The Great Terror

It is improbable that a majority against the Purge now existed in the Politburo. Voroshilov, Kaganovich, and probably Andreyev were by now committed to it. Molotov, too, must already have learned his lesson. At least, he was back in good odor by 21 September,¹⁰ when an alleged attempt on his life was being put into the scenario for the next trial. And this return to favor can hardly be accounted for except on the view that he had aligned himself wholeheartedly with Stalin’s plans in the September discussions.

Nevertheless, Stalin retreated as far as the two Rightists were concerned. He had, it should be noted, never committed himself finally to their arrest. He may well have intended no more at this stage than a preliminary sounding, a putting of the Bukharin problem on the agenda, as it were, in his usual devious style. In that case, it was not a question of decisive votes in the supreme body. And in his absence, his own prestige was not directly involved.

As I write in 1989, there is still some uncertainty about the plenums of the Central Committee which took place in the last half of 1936, but were never announced. For many years, the only reference to any in an official document came in evidence at a later trial referring to “one of the autumn plenums of the Central Committee of the Party,” which, from the context, must have been after March 1936 and before 1937.¹¹ Roy Medvedev writes of “one of the plenary sessions held in the late summer or early autumn of 1936,” at which the arrest of Pyatakov (and “apparently” of Sokolnikov) was sanctioned.¹²

As to “late summer,” one former official has described a four-day plenum held in early September, with the Bukharin issue debated on the last day. But this is hard to reconcile with the absence of various leaders, and it shows signs of confusion with later plenums. Moreover, we are told that a plenum discussed the Bukharin issue “for the first time” in December.¹³ The December plenum (described as “unofficial”) was only confirmed in 1988.¹⁴

If the other was convened in “early autumn,” it was presumably in late September or October.

As for the constitutional point, this does not, after all, help us with this plenum’s dating. Khrushchev remarks that the Central Committee members arrested in 1937 and 1938 were expelled from the Party illegally through gross violation of the Party statutes, since the question of their expulsion was never studied at a Central Committee plenary session. By implication, the arrests of Pyatakov and Sokolnikov, the only Central Committee member and candidate member known to have been arrested in 1936, were legalized. But we are now told that this was not done, as Khrushchev implies, by a plenum. Instead, the Central Committee was polled

on 25–26 August in the case of Sokolnikov, and on 10–11 September in the case of Pyatakov.¹⁵ The plenum, when it assembled, was presumably required to vote formal approval. It was quite a different matter, as yet, from proceeding against men like Kamenev and Zinoviev, already in jail, already expelled from the Party.

Stalin had made certain gains. The materials were in his hand for prolonging the Purge. He now had, after all, a reasonable quota for the next trial: Serebryakov and Sokolnikov, and now Radek, arrested on 22 September, and Pyatakov, who had been taken on 12 September, while Sokolnikov (though not Serebryakov) was already confessing. The failure over Bukharin and Rykov, even if Stalin had not been certain of success at the first attempt, evidently rankled. It was plain that a powerful effort, a new campaign, would be needed. In the Black Sea sunshine, he considered the next move. The Soviet press concerned itself with other matters: democracy, the triumph of Soviet aviation, the successful harvest, and massive support for the struggle of the Spanish Republic.

Like a general who transfers the weight of his offensive from a line where the going is heavy to an easier approach, Stalin shifted his attack to Yagoda.