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Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (interwar period, 1921-1939): NEP, Famine and Terror

Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (interwar period, 1921-1939): NEP, Famine and Terror. Multinational USSR. How was the USSR ruled?. Officially, Federation with widely dispersed powers In fact, highly centralized through the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU)

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Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (interwar period, 1921-1939): NEP, Famine and Terror

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  1. Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (interwar period, 1921-1939): NEP, Famine and Terror

  2. Multinational USSR

  3. How was the USSR ruled? • Officially, Federation with widely dispersed powers • In fact, highly centralized through the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) • All leading government officials were communists

  4. Who ruled? • Lenin’s creation • Testament • died in 1924 • Result: Power struggle: • Josef Stalin • Leon Trotsky • Nikolai Bukharin • Lev Kamenev • Grigory Zinoviev

  5. Stalin won (by 1928) Why? • Not a man of ideas • Ruthless • Patronage • Will to win • Used extreme measures • Appealed to non-intellectuals

  6. New Economic Policy (NEP), 1921-28 • State-owned large businesses • Private small and medium-sized businesses • Some free trade • Peasants left alone to feed cities (N. Bukharin) • Tax-in-kind • Little use of violence • NEPmen

  7. The Great Turn, 1928-> • Move to Planned Economy • First Five-Year Plan, 1928-1932 • Focus on Heavy Industry • Sacrificed consumer goods • Quotas for everything • Quantity over quality • Stakhanovites as role models

  8. The Great Turn (cont.) Collectivization, 1929-1935 • 1927: voluntary • 1929: forced • Main goal: control of food • Requisitions • Peasants resisted (1600 large-scale revolts) • “Kulaks” • De-kulakization: by 1933, over two million removed as “class enemies.”

  9. The Great Famine, 1932-33 Causes: • Requisitions for cities and export • De-kulakization • Poor collective farm management • Livestock slaughtered • Bad weather • Border closing exacerbated deaths About six million starved to death Mostly in Ukraine

  10. The Terror, 1934-39 • Sergei Kirov, 1886-1934 • Leader of CPSU in Leningrad • December 1, 1934: assassinated by a communist • Sparked Terror

  11. Show Trials, 1936-38

  12. Many Bolsheviks leaders wiped out of history

  13. Mirsaid Sultan-Galiev, 1892-1940 • Bolsheviks’ Muslim • Worked for Stalin at NarKomNats • 1923 arrested, put on “trial,” and released. • “Sultangalievism” • 1928 arrested, sentenced to death • Commuted to 10 years in Solovki labor camp • Released 1934 • Arrested 1937 • Executed 1940

  14. Evgeniia Ginzburg • Journey into the Whirlwind • Loyal, dedicated communist • 1937: arrested • “Trotskyist” • “Conveyor belt” • GULAG • Magadan • 1955: released

  15. Consequences • Eight million arrested • How many killed? • 681,692 people were executed during 1937–38 • 786,098 state prisoners shot, 1931-53 • Memorial society released list of 1,345,796 victims for period, 1928-53 • Exact figures will probably never be determined, but about 20 million • Initially, allowed considerable ‘upward mobility’ • Gradually, greatly undermined CPSU’s authority and legitimacy

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