this a mere

coincidence or does it suggest that there are links between the Five-Year Plans and the purges?

Thus the aim of this essay is to examine the question: To what extent did the purges link to the

Five-Year Plans?

The first Five-Year Plan is the most notorious out of the three Five-Year Plans because the

Communist leadership, especially Stalin set such high out targets for the plan which seemed

impossible to achieve to most people. Like all the Five-Year Plans, the first Five-Year Plan was

aimed at rapid industrialization of the Soviet Union through the focus on heavy industries such as

producing steel, mining iron ore and coal, producing electricity, etc. As a result, most of the labour

force was concentrated for the work in these heavy industries instead of the consumer industries.

Furthermore, since the State had to ensure that the grain supplies were sufficient for the working

force to make sure that the output targets would be met, the pressure was on the peasants who now

were forced into collective farms. However, not only the collectivization of agriculture only

produced mixed results, it led to the death of 2-3 millions of peasants and the dispossession of

around 10 million peasants according to a research by historian Roy Medvedev. Moreover, there

was a famine from 1932 to 1934 which resulted in around 7 million deaths. The collectivization of

agriculture no doubt caused great distress and fury among the Soviet population and because the

scheme was designed by Stalin to ensure the supply needed for his plans to industrialize the Soviet

Union, the Five-Year Plans unpopular as well despite overwhelming achievements in the heavy

industries and Stalin unavoidably came “under fire”.

While the peasants developed hatred towards the rural Communists and urban workers became

antagonized by the low wages and harsh punishments at the workplace, the Communist party

members who favoured industrialization in the first place were also horribly disturbed by the

methods employed to push through the industrialization process and the terror used against the

peasants. As a result, many local party members refused to implement central policies and orders,

unwilling to push forward the process of collectivization and breakneck industrialization for various

reasons. This caused anger among top party leaders who valued discipline above all else and hence,

Moscow launched the “chitska” from 1932 to 1935 to root out all passive elements, violators of the

party and state discipline which basically meant all those who opposed Stalin’s economic policy.

And by 1935, around 20% of the members were expelled from the Communist Party. This is the

first link between the purges and the application of the Five-Year Plans with the collectivization of

agriculture as the link between the events.

But opposition to Communist leadership did not stop at local level. In the 1930s, there were

signs of growing opposition to Stalin’s leadership at higher levels, much due to his unpopular

economic policy and use of coercion to force collectivization on the peasants. In 1932, after the

Five-Year Plan, Ryutin circulated a document that was highly critical of Stalin. Stalin wanted him

dead, however he was opposed by Kirov and Ordzhonikidze and in the end, Ryutin was not

sentenced to death. The upshot of this event is that Stalin realized that he was not yet the

unchallenged leader of the Soviet Union. This point is emphasized even clearer at the 17 th Party

Congress where Sergei Kirov – the Leningrad party boss who was a very popular figure,

decided to take a stance against Stalin’s forcible grain seizure of the peasants and maltreatments of

the workers. Even worse, Stalin’s title of General Secretary was abolished and thus he was put on

equal ranks with Kirov. Stalin was completely aware of his vulnerability as he could be removed

or demoted from his position so he decided to take a decisive act to remove all of his rivals once

and for all.

On 1 Dec 1934, Kirov was mysteriously murdered by a man who is said to have mental issues.

Whether Stalin was involved in this event or not, he definitely used it as a pretext to root out his

oppositions, leading to the second stage of the purges which was dominated by numerous “show

trials” of old Bolshevik party members such as Zinoviev, Kamenev and Bukharin. In the

beginning, there was an extensive purge of the Leningrad party – Kirov’s power base, followed by

mass purging outside the Party whose targets were the supposed “Trotskyites” involved in the plot

to murder Kirov and other Communist leaders. From 1936 to 1938, show trials were held publicly

with the aim of putting old Bolshevik leaders such as Zinoviev, Kamenev and Bukharin to death.

Stalin succeeded and at the end of 1938, none of his old Bolshevik colleagues survived. But again,

one should remember that these events could not have been materialized without the unpopular

Five-Year Plan and collectivization of agriculture in the beginning because Kirov was probably

murdered because he presented opposition to Stalin through his different viewpoint on the Soviet

economic policy and without Kirov, there might not have been a pretext for Stalin to launch such a

frightening purge. However, historians from the totalitarian line such as R. Conquest and R.

Tucker in their works have argued that the purges had more to do with Stalin’s personality as a

person characterized by paranoia who had unlimited ambitions despite limited capability. They

have explained that Stalin’s removal of his old Bolshevik colleagues who knew his limitations had

more to do with personal grudges and the fear of being thwarted. And also he had a preference of

using brute force as an instrument of control and to resolve problems, this can certainly be

connected with the force seizure of grains from the peasants. So perhaps after all, the Five-Year

Plans were not the sole causes of the purges?

The last stage of the purges was called the “Yezhovschina” from 1937 to 1938 in which Yezhov

– the new head of the NKVD unleashed mass terror against Soviet citizens of all elements: party

officials (apparatchiki), intelligentsia, scientists, managers, economic administrators... Anyone

could be arrested as an oppositionist including those from the Red Army and in fact, the hero of the

Civil war – Marshal Tukhachevsky was also arrested and sentenced to death. A quota system was

applied to geographical areas and to public bodies and the encouragement of denunciation of higher

level party officials from below put the purges out of control. Even Stalin felt that the use of terror

had sprung out of control thus he decided to put the “Yezhovschina” to an end in 1938, first by

replacing Yezhov with Beria as the head of the NKVD and second, by slowing down the arrests and

purges. At this point, virtually all of the old Bolsheviks had been wiped out and Stalin was

definitely the all-powerful leader of the Soviet Union. But because causes for this last stage of the

“Great Purge” had more to do with Yezhov himself and the position of the NKVD, the influence of

the Five-Year Plans seem especially weak here.

While historians from the totalitarian line put a stronger emphasis on Stalin’s personality, they

also argued that he intentionally used the purges as a way to defend his economic policies by

finding scapegoats and also used terror to ensure that the business managers would do their best

to meet his output targets and hence, the Five-Year Plans could be seen as central to the purges.

Historians from the revisionist school such as R. Manning and J. Arch Getty, despite focusing

more on structural causes, they agree that there were conflicts and rivalries between the centre –

Moscow and the local regions mainly because the local party bosses did not want to purge

specialists and kulaks who were valuable men to them which conflicted the demands of the centre.

But again, the local regions did not want to purge kulaks and specialists because they would help

them to meet the output targets set by Stalin in his Five-Year Plans and thus the root of all problems

are still the Five-Year Plans. Because the consequences of the Five-Year Plans are so immense, it is

possible to conclude that the Five-Year Plans were to a great extent, the causes of the purges in the

1930s in the Soviet Union.