50 Years Ago: The Russian show trials (1988)

The 50 Years Ago column from the April 1988 issue of the Socialist Standard

It had been assumed by many newspaper correspondents in Russia that the series of trials of Stalins opponents and potential rivals had ended, and Stalin himself had talked of stopping the judicial persecution at least of the more obscure victims. But the trial of the twenty-one Old Bolshevists is barely ended before there are reports of further public trials involving highly placed generals and others.

The usual confessions were made by these Old Bolshevists that they had been the agents of Japan, Germany, Great Britain, and so on, but with the difference that the dates of the treachery were placed much farther back. Rakovsky "confesses" that he was in the pay of the British Secret Service in 1924. Sharangovitch was spying for the Poles in 1921. Rosenholtz began his espionage for Germany in 1923. Trotsky (but he isn't in Moscow, so someone else had to confess for him) worked for Britain from 1926 and for Germany from 1921. Bukharin confessed that he was plotting against Lenin in 1918.

All of this leads to an interesting speculation. Either the confessions are false or they are genuine. If the latter, then we have to believe that right back in the early days, during and after the Bolshevist seizure of power, the leaders were secretly conspiring against each other. It will be recalled that Lenin and other exiled leaders reached Russia in 1917 in a train which crossed Germany and was placed at their disposal by the German military authorities. The charge was made that Lenin and his friends were nothing but German agents paid by Germany to disorganise the Russian army. The charge was denied by Lenin and the denial was accepted by the working-class organisations generally. But if, as the Communists say, these Moscow confessions are genuine, then many of the men concerned were at the very beginning hopelessly corrupt. If the rest of them, why not Lenin?

[From an article "Another Russian Sacrificial Feast", Socialist Standard April 1938.]

Which Way Russia? (1937)

From the July 1937 issue of the Socialist Standard

Socialists have always held that dictatorship, even though it is inaugurated by people who call themselves Socialists, cannot lead to Socialism. Russia is now showing us where it does lead. Hardly anybody but the editor of the Communist Daily Worker, can regard the latest wave of plots and executions as evidence of a healthy condition in the Soviet State. To him it is a simple story of treachery by men in high positions who wished “to place the people of the U.S.S.R. under the yoke of capitalist slavery” (Daily Worker editorial, June 12th, 1937). Happily, the ever-vigilant intelligence service unearthed their dastardly plot and crushed it in the nick of time. Otherwise “they would have wrought incalculable harm to the cause of peace, progress and Socialism.” This may satisfy the members of the Communist Party, but nobody else. How, for example, does it come to pass that highly-placed army generals with distinguished records, some with 20 years’ membership of the Communist Party, should have conceived the desire to turn their backs on what an admirer, Mr. G. B. Shaw, calls “the amazing success of the Soviet Government” in order to establish the capitalism they had spent a lifetime trying to destroy? How does it happen that men bred from their youth in the Communist tradition could have such aims? And how came they to believe that those aims could be welcomed by or forced upon the 160-million population of Russia? The Daily Worker does not give the answer because it is so mesmerised by Stalinist self-advertisement that it does not even know there is a problem.

Explanations—Plausible and Otherwise

Many explanations have been offered, some of them as unconvincing as the Daily Worker’s. One which fits at least some of the known facts and probabilities is that published by the News Chronicle (June 16th, 1937). It is based on statements made by Soviet circles in London. It is that the executed generals had decided to seize power and set up a military dictatorship in place of the present party dictatorship. They did not want Germany and Japan to profit by the temporary disturbance by declaring war, so they asked the military staffs of those countries for a pledge to lay off. In return those two countries were promised territorial concessions. Inside Russia the plotters relied on the support of the army to raise them to power and crush the opposition. That is the story told to the News Chronicle. It is by no means impossible, for dictatorships have a habit of breeding vaulting ambitions among the military leaders. And colour is lent to it by the known fact that the Russian and German general staffs secretly maintained close relationships for years before Hitler came to power. It was Russian policy to help Germany to rearm against their common enemy, the allied powers. It is now said that the dead Russian generals were some of those in active charge of these secret contacts and that when the Russian Government ordered their discontinuance, some time after Hitler took office, they maintained them without the knowledge of their own Government.

An explanation along these lines is at least a possibility, and it is not much different from the official version given out in Moscow, but it is credible only on two very significant assumptions. One is that the generals were so stupid as to be on the borderline of imbecility. The other is that there is something very much amiss with the Soviet system. The generals formed the idea of setting up a military dictatorship, but how could they form that idea unless they were confident that their movement would be actively supported by a large proportion of the military and civil rank and file? And how could they have that confidence unless they thought they could see convincing evidence of widespread discontent with the existing regime? We are forced, therefore, to choose between two conclusions. If the generals thought that they could establish a military dictatorship without having any popular support at all, and against the determination of army and civil population alike, then they must have been weak in the head and utterly incompetent to judge any kind of situation. But everyone agrees that they were clever and experienced men, many of them as much at home in Communist political circles as in military ones. The only alternative, and one we have to accept, is that they did not believe the Stalinist claim that all Russia, except a handful of Trotskyist plotters and foreign-paid agents, is behind the existing regime. On the contrary, they counted, evidently, on widespread discontent and disillusionment to give them the support without which they knew they could not possibly succeed.

“Everyone Suspect in Russia”

The most terrible indictment of the belief that party dictatorship is a means of achieving Socialism is to be found by comparing a current account of Russia, written by a correspondent who has hitherto shown himself sympathetic towards the Stalinist point of view, with a claim made a few years ago by the Government itself.

First, the claim made for Russia in preamble to the Constitution adopted in 1923: –

   “Here – in the camp of Socialism – are mutual confidence and peace, national freedom and equality, and dwelling together in peace and the brotherly collaboration of peoples.”

Now for statements about the present peaceful the and brotherly condition of Russia, by the correspondent in Moscow of the Daily Herald

EVERYONE SUSPECT IN RUSSIA.

   "Suspicion, denunciation, high and low hunts for alleged Trotskyists, spies and wreckers have reached such a pitch throughout Russia that it is safe to say that the past and future of everybody in the country is under review. Members and officials of trades unions, the Army and all political organisations are being sifted and sorted as though by a gigantic sieve. . . . Idols of the past become Trotskyists, wreckers or enemies overnight. So swift and vast are the changes in industry, from leadership down to the lowest grades, that it is impossible to keep track of them.” – (Daily Herald, June 5th, 1937.)
   

  “News of arrests, suicides, plots, still pours into Moscow from all parts of the Soviet Union. In the city of Ordjonikidze, in the North Caucasus, 5,362 people have been expelled from the Communist Party, according to newspaper reports. More than 30 Party and Government officials have been arrested at Rostov. One prominent Communist had committed suicide. The “Pacific Ocean Star” reports that Krutov, President of the Executive Committee of the Far Eastern Region, has been denounced as a “Japanese and Trotskyist enemy.” In White Russia, wreckers are alleged to have maimed thoroughbred bulls sent there to improve local stocks.” – (Daily Herald, June 18th, 1937.)

  “Wholesale denunciations and arrests of officials for alleged shortcomings in their work are threatening to bring Soviet industry practically to a standstill. Demoralisation increases rather than diminishes because of the element of fear under which all are working – each one fears he may be the next to be denounced.” – (Daily Herald, June 19th, 1937.)

Mr. G. B. Shaw may go on thinking that the Russian Communist dictatorship is an amazing success, but Socialists remain of their first opinion: that dictatorship of a party does not lead to Socialism. Russia appears to be one more proof that it leads to a condition in which threatened chaos gives ambitious Napoleons their opportunity to plot for military dictatorship.

Edgar Hardcastle

Here Today and Gone Tomorrow (1950)

From the February 1950 issue of the Socialist Standard

On the 14th December,1949, Traicho Kostov, the former Vice-Premier of Bulgaria, was sentenced to death for treason by the Bulgarian Supreme Court. Two days later he was executed—so quickly do the wheels of Bulgarian law turn they did not allow even an appeal. Ten other "Communists” were tried with him, of whom five received life sentences, three got 15 years, one 12, and the other 8 years' imprisonment. All his companions, following the tradition of the Russian trials, pleaded guilty. Kostov, though pleading guilty to "anti-Soviet activities," was unexpectedly awkward and insisted that he was not guilty of the major charges levied against him, of spying for Britain and plotting on behalf of Yugoslavia.

The trial followed the usual lines. All of Kostov's companions were abject in their confessions of guilt, admitting unreservedly that the charges made against them were true. At the same time, some of them tried to make things better for themselves by making things worse for Kostov, accusing him of all manner of things, in particular of blackmailing them into doing what they had done.

The prosecution, of course, did even better. Chervenkov, the secretary of the Central Committee and the present "big-boss" of Bulgaria, coined a new word specially for the occasion—"Kostovism." "Kostovism," he said, "is Titoism on Bulgarian soil, and like Titoism is grows on treason and espionage." Further, said Chervenkov, Kostov had managed to assume the leadership of the Bulgarian Communist Party, thanks to his "devilish duplicity, fantastic hypocrisy, and subtle diabolical methods." (Times, 2nd December, 1949.)

Whether the charges are true or false, we hold no brief for Kostov. What has happened to him he would no doubt have had happen to others if the circumstances had demanded it. But what strikes us as worthy of record is this further fantastic example of the way in which "Communist heroes" are turned into "imperialist blackguards" almost overnight. Turning back the pages of history only a little way, this is what the Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist Party said about Kostov just over two years ago:

    “Great are your achievements, Comrade Traicho Kostov, as the builder of the party, as teacher and instructor of the party members. Under your leadership and your heroic example thousands of party members were educated into absolute loyalty to the party. In the underground, in prisons, tens of thousands of party members studied, and are at present studying at liberty, your lectures and your books; they are learning from the example of your life and career, from your utmost loyalty to the party and the people.
    “Today, as Deputy Prime Minister in the Government headed by the wise leader of the party and the people, Comrade George Dimitrov, you are his right hand; you the direct executor of the economic reconstruction in the country, of the economic plan, of the great construction work in our republic.
   “Your deep Marxist-Leninist theoretical knowledge, your great culture, your famous industry and steadfastness, your modesty, your iron will, your unquestionable loyalty towards the party and the working class are those Bolshevik characteristics which beautify your whole lighting life, forever united with the struggle of the party.
    “A loyal colleague of George Dimitrov, and his first assistant, you are to-day one of the most loved and respected leaders of our party, a great statesman and builder of new Bulgaria.
   “Comrade Traicho Kostov! The Central Committee of the Bulgarian Communist party is wishing you good health and strength so that you may go on working just as loyally, unceasingly, and whole-heartedly for the party and the people, for the triumph of the economic plan, and the great historical achievements of the working class.” (Manchester Guardian 15/12/49.)

This effusion, incidentally, is signed by Chervenkov, later Kostov’s bitterest accuser.

As with many other Communist twists and turns, this one has its amusing side. Kostov the "traitor" was, it appears, the author of the Bulgarian Communist Constitution passed in 1947 with great acclamation, and presumably still in force. At the fifth party congress held only a year ago it was he who put forward the party's future political programme, which again was most enthusiastically received. Further, according to the Times correspondent (2nd December, 1949), "All party pamphlets on policy, strategy, and tactics have now to be re-edited as they were almost all written by Kostov."

Finally, to add insult to injury, a Bulgarian newspaper, says the Times correspondent, has recently protested that the official film of the fifth party congress is still going the rounds of the country. In one shot stands Kostov. On one side is Dimitrov; on the other is Suslov, the Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party!

Communists the world over must be kept pretty busy one way and the other. Half their time they spend working out the implications of the new Party-line, the other half scrubbing out the evidence and the effects of the old one.

Stan Hampson