The Great Terror

Espionage contact had been established with the Germans and Japanese. And, as in the Zinoviev Trial, a number of terrorist groups had been organized, “in Moscow, Leningrad, Kiev, Rostov, Sochi, Novosibirsk and other towns.” An attempt had actually been made on Molotov’s life by involving him in a car crash at Prokopyevsk in 1934. Nor had their practical activity been limited to the preparation of terrorist acts. In addition, they had been responsible for many industrial accidents and deficiencies.

Other activities likely to prove more unpopular than assassination had been thrown in for good measure. For example, Knyazev was quoted as having confessed that “the Japanese intelligence service strongly stressed the necessity of using bacteriological means in time of war with the object of contaminating troop trains, canteens and army sanitary centres with highly virulent bacilli….”fn4⁷¹

Although such accusations transferred unpleasant responsibilities to the accused, they had the disadvantage of appearing less plausible than those of 1936. Although the Zinoviev trial was full of evident falsehoods, it could at least be argued that there might have been a genuine case, tarted up by the NKVD. It was at least not incredible that the oppositionists might have shot Kirov, and even less so that they might have wished to shoot Stalin. The new accusations were highly unbelievable on any view. Sabotage, by Pyatakov and his subordinates, was most implausible. Moreover, it was virtually incompatible with the charges of terrorism. As we have said, a plot designed to break the Government by terrorist acts could scarcely divert its energies, and risk exposure, by a vast network of people blowing up mines and causing railway accidents, simply to weaken the economy and sow distrust of the Government.

In the economic field, if not in the political, there is nevertheless some sort of rationale in Stalin’s choice of victims. For there were genuine failures which required scapegoats. Men like Livshits were shot, it might be argued, like Admiral Byng fn5 —pour encourager les autres

. Even this peculiar style of common sense has its limits. To shoot the best economic organizers in order to encourage the second-best to be more effective than they had been is doubtful policy. It is true that the Soviet Union finally gained a fairly competent cadre of administrators capable of working under the threat of liquidation. But there are no doubt managers who do not give their best in such circumstances, and of whose services the country was deprived.

The sabotage theme was not, of course, new. It was in the old Shakhty Trial tradition—and, indeed, it was expressly stated in evidence that the old saboteurs had linked up with the new. The Shakhty/Metro-Vic Trial technique was also revived. An immense amount of confusing technical evidence was given. As a result, the trial of the present seventeen took seven days as against the five days which had been sufficient for the Zinoviev sixteen.

The accused were this time presented in a more logical order. First, the four leaders, then the seven West Siberian terrorists and saboteurs, then the three railwaymen, and last the three from the chemical industry.

First was Pyatakov. His appearance was still intellectual and dignified, but he had visibly aged and was thin and pale.

He made certain limitations in his evidence. Admitting the responsibility for forming terrorist and sabotage groups, and for planning acts of terror and “diversion” to be carried out in the future, he at no time confessed to complicity in any particular act of violence, and specifically denied being in direct touch with all the plotters. After considerable revelations about the political contacts of the alleged plot, he went on to confess to the organization of sabotage. But his sabotage acts were always of the following type:

In the Ukraine the work was carried on mainly in the coke industry by Loginov and a group of persons connected with him. Their work, in the main, consisted of starting coke ovens which were not really ready for operations, and of holding up the construction of very valuable and very important parts of the coke and chemical industry. They operated coke ovens without utilizing those very valuable by-products which are obtained in coking and thereby huge funds were rendered valueless.⁷²

… Maryasin carried on the wrecking work along the following lines. First of all he sank money in piling up unnecessary materials, equipment and so on. I think that by the beginning of 1936 about fifty million roubles were frozen in the form of materials….

The wrecking activities in the last period assumed new forms. Despite the fact that, after a delay of two or three years, the plant began to enter on its operation stage, Maryasin created intolerable conditions, fomented intrigues, and in a word did everything to obstruct operation.⁷³