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The Impact of the Great Purges on the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Teddy J. Uldricks
Teddy J. Uldricks*
Affiliation:
University of California, Riverside
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Extract

We must finally understand that of all precious capital in the world, the most precious capital, the most decisive capital is human beings, cadres. We must understand that in our present condition cadres decide everything. If we have good and plentiful cadres in industry, in agriculture, in transport, in the Army, our country will be invincible. If we have no such cadres we will limp with both legs.

Joseph Stalin

Descartes argued that the initial operation in the solution of any complex problem must be its subdivision into a series of smaller, less intricate, and therefore, hopefully, more tractable problems. Following that strategy, this study will examine one particular aspect of the purges—the destruction of the Soviet diplomatic corps—in an attempt to shed more light on the general nature of the purges and to assess the relationship, if any, between the purges and the evolution of Soviet foreign policy in the 1930s. The central tasks, then, are to describe the impact of the "Great Terror" on the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs and its embassies, and to evaluate the significance of these developments for both domestic politics and foreign relations of the USSR.

Type
Articles
Information
Slavic Review , Volume 36 , Issue 2 , June 1977 , pp. 187 - 204
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1977

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References

1. The establishment and early evolution of the Narkomindel are described in detail in Teddy J. Uldricks, “The Development of the Soviet Diplomatic Corps, 1917-1930” (Ph.D. diss., Indiana University, 1972).

2. M. M. Lebedynets, a minor Narkomindel official in the Ukraine, was probably the first Soviet diplomat to fall during the Great Terror. He was sentenced to death on December 13, 1934, as part of the Ukrainian White Guard Terrorist Center, in the wake of Kirov's assassination ( Hryhory, Kostiuk, Stalinist Rule in the Ukraine : A Study of the Decade of Mass Terror, 1929-39 [New York, 1960], pp. 98–100Google Scholar).

3. Until 1941 the head of a Soviet mission was officially styled polprcd or polnomochnyi predstavitcl’ rather than ambassador.

4. This and all subsequent biographical and statistical data about the personnel of the Narkomindel, unless otherwise attributed, have been derived from the author's study of all available biographical data on Soviet diplomats and responsible officials of the commissariat. The origins of the information and the biases of the “sample” are discussed in the appendix.

5. Purged diplomats disappeared not only from their embassies, but from the pages of history as well. None of them were mentioned in the first edition of the Diplomaticheskii slovar’ (Moscow, 1948), but the names of a few (for example, Iurenev, Skvirskii) reappeared in the second edition (Moscow, 1960-64), and a few more (such as Davtian) we're named in the third edition (Moscow, 1971). The names of such prominent purge victims as Lev Kamenev, Khristian Rakovskii, and Grigorii Sokol'nikov have also been deleted from their dispatches published in Dokumenty vneshnei politiki SSSR (Moscow, 1957- ).

6. Robert, Conquest, The Great Terror : Stalin's Purge of the Thirties (New York, 1973), p. 609.Google Scholar

7. For an account of a foiled kidnap attempt see Alexander, Barmine, One Who Survived : The Life Story of a Russian under the Soviets (New York, 1945), p. 12–16.Google Scholar

8. Cf. Alexander, Orlov, The Secret History of Stalin's Crimes (New York, 19S3), pp. 222–32Google Scholar. Orlov, an intelligence agent who defected, felt that a combination of fear of reprisals against family members in Russia and the perverse belief that an otherwise unjust system would treat them fairly accounts for the return to their doom of numerous NKVD field operatives serving abroad.

9. Barmine, One Who Survived, p. 21.

10. Ibid.; and Medvedev, R. A., K sudu istorii (New York, 1974), p. 795, n. 87Google Scholar. Il'ia Ehrenburg claims that Raskol'nikov “had a nervous breakdown and died” (Ilya Ehrenburg, Memoirs : 1921-1941 [Cleveland and New York, 1963], p. 469; see also V. S., Zaitsev, “Geroi oktiabria i grazhdanskoi voiny,” Voprosy istorii KPSS, 1963, no. 12, pp. 90–94Google Scholar).

11. See note 7 above.

12. Ivan Maiskii has noted that the purges made it difficult for him to deal with even those sections of Western public opinion usually sympathetic to the USSR. See B. Shou i drugie : Vospominaniia (Moscow, 1967), pp. 82-83. Joseph E. Davies, the American ambassador in Moscow, was taken in by the public trials. See Davies, Joseph E., Mission to Moscow (New York, 1941), p. 1941 Google Scholar. His more sagacious staff members—such as Loy Henderson and the young George Kennan—were able to discern the falsity of the charges. See, for example, Kennan's “Memorandum : The Trial of Radek and Others, ” February 13, 1937, U.S. Department of State, decimal file no. 861.00/11675.

13. See Report of the Court Proceedings in the Case of the Anti-Soviet Trotskyite Center (Moscow, 1937), p. 443.

14. Severyn, Bialer, “Andrei Andreevich Gromyko,” in Soviet Leaders, ed. Simmonds, George (New York, 1967), p. 166.Google Scholar

15. Roy, Medvedev, Let History Judge : The Origins and Consequences of Stalinism (New York, 1971)Google Scholar, chapter 6. The combination of pervasive terror and the loss of skilled cadres had a profoundly negative effect not just on diplomacy, but on all areas of Soviet life —in the party, the Red Army, the economy, and so forth. See, for example, Khrushchev, N. S., “Secret Speech,” in The Anti-Stalin Campaign and International Communism (New York, 1956), especially pp. 22–24;Google Scholar Alec, Nove, An Economic History of the USSR (Harmondsworth, 1969), pp. 235–38, 255-56, 269Google Scholar; K. E., Bailes, “Technology and Legitimacy : Soviet Aviation and Stalinism in the 1930s,” Technology and Culture, 17, no. 1 (January 1976) : 71–72 Google Scholar; and John, Erickson, The Soviet High Command, 1918-1941 (London, 1962), especially chapters 14 and 15, Google Scholar

16. William, Reswick, Dreamt Revolution (Chicago, 1952), p. 153–54.Google Scholar

17. Nora, Murry, Spied for Stalin (New York, 1951), p. 83.Google Scholar

18. The displacement of Korzhenko by Dekanozov was part of the 1938 purge of the NKVD which saw the destruction of Ezhov and his henchmen and their replacement by Lavrentii Beria and his protégés. See Nicolaevsky, Boris I., Power and the Soviet Elite (Ann Arbor, 1975), pp. 121 and 124Google Scholar. For an example of Dekanozov's handiwork in the Narkomindel see Loginov, M, “Kul't lichnosti chuzhd nashemu stroiu,” Molodoi kommunist, 1962, no. 1, pp. 53–54.Google Scholar

19. Hilger, Gustav and Meyer, Alfred G., The Incompatible Allies : A Memoir-History of German-Soviet Relations, 1918-1941 (New York, 1953), p. 292.Google Scholar

20. Foreign Relations of the United States : The Soviet Union, 1933-1939 (Washington, D.C., 1952), p. 772.

21. Barmine, One Who Survived, p. 3.

22. Henderson to secretary of state, June 10, 1937, decimal file no. 861.00/11705.

23. Moffat to Sumner Wells, August 3, 1939, decimal file no. 701.6111/954.

24. For a thorough discussion of these negotiations see Weinberg, Gerhard L., Germany and the Soviet Union, 1939-1941 (Leiden, 1954), pp. 4–52 Google Scholar; and Watt, D. C., “The Initiation of the Negotiations Leading to the Nazi-Soviet Pact : A Historical Problem,” in Essays in Honour of E. H. Carr, ed. Abramsky, Chimen (Hamden, Conn., 1974), pp. 152–70.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

25. It is hard to disagree with Adam Ulam's assessment : “With most Soviet diplomats and intelligence operatives unmasked as traitors, it is difficult to see how Soviet foreign policy could operate at all… . But the problem that confronted Soviet policymakers who had somehow escaped the net was how to secure the data on which any policy must be based. How did one appraise a diplomatic dispatch filed by a man whose superior had just been shot as a foreign agent?” ( Adam, Ulam, Stalin : The Man and His Era [New York, 1973], P. 473 Google Scholar).

26. Ilya, Ehrenburg, The Post-War Years, 1945-1954 (London, 1966), p. 277 Google Scholar. Litvinov may have carried a pistol even before the purges (see Richard K., Debo, “Dutch-Soviet Relations : 1917-1924,” Canadian Slavic Studies, 4, no. 2 [Summer 1970] : 209, n. 31Google Scholar). N. S. Khrushchev alleges that the NKVD actually planned to murder Litvinov, disguising the crime as a traffic accident. Khrushchev does not explain why these plans were never carried out (Khrushchev Remembers [Boston, 1970], p. 278).

27. Louis Fischer notes that “Litvinov retired to a bungalow in the woods outside Moscow. He played much bridge, learned to type, read poetry and fiction, and took long walks. He was completely isolated from Soviet politics” (see Louis, Fischer, The Life and Death of Stalin [New York, 1952], p. 56 Google Scholar). This picture is confirmed by Ehrenburg, Post- War Years, pp. 276-78.

28. Foreign Relations of the United States, vol. 3 (Washington, D.C., 1963), pp. S22-24.

29. Ehrenburg, Post-War Years, p. 279.

30. Ivan, Maisky, Memoirs of a Soviet Ambassador, The War : 1939-1943 (New York, 1967), pp. 365–81 Google Scholar. Maiskii left the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1946 when he was elected a member of the prestigious Academy of Sciences. He was subsequently arrested in February of 1953 in what may have been the advent of a new Great Purge. Stalin died just two weeks later, but Maiskii remained in custody until his trial in the summer of 1955. Although charged with treason and espionage, he was found guilty only of certain “errors” in the performance of his former diplomatic duties and was sentenced to six years in prison. Maiskii was immediately pardoned by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, reinstated in the party, and permitted to resume his academic work (see Alexander, Nekrich, “The Arrest and Trial of I. M. Maisky,” Survey, 22, no. 3/4 [Summer/Autumn 1976] : 313–20Google Scholar).

31. Historians differ in their estimates as to why Stalin chose to remove the last remnant of Narkomindel veterans from major responsibilities in 1943. Adam Ulam argues that Stalin's post-Teheran confidence in his ability to deal with the Western leaders made him feel less dependent on the old-line, professional diplomats (see Ulam, Stalin, p. 292). Ehrenburg believes that the withdrawal of such pro-Western ambassadors as Litvinov and Maiskii was intended as a sign of Stalin's displeasure over the continued postponement of a second front in France (Ilya Ehrenburg, The War : 1941-1945 [Cleveland and New York, 1964], p. 119). Vojtech Mastny has gone so far as to suggest that the dismissal of these two living symbols of inter-Allied cooperation may have been intended by Stalin as a signal to Hitler of Russia's willingness to consider a separate peace ( Vojtech, Mastny, “The Cassandra in the Foreign Commissariat : Maxim Litvinov and the Cold War,” Foreign Affairs, 54, no. 2 [January 1976] : 368 Google Scholar).

32. These and subsequent figures on the Narkomindel from 1917 to 1930 are taken from chapter 8 of my dissertation, cited in note 1 above, and from my article, “The Soviet Diplomatic Corps in the Čičerin Era, ” Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas, 23, no. 2 (1975) : 213-24.

33. Anatoly Dobrynin, for example, graduated with a degree in engineering from the Aviation Institute. His subsequent assignment to the Narkomindel came as a complete and apparently not altogether pleasing surprise. Iakov Malik graduated from the Kharkov Institute of National Economy, while Arkadii Sobolev received his diploma from the Leningrad Electrical Engineering Institute.

34. Charles E. Bohlen, who served in the American embassy in Moscow during the purges, comments : “Most of the new officials seem to have been selected because of their non-experience or non-connection with foreign affairs. Among the new officials mentioned in an Embassy dispatch was Andrei Gromyko. This was the first time, I think, that anyone had heard the name Gromyko in the foreign service of the Soviet Union. During this period, he came to lunch at Spaso House, and I think it was the first time he had ever had a meal with foreigners. It was quite apparent that Gromyko, a professor of Economics, had virtually no knowledge of foreign affairs. He was ill at ease and obviously fearful of making some social blunder during the luncheon” ( Bohlen, Charles E., Witness to History, 1929-1969 [New York, 1973], p. 65Google Scholar). Also see David, Kelly, The Ruling Few : Or the Human Background to Diplomacy (London, 1952), p. 374 Google Scholar.

35. New recruits into the party apparatus, for example, showed many of these same career characteristics. Cf. Leonard, Schapiro, The Communist Party of the Soviet Union (New York, 1971), p. 440–44.Google Scholar

36. Two survivors of the purges note that “the zeal with which young people and subordinates strove to ‘unmask’ and accuse their seniors was particularly noteworthy. Students 'unmasked’ their professors, humble party members denounced those in official positions, junior officials accused those above them. This general revolt of the subordinate, particularly inside the party, provided an outlet for the ambitious and a quick and easy road to promotion. This was one of the deepest roots of the events of the Yezhov period” ( Beck, F. [pseud.] and Godin, W., Russian Purge and the Extraction of Confession [London, 1951], p. 30 Google Scholar). There is no evidence* however, that the purge of the Narkomindel was either caused or greatly expanded by such ruthless careerism. For the most part the new generation of diplomats was brought into the commissariat from outside in order to replace veterans who had already been purged or were foredoomed if still in place.

37. Conquest, The Great Terror, p. 639. Also see Rigby, T. H., Communist Party Membership in the USSR, 1917-1967 (Princeton, 1968)Google Scholar, chapter 6, for a discussion of the “new elite” coming to dominate the party. Also see Beck and Godin, Russian Purge, pp. 210-26; and Brzezinski, Zbigniew K., The Permanent Purge : Politics in Soviet Totalitarianism (Cambridge, Mass., 1956), p. 89.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

38. It should be noted, however, that while the purge greatly altered the character of the commissariat, its scope was not limited to experienced diplomatic cadres alone. Its victims also included numerous officials who joined the NKID between 1931 and 1936 and even some of the most recent recruits who had entered during the terror.

39. A statistical profile of the Narkomindel staff in 1933, published by the government, showed that the personnel characteristics of the commissariat had changed only gradually since Chicherin's retirement. The foreign office was still a bourgeois stronghold, although the percentage of responsible officials from working-class backgrounds had risen from 5 percent to 19 percent. The educational level of the NKID also remained high, with nearly 60 percent of its officials having graduated from one or another sort of higher educational institution. See Sostav rukovodiashchikh rabotnikov i spetsialistov Soiusa SSR (Moscow, 1936), pp. 296-303.

40. Walters, F. P., A History of the League of Nations, vol. 1 (London, 1952), p. 358–59.Google Scholar

41. Philip E. Mosely, who served with many of the new generation Soviet diplomats on various inter-Allied commissions at the close of the Second World War, described them as men with no initiative or latitude in negotiations who were hamstrung by their instructions from Moscow. He noted, too, that they lacked knowledge or understanding of foreign nations and that they were uncomfortable—even “wooden “—in negotiating. They also seemed nearly paralyzed by the fear of failure (see Mosely, Philip E., The Kremlin and World Politics [New York, 1960], pp. 3–41Google Scholar). Litvinov was also highly critical of the men who had replaced him at the top of the Narkomindel apparatus. He told an American journalist that the Foreign “Commissariat is run by three men [Molotov, Vyshinskii, and Dekanozov] and none of them understand America or Britain” (quoted in Mastny, “Cassandra, ” p. 371).

42. Hilger and Meyer, Incompatible Allies, p. 290.

43. Uldricks, “Soviet Diplomatic Corps, 1917-1930, ” pp. 255-57. Also see Alexandre Barmine, “A Russian View of the Moscow Trials, ” International Conciliation : Documents for the Year 1938, no. 337, pp. 48-49.

44. Iakov Malik is a good example of the new generation of Soviet diplomats who were willing to carry out, and even supervise, covert espionage operations (see Jack Anderson and Les Whitten, “Soviet U.N. Envoy Linked to Spying, ” Washington Post, February 11, 1975).

45. On the role of the Narkomindel in the making of foreign policy see Uldricks, , “Soviet Diplomatic Corps, 1917-1930,” pp. 166–80Google Scholar; Glassman, Jon D., “Soviet Foreign Policy Decision Making,” Columbia Essays in International Affairs : The Dean's Papers, 1967, ed. Cordier, Andrew W. (New York, 1968), 3 : 373–402Google Scholar; Aspaturian, Vernon V., Process and Poxvcr in Soviet Foreign Policy (Boston, 1971), pp. 555–88 Google Scholar; and Slusser, Robert M., “The Role of the Foreign Ministry,” Russian Foreign Policy, ed. Lederer, Ivo J. (New Haven, 1962), p. 211–39.Google Scholar

46. The American chargé in Moscow reported : “Since as indicated above the new incumbents without exception appear to be persons with no formal experience in matters relating to foreign affairs, the opinion may be offered that the Kremlin desires to have in the Commissariat of Foreign Affairs Soviet citizens who have had no contact with foreigners or foreign thought and who consequently in their dealings with foreign representatives here will, knowing no other, reflect only the orthodox Soviet point of view unencumbered by any knowledge or experience of life abroad” (Stuart E. Grummon to secretary of state, July 6, 1939, decimal file no. 861.621/41).

47. Citing Gromyko, Malik, G. N. Zarubin, Zorin, and Pavlov as examples in the diplomatic service, Abdurakhman Avtorkhanov argues that “the new generation, free from past ‘errors’ and deviations, lacking in self-will, efficient and devoted, ready to act and not to reason and, most important, having grown up under the eyes of Stalin himself and passed their lives as part of a ‘collective, ’ was capable of everything except independent thought “ ( Abdurakhman, Avtorkhanov, Stalin and the Soviet Communist Party [New York, 1959], pp. 164–65Google Scholar).

48. Aspaturian, Process and Power, p. 628. This view of the Narkomindel is shared by Dallin, David J., From Purge to Coexistence (Chicago, 1964), p. 212.Google Scholar

49. Aspaturian, Process and Power, p. 630.

50. Cohen, Stephen F., Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution : A Political Biography, 1888-1938 (New York, 1973), p. 1973 Google Scholar; and Ulam, Stalin, p. 393.

51. Uldricks, “Soviet Diplomatic Corps, 1917-1930, ” pp. 180-90; and Uldricks, “Soviet Diplomatic Corps in the Cicerin Era, ” pp. 219-23.

52. Tucker, Robert C., “Stalin, Bukharin, and History as Conspiracy,” in Tucker, Robert C. and Cohen, Stephen F., eds., The Great Purge Trial (New York, 1965), p. xxxvi Google Scholar. Also see Slusser, “Role of the Foreign Ministry, ” pp. 214-30; and Kennan, George F., Russia and the West under Lenin and Stalin (New York, 1961), pp. 288–91, 296Google Scholar. For earlier expressions of this interpretation of the purges see Boris, Nikolaevskii, “Stalin i ubiistvo Kirova,” Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, 1956, no. 10, p. 186 and no. 12, pp. 239-40Google Scholar; Franz, Borkenau, European Communism (New York, 1953), pp. 117, 132-35, 234-35Google Scholar; Krivitsky, W. G., Was Stalin's Agent (London, 1939), pp. 18–34, 37-40Google Scholar; and Erich, Wollenberg, The Red Army : A Study of the Growth of Soviet Imperialism (London, 1940), p. 237 Google Scholar. Cf. Daniels, Robert V., The Conscience of the Revolution : Communist Opposition in Soviet Russia (New York, 1969), p. 1969 Google Scholar. Daniels moots the opposite possibility—that “fear of criticism of his [Stalin's] impending alliance with democratic forces abroad, contributed to his decision to liquidate the oppositionists. “

53. Cohen, Bukharin, p. 360.

54. Tucker, “Stalin, Bukharin, and History as Conspiracy, ” pp. xxxvi-xxxix; and Slusser, “Role of the Foreign Ministry, ” p. 231.

55. On the dysfunctional nature of the purges see Moore, Barrington Jr., Terror and Progress—USSR : Some Sources of Change and Stability in the Soviet Dictatorship (Cambridge, Mass., 1954), pp. 175–76CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Roger, Pethybridge, The Social Prelude to Stalinism (London, 1974), p. 315.Google Scholar

56. For discussions of Litvinov's political orientation and his role in Soviet diplomacy see Raoul, Girardet, “Litvinov et ses enigmes,” Les Relations Germano-Sovietiques de 1933 a 1939, ed. Duroselle, Jean-Baptiste (Paris, 1954), pp. 103–35 Google Scholar; and Roberts, Henry L., “Maxim Litvinov,” The Diplomats, 1919-1939, ed. Craig, Gordon A. and Gilbert, Felix (New York, 1963), p. 344–77.Google Scholar

57. The terms pro-British, pro-German, and so forth are used here not in the sense of any emotional attachment or political commitment to these nationalities or states, but only to indicate the general foreign policy orientation which various Narkomindel figures considered optimal for the USSR.

58. Krestinskii is an especially good example of a pro-German diplomat who fell victim to the purges. The staff of the German embassy in Moscow considered him an important advocate of Russo-German cooperation (see Dirksen, Herbert von, Moscow, Tokyo, London : Twenty Years of German Foreign Policy [London, 1957], p. 91 Google Scholar). It was Krestinskii who, as deputy commissar of foreign affairs, had tried to prevent the rapid deterioration of relations between the USSR and Hitler's Germany in October of 1933. The Fiihrcr, however, had no interest in a rapprochement with the Soviet Union. Krestinskii's aborted mission to Berlin is discussed in Weinberg, Gerhard L., The Foreign Policy of Hitler's Germany : Diplomatic Revolution in Europe, 1933-36 (Chicago, 1970), p. 81 Google Scholar. At his trial Krestinskii was, of course, accused of striving “to hamper, hinder and prevent the normalization of relations between the Soviet Union and Germany along normal diplomatic lines” (Tucker and Cohen, eds., The Great Purge Trial, p. 51). This seems to have been precisely the reverse of the truth.

59. Radek's role in Russo-German relations and his dealings with various right-wing circles in Germany is described in Warren, Lerner, Karl Radek : The Last Internationalist (Stanford, 1970).Google Scholar

60. Even Litvinov, that undisputed champion of collective security, had hinted at the possibility of a rapprochement with Germany when he said : “We certainly have our own opinion about the German regime. We certainly are sympathetic toward the suffering of our comrades [that is, the KPD]; but you can reproach us Marxists least of all for permitting our sympathies to rule our policy. All the world knows that we can and do maintain good relations with capitalist governments of any regime including Fascist. We do not interfere in the internal affairs of Germany or of any other countries, and our relations with her are determined not by her domestic but by her foreign policy” ( Litvinov, M. M., Vneshniaia politika SSSR [Moscow, 1935], p. 70 Google Scholar).

61. Tucker, Robert C., Stalin as Revolutionary, 1879-1929 (New York, 1973), p. 1973 Google Scholar. Cf. Joel, Carmichael, Stalin's Masterpiece : The Shoiv Trials and Purges of the Thirties—the Consolidation of the Bolshevik Dictatorship (London, 1976), pp. 208 ff.Google Scholar

62. Stalin's letter of 1925 to Arkadi Maslow, leader of the German Communist Party, gives early evidence both of his low regard for the intelligentsia and of his plans for remolding Soviet elites. “We in Russia have also had a dying away of a number of old leaders from among the littérateurs and the old ‘chiefs'…. This is a necessary process for a renewal of the leading cadres of a living and developing party” ( Stalin, I. V., Sochineniia, vol. 7 [Moscow, 1947], p. 43 Google Scholar; see also Stalin, , Sochineniia, ed. McNeal, Robert H., vol. 1 [14] [Stanford, 1967], p. 245 Google Scholar).