Stalin: Waiting for Hitler, 1929-1941

128. Vinogradov, Genrikh Iagoda, 391–6 (TsA FSB, f. 3, op. 2, d. 60, l. 1–6); Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 285–7 (RGANI, f. 6, op. 13, d. 71, l. 23–6). Nikolayev, in an interrogation protocol (Dec. 13) delivered to Stalin, “confessed” that he belonged to a “group” of former oppositionists (Shatsky and Kotolynov), which adhered to Trotskyite-Zinovievite views and “considered it necessary to change the existing party leadership by all possible means.” This passage was underlined in pencil. The protocol further stated that they had directed Nikolayev to make it appear he acted alone “to hide the participation of the Zinovievite group.” This passage was also highlighted with pencil. Agranov called the threesome “best friends.” He tried to get Nikolayev to confess that his visits to the German and Latvian consulates in summer and fall 1934 constituted attempts by his “group” to contact Trotsky abroad. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 578–9 (APRF, f. 3, op. 24, d. 198, l. 2); Zhukov, “Sledstvie.”

129. Khlevniuk, Stalin: zhizn’, 187 (no citation).

130. Na prieme, 144; Mikoian, Tak bylo, 316. Agranov was relieved of his post as acting director of the Leningrad NKVD to focus on the investigation; Zakovsky was appointed in his place (Dec. 10).

131. Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 304 (RGANI, f. 6, op. 13, d. 138, l. 4–9; RGASPI, f. 671, op. 1, d. 271, l. 542); Kotolynov had been expelled in 1927 and reinstated in 1928. Kirilina, Neizvestnyi Kirov, 411.

132. Khaustov and Samuelson, Stalin, NKVD, 49–50 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 130, l. 161), 51 (d. 131, l. 34). From Dec. 1934, Polish-language instruction at schools and institutes was curtailed or eliminated. Kuromiya, Freedom and Terror, 208 (citing TsDAHO, f. 1, op. 16, spr. 12, ark. 278, 304, 313).

133. Murin, Stalin v ob’iatiakh, 167; Na prieme, 144.

134. Zhukov, “Sledstvie,” 42.

135. Kotolynov claimed he heard the following from Zinoviev: “It would be better if he [Stalin] did not exist.” Kirilina, Neizvestnyi Kirov, 416.

136. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 577–8 (APRF, f. 3, op. 24, d. 198, l. 8, 9).

137. When they came for Zinoviev at night, he hastily composed a note to Stalin: “In no way, no way, am I guilty before the party, before the Central Committee or before you personally. I swear to you all by everything that is holy to a Bolshevik, I swear to you by Lenin’s memory. I cannot even imagine who could have raised suspicion against me. I beg you to believe this, my word of honor. I am shaken to the depth of my soul.” Stalin did not answer. He had Zinoviev, along with Kamenev, expelled from the party again on Dec. 20. The first draft of the indictment (Jan. 13) would note that Zinoviev and Kamenev pleaded innocent; the indictment soon changed. “O dele tak nazyvaeomom ‘Moskovskom tsentre.’”

138. “O dele tak nazyvaeomom ‘Moskovskom tsentre,’” 80; Iakovlev et al., Reabilitatsiia: politicheskie portsessy, 154.

139. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 955, l. 42 (Dec. 19, 1934). “We lived and live under an unflagging regime of terror and force,” the Nobel Laureate Ivan Pavlov wrote to the Council of People’s Commissars (Dec. 21, 1934). “I more and more see the parallel between our life and the life of ancient Asiatic despotisms . . . Remember that humans, descended from animals, can fall easily, but elevating them is difficult . . . Take pity on the motherland and on us.” Sovetskaia kul’tura, Jan. 14, 1989.

140. Na prieme, 144. Akulov, frozen out by the clans at the OGPU, had been removed as first deputy there in Oct. 1932; he had been named USSR procurator general with the position’s creation on June 20, 1933. Golunskii, Istoriia zakonodatel’stva SSSR, 510–1; Kolpakidi and Seriakov, Shchit i mech, 343. In Feb. 1936, Akulov would fall off a horse, cracking his skull. “Bolezn’ tov. Akulova,” Pravda, Feb. 28, 1936: 6. Akulov would be arrested (July 1937) and executed.

141. Svetlana developed a high temperature (from scarlet fever). Sergeev and Glushik, Besedy o Staline, 144, 147.

142. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 169–71 (Maria Svanidze diary: Dec. 23 and 28, 1934). Svanidze effectively confessed to her diary that she was in love with Stalin, and vied with many women for the now twice-widowed Stalin’s attention: Sashiko and Mariko Svanidze, the sisters of Stalin’s deceased first wife; Anna Alliluyeva; Yevgeniya “Zhenya” Alliluyeva (Stalin’s sister-in-law, married to Pavel Allilyuev, Nadya’s elder brother)—all of whom hoped to become indispensable to “poor Iosif,” as Maria described him. Svanidze imagined that Stalin was having an affair with Zhenya (b. 1898), since he was attentive to her and the two were often missing at the same time. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 157–8.

143. On Dec. 25 at 9:15, Stalin convened a meeting in his office to discuss and edit the indictment; the sentence of execution for all fourteen defendants was printed before the trial commenced. Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 344–52 (RGANI, f. 6, op. 13, d. 34, l. 36; TsA FSB, a.u.d. N-Sh44, t. 1, l. 1–16).

144. Vinogradov, Genrikh Iagoda, 396–404 (TsA FSB, f. 3, op. 2, d. 60, l. 48–56, 33); Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 358–77. Others have Nikolayev supposedly falling to the ground and shouting, “You cannot shoot me. Comrade Stalin promised . . .” Kirilina, Rikoshet, 67.

145. Kirilina, Neizvestnyi Kirov, 303 (Matveyev).

146. Sedov et al., “Spravka”; Kirilina, Neizvestnyi Kirov, 302–3; Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 370–1 (RGANI, f. 6, p. 13, d. 24, l. 51–68).

147. Maslov and Chistiakov, “Stalinskie repressii i sovetskaia iutsitsiia,” 105.

148. Lugovskaia, Diary of a Soviet Schoolgirl, 140.

149. Stalin had the politburo in May 1934 decree the Stalin Institute, in Tiflis, subordinated as an affiliate to the central Marx-Engels-Lenin Institute. Still, whether he was fully aware of the enormous pile of documents concerning his youth that was being accumulated remains unclear. Kun, Stalin, 3–4.

150. Hoover Archives, Lakoba papers, 1–57.

151. Lakoba, Stalin i Khashim, 5, 32–5.

152. Hoover Archives, Lakoba papers, 2–22. Sebastian Kirakozov made a painting of Stalin and Hashim. Kravchenko, Stalin v izobrazitel’nom iskusstve, opposite 26.

153. See also the intrigue surrounding Baron Bibineishvili’s biographical celebration of Kamo (1934), the revolutionary bandit: Sukharev, “Litsedeistvo,” 107, citing PA IIP pri TsK KP Gruzii, f. 8, op. 1, d. 22, l. 5; f. 14, op. 9, d. 18, l. 239. Bibineishvili, Kamo.

154. Enukidze, Nashi podpol’nye tipografii Kavkaza.

155. Shaumian, “Stoikii bol’shevik.”

156. Yenukidze wrote a response (Jan. 8, 1935) claiming the mistakes were not his; Stalin marked up and had Yenukidze’s response circulated. Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 351–5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 206, l. 111), 355–61 (d. 728, l. 108–24); Enukidze, Bol’shevistskie nelegal’nye tipografii.

157. Stalin had ordered a film crew out of the 16th party conference in April 1929 for creating a ruckus (“turning the conference into a bazaar”). Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 100 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 1, d. 132, l. 77).

158. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 227 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 114, d. 379, l. 163–4), 229–30 (d. 661, l. 97–9: Jan. 17, 1934). “Newsreels are an interesting type of art, they have notably done well here, they are pleasant and edifying to watch,” Stalin remarked after watching the May Day 1934 newsreel. Typically, he wanted them shortened and sharpened. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 919–23 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 828, l. 27–30).

159. Bulgakowa, Eisenstein, 137 (citing Eisenstein archive, 1923–2–1116); Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 139 (PARf, f. 3, op. 35, d. 87, l. 13). Geduld and Gottesman, Sergei Eisenstein and Upton Sinclair. On Dec. 1, 1931, Eisenstein’s colleagues in Moscow pronounced the AWOL director a “deserter.” Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 150 (APRF, f. 3, op. 35, d. 87, l. 27: Yukov, Dec. 1, 191), 151 (l. 32: Shumyatsky, Dec. 1). On May 20, 1932, eleven days after Eisenstein and his assistant Grigory Alexandrov had finally arrived back from their three-year sojourn, they asked for an audience with Stalin, who wrote on the request, “I cannot receive them, no time.”

160. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 184 (APRF, f. 3, op. 35, d. 87, l. 81: June 8, 1932). See also Pyr’ev, Izbrannye proizvedeniia, I: 64; Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 176–7 (APRF, f. 3, op. 35, d. 87, l. 77–8), 180 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 114, d. 403, l. 62); and Pravda, Jan. 23, 1973. Thunder over Mexico, attributed to Eisenstein, was screened in Los Angeles on May 10, 1933. In July 1933, he entered a hospital in Kislovodsk with depression. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 195–200 (RGASPI, f. 142, op. 1, d. 586, l.11–22).

161. Shumyatsky had only been able to show parts of the film at the first screening; a week later he showed it in its entirety. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 940–5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 828, l. 46–60: July 14, 1934), 945–7 (l. 51–2), 947n3 (d. 27, l. 88). One of the film’s numbers, “Such a lot of nice girls!,” would be immortalized as the tango “Heart” by Pyotr Leshchenko. Stalin tended to like thoughtful songs, even those a bit sad (such as “Suliko”) but he was captivated by the dance numbers. Stalin’s thirst for relaxation was immense. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 947–9 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 828, l. 53–4).

162. Aleksandrov, Epokha i kino, 159; Kushnirov, Svetlyi put’, 96–7; Shumiatskii, Kinematografiia millionov, 236. On the resistance of some musicians to the acting tricks under Utyosov, and the changeover in his band’s personnel, see Batashev, Sovetskii dzhaz, 40–3; and Chernov and Bialik, O legkoi muzyke, 120. Igor Savchenko, the Ukrainian filmmaker, had actually made the first Soviet musical comedy, The Accordion (June 1934), about a youth who stops playing the supposedly frivolous instrument after he becomes a village Communist Youth league secretary. Aleksandrov, Epokha i kino, 196; Zel’dovich, Liubov’ Orlova, 17. Stites, Russian Popular Culture, 90–2.

163. “A film and its success are directly linked to the degree of entertainment in the plot,” Shumyatsky had noted in Dec. 1933. But that year, of the eight Soviet films released, a mere three were comedies. Shumiatskii, “Tvorcheskie zadachi templana”; Taylor, “Ideology as Mass Entertainment,” 193.

164. At the orgburo cinema commission, Jolly Fellows came in for severe criticism as “counterrevolutionary” and “muck, hooliganism, false throughout.” Sidorov, “‘Veselye rebiata’—komediia kontrrevoliutsionnaia,” 73–4; (RGASPI, f. 74, op. 1, d. 293, l. 18–20: July 28, 1934), 75 (l. 21: July 29). Iurii Saakov, “Secha v kommunal’noi kvartire,” Iskusstvo kino, 1995, no. 2: 134-44; Salys, Films of Grigorii Aleksandrov, 34. Stalin had the orgburo cinema commission dissolved. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 246–7, 248, 252 (f. 17, op. 163, d. 1048, l. 156: Dec. 17, 1934), 252n3 (op. 3, d. 955, l. 57). Shumyatsky showed Stalin a screed in Literarturna gazeta accusing Jolly Fellows of being “great talent wasted.” Stalin erupted and tasked Zhdanov with setting things right. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 969–70 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 828, l. 69: Nov. 20, 1934); Literaturnaia gazeta, Nov. 18, 1934. On Dec. 11, 1934, when Stalin asked Shumyatsky how things were going he got an earful; the dictator phoned Molotov on the vertushka and inquired about the reserve budget fund and how much extra could be given for cinema. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 976–8 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 828, l. 77–80).

165. Douglas, Inventing American Broadcasting.

166. In Britain, the number of radios would jump from 3 million in 1930 to 9 million by the end of the decade—three of four British households—while the number of listeners would increase from an estimated 12 million in the 1920s to 34 million by 1939. By the second half of the 1930s, Germany would have more than 9 million radio receivers. Goebbels had noted (Aug. 1933), “What the press was to the 19th century, radio will be to the 20th.” Bowden and Offen, “Revolution that Never Was,” 244–74; Williams, Communications; Bergmeier and Lorz, Hitler’s Airwave, 6, 9.

167. The USSR would have 7 million by decade’s close, including 1.6 million in rural areas. It had planned for far more, but Soviet industry could not manufacture sufficient quantities of vacuum tubes. Inkeles, Public Opinion in Soviet Russia, 243–4, 274–5; Gurevich and Ruzhnikov, Sovetskoe radioveshchanie, chap. 5.

168. Lovell, Russia in the Microphone Age, 101. Small local stations had proliferated, but they were soon obliged to rebroadcast set amounts of Moscow material. Initially, live material predominated, although by 1933 texts for live broadcasts had to be submitted in advance, and programs were monitored for compliance. Goriaeva, Radio Rossii, 157; Goriaeva, “Veilkaia kniga dnia,” 91–2 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 114, d. 558, l. 9–10: July 9, 1935), 93 (GARF, f. A-2306, op. 60, d. 79, 84: Dec. 27, 1935); Goriaeva, “Zhurnalistika i tsenzura.”

169. Taylor, “Ideology as Mass Entertainment,” 198.

170. Letters to the party propaganda department asked that radio lectures be read more slowly, to allow for notetaking. Lovell, Russia in the Microphone Age, 67 (citing Mikhail Angarskii and Voiacheslav Knushev, “Slovo slushatelei o peredachakh: obzor pisem radioslushatelei,” Govorit SSSR, 1933, no. 12–13: 33–4; GANO, f. 3630, op. 5, d. 54, l. 15–6; GARF, f. 6903, op. 1, d. 49, l. 2, 4, 9). Nazi-era radio featured popular music and comedy as well as anti-Semitic speeches. “Disney, Dietrich and Benny Goodman,” Anson Rabinbach observed, “shared radio time with Goebbels, Göring and the Führer.” Rabinbach, “Imperative to Participate,” 7.

171. Nikolaevich, “Poslednii seans,” at 22.

172. Ivanov, Ocherki istorii rossiisko (sovetsko)-pol’skikh otnoshenii, 195; Dolinskii, Sovetskaia kinokomediia tridtsatykh godov, I: 11.

173. Zil’ver, Za bol’shoe, 22–49, 58–80 (quote at 72).

174. Sovetskoe Kino, 1935, no. 1: 9; Taylor and Christie, Film Factory, 348–55 (Leonid Trauberg). See also Shumiatskii, Kinematografiia millionov, 7.

175. Maksimenkov, Kremlevskii kinoteater, 257–61 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 958, l. 15, 45–7; op. 163, d. 1051, l. 90–4); Pravda, Jan. 12, 1935; Sovetskoe kino, 1935, no. 1: 11–2; Fomin and Deriabin, Letopis’ Rossiiskogo kino, II: 315–6. See also Miller, Soviet Cinema, 22–3.

176. Eisenstein’s closing remarks were published (Kino, Jan. 17, 1935: 4), and Shumyatsky sent a withering complaint about them. Fomin and Deriabin, Letopis’ rossiiskogo kino, II: 317 (RGALI, f. 2456, op. 4, d. 23, l. 17–8). When the film industry completed an apartment house in 1934 in central Moscow (between Malaya Nikitskaya and Povarskaya streets, behind the House of Cinema), Eisenstein put in for two apartments (for himself and his mother); he got nothing. Bulgakowa, Eisenstein, 159–60.

177. Leyda, Kino, 319–20. Leyda attended the evening at the Bolshoi.

178. Shumiatskii, Kinematografiia millionov, 249, 8.

179. Evans, Third Reich in Power, 623–7; Domarus, Hitler: Reden, II: 643–8 (at 644); Kershaw, Hitler: 1889–1936, 546–8. “The French have definitely missed the opportunity for a preventive war,” Hitler remarked internally once the plebiscite arrangements had been finalized. DGFP, series C, III: 704–6 (Dec. 4, 1934).

180. Bud, “Fil’m o Kirove.”

181. Iakovlev et al., Reabilitatsiia: politicheskie protsessy, 162, 166

182. Pravda, Jan. 16, 1935. See also Haslam, “Political Opposition,” 409–10.

183. A third trial, with another 77 defendants, including Zinoviev’s wife, Zlata Radić, and various relatives of Nikolayev, would result in sentences of two to five years.

184. Stalin authored the letter. The day before he sent the text to other politburo members. “O tak nazyvaemom ‘Antisovetskom ob”edinennom tsentre Trotskistko-Zinov’evskom tsentre,’” 95–100; Iakovlev et al., Reabilitatsiia: politicheskie protsessy, 191–5; Getty and Naumov, Road to Terror, 147–50; Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 381 (RGANI, f. 6, op. 13, d. 13, l. 18).

185. Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 446–7 (APRF, f. 3, op. 24, d. 201, l. 106–8, 114), 447–50 (RGANI, f. 6, op. 13, d. 92, l. 173–7: draft), 450 (169–72: draft). A draft is also in Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 592–3 (TsAFSB, f. 3, op. 2, d. 7, l. 1–2).

186. Brontman, Dnevniki. See also Kommunisticheskaia revoliutsiia, 1935, no. 1: 23–4.

187. Stalin offered both praise and complaints about parts that were missing despite his instructions. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 989–90 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 828, l. 111); Pravda, Jan. 21 and 22, 1935. I. P. Kopalin and I. F. Setkina made the Lenin documentary.

188. Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 436–52 (RGANI, f. 6, op. 13, d. 79, l. 99–104; d. 82, l. 15–132).

189. See also Gronsky to Stalin in 1933 on Kuibyshev’s drinking: RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 725, l. 49–58.

190. Recently, on his trip to Central Asia to pressure the cotton harvest, he had undergone an emergency operation, but then returned to Moscow to work, refusing to lie in hospital. One evening, after countless meetings, he told his staff that before giving a speech that night he was going across the courtyard to his nearby apartment (on the third floor) to lie down. His aides and then the apartment staff woman wanted to call a doctor. He refused. By the time a doctor arrived, he was dead. Kabytov, “Valerian Kuibyshev”; Sochineniia, XI: 220.

191. Lota, “Alta” protiv “Barbarossy,” 143–191, 248–55; Lota, Sekretnyi front, 75–94; Lurie and Kochik, GRU, 504, 511–2, 531, 532.

192. Sorge had been born in the Baku oil fields (1895)—his father was an oil technician—and grew up in Germany, where he fought in the Great War, then became a Communist in 1919, before moving to Moscow. In late 1929, military intelligence poached him from Comintern intelligence and sent him to China; he arrived in Tokyo in 1933. He joined the Nazi party, to aid his spy work, and criticized Nazi officials and actions, which, however, enhanced his credibility. He chased women and drank. Colonel Ott, the German military attaché in Tokyo, invited Sorge to travel with him to Manchuria in Oct. 1934; Sorge wrote the trip’s report. Soon, Sorge bedded Ott’s wife, Helma. When Ott learned of the affair, he surmised it would not endure and did nothing, keeping the valuable Sorge, whom he called “the Irresistible” and “the man who knew everything.” Whymant, Stalin’s Spy, 145–94 (at 153, 184, no citation).

193. Primakov, Ocherki, III: 20, 26–39, 41; Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, 448n50, 449n65; Tsarev and West, KGB v Anglii, 44–7; Poretsky, Our Own People, 72–85; Peake, Private Life of Kim Philby, 220–1; Gazur, Secret Assignment, 15. See also Borovik, Philby Files; and Koch, Double Lives.

194. Golubev, “Nash tovarisch”; Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, 445n3. Maclean would deliver his first purloined secret file in Jan. 1936 (about secret negotiations between Britain and Nazi Germany over an airforce agreement). The Soviets soon were able to discern that the British had an agent in the foreign affairs commissariat and in Willi Münzenberg’s circle. Maclean would also discover, through correspondence, the home address of Vernon Kell, the head of the secret MI5, allowing the Soviets to establish surveillance on the residence. See Primakov, Ocherki, III: 40–9. An alleged Polish agent who worked in Molotov’s secretariat, who passed on evaluations of Soviet brass, was never discovered. Dzanovich, Organy, 723n54, citing TsA FSB, f. 1, op. 9, d. 19, l. 339–400.

195. Shearer, Policing Stalin’s Socialism, 136–7. The special departments were particularly busy hauling in soldiers for counterrevolutionary utterances in relation to the Kirov murder. Suvenirov, Tragediia, 27; Whitewood, Red Army and the Great Terror, 170 (citing RGVA, f. 37837, op. 10, d. 26, l. 289, 194–6). In March 1935, the NKVD instructed an agent in Germany to investigate the links between Tukhachevsky and the Wehrmacht high command. “M. N. Tukachevskii i ‘voenno-fashistskii zagovor’,” 11.

196. Artizov et al., Reabilitatsiia: kak eto bylo, II: 735: Dec. 13, 1934); Gamarnik had managed, during the push for socialist legality, to obtain a ruling whereby the OGPU could summon army personnel for interrogation only with the agreement of the unit’s commissar. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 524 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 16, l. 66: May 26, 1934).

197. Dokumenty i materialy po istorii sovetsko-pol’skikh otnoshenii, VI: 249–250 (AAN, d. AMSZ, Poselstwo RP, Berlin); Roos, Polen und Europa, 208–12; Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 193 (citing Bundesarchiv, Papers of General Beck, H 08–28/1, f. 54: Schindler to Blomberg, Feb. 22, 1935); Mikhutina, Sovetsko-pol’skie otnosheniia, 239–41, citing Diariusz i teki Jana Szembeka, 1935–1945, 2 vols. (London: Polish Research Centre/Orbis, 1964–6), I: 217–25, 230; Wojciechowski, Stosunki polsko-niemieckie, 243–4; and Beck, Final Report, 27–31. See also Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 204.

198. “General Goering to Visit Poland,” “General Goering’s Secret Visit to Warsaw,” and “Conscription in Germany,” Manchester Guardian, Jan. 25, 28, and 29, 1935, respectively; “General Goering in Warsaw,” The Times, Jan. 28, 1935; Izvestiia, Feb. 14, 1935. See also Harris, “Encircled by Enemies,” 539 (citing AVP RF f. 05, op. 15, pap. 109, d. 67, l. 5: Göring with Bek).

199. Bobylev et al., Sovetskie Vooruzhennye Sily, 143 (no citation). In 1933, the actual figure for military expenditures had been 4.299 billion, versus the published 1.421 billion rubles (hence Tukhachevsky’s claims of fourfold increase in one year). Harrison and Davies, “Soviet Military-Economic Effort,” 369–70.

200. Barmine, One Who Survived, 221 (confirmed in the Pravda account).

201. Erickson, Soviet High Command, 381; Berson, Kreml na biało, 49. On Feb. 23, 1935, Red Star published a photomontage of five military portraits: Tukhachevsky occupied third position, after Voroshilov and Gamarnik, ahead of Yakir and Uborevičius.

202. Iurii Domobrovskii, in Literaturnaia gazeta, Aug. 22, 1990: 6; Larina, Nezabyvaemoe, 270.

203. Zhavaronkov, “I snitsia noch’iu den’,” 52; Pavliukov, Ezhov, 335–6 (citing Aleksander Fadeev, “Nikolai Ivanovich Ezhov”).

204. Encountering Yezhov in spring 1930 at a government resort in Sukhum on the Black Sea coast, Nadezhda Mandelstam, wife of the poet Osip, found him “a modest and rather agreeable person.” Mandelstam, Hope against Hope, 321–5.

205. Razgon, Plen v svoem otechestve, 50–1.

206. On Yezhov’s remarkable workload, see Pavliukov, Ezhov, 96 (citing RGASPI, f. 17m, op. 114, d. 298, l. 1–5; d. 300, l. 8–11).

207. “Blizhaishee okruzhene diktatora,” Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, 1933, no. 23: 8–9. Yezhov suspected the essay’s source was Pyatakov, first deputy commissar of heavy industry, who had traveled to Berlin in late 1932. Pyatakov was Yezhov’s old drinking buddy. (Once, after Pyatakov, inebriated, had pricked him with a pin, Yezhov had punched in the face.) Pavliukov, Ezhov, 99–100; Petrov and Jansen, Stalinskii pitomets, 29–30.

208. They would adopt a daughter (Natasha) from a children’s home. Yevgeniya ran a literary salon, while pursuing extramarital affairs. Yezhov, for his part, bedded subordinates’ wives, household and cleaning personnel, prostitutes, and various male lovers; he drank and became pugnacious, beating her.

209. Chubar, whom Stalin met during the October days of 1917, had a reputation as an expert, and Stalin promoted him to deputy chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars and finance commissar and invited him to inner-circle meals. Khlevniuk, Politbiuro, 228–9; Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh sem’i, 167.

210. This resolution appears to have been dictated by Stalin to Poskryobyshev; other members of the politburo signed it in the same red pencil on Stalin’s desk (Kalinin’s was evidently a telephone approval). The logbook for Stalin’s office records no meeting that day. Khlevniuk, Master of the House, 139 (citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 163, d. 1056, l. 35–6); Khlevniuk et al., Stalinskoe politbiuro, 142 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 960, l. 7; op. 2, d. 538, l. 3), 143 (op. 3, d. 961, l. 16); Na prieme, 152.

211. Khaustov and Samuelson, Stalin, NKVD, 141.

212. Mironenko, Moskovskii kreml’, 187, 210, 241.

213. On Sept. 23, 1934, Barbusse had requested an audience with Stalin, which was granted. Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 341–2 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 699, l. 81). On the Sept. 16, 1927, audience, see RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 699, l. 2–10; “‘U nas malo rasstrelivaiut’: beseda I. V. Stalina s A. Babiusom” (APRF, f. 45, op. 1, d. 699, l. 2-10); and Barbusse, Voici ce qu’on a fait de la Géorgie (Paris: E. Flammarion, 1929). On the Oct. 5, 1932, meeting: Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 251–8 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 1, d. 699, l. 35–42, 43–51), 259 (l. 53–4).

214. Stetsky, who was assigned to edit Barbusse, mostly raised issues about the portrayal of Trotsky and the Stalin-Trotsky clash. Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 341–6 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 699, l. 124–5: Sept. 29, 1934).

215. Barbusse described the Amusement Palace apartment, where Stalin no longer lived by the time the book came out. Barbusse, Stalin, vii–viii, 7, 277, 278. Louis Fischer would write that in Moscow, Barbusse had talked mostly about Jesus Christ. Margarete Buber-Neumann, who had encountered Barbusse in Moscow in 1932, would write that “I was very surprised my idol Barbusse displayed such traits of the bourgeois and the prima donna” by complaining about the hotel. Fischer, Men and Politics, 193; Buber-Neumann, Von Potsdam nach Moskau, 326.

216. Davies et al., Years of Progress, 153–6; Pravda, Jan. 30 and Feb. 16, 1935; Vtoroi vsesoiuznyi s”ezd kolkhoznikov-udarnikov, 186–7 (Yezhov), 247–97; Vyltsan, Zavershchaiushchii etap, 25–40.

217. Pravda, Feb. 10, 1935; Vtoroi vsesoiuznyi s”ezd kolkhoznikov-udarnikov, 144. See also Kolkhoznitsa, 1935, no. 11–12: 14–5; “Priem kolkhoznits-udarnits sveklovichnykh polei rukovoditeliami partii i pravitel’stva,” Sotsialisticheskaia rekonstruktsiia sel’skogo khoziaistva, no. 11 (1935): 15–8; Kataev, “Mariia Demchenko,” 295–300 (dated 1938).

218. Buckley, Mobilizing Soviet Peasants, 235–6, citing Sergei K. Korotkov et al., My predsedatel’stvuem na Vsesoiuznom s”ezde (Moscow: Sel’khozgiz, 1935), 12–3, 39. See also Kazakhstanskaia pravda, Feb. 18, 1935. All congress delegates received a copy of the bound published record. Stoletov, “Zamechatel’nye knigi.”

219. Pravda, Feb. 15, 1935. A model statute had been drafted in late 1929 and published in revised form on March 2, 1930, but it had contained no specifics on organization, forms of payment, and so on. Ivnitskii, Kollektivizatsiia i raskulachivanie, 78–80. As one scholar has demonstrated, enduring regulations governing the collective farm system were not in place until 1933, when the concessions of 1932 were acknowledged as permanent. Merl, Bauern unter Stalin.

220. Danilov et al., Tragediia sovetskoi derevni, IV: 390–402 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 120, d. 138, l. 68–91). Yakov Yakovlev, head of the CC agriculture department, gave the report on the new model statute the first day; Mikhail Chernov, the new USSR land commissar and chairman of the commission, reported on Feb. 17 with the Stalin-corrected version. II vsesoiuznyi s”ezd kolkhoznikov-udarnikov, 225–32. The 1935 statute defined “land as state property owned by the whole people, and assigned to artels for permanent use.” Land was “not subject to either purchase-sale or leasing.” Nomad households in Kazakhstan were allowed 8–10 cows and their calves, 100–150 sheep/goats, 10 horses, and 5–8 camels. Izvestiia, Feb. 18, 1935; Sobranie zakonov, 1935, art. 82; “Soviet Legislation (XIII): Selection of Decrees and Documents,” Slavonic and East European Review 14, no. 40 (1935): 188–99.

221. Women made up 30.5 percent of the delegates (more than double the number at the first congress in 1933). Pravda, Feb. 16, 1935. According to the Soviet press, more than 7,000 women served as collective farm chairmen (up from just 1,290 in 1931), 8.1 percent of the total. Women made up 49.2 percent of managers of livestock units. Sotsialisticheskoe zemledelie, March 7, 1935; II vsesoiuznyi s”ezd kolkhoznikov-udarnikov, 247–97.

222. Yakovlev, in a report to party activists, summarized Stalin’s remarks: Pravda, March 13, 1935; Sotsialisticheskie zemledelie, March 13, 1935; Sotsialisticheskaia rekonstruktsiia sel’skogo khoziaistva, 1935, no. 2–3: 8–30. See also Fitzpatrick, Stalin’s Peasants, 122 (quoting Krestian’skaia pravda, Feb. 27, 1935: 2).

223. Whitman, “Kolkhoz Market,” 393. Rural laborers’ market sales fed regime coffers in the form of taxes, but the household plots and the direct marketing absorbed time from collective farm duties, and the opportunities for marketing further reinforced rural laborers’ deep commitment to the plots.

224. Maslov, Kolkhoznaia Rossiia, 198, 227–8.

225. Remuneration was calculated by a system known as the “labor day” (time plus skill, so that the chairman’s work time was worth more than the field hand’s). But only about 10 percent of the collective farmers’ cash income came from collective farm work; more than half came from sales at market or to state contractors. Seasonal labor at factories and construction sites provided significant cash income as well. Vyltsan, Zavershchaiushchii etap, 101 (citing GRAE, f. 4372, op. 36, d. 356, l. 18), 203–4; Kolkhozy vo vtoroi, 37; 20 let sovetskoi vlasti, 48.

226. Pravda, March 13, 1935 (Yakovlev). New members were to be admitted even if they had no animals or implements to contribute, a bitter pill for those who had had to yield up their property. Fitzpatrick, Stalin’s Peasants, 124–7, citing Krest’ainskaia pravda, Feb. 28, 1935; II vsesoiuznyi s”ezd kolkhoznikov-udarnikov, 17–8, 85.

227. Fitzpatrick, Stalin’s Peasants, 139–42. Collective farmers “could shout, fume, curse,” wrote the eyewitness Hindus, “but they could not dodge the challenge the kolkhoz had thrust upon them.” Hindus, Red Bread, 210.

228. Peterson (b. 1897), an ethnic Latvian who had commanded Trotsky’s civil war train in 1919, since 1920 served as a punctilious Kremlin commandant, earning high praise and two Orders of the Red Banner and the Order of Lenin. Suvenirov, Tragediia RKKA, 158 (citing AVKVS RF, op. 64, d. 776, l. 1–4); Zhukov, Inoi Stalin, 141–3.

229. “We were sitting together, Avdeyeva, Zhalybina-Bykova, and I on the first floor of the government building in a small room drinking tea,” one woman, E. S. Mishakova, testified. “Avdeyeva started to talk about how we lived badly, how our bosses drank, ate well, and we eat poorly. And I said to her that I live better now than before.” Then Avdeyeva supposedly started to say that Stalin was not a Russian, divorced his first wife [sic], and the second had shot herself. “I said that this is not true, we do not know. On this note the conversation ended and we returned to work.” For her part, A. E. Avdeyeva, a twenty-two-year-old cleaning lady in the central executive committee school, claimed “all that was said by [M. S.] Zhalybina.” Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 599–600 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 231, l. 1, 14).

230. Khaustov and Samuelson, Stalin, NKVD, 84–5 (TsA FSB, f. 3, op. 2, d. 8, l. 3). This was not Stalin’s first such appearance at a secret police meeting, sessions that were followed by generous tables of food and drink. Shreider, NKVD iznutri, 22, 27.

231. “O tak-nazyvaemom dele ‘Moskovskogo tsentra,’” 70; Iakovlev et al., Reabilitatsiia: politicheskie protsessy, 155; Sedov et al., “Spravka,” 465.

232. Vasily Doroshin, a forty-year-old aide to the Kremlin commandant, was said to have testified that “the commandant of the Grand Kremlin Palace Lukyanov Ivan Petrovich told me on the second day after the death of N. A. Alliluyeva that the Kremlin commandant Peterson had gathered a group of comrades and announced that Alliluyeva had died an unnatural death.” Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 602–3 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 231, l. 22–6).

233. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 606–10 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 230, l. 67–75: E. K. Mukhanova testimony, Feb. 10). Another librarian, P. I. Gordeyeva, daughter of workers and herself a Communist Youth League member, testified (March 1) that after the official news about Kirov’s death, Kremlin library employees discussed how “the murder of Kirov was not political, but a result of personal revenge” (618–9: d. 232, l. 31–4).

234. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 610–2 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 231, l. 54–9: Feb. 10, 1935). See also Khlevniuk, Khoziain, 253.

235. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 604–6 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 231, l. 32–6: Feb. 7), 230 (d. 230, l. 67–75: Feb. 10).

236. Gosudarstvennaia okhrana Rossii, 49 (no citation).

237. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 617 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 231, l. 88).

238. “O tak nazyvaemon ‘Kremlevskom dele,’” 90–1.

239. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 961, l. 58 (March 31, 1935). See also Hoover Institution Archives, Nicoalevsky Collection, box 233, folder 9 (“Iz zapisonoi knizhki Boris Ivanovicha Nikolaevskogo [rasskazy A. F. Almazova]), 1–2.

240. Ivanov, “Operatsiia ‘Byvshie liudi,’” 118–9, 121, 129; Vinogradov, Genrikh Iagoda, 465–6.

241. Of the 11,095 he listed, 5,044 were said to be former “big” merchants and rentiers, 2,360 aristocrats, and nearly 1,000 family members of executed terrorists, spies, and saboteurs. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 613–6 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 174, l. 42–9: Feb. 16, 1935), 617 (l. 41).

242. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 613–6 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 174, l. 42–49: Zakovsky to Yagoda, Feb. 16, 1935), 617 (l. 41: Yagoda to Stalin, Feb. 26, 1935).

243. Various officials in Karelia, too, were arrested as “spies,” and at least 5,000 “kulak” families within a fifteen-mile radius of the Finnish border were evicted, and their livestock and possessions confiscated. Dmitriev, Pominal’nye spiski Karelii, 17. In Oct. 1935, Zakovsky opened an NKVD training school in Leningrad desperately seeking more personnel. Tumshis and Papchinskii, 1937, bol’shaia chistka, 51.

244. Dubinskaia-Dzhalilova and Chernev, “Zhmu vashu ruku, dorogoi tovarishch,’” 188–9. Turbins had been approved for staging in Leningrad in 1933. In 1936, it would be permitted in Kiev. Milne, Mikhail Bulgakov, 168.

245. On Stalin’s fifteen visits, see V. Lakshin, preface to Bulgakov, Izbrannaia proza, 30. See also Jelagin, Taming of the Arts, 102–3; Shapoval, “‘Oni chuvstvuiut sebia, kak gosti . . . ,’” 107–8, 122; Smeliansky, Is Comrade Bulgakov Dead? 170–3; Shentalinskii, Raby svobody, 120. Between 1926 and 1941, the Moscow Art Theater would stage Turbins 987 times. Bulgakov, Dramy i komedii, 583.

246. Sergeev and Glushik, Besedy o Staline, 15.

247. Bulgakowa, Eisenstein, 168–72. Sixty-five films were submitted and twenty-six accepted. Kino, Feb. 2 and Feb. 21, 1935; Pravda, Feb. 22, 1935: 4. On Feb. 22, the state medals for cinema that had been announced in Jan. were presented by Kalinin in the Kremlin, with Stalin in attendance.

248. Pravda, Nov. 29, 1935.

249. Iasenskii, “O dvukh neudachnykh popytkakh.”

250. Mekhlis summoned the editors to Old Square (March 11), reading them the riot act; the next day’s editorial in Pravda was unsigned. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 996–7 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 1, d. 829, l. 9–10: March 11, 1935); Fomin and Deriabin, Letopis’ Rossiiskogo kino, II: 325; Pravda, March 12, 1935.

251. Izvestiia, March 3, 1935; Kino, March 5, 1935; “K itogam pervogo sovetskogo kinofestivalia,” Sovetskoe kino, no. 3 (1935): 3–5. By now, Chapayev was being shown in New York on Broadway. “Sovetskie fil’my v N’iu-Iorke,” Pravda, March 2, 1935.

252. The Soviets produced almost no expressly antifascist movies, beyond Pyryev’s Assembly Line of Death (Nov. 7, 1933), set in an unspecified European country, which portrayed fascism as a movement aiming to restore capitalism in the Soviet Union.

253. Friedberg, Literary Translation in Russia, 115. See also Baer, “Literary Translation.” “The Style of Soviet Culture,” a Pravda article by a literary critic, put forth Balzac, Goethe, Shakespeare, and Lev Tolstoy for emulation. Pravda, April 29, 1935 (Dinamov, pen name of Sergei Ogladkov). (“Mayakovsky shot himself while I translate,” Pasternak supposedly remarked of his means of livelihood.)

254. “Bol’she’ shekspirovat’!” Literaturnaia gazeta, April 23, 1933. Translations included Rabelais’s Gargantua and Pantagruel (1929), Virgil’s Aeneid (1933), Homer’s Iliad (1935), and Homer’s Odyssey (1935).

255. Litovskii, “Korol’ Lir”; Harshav, Moscow Yiddish Theater, 90; Clark, Moscow, 189 (citing GARF, f. 5283, op. 8, d. 242). See also Fowler, “Yiddish Theater in Soviet Ukraine.”

256. Mikhoels, “Moia rabota nad ‘Korolem Lirom,’” 94–123. A Shakespeare conference (Nov. 25–27, 1935) sparked controversy about how best to translate and interpret the playwright. Pravda, Nov. 29, 1935; O. Litovskii, “Zhivoi Shekspir,” 7–8; Clark, Moscow, 184–5.

257. Lang, Modern History of Soviet Georgia, 253.

258. Lakoba, Ot VI k VII s”ezdu sovetov ASSR Abkhazia; Lakoba, “Sel’skoe khoziaistvo Abkhazii—baza Sovetskoi pishchevoi promyshlennosti,” Hoover Archives, Lakoba papers, 2–32. See also Kolt’sov and Lezhava, Sovetskie subtropiki.

259. Lakoba, “‘Ia Koba, a ty Lakoba,’” 58 (March 15, 1935).

260. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 610–2 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 231, l. 54–9: Feb. 10).

261. It seems that in 1932, Kamenev had stopped by Yenukidze’s Kremlin office after being sentenced to exile in Minusinsk, asking that he be allowed to keep his Moscow apartment and that Yenukidze later passed on to Stalin a letter Kamenev intended to write from exile asking to be allowed to return to Moscow. Vinogradov, Genrikh Iagoda, 508–17 (TsA FSB, f. 13614, tom 2, l. 308–10, 314–22: May 30, 1937).

262. “Irina Gogua: semeinye istorii,” Ogonek, April 1997: http://kommersant.ru/doc/2284891; Cherviakova, “Pesochnye chasy.” Maria Svanidze took a more sinister view, writing in her diary about Yenukidze’s deceit, abuse of the perquisites of his office, and involvement with girls as young as nine to eleven, corrupting them morally if not physically.” Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 182 (Svanidze diary: June 28, 1935).

263. Zaria vostoka, March 5, 1935. Peterson was dismissed in April 1935 but not arrested (Yakir brought him to the Kiev military district as an aide in June).

264. Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 287–8 (RGANI, f. 6, op. 13, d. 33, l. 49–50: Ulrich to Stalin, March 11, 1934).

265. Kokurin and Petrov, Lubianka, 548–52; RGASPI, f. 671, op. 1, d. 271, l. 565–65ob.: Yezhov notes for presentation to Stalin, Dec. 1934 or Jan. 1935.

266. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 628–31 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 232, l. 168–76: March 11, 1935). A June 17, 1935, joint Central Committee and Council of People’s Commissars decree, “On the procedure for conducting arrests,” superseded the May 8, 1933, instruction, and stipulated that the NKVD could make arrests only with the sanction of the procuracy; arrests of personnel who reported to commissariats could be made only with the sanction of that particular commissar, including in the defense commissariat. Arrests of members and candidates of the Central Committee only with CC approval. A further directive would be issued Dec. 1, 1938, to take into account institutional changes, but arrests still required the authorization of the governing institution’s leadership. Suvenirov, Tragediia RKKA, 63 (citing RGVA, f. 9, op. 36, d. 1339, l. 191–2ob.).

267. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 648–50 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 234, l. 1–6: March 21, 1935). Zakovsky would report from Leningrad that more than 11,000 “former people” had already been sentenced and 22,000 inhabitants of border zones deported. Khaustov and Samuelson, Stalin, NKVD, 64; Vinogradov, Genrikh Iagoda, 465–76 (March 31, 1935); Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 654–7. Yezhov presented Stalin a list (April 4, 1935) of the recipients of the various dachas that Yenukidze had doled out. Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 371n4 (RGASPI, f. 671, op. 1, d. 52, l. 32: Yezhov to Stalin, April 4, 1935). The politburo ordered the purchase—rather than the confiscation—of some valuable literary archives by people being deported from Leningrad in the wake of the Kirov murder. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 255 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 962, l. 48: April 23, 1935), 763n92 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 174, l. 78–9).

268. The document was worked out by Stalin, Molotov, Kaganovich, and Yezhov, but not Voroshilov or Orjonikidze, and would be dated April 3, 1935. Stalin was in his office with those three only on March 15, 1935. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 658–60 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 234, l. 47–53); Na prieme, 156–7.

269. “‘Zamenit’ Vas nekem’: pis’ma M. Gor’kogo I. V. Stalinu,” 116–7 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 284, l. 127–127ob, 124).

270. Izvestiia, March 24, 1935; DVP SSSR, XVIII: 204–13; Lensen, Damned Inheritance, 457–9; Slavinskii, Vneshniaia politika, 53. See also RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 83, l. 73–83, 104–6.

271. Davies et al., Years of Progress, 91n5 (citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 17, l. 157–8). Stalin would inspect the first ZIS-101 luxury limousine on April 29, 1936.

272. Paine, Wars for Asia, 92.

273. Crowley, Japan’s Quest for National Autonomy, 214–7; Safronov, SSSR, SShA, i iaponskaia, 145.

274. DVP SSSR, XVIII: 626 (Spil’vanek in Nanking to Moscow, Jan. 28, 1935).

275. Khlevniuk, Stalin: zhizn’, 195.

276. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 173–6 (Svanidze diary: April 29, 1935), 178 (May 9); Na prieme, 161. See also Medvedev, K sudu istorii, 628; Brandenberger and Dubrovsky, “‘The People Need a Tsar,’” 873, 884n4. When a common person, Petrushenko, was asked in a study circle that same year who Stalin was and answered, “someone like the tsar used to be,” the secret police reported the remark. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 120, d. 176, l. 45; Davies, Popular Opinion, 168–9. The metro opened with two lines: from Sokolniki to the Park of Culture through Hunters Row station; and from the latter to Smolensk Square. Medvedev, All Stalin’s Men, 124–5.

277. Tucker, Stalin in Power, 223–37. Ulam observed that “it is unlikely that Stalin would have wanted to establish the precedent of a successful assassination attempt against a high Soviet official.” Ulam, Stalin, 385. “One thing is certain,” wrote the émigré Nicolaevsky, “the only man who profited by the Kirov assassination was Stalin.” Nicolaevsky, “Kirov Assassination.”

278. Medved evidently discussed with other NKVD officials and his closest relatives his suspicion that Stalin and Yagoda were responsible for Kirov’s death. Shreider, NKVD iznutri, 26–9. In 1935, Yefim Yevdokimov evidently asked Frinovsky if he had any information about the hand of Yagoda in the murder of Kirov (insinuating Stalin’s involvement). Protocol of Frinovsky interrogation, Beria to Stalin, April 11, 1939 (APRF, f. 3, op. 24, d. 373, l. 3–44), http://www.hrono.ru/do kum/193_dok/19390413beria.php.

279. All six 1956–57 commissions formed under Khrushchev concluded that no underground Zinoviev-Trotskyite terrorist group existed; the thirteen people executed with Nikolayev would be rehabilitated in 1989.

280. Lenoe rightly assesses the evidence provided by Genrikh Lyushkov, who worked alongside Agranov and interrogated Draule, Zinoviev, Kamenev, and others, as the most important. Lysuhkov would write in 1939: “I can confirm that Kirov’s murder was the individual deed of Nikolayev. Nikolayev was a psychologically unbalanced person who suffered many anxieties and was unhappy with life. He believed that he had the abilities to accomplish anything and he imagined himself as a man of intrigue. In reality, he was a constant complainer who could not get along with people. Confronted at every turn by the horrifying inertia of the state apparatus, he nonetheless fought to maintain the right and battle corruption. Society’s indifference aroused in him hatred and an intense desire for revenge . . . And so Nikolayev’s disenchantment with the party apparatus drove him to make plans for the assassination of one of the party leaders.” Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 681–6 (Kaizo, April 1939).

281. Rimmel, “Another Kind of Fear,” 484, citing TsGAIPD, f. 25, op. 5, d. 47, 1. 2, 492, citing TsGAIPD, f. 25, op. 5, d. 46, 1. 3ob.

282. A group of workers from the Kirov plant in a letter to new Leningrad party boss Zhdanov condemned “deceivers,” “scoundrels,” and the regime’s “soap-bubble comedy,” and called the end of rationing “Molotov’s vile deception,” given how workers continued to live in squalor. Davies, Popular Opinion, 137 (citing TsGAIPD, f. 24, op. 2v, d. 1518, l. 184–8). By contrast, Tokayev, a young military engineer, noted that “the public . . . felt a cloud lifted . . . There was a new sense of freedom in domestic life; not that food became more plentiful, but it was not hard to draw the conclusion that, if the Government could take this step, ‘things could not be so bad after all.’” Tokaev, Betrayal of an Ideal, 278–9.

283. Davies, Popular Opinion, 115–6 (citing TsGAIPD St.P f. 25, op. 5, d. 35, l. 7, 90; d. 54, l. 99; f. 24, op. 5, d. 240, l. 22; TsKhDMO, f. 1, op. 23, d. 1102, l. 167); Rimmel, “Another Kind of Fear,” 484. See also Kedrov, Lapti Stalinizma, 152 (citing GAAO, otdel DSPI, f. 290, op. 2, d. 312, l. 107–10; d. 462, l. 56–60); Fainsod, Smolensk under Soviet Rule, 422; and Kuromiya, Freedom and Terror, 210 (citing DAHO, f. 326p, op. 1, spr. 304, ark. 34).

284. As we shall see, all of Orjonikidze’s relatives would suffer from the dictator’s falling out with his former intimate, while none of Kirov’s relatives suffered.

285. “Comrade Stalin, as I now recall, summoned me and Kosaryov and said: ‘Look for the murderers among the Zinovievites,’” Yezhov would state three years later. “I must say the Chekists did not believe in that and as insurance for themselves they were developing a second scenario, involving foreigners, on the off chance something would leap out.” Yezhov was discrediting Yagoda and added that in Yezhov’s presence, Stalin phoned Yagoda and said, “Look, we’ll smash your face.” L. P. Kosheleva et al., “Materialy fevral’-martovskogo plenuma TsK VKP (b) 1937 goda,” (1995, no. 2): 16–7; Sedov et al., “Spravka,” 482–3.

286. The bodyguard detail lacked even written operational instructions. Sedov et al., “Spravka,” 494.

287. Shubin, Vozhdi i zagovorshchiki, 273.

288. A wealth of documents demonstrates this, which Yezhov would stress at the Feb.–March 1937 plenum: “Materialy marto-fevral’skogo plenuma TsK VKP (b) 1937 goda” (1995, no. 2), 17.

289. See the incisive memorandum by the American diplomat George Kennan (March 1935) about how “all the resources of the Soviet state have been applied to the construction of a vast military machine . . . A generation has been reared whose patriotic arrogance and whose ignorance of the outside world rival the formidable traditions which the history of Tsardom can offer in this respect.” Kennan noted further that the Soviet willingness to sign pacts and enter the League of Nations derived from a belief that the next war would be fought by others, so that the Kremlin was interested not in collective security but in continuing to throw wrenches in efforts to achieve any sort of peaceful settlement among the Western powers. George Kennan, “The War Problem of the Soviet Union,” in George F. Kennan Papers, Box 1, Mudd Library, Princeton University, reprinted in Hochman, Failure of Collective Security, 176–83 (at 178).

CHAPTER 5. A GREAT POWER

1. The correspondent added that pure Communist types had been set on edge by French Foreign Minister Laval’s pending arrival. Sotsialisticheskii vestnik, May 25, 1935: 24.

2. About a quarter million copies of Mein Kampf, first published in 1925–26, had sold before he became chancellor, when sales really took off. In 1933, he earned more than 1 million marks in royalties, when schoolteachers averaged under 5,000 marks in annual salary. See also Lukacs, Hitler of History, 3.

3. Hitler, My Struggle (London: Hurst and Blackett, 1933); Hitler, Mon combat (Paris: Nouvelles éditions latines, 1934). Horace Rumbold, British ambassador in Berlin, had written a 5,000 word report (April 23, 1933) about Mein Kampf (“blood and thunder book”) and Hitler’s vow to restore German power “by force of arms.” The memo was read by the cabinet and prime minister, and internally called “our Bible” on Germany. DBFP, 2nd series, V: 47–55 (Rumbold to Simon, April 26, 1933); Medlicott, Britain and Germany, 6n1; Steiner, Triumph of the Dark, 22–3; Durocelle, La décadence, 61. But see also Vansittart, Mist Procession, 305, 500; Glibert, Roots of Appeasement, 132.

4. Gitler, Moia bor’ba (Shanghai: Gong, 1935).

5. Hitler, Mein Kampf, 553. Radek would pointedly tell a German official in Moscow that there had been no changes to chapter 14 (treating of expansion to the east) in the recent reissue of Hitler’s book—evidently the argument being used against Radek by foreign affairs commissariat personnel. DGFP, series C, II: 296–8 (unsigned memorandum, likely Twardowski, Jan. 1, 1934).

6. Pipes, Russian Revolution, 586; Ludendorff, Kriegsführung und Politik, 51.

7. Krasnaia zvezda, 1935, no. 57; see also no. 10, no. 31, no. 40, and no. 59.

8. Harris, “Encircled by Enemies,” 513–4 (citing RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 188, l. 31–51).

9. Wandycz, “Polish Foreign Policy: an Overview,” 65–73.

10. Na prieme, 152 (Feb. 28, 1935), 154–5 (March 8).

11. Ken, Mobilizatsionnoe planirovanie, 280 (citing AVP RF, f. 82, op. 18, pap. 80, d. 3, l. 35: Stern to Bessonov, March 17, 1935).

12. In Feb. 1935, Tukhachevsky and Jeronimas Uborevičius, commander of the Belorussian military district, had separately submitted secret memoranda arguing for war plan revisions. For Tukhachevsky, defeat of Poland remained a primary objective, but he foresaw Germany as “the chief agent of anti-Soviet intervention.” Uborevičius also named Germany and Poland as the main enemies, and deemed this new coalition more formidable because it could quickly get assistance from Finland and the Baltic states, and perhaps Britain, while still, as before, drawing in Japan in a two-front war. He argued that a quick defeat of Poland would prevent Germany from being able to mobilize fully. Aptekar’ and Uspenskii, Marshal M.N. Tukhachevskii, 2–11; Samuelson, Soviet Defence Industry Planning, 193–4; Samuelson, “Wartime Perspectives,” 187–214, at 207 (citing RGVA, f. 33987, op. 3, d. 400, l. 226–36: Tukhachevsky, Feb. 5, 1935; and d. 279, l. 124–49: Uborevičius, Feb. 19, 1935); Roberts, “Planning for War,” 1304–5; Dullin, Men of Influence, 97–8; Bruce Menning, personal communication.

13. Adibekov et al., Politbiuro TsK RKP (b)—VKP (b) i Evropa, 300 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 15, l. 5–6).

14. Hochman, Failure of Collective Security, 50–1.

15. Seraphim, Das politische Tagebuch Rosenbergs, 74–5.

16. Kershaw, Hitler, 1889–1936, 549–53; Shirer, Berlin Diary, 34; Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 204; Pravda, March 17 and 18, 1935.

17. New York Times, March 17 and 18, 1935; Washington Post, March 18, 1935.

18. Bullock, Hitler, 333; Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 203–6.

19. He added: “The only unusual thing about him was the length at which he spoke.” Schmidt, Hitler’s Interpreter, 17–26. This was Schmidt’s first encounter with Hitler.

20. DBFP, 2nd series, XII: 703–46; DGFP, series C, III: 1043–80 (Schmidt). A few days later, Hitler told Luftwaffe officers: “I don’t know how many aeroplanes Göring really has got, but that seemed about what there ought to be.” Kershaw, Making Friends with Hitler, 99–102 (citing PRO FO 800/290, fol. 200: April 2, 1935). See also Simon, Retrospect, 200–3; Strang, At Home and Abroad, 66–7; and Dodd and Dodd, Ambassador Dodd’s Diary, 228 (April 4, 1935).

21. Andrew and Elkner, “Stalin and Foreign Intelligence,” 76–7; West and Tsarev, Crown Jewels, 81–2.

22. Primakov, Ocherki, III: 461–7.

23. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 651–3 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 188, l. 74–8: Slutsky); Khaustov, “Deiatel’nost’ organov,” 234 (APRF, f. 45, op. 1, d. 188, l. 74–6).

24. DBFP, 2nd series, XII: 793–5 (Sargent: April 1, 1935), 795 (Simon to G. Clerk in Paris, April 1). “Laval,” one shrewd observer noted, “was very intelligent but he was also more cunning than competent. He wasn’t a man of clear-cut decisions but rather ‘everybody’s friend.’” Duroselle, France and the Nazi Threat, 87. In general, the French got caught up in “pactomania,” then sought loopholes in them.

25. A joint intelligence committee would be established in July 1936, but only at deputy director level; it would remain peripheral until summer 1939. In the 1930s, major militaries switched from medium to high frequencies for wireless, which, paradoxically, allowed more signals to be intercepted, but these still had to be decrypted. (Britain, after the end of the Great War, had not even tried to intercept German traffic again until 1934.) By 1935, Britain’s specialists had broken Japan’s main army and naval ciphers and some of Italy’s, but German, as well as Soviet, ciphers remained inaccessible. Hinsley et al., British Intelligence, I: 36–43, 52–3, 57, 61, 199–200; Wark, Ultimate Enemy, 158–60; West, MI6, 45, 48–9; Strong, Intelligence at the Top, 24.

26. Benjamin Disraeli, at the time Britain’s Tory party opposition leader, had admonished his fellow conservatives in 1872 that the choice was “whether you will be content to be a comfortable England, modelled and molded upon continental principles and meeting in due course an inevitable fate, or whether you will be a great country—an imperial country—a country where your sons, when they rise, rise to paramount positions, and obtain not merely the esteem of their countrymen, but command the respect of the world.” Kebbel, Selected Speeches, 529–34 (at 534).

27. Holman, “Air Panic of 1935”; Levy, Appeasement and Rearmament; Neville, “Prophet Scorned?” British intelligence knew the claim of air parity to be false. Wark, Ultimate Enemy, 44 (citing CP 100[35], May 13, 1935, Cab 24/255; and AA Berlin to Director, AI, April 3, 1935, Air 2/1356); Vansittart, Mist Procession, 499; Winterbotham, Nazi Connection, 127–33.

28. DVP SSSR, XVIII: 228–39 (at 232–3, 235–6); DBFP, 2nd series, XII: 771–84 (Chilston to Simon, April 1).

29. Eden rose to answer that his mission aimed for an exchange of views in the quest for peace and toasted Litvinov’s health. The festivities ended at 1:30 a.m. Pravda, March 29, 1935; DVP SSSR, XVIII: 226–8; Eden, Facing the Dictators, 144–63.

30. Eden, Facing the Dictators, 164.

31. When Eden and Chilston broached the issue of expanding bilateral trade, Litvinov, according to the British notetaker, replied positively (“why not?”), but, according to the Soviet notetaker, stated that no negotiations were possible because of the British position on tsarist debts. DVP SSSR, XVIII: 240–5 (at 242–3); DBFP, 2nd series, XII: 784–91.

32. Eden found the exchange enigmatic. Eden, Facing the Dictators, 156.

33. DVP SSSR, XVIII: 246–251; Naumov, 1941 god, II: 521; Maiskii, Dnevnik diplomata, I: 98–101.

34. On the evening of March 29, Eden was taken to Swan Lake at the Bolshoi, where the orchestra played “God Save the King,” the British anthem. He was also afforded a ride on the new Moscow metro and a visit to the aircraft factory at Fili, just outside Moscow, which produced the TB-3 heavy bomber. Eden, Facing the Dictators, 155–60. The British omitted their full record of the Eden-Stalin conversation from the published document collection. See also DBFP, 2nd series, XII: 803–10 (Eden and Beck in Warsaw, April 2–3, 1935), 812–7 (Eden and Beneš in Czechoslovakia, April 4). By early 1936, after Eden would become foreign secretary, he would no longer doubt German aggressiveness, according to Maisky. DVP SSSR, XIX: 77 (conversation Feb. 11, 1936).

35. The idea had grown out of the secret cooperation with Germany, but “deep operations” offered a more comprehensive vision. Triandafillov, Kharakter operatsii sovremennykh armii; Isserson, Evolution of Operational Art, 43–76; Savushkin, Razvitie sovetskikh vooruzhennykh sil, 59–62; Iakov, V. K. Triandafillov; Harrison, Russian Way of War, 194–217; Habeck, Storm of Steel, 206–28.

36. Of three main Red Army groups, a Northwestern (Leningrad military district), Western (Belorussian military district), and Southwestern (Kiev military district), the first was primarily to deter aggression from enemy use of Finland and the Baltic states, while the second and third would launch operations on enemy territory (north and south of the swampy Pripet Marshes) by means of mobile ground and air forces prepositioned and concealed in fortified frontier regions. Menning, “Soviet Strategy,” I: 218–9; Gorkov, “Gotovil li,” 30–1.

37. Reprinted (abridged) in Tukhachevskii, Izbrannye proizvedeniia, II: 233–9.

38. “Nakanune voiny (Dokumenty 1935–1940 gg.),” 168–9 (RGVA, f. 33987, op. 3, d. 400, l. 238ff.). Tukhachevsky’s argument resembled what Svechin had suggested back in 1926–27. Svechin, Strategiia, 184. Tukhachevsky had savaged Svechin as “a conduit for the influence of bourgeois ideology” in the introduction to the Russian edition of Hans Delbrück’s History of the Military Art, “Predislovie k knige G. Del’briuka,” in Tukhachevskii, Izbrannye proizvedeniia, II: 144. See also Kokoshin, “A. A. Svechin,” 134. Soviet war planning envisioned only enemies, no allies: Budushchaia voina, 35–6; Plekhanov, VChK-OGPU, 102; Stoecker, Forging Stalin’s Army, 148–9; Samuelson, Soviet Defence Industry Planning, 46–52.

39. DGFP, series C, IV: 1–2 (Schulenburg, April 1, 1935), 7 (state secretary, April 2); DVP SSSR, XVIII: 262 (April 4); “Nakanune voiny (Dokumenty 1935–1940 gg.),” 171–2 (Gekker for Berzin, April 4).

40. DBFP, 2nd series, XII: 766–7 (Chilston to Simon quoting Eden, sent March 30, 1935), 768–9 (March 31).

41. Eden deemed Stalin “the quietest dictator I have ever known, with the exception of [Portugal’s] Dr. Salazar.” Eden, Facing the Dictators, 153.

42. An “economic agreement” had been signed March 20, 1935, but the more critical loan terms were signed on April 9. DGFP, series C, III: 1028–31, IV: 28–38, 38–43; DVP SSSR, XVIII: 270–4. Schacht (now acting economics minister), who had sought to sabotage the credit negotiations, emerged as the lead proponent. Ericson, Feeding the German Eagle, 17–9; DGFP, series C, III: 367–9 (Aug. 29, 1934), 682–5 (Nov. 27, 1934), 930–3 (Feb. 14, 1935), 935–6 (Feb. 15), 960–1 (Feb. 25), 1002. See also Doering, Deutsche Aussenwirtschaftspolitk, 169–75; von Strandmann, “Grossindustrie und Rapallopolitik,” at 337.

43. Abramov, “Osobaia missiia Davida Kandelaki,” 147 (citing AVP RF, f. 082, op. 18, pap. 81, d. 7, l. 150–1: April 12, 1935). Kandelaki returned from Berlin and Stalin received him on April 13, May 4 and 5, July 5 and 7, 1935. Kandelaki appears to have imagined that opposition to Hitler existed and could be galvanized via improved relations, a view dismissed by Litvinov and Surits. Na prieme, 160, 162, 169; Roberts, “Soviet Bid for Coexistence.”

44. Laval had been stalling Moscow over the deadlocked negotiations with Germany for a multilateral Eastern Pact, but on March 30, 1935, fearful that events would outrun him, he had handed Potyomkin a text for a bilateral pact solely between France and the Soviet Union, and possibly one also with Czechoslovakia, and with Italy, all within the framework of the League. DDF, 1e série, X: 75–83; DVP SSSR, XVIII: 253–4. The politburo instructions for Litvinov specified that the Soviet government preferred a Franco-Soviet pact that included Germany, or if not, then Poland, or if not, then France, Czechoslovakia, and the Baltic states. The French stuck to two bilateral pacts, France-USSR, Czechoslovakia-USSR. DVP SSSR, XVIII: 158–60 (Litvinov to Potyomkin: March 4, 1935), 174 (Potyomkin, April 9, 1935), 174 (April 10); Borisov, Sovetsko-fratsuzskie otnosheniia, 248–9; Herriot, Jadis, II: 530. It seems that both Edvard Beneš (Czechoslovak foreign minister) and Nicolae Titulescu (Romanian foreign minister) were at the French foreign ministry and helped draft the public announcement of France’s decision. Hochman, Failure of Collective Security, 51 (citing AMZV Prague, incoming 1935, Osuský from Paris, April 9). During three meetings in the Little Corner (April 22, 23, 28, 1935), Litvinov pressed for France’s much-reduced incarnation (no Germany, Poland, or even Baltic states); Stalin agreed. DVP SSSR, XVII: 280–6 (at 281: April 21, 1935), 292–3 (April 18, 1935), 295, 296; Adibekov et al., Politbiuro TsK RKP (b)—VKP (b) i Evropa, 322–3 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 18, l. 2), 323–4 (l. 5: April 19, 1935); DDF, 1e série, X: 322–5, 334–5; Na prieme, 160–1.

45. Pravda, May 4, 1935. Stalin was seen to leave early, but it is unclear why. Ken, Mobilizatsionnoe planirovanie, 293 (N. Charles to John Simon, May 7, 1935: PRO FP 371/19450/N2376).

46. Voroshilov had initiated these celebratory “breakfasts” (as well as a separate annual May graduation ceremony for the military academies). At the May 2, 1933, reception, during the famine, 1,800 pounds of meat, poultry, fish, and sausage were served. Nevezhin, Zastol’ia, 66; Osokina, Ierarkhia potrebleniia, 79n21; Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 41–5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1117, l. 9–10); Borev, Staliniada, 90.

47. The immense interior encompassed more than seven hundred rooms. Deviatov and Zhuravleva, Dvortsy Kremlia; V. Bogomolova et al., Moskovskii kreml’; Chuev, Molotov, 96; Kabanov, Stal’nye peregony, 53. Two ancient monasteries (the Chudov and Voznesensky) were demolished. So was Moscow’s onion-domed Savior in the Wood, originally consecrated in the thirteenth century, to make way for a five-story service facility, while the magnificent Red Porch leading to the Palace of Facets was destroyed for a two-story canteen. Vinogradov, Genrikh Iagoda, 435–6 (TsA FSB, f. 3, op. 3, d. 883, l. 1–2, June 2, 1936).

48. “Stalin slowly gets up from his chair” amid deafening applause, noted a record of the 1933 banquet. “The hall quiets. ‘I am not inclined to speak, but I am being obliged. The first toast is for Lenin, the second for technology.’” Warming to the room, Stalin continued: “Lenin did not die, he lives together with the party he created, together with the Soviet power he created. Who are we, Soviet power and the party of Bolsheviks? We are considered great people. No, we are little people in comparison with Lenin. Lenin organized the party and the proletarian revolution on one-sixth of the earth, which astounded the whole world . . . To the dictatorship of the proletariat, to the great teacher Lenin!” Stalin then toasted “the Russian nation—the most talented nation in the world,” and raised a glass to “our military technology! To our air industry personnel! To our aviators! To our tank drivers! . . . To the leaders and vozhds of the Red Army! To the best student of Lenin, Klim Voroshilov! Hurrah!’ (stormy applause).” Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 43–5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1117, l. 9–10). See also Pravda, May 2 and May 4, 1934; Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 46–55 (RGASPI, f. 74, op. 1, d. 164, l. 165–8, 162–4; d. 160, l. 23–5). The Soviet brand of champagne had been developed on the basis of tsarist foundations in Crimea and blossomed after 1934, when a former aristocrat and chemist, Anton Mikhailovich Frolov-Bagreev, perfected a process of fermenting sparkling wine in large reservoirs, rather than in bottles, facilitating mass production.

49. Izvestiia, May 2, 1935. See also Nevezhin, “Bol’shie Kremlevskie priemy Stalina” (no. 3), 56–70, (no. 4), 123–39. Stalin would approve replacement of the tsarist double-headed eagles atop the Kremlin’s main gates—the Savior (Spassky), Nikolsky, Trinity, and Pinewood (Borovitsky)—with metal red stars in 1935 (two years later, the metal would give way to glass).

50. Nevezhin, Zastol’ia, 280.

51. Shmidt, “Priemy v Kremle,” at 274; Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 192.

52. Izvestiia, May 4, 1935. The account in Pravda (May 4, 1935) by Mekhlis was less exuberant. In Feb. 1935, Bukharin had written to Stalin begging for approval, “in order that I could say, ‘all the same. comrade Stalin thinks that the newspaper is not such a bad one.’” Adibekov and Anderson, “‘U menia odna nadezhda na tebia,’” 50. Security at the banquets would tighten considerably. Moiseev, Ia vospominaiu, 47.

53. Krenkel’, RAEM, 492–3. One scholar has asserted (without presenting the evidence) that Soviet military academies began teaching ballroom dancing and manners in the 1930s. Tumkina-Perfil’eva, Russkii etiket, 148.

54. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 4, d. 657, l. 236.

55. Back on May 2, 1932, at the close of the evening’s concert, Stalin had remarked that the artists “were dressed not the way artists of a great country should be” (part apology for Soviet material life, part directive). Barsova, “Nash veilikii drug,” 59.

56. Pravda, May 4, 1935; Le Temps, May 5, 1935.

57. Beloff, Foreign Policy of Soviet Russia, I: 152–4; Scott, Alliance against Hitler, 247. “One must remember that there was never an alliance between the tsarist government and France,” Maisky wrote to Litvinov on May 3, 1935, of the 1892 military convention that was activated by the Great War, “only an exchange of notes and an agreement between the two high commands.” Dullin, Men of Influence, 112, citing AVP RF, f. 10, op. 10, pap. 48, d. 7.

58. Hilger, a German embassy counsellor, reported goodwill toward Germany in Ukraine in late spring 1935. “Germany was only trying to liberate itself from the oppressive fetters of the Versailles Treaty,” the chairman of the provincial soviet told him at a consul reception in Kiev. “But instead of aiding her to do so, the Soviet government was making a pact with Germany’s oppressors.” The Ukrainians blamed Litvinov. Hilger and Meyer, Incompatible Allies, 269.

59. Pravda and Izvestiia, May 16, 1935; Humanité, May 17, 1935.

60. Some Polish officials understood better than others. In Nov. 1934, the Polish envoy to Germany, Lipski, had told his American counterpart that “Germany intends to re-annex part of our country, the maps posted all over Germany show this clearly.” Lipski predicted Hitler would also annex Alsace-Lorraine, Austria, and Czechoslovakia, too. Dodd and Dodd, Ambassador Dodd’s Diary, 192 (Nov. 17, 1934).

61. Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 71–5 (RGASPI, f. 74, op. 1, d. 160, l. 42–9). A German periodical would observe in late 1935, in a comment reprinted in the Red Army newspaper, that “alongside his great organizational talent, the people’s commissar Voroshilov possesses a surpassing gift for speaking, thanks to which he takes listeners prisoners of war.” Krasnaia zvezda, Jan. 5, 1936.

62. Stalin was said to have directed the bygones quote at Bukharin and to have proposed a toast to him, which elicited applause, but if so, this was not recorded in the raw transcript. Larina, Nezabyvaemoe, 33.

63. Back on Dec. 27, 1934, at a Kremlin reception for the metal industry, Stalin, speaking about the first Five-Year Plan slogan, “Technology Decides Everything,” had stated that the people operating the technology were more important, and “must be carefully and attentively cultivated the way a gardener tends a beloved fruit tree.” “Metallurgi u tovarishcha Stalina, Molotova, i Ordzhonikidze,” Pravda, Dec. 29, 1934: 1, reprinted in Sochineniia, XIV: 49–50.

64. Stalin loved gardening metaphors. Jochen Hellbeck, “Laboratories of the Soviet Self: Diaries of the Stalin Era,” PhD dissertation, Columbia University, 1998, 64–6. One scholar noted a shift in novels in the 1930s from machine to gardening metaphors. Clark, Soviet Novel, 99, 105.

65. Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 76–84 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1077, l. 43–9).

66. See also Arsenidze, “Iz vospominaniia o Staline,” 235. One scholar has argued that “consumption . . . was one of the most frequent items on the politburo’s agenda” and, in Stalin’s words, one of “the most contested issues.” Gregory, Political Economy of Stalinism, 94.

67. The original had been: “Now we have reached the stage of development when cadres decide everything, not mares and machines.” Pravda, May 6, 1935. See also Rees, Political Thought from Machiavelli to Stalin, 227. The newspaper account contained an insertion after Stalin’s mention that he had had a hand in smashing some people along the way: “stormy applause.” Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 69, 84–91 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1077, l. 31–42); Pravda, May 6, 1935, reprinted in Sochineniia, XIV: 56–64 (at 61–4). See also Oleinikov, “Chetvertoe maia.” In his speech on May 4, 1934, for Soviet military academy graduates, Stalin had also struck a note of populism. “I do not deny that leaders [vozhdi] have significance, they organize and lead the masses,” he allowed. “But leaders without the mass are nothing. Such people as Hannibal, Napoleon, perished as soon as they lost the masses.” Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 55 (RGASPI, f. 74, op. 1, d. 160, l. 23–5).

68. Svanidze noted of Stalin’s May 4, 1935, speech: “Iosif said that he had forgotten to add ‘our leaders came to power as landless peasants and have remained that way to the end, that they are driven by ideas, not acquisitiveness,’ as we can observe in capitalist countries. Over there, being in power means getting rich. I don’t remember exactly, but something to that effect.” A mixed message: soulless functionaries yet selfless leader(s). Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 177–8 (Svanidze diary: May 9, 1935).

69. DDF, 1e série, X: 575–7, 630–1. The Soviets did not publish the record of the conversation, only a speech by Litvinov at the May 13 banquet for Laval: DVP SSSR, XVIII: 328–30. See also DVP SSSR, XVIII: 337 (TASS); Pravda, May 14, 1935.

70. Harrison and Davies, “Soviet Military-Economic Effort,” 391 (citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 18, l. 123: Aug. 28, 1935).

71. “‘Osnovnaia tsel’ ego priezda’,” 139. On May 14, 1935, a grand ceremony was held in the Columned Hall of the House of Trade Unions for the Moscow metro. Lazar Brontman and another Pravda colleague were assigned to the event. Kaganovich opened the proceedings for his beloved project (“his most memorable, temperamental speech,” Brontman decided). But Stalin walked in during the speech, with Voroshilov and others in tow, provoking an ovation. The dictator took the podium, to delirium. In the din, Brontman and a colleague had a difficult time transcribing the speech (the journalists stopped to applaud as well). They rushed to Pravda’s offices, typed it up and had the text run over to Poskryobyshev for approval—Brontman crowed in his diary that only Pravda had the speech the next day. Pravda, May 15. This was Brontman’s second encounter with Stalin: “The first time it happened during the 5th Congress of Soviets at the Bolshoi . . . Stalin looked at my astonished face, laughed and continued to his box.” Brontman, Dnevniki (Aug. 10, 1936): http://mathscinet.ru/files/Dnevniki_1932_1947.pdf.

72. “I listened without comment,” Schulenburg reported. DGFP, series C, IV: 138 (May 8, 1935). On the immediate public distancing from the pact in France, see Borisov, Sovetsko-frantsuzskie otnosheniia, 230–95; and Haslam, Struggle for Collective Security, 83–5.

73. Laval, according to Litvinov, was shocked at Stalin’s bluntness. Maiskii, Dnevnik diplomata, I: 110–1 (June 19, 1935); Gorodetsky, Maisky Diaries, 51–2. On June 7, 1935, Laval took the reins of the French government for the second time.

74. Scott, Alliance against Hitler, 253–4. Trotsky, then living in Grenoble, noted: “Even though I am sufficiently familiar with the political cynicism of Stalin, his contempt for principles . . . , I still could not believe my eyes when I read those lines.” Trotsky’s Diary in Exile, 1935, 120 (May 17, 1935).

75. M. Mourin, Les Relations Franco-Sovietiques (1917—1967) (Paris, 1967), 208; Scott, Alliance against Hitler, 254–5, 266; Les evénéments survenues en France de 1933 à 1945, I: 142–3 (Laval to Flandin, May 16, 1935).

76. “The obligations of mutual assistance will take effect only under the condition, as stipulated in this agreement, of assistance being extended on the part of France to the side that is the victim of aggression.” DVP SSSR, XVIII: 336–7; DDF, 1e série, X: 575–7, 630–1; Adibekov et al., Politbiuro TsK RKP (b)—VKP (b) i Evropa, 326–7 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 18, l. 49: June 1, 1935). The Soviets would undertake no efforts to establish a transit right for the Red Army through Poland or Romania to defend Czechoslovakia in the event of a German attack. Both bilateral pacts, as per French insistence, were limited to Europe. Still, Czechoslovakia pledged not to supply Japan with arms. Hochman, Failure of Collective Security, 53, citing Zahraniční politika (Prague, 1935), 324–6. For a time, the Soviets took credit for the clause that provided for taking action only if France did so. Potemkin, Istoriia diplomatii, III: 387–9.

77. Potocki, Master of Lancut, 207; Szemberg, Journal, 85.

78. Roos, Polen und Europa, 218–9; Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 209. Göring was in Poland May 17–24, 1935: DGFP, series C, IV: 184–5 (May 21), 223–5 (May 28).

79. Domarus, Hitler: Reden, I: 505–14; Kershaw, “Hitler Myth,” 125–6.

80. Stalin had Berzin, after eleven years heading military intelligence, reassigned to the Soviet Far Eastern Army. Moisei Uritsky, the nephew of the celebrated Chekist who had been assassinated in 1918, brought over his own deputy, Alexander Nikonov, who was appointed alongside Artuzov. Primakov, Ocherki, III: 11; Kolpakidi and Prokhorov, Imperiia GRU, I: 121–2, 196, 219–20; Gorbunov, “Voennaia razvedka v 1934–1939 godakh” (no. 2); Lota, “Alta” protiv “Barabrossy,” 51; Na prieme, 161–2. The Danes shared their findings with other European intelligence services, which produced still more revelations on Soviet agents. See G. Solonitsyn, “Nachal’nik sovetskoi razvedki.”

81. Yagoda had reported to Stalin (May 2, 1935) that the NKVD had completed interrogations of the librarian Nina Rozenfeld, establishing that the Mukhanova “terrorist group” in the library, to which Rozenfeld was said to belong, had “links” to the Kremlin commandant office and a group of Trotskyite youth and White Guards. “Lev Kamenev,” Yagoda wrote of Nina’s brother, “is not only the inspiration, but the organizer of the terror.” Vinogradov, Genrikh Iagoda, 427–8 (TsA FSB, f. 3, op. 2, d. 9, l. 241–42). See also Khaustov, “Deiatel’nost’ organov,” 380 (TsA FSB, f. 3, op. 2, d. 900, l. 137). As of summer 1935, the Kremlin housed just 374 inhabitants (102 households), not including bodyguards, soldiers, and service personnel.

82. Yagoda had proposed nine death sentences (for “Trotskyites”), eighteen sentences of ten years in camps for key figures, and for the rest, three to five years in camps or exile; three were to be released. Stalin wrote in ten years instead of five for Irina Gogua, and freed three more of the hundred and twelve. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 663–9 (APRF. F, 3, op. 58, d. 237, l. 37–49), 681 (d. 238, l. 1: July 17).

83. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 963, l. 37.

84. The circular threatened local party bosses with expulsions for failures to restore order, giving a deadline of two to three months. Adibekov et al., Politbiuro TsK RKP (b)—VKP (b): povestki dnia zasedanii, II: 645; Khlevniuk et al., Stalinskoe politbiuro, 240; Pavlov, Kommunistichskaia partiia, 51. In Oct. 1934—before Kirov was murdered by a holder of a party card—the regime had decided on a universal re-registration of party members in 1935. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 963, l. 3.

85. Getty, Origins of the Great Purges, 60–1 (citing Partiinoe stroitel’stvo, 1935, no. 4: 32–6); Pravda, May 16, 1935. Another 340,000 Communists had been expelled in the 1934 purge, which mostly targeted those who had recently joined. Total membership as of January 1, 1935, was 2.35 million. Fainsod, How Russia Is Ruled, 212, 224; Bol’shevik, 1934, no. 15: 9.

86. “We have a lot of Americans,” Yezhov stated during a meeting connected to the party document verification. “Traditionally our people take the view that these are wonderful people. Relations with Germany have worsened, so you need to keep an eye on them, Poles as well, and you need to watch the English . . . Keep in mind, that Americans, as a rule, are almost all spies.” Pavliukov, Ezhov, 159–60 (RGASPI, f. 671, op. 1, d. 32, l. 20–1: July 1, 1935).

87. Khaustov and Samuelson, Stalin, NKVD, 86 (RGASPI, f. 671, op. 1, d. 273, l. 700).

88. Iakovlev et al., Reabilitatsiia: politicheskie protsessy, 175.

89. Biulleten’ oppozitsiia, no. 1–2 (July 1929): 2; Trotsky, Writings of Leon Trotsky, 1929, 61–2. When Radek asked Stalin (June 4, 1935) whether he should be republishing Trotsky’s writings in the regime’s internal Bulletin of the Foreign Press for high officials, the dictator told him “to liquidate” the publication. Khaustov and Samuelson, Stalin, NKVD, 86 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 420, l. 4ob.). By contrast, when Tal (head of the Central Committee press and publications department) queried the politburo about which émigré subscriptions he should take for the next year, Stalin commanded: “Order the lot!” Volkogonov, Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy, 228 (citing RGVA, f. 33987, op. 3, d, 273, l. 36: Dec. 1935).

90. Getty and Naumov, Road to Terror, 161–6 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 2, d. 542, l. 55–86), 177–71 (l. 125–41), 172–3 (l. 175–8).

91. The usual chorus had followed the dictator’s lead and remained reticent. Getty and Naumov, Road to Terror, 161–7 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 2, d. 542, l. 55–86).

92. Getty and Naumov, Road to Terror, 176 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 2, d. 547, l. 69), 177 (d. 544, l. 22, l. 70); Pravda, June 8, 1935. The regime abolished the Society of Old Bolsheviks (which had its own publishing house) on May 25, 1935, and the Society of Political Prisoners on June 25.

93. No new charges were brought in the Kirov case, despite Yezhov’s ominous speech, which Stalin alone could have authorized. Pravda (June 16 and 19, 1935) issued follow-up fulminations, by Zhdanov and Khrushchev, over “former princes, ministers, courtiers, Trotskyites, etc. . . . a counterrevolutionary nest.”

94. DBFP, 2nd series, XIII: 364–71 (June 5, 1935), 477–84 (E. Drummond in Rome to Samuel Hoare, June 25); XIV: 329–33 (Drummond in Rome to Hoare); DGFP, series C, IV: 253–62 (June 4), 262–6 (June 4), 269–71 (June 5), 271 (June 5), 272–3 (June 5); Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 213. Germany’s Admiral Raeder had caught British attention in April 1935 when he had announced, in an obvious negotiating ploy, that Germany had begun to build twelve submarines. To London, it appeared to be a choice between a deal to get the Germans to proceed more slowly, as Hitler claimed he was inclined to do, or to build up the British fleet even more rapidly. But even beyond financial straits, the British admiralty rightly anticipated that between 1936 and 1941 their ship building capacity would be sufficient to replace the existing fleet but not to expand it. The British also reasoned, conveniently, that resistance to approving German rearmament of any kind (the French position) would only elicit a far stronger German action. And British naval intelligence concluded that Hitler needed a fleet for use against the Soviet Union in the Baltic Sea, not against Britain. Wark, Ultimate Enemy, 134–9, 141–2.

95. The battleship plans originally dated to Nov. 1934. Dülffer, Weimar, Hitler und die Marine, 570. In May 1936, Germany laid the keels for five instead of the agreed two A-cruisers. Hildebrand, Foreign Policy, 43. The Bismarck would be laid down in July 1936 (and finished in Sept. 1940), while the Tirpitz would be laid down in Oct. 1936 (and finished in Feb. 1941). The Germans reported the Bismarck to Britain as 35,000 tons displacement; in reality, the design was for 41,000. See also R. Ingrim, Hitlers Glücklichster Tag: London, den 18 Juni (Stuttgart: Seewald, 1962).

96. Aubrey Kennedy, the journalist, replied that Baldwin was more the kind of man to hear political proposals than expositions of ideas. Martel, Times and Appeasement, 180. Kennedy had written a book calling early for Versailles treaty revision. Kennedy, Old Diplomacy and New.

97. Most of the rest of the seats had to be purchased. Many of the attendees were political émigrés, such as Bertolt Brecht, Heinrich and Klaus Mann, Anna Seghers, and Robert Musil. Stalin evidently wanted to prevent an anti-German eruption, for though Shcherbakov had been dispatched to keep a watchful party eye on the proceedings, the dictator sent him a telegram to “harmonize all reports and speeches with our envoy Potyomkin.” Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 386n7 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 52, l. 114: June 20, 1935). Shcherbakov wrote privately in his diary, “there is not one tractor or motorcar on the roads of Poland . . . And Vienna loses its past greatness, and withers, and is dying.” Golubev et al., Rossiia i zapad, 145 (citing RGASPI, f. 88, op. 1, d. 467, l. 1, 3–4); Golubev, “Esli mir obrushitsia na nashu Respubliku,” 13 (citing RGASPI, f. 88, op. 1, d. 467, l. 1).

98. Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 384–6, n1 (RGASPI, f. 329, op. 2, d. 4, l. 160–161ob.), n2 (f. 17, op. 163, d. 1059, l. 186), n3 (d. 1063, l. 131; f. 558, op. 11, d. 52, l. 108), n5, n7; Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 256–7 (RGASPI, f. 88, op. 1, d. 472, l. 1–2: Shcherbakov to Stalin, May 27), 264–5 (f. 17, op. 3, d. 965, l. 42: June 19). A giant Gorky likeness was set up in the hall. Ehrenburg, living in Paris with a Soviet passport, had written worriedly to Bukharin (editor of Izvestiya, which published Ehrenburg) that “there will be few stars and many Bohemian wretches of the Trotskyite-anarchist type. Our delegation is peculiar: none speak foreign languages, and out of eighteen souls just five are even a bit known in the West as writers.” Voroshilov voted against Babel’s inclusion.

99. Ehrenburg’s denunciation: Literaturnaia gazeta, June 17, 1933, published in French translation in his essay collection Dumael, Gide, Malraux, Mauriac.

100. Mezhdunarodnyi kongress pisatelei; Klein, Paris 1935; Teroni and Klein, Pour le défense de la culture. A joint report to Stalin by Shcherbakov and Koltsov deemed this “the biggest event in the sphere of the consolidation of antifascist forces,” but added that “not a little difficulty in our work was caused by the ambiguous behavior of Ehrenburg,” whom they accused of wanting to “appear neutral,” rather than influencing the French or defending Soviet interests. Ehrenburg in a report that reached Stalin called Koltsov a journalist rather than a writer. Stalin, for his part, advised Kaganovich not to allow Soviet Communists to “finish off” Ehrenburg. Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 382–6 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 710, l. 25–9: July 20, 1935), 387–9 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 710, l. 30–4: July 21).

101. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 255 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 964, l. 14: May 19, 1935). The timing with the congress in Paris might have been a coincidence; Rolland had delayed the trip for reasons of health.

102. Remark dating to 1928, as cited in Drabovitch, Les Intellectuels français et le bolchévisme, 151–2. An internal Soviet evaluation (1934) of Rolland cited his “individualistic humanism” and pacifism as detriments. David-Fox, Showcasing the Great Experiment, 243 (citing RGALI, f. 631, op. 14, d. 716).

103. Yagoda had commissioned a twenty-volume Russian translation of Rolland’s collected works and assigned oversight of the task to the Russian-French Maria Kudryashova; Rolland had married her, and she accompanied him as interpreter. “Stalin did not look anything like his portraits,” Rolland wrote in his diary. “He is neither large nor stocky, as he is imagined . . . His characteristic coarse dark hair is beginning to turn gray and lighten . . . But as before he has a direct and vigorous visage and enigmatic smile, which is (or can be) cordial, impenetrable, indifferent, good-natured, implacable, amused and mocking. In all situations, a perfect self-control. He speaks without raising his voice, with a timber a bit nasal and guttural at times (a Georgian accent, I’m told), with long pauses, to think things through. He listens still better than he talks, noting the principal points of what I said, scribbling with blue and red pencil on a piece of paper while I spoke. (I greatly regret not having asked him for that sheet.)” Rolland, Voyage à Moscou, 126–34; “Moskovskii dnevnik Romena Rollanda,” 217.

104. Stalin did not let on that he had personally edited the draft of the law. “Moskovskii dnevnik Romena Rollanda,” 221–2. That night, after returning to the Savoy hotel with his wife, Rolland was approached by Antonio Gramsci’s two sons, aged nine and eleven, who thanked him for all he had done for their father (imprisoned in Mussolini’s Italy). On the law, see Izvestiia, April 8, 1935; RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 962, l. 32, 57; Khlevniuk, Politbiuro, 145–6 (citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 163, d. 1059, l. 23–4, 27); Khlevniuk et al., Stalinskoe politbiuro, 144–5 RGASPI, f. 78, op. 1, d. 550, l. 7, 7a: (Voroshilov, March 18, 1935). See also Suvenirov, Tragediia RKKA, 325.

105. Besides a certain hero-worship, Rolland’s purpose had included inquiring about the fate of the writer Viktor Kibalchich, known as Viktor Serge, who had been born in Brussels to Russian Jewish political émigrés from tsarism, emigrated after the revolution to the Soviet Union, and had been arrested in Leningrad (March 9, 1933) and internally exiled for “Trotskyite” propaganda. (Rolland would leave without being satisfied.) Serge’s case had been forced into the discussion at the international gathering in Paris. Vinogradov, Genrikh Iagoda, 428–31 (TsA FSB, f. N-13614, tom 2); Mikhailov, M. Gor’kii i R Rollan, 313–5; Bialik, Gor’kii i ego epokha, III: 190–2 (Gorky to Yagoda, July 29, 1935), 191–2 (Gorky to Yagoda, March 7, 1936), 206; Comédie, August 30, 1933; Flores, L’immaginare dell’URSS, 235–42; Stern, Western Intellectuals, 27–8; Serge, Memoirs of a Revolutionary, 317–8.

106. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 775, l. 1–16 (unedited). Both Stalin and Rolland edited the text. Rolland, Voyage à Moscou, 237–47. Rolland recorded the session in his diary immediately, and noted that it lasted from 4:10 to 5:50 p.m. Pravda (June 29, 1935) also reported a duration of one hour and forty minutes, while the logbook for Stalin’s office has two hours. “Moskovskii dnevnik Romena Rollanda,” 215–6; Na prieme, 168. Alexander Arosyev, the head of all-Union society for cultural ties with foreigners, who was present (and made the transcript), reported to Stalin that Rolland “repeated several times to me that he had not expected anything like that and that he had never in his life imagined Stalin that way.” Stalin wrote: “into my archive.” Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 377–8 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 795, l. 60–1). Rolland would also pepper Gorky with queries about Soviet repression.

107. “Moskovskii dnevnik Romena Rollanda,” 226–8 (July 9, 1935). Rolland read out a greeting on Soviet radio that July. “It’s a wonderful thing, to laugh . . . Genuine joy is . . . in us, comrades, in a well dispositioned spirit, in a proud consciousness, in any beloved labor, joy is in the work in the cornfield of all humanity.” Goriaeva, “Veilkaia kniga dnia,” 300–1 (GARF, f. 6953, op. 15, d. 53).

108. Rolland, Voyage à Moscou, 149–54 (July 4, 1935); “Moskovskii dnevnik Romena Rollanda,” 238–40. Stalin’s pipe, by now, had become a significant part of his iconography. Pravda (April 17, 1935), for ex., had run a caricature by Viktor Deni called “peace pipes” contrasting Stalin’s with that of a fat bulldog-faced bourgeois.

109. Hitler received Beck again in the afternoon, with Göring, Neurath, and Ribbentrop, but skipped Beck’s third and final conversation on July 4, when the Polish foreign minister summoned the courage to mention Germany’s freight arrears and the currency exchange problems Germany caused in Danzig. DGFP, series C, IV: 398–407 (July 3), 410 (July 4); Wojciechowski, Stosunki polsko-niemieckie, 205; Beck, Przemówienia, 164–5; Beck, Final Report, 92–9. A British Foreign Office summary mentioned deep Soviet fears of becoming simultaneously the object of Western and Japanese ambitions, as well as smaller countries’ opportunism. Lensen, Damned Inheritance, 465 (FO 371/19460–881, Colonel Ismay to Collier, July 8, 1935). The NKVD’s Prokofyev wrote to Stalin (July 11, 1935) about the arrest of a saboteur parachuted in by Japan; two of three were killed, one fled but was captured, and the politburo resolved to stage a public trial in Irkutsk. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 679–81 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 247, l. 105–7), 681 (l. 104), 683 (l. 157).

110. It is not clear the German foreign ministry even knew of Schacht’s proposal. Kandelaki wanted the offer in writing. Litvinov warned against it as a German “maneuver.” Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 221; DVP SSSR, XVIII: 646–7 (Litvinov to Potyomkin, June 26, 1935), 647 (Litvinov to Surits, June 27); Haslam, Struggle for Collective Security, 85–6, 127; Na prieme, 169.

111. On the unexpected twists and turns concerning finance and cash in a “planned” economy, see Arnold, Banks, Credit and Money; Nakamura, “Did the Soviet Command Economy Command Money?”; and Gregory, Political Economy, 213–42.

112. Stalin had played a key role in the moderation of investment targets in 1932–4, which proved important for stabilization. Davies et al., “The Politburo and Economic Decision Making,” 113–4. The state planning commission did have a few line-management functions, but mostly it served in an advisory capacity, and tried to counter the systemic prevarication of commissariats and factories. Gregory and Harrison, “Allocation under Dictatorship.”

113. Na prieme, 170.

114. The 22 billion included 6.5–6.7 billion for Orjonikidze’s heavy industry (vs. the proposed 6, and a requested 9), and 3.5 billion for Kaganovich’s railroad commissariat (vs. the proposed 3, and a requested 4.5).

115. Khlevniuk et al., Stalinskoe politbiuro, 241–2; Adibekov et al., Politbiuro TsK RKP (b)—VKP (b): povestki dnia zasedanii, II: 673.

116. Davies et al., Years of Progress, 264 (citing GARF, f. 5446, op. 26, d. 66, l. 266, 264–6), 266 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 769, l. 159–60, 162–3); RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 969, l. 1, 31–8; Kosheleva, Pis’ma Stalina Molotovu, 249–50 (Aug. 2, 1935); Davies, “Making Economic Policy,” 64–80.

117. Narodno-khoziaistvennyi plan 1936, 269, 280. In July 1936, the investment plan introduced for 1937 would, again, be relatively moderate. Davies and Khlevnyuk, “Stakhanovism.”

118. Following much back-and-forth, the agreed amount was 112.75 billion in July, but the battles were refought and the numbers rose again to 133 billion. Khlevniuk, Politbiuro: mekhanizmy, 136–7 (RGAE, f. 4372, op. 92, d. 17, l. 366; d. 18, l. 76–8); Davies, Crisis and Progress, 292–301. Stalin wrote to Molotov (Sept. 12, 1933), “I agree that capital investment should not be fixed at more than 21 billion rubles for ’34, and that the growth of industrial output should not be more than 15 percent. That will be better.” Kosheleva, Pis’ma Stalina Molotovu, 248–9.

119. DVP SSSR, XVIII: 646–7n157 (Litvinov to Potyomkin, June 26, 1935); Abramov, “Osobaia missiia Davida Kandelaki,” 147 (citing AVP RF, f. 010, op. 10, nap. 51, d. 45, l. 136). Schacht advised Kandelaki to have the Soviet ambassador approach the foreign ministry. DGFP, series D, IV: 453–4. Kandelaki was received by Stalin on July 5 and July 7, 1935. Na prieme, 169.

120. Kommunisticheskii Internatsional pered VII Vsemirnym kongressom: materialy (Moscow: Partizdat, 1935), 116.

121. Dimitrov, “Nastuplenie fashizma,” 12–1; Dimitroff, Against Fascism and War, 14. Manuilsky spoke of the victories of socialist construction in the USSR, Thorez about how the USSR’s very existence had radicalized capitalism’s crisis and contradictions, and Togliatti about Soviet foreign policy (“Can one imagine a more remarkable achievement than a great capitalist country having to sign a mutual assistance pact with the Soviet Union, involving defense against an aggressor and a willingness to defend peace and the borders of the homeland of the dictatorship of the proletariat?”). This was the only Comintern Congress for which a complete stenographic record was not published. Carr, Twilight of the Comintern, 403–27. See also Haslam, Struggle for Collective Security, 52–9.

122. There was speculation that the photograph in Pravda of Stalin and the delegates was faked. Peschanski, Marcel Cachin, IV: 111 (July 26, 1935).

123. Clark, “Germanophone Exiles.” At a meeting with the scholars at the Institute of World Economics and World Politics, Yezhov “said that he does not trust political émigrés and those who have been abroad.” By Sept. 1935, he would come to the (inevitable) conclusion that spies were rampant among the political émigrés. Solov’ev, “Tetradi krasnogo professora 1912–1941 gg.,” IV: 178. See also Zhuravlev and Tiazhel’nikova, “Inostrannye kolonii,” 181. On Feb. 28, 1936, a politburo decree would restrict the movement and further arrivals of political émigrés. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 79, l. 98–100; Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 738–41 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 248, l. 115–8: March 9), 823n171. In 1935–6, of the 9,965 arrests for espionage, 7,100 were accused of espionage on behalf of Germany (1,322), Japan (2,275), or Poland (3,528). Khaustov and Samuelson, Stalin, NKVD, 46 (TsA FSB, f. 8 os, op. 1, d. 79). 317).

124. One person died before sentencing. “O tak nazyvaeomom ‘Kremlevskom dele’”; RGASPI, f. 17, op. 163, d. 1062, l. 167–9; Zhukov, Inoi Stalin, 133–72. Abroad, a Ukrainian-language newspaper published in the then Romania-controlled city of Cernăuți (Chernivtsi/Czernowitz) imagined with the Kremlin Affair that Soviet elites could not be bought off with a return to bourgeois private property or reinvigorated with an influx of youth. “Dictatorship in Soviet Russia is seriously reeling,” the article fantasized. “Stalin already is no longer master of the secret police . . . Stalin—whose name makes 160 million quake with fear—is already staggering.” “Propast’ radianskogo soiuzu i nezaleshna Ukraina!” Chas, July 6, 1935, courtesy of Cristina Florea.

125. Bediya did not write the text; he oversaw the working group (P. Butyrina, G. Khachapuridze, V. Mertskhulava), whose draft Merkulov edited. Sukharev, “Litsedeistvo,” 112 (citing PA IIP pri TsK KPSS, f. 8, op. 1, d. 39, l. 1; f. 8, op. 2, chast’ 1, d. 32, l. 117; f. 8, op. 1, d. 39., l. 3, 11–12). See also Beria’s remarks (Jan. 1934): VII s”ezd Kommunisticheskikh organizatsii Zakavkaz’ia, 29–30. Dawn of the East also published “responses” confirming the narrative. Bediya would be arrested on Oct. 20, 1937; Beria would have him admit Beria’s authorship in his presence. Popov and Oppokov, “Berievshchina” (1989, no. 7), 82–7; “Plenum TsK KPSS, iiul’ 1953 goda: stenograficheskii otchet,” 181.

126. Pravda, July 29 to August 5, 1935. Pravda then praised it in a separate editorial (Aug. 10, 1935). See also RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 704–5; op. 4, d. 662, l. 428.

127. Beria, K voprosu ob istorii bol’shevistskikh organizatsii na Zakavkaz’e (Moscow: Partizdat, 1935); Maslov, “‘Kratkii kurs istorii VKP (b),’” 53n15.

128. Zaria vostoka, Sept. 2, 1935. The Soviet envoy to Hungary, Alexander Bekzadyan, an ethnic Armenian, while giving a mandatory report about the Central Committee plenum to embassy party members, was said to have remarked, “They took down Yenukidze wrongly, he’s a big-time revolutionary of the Caucasus, and they swallowed him on the basis of settling personal scores.” He said in reference to Beria, “I know him.” APRF, f. 3, op. 24, d. 324, l. 84–8 (a denunciation by I. D. Ovsiannikov later sent by Yezhov to Stalin: http://www.alexanderyakovlev.org/fond/issues-doc/61210).

129. Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 94–100 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1077, l. 62–5), 100–7 (l. 67–73), 108–10; Pravda, Aug. 2, 1935.

130. Menning has noted that in Dec. 1935, “a special group of the party Control Commission would report to Stalin that an investigation had revealed that railroads along the Baltic, western, and southwestern strategic directions ‘were unprepared in a full sense for a mobilization period.’” Voroshilov pointed out that on the right bank of the Dnieper, Poland’s throughput capacity exceeded the Soviet Union’s, 195 trains against 156, and he requested massive construction, and special appropriation of 387 million rubles. Bruce W. Menning, “Soviet Railroads and War Planning,” unpublished ms., 19–20 (citing RGUA, f. 4, op. 14, d. 1452, l. 27, 30–33, 2–3).

131. Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 94–100 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1077, l. 62–5), 100–7 (67–73—a second variant). Stalin removed from the transcript Kaganovich’s phrase “for the victory of the world revolution.” It became just “toward victory.”

132. Leibzon and Shirina, Povorot v istorii Kominterna, 93–102.

133. Rosenfeldt, Knowledge and Power, 181. On Sept. 29, 1935, the Central Committee decreed the founding of the Central Museum of Lenin in Moscow. All documents and other materials were ordered sent to Moscow (local museums were supposed to make do with photo duplications, even if the original had been generated in their locale). RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 971, l. 72; Shul’gina, “Teoretiko-metodoligicheskie osnovy deiatel’nosti museev.” In 1936, the Lenin Museum would be given the building of the old Moscow city Duma.

134. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 1, d. 5089, l. 1; Brandenberger, “Stalin as Symbol,” at 257–8. Tovstukha, rebuffing Yarosvalsky’s request for assistance, had rudely stated: “It will not turn out as a biography of Stalin—it will just be another history of the party and Stalin’s role therein.” Sukharev, “Litsedeistvo,” 105–7, 110–1, 116; RGASPI, f. 89, op. 8, d. 1001, l. 7, 23–4; f. 155, op. 1, d. 88, l. 1; d. 90, l. 1–1ob. On Aug. 19, on the dictator’s instructions from Sochi, the politburo forbade Beria to republish Stalin’s writings from 1905–10 without his express authorization. Beria responded that there had never been a plan to republish without authorization. The politburo also resolved to publish Stalin’s collected works, projected at eight volumes. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 526 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 88, l. 21–2, 23; f. 17, op. 3, d. 970, l. 50); Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 394 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 905, l. 6, 10; d. 1164, l. 113); Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 745n17. Ilizarov, Tainaia zhizn’ Stalina, 138; Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 405–6 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 905, l. 11–3: Nov. 13, 1935). The second edition of Lenin’s Collected Works was being completed in thirty volumes: Sochineniia, 30 vols. (Moscow-Leningrad: Gosizdat, 1926–35).

135. Despite the secrecy and lies of the regime surrounding Stalin’s life, Souvarine managed thorough, judicious research in published sources. He wrote a classic political history of the regime rather than a biography per se, but attained an insight into Stalin’s character. Souvarine, Stalin, with a new chapter added to the 1937 French re-edition. See also Lyons, “Stalin, Autocrat of all the Russias.” In France, Gallimard had rejected the manuscript. Panné, Souvarine, 222–6. Adam Ulam, and many others, would largely follow Souvarine’s template. Ulam, Stalin.

136. The breakout to the Long March occurred on Oct. 16, 1934. Radio contact with the Comintern had already been lost the month before. Wilson, Long March; Yang, From Revolution to Politics; Shuyun, Long March; Braun, Kitaiskie zapiski. The Japanese had demolished Chinese Communist organizations in Manchuria by 1934. Lee, Revolutionary Struggle in Manchuria, 231; in Krymov, “Istoricheskie portrety,” 65–6.

137. Kosheleva, Pis’ma Stalina Molotovu, 252–3 (Aug. 5, 1935). Trotsky predicted from exile that the gathering would “pass into history as the liquidation congress.” Biulleten’ oppozitsii, no. 46 (Dec. 1935): 12.

138. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 18, l. 110. Kaganovich and Yezhov telegrammed from Moscow that they had spoken to Pyatnitsky and Knorin, both of whom were being moved out of the Comintern. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 523 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 88, l. 9: Aug. 14, 1935), 523 (l. 9: Aug. 15), 523 n1 (f. 17, op. 3, d. 970, l. 42: Aug. 16).

139. Khaustov and Samuelson, Stalin, NKVD, 141–3 (TsA FSB, ASD P-4497, t. 1, s. 24, ASD p-4574, t. 1, l. 31: Baumanis). Kaganovich’s profile had risen higher still thanks to the successful metro construction. He would receive a thunderous ovation at the Central Committee plenum in Dec. 1935. After a Dec. 1936 banquet for the wives of engineers, Galina Shtange would write in her diary that Kaganovich was simple, expressive, and handsome, with “above all, enormous serenity and intelligence, then firmness of purpose and an unyielding will; but when he smiles, his basic goodness shows through.” Garros et al., Intimacy and Terror, 184.

140. Pravda, Aug. 21, 1935.

141. Bullitt had conveyed the same warning to Litvinov. FRUS, The Soviet Union, 1933–1939, 111, 131, 156–7, 221–3. U.S. complaints were already frequent about Soviet violations of the no-domestic-interference clause. The Nov. 16, 1933, agreement on noninterference in internal affairs did not specifically mention the Comintern, but the Soviet government had promised “not to permit the formation or residence on its territory of any organization or group—and to prevent the activity on its territory of any organization or group, or of representatives of any organization or group—which has as an aim the overthrow or the preparation for an overthrow of, or the bringing about by force of a change in, the political or social order of the whole or any part of the United States.” FRUS, The Soviet Union, 1933–1939, 29. Louis Fischer, who on July 2, 1935, had passed to Bullitt the probable dates of the Comintern Congress, lobbied him not to protest, given the spread of fascism in Europe and the Comintern’s intention to take up the question of how to stop it. Fischer, Autobiography, 305; Bennett, Search for Security, 63.

142. VII Congress of the Communist International, 83–8, 245–8; Maddux, Years of Estrangement, 41 (citing Bullitt to Washington, Aug. 21, 1935).

143. From Washington, Troyanovsky wrote that the Aug. 25 note could be seen as a threat of war. On Aug. 27, Krestinsky handed Bullitt a response (approved by Stalin) maintaining that the Americans had not cited one fact of the supposed interference in their domestic affairs. In a new telegram to Washington, Bullitt additionally recommended expulsion of the Soviet military navy and air attachés. FRUS, The Soviet Union, 1933–1939, 242–3, 249, 250 (Bullitt to Hull); DVP SSSR, XVIII: 474, 476–7; Sevost’ianov, “Obostreniie sovetsko-amerikanskikh otnoshenii,” 27 (citing APRF, f. 05, op. 15, pap. 113, d. 126, l. 85, 1, 11); Maddux, Years of Estrangement, 149 (citing National Archives, 711.61/541: Bullitt to Hull, Aug. 29, 1935); Bishop, Roosevelt-Litvinov Agreements, 50; Hull, Memoirs, I: 305.

144. DVP SSSR, XVIII: 507 (letter to Warsaw, B. G. Podolsky, Sept. 8, 1935).

145. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 532–3 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 88, l. 87, 88–91: Aug. 25, 1935), 534–5 (l. 81–3: Aug. 26), 535 (l. 81: Aug. 27), 536–7 (l. 110–110ob.: Aug. 27), 546 (d. 89, l. 4, 5–8: Sept. 2); Khromov, Po stranitsam, 205. Soviet press accounts were restrained: Pravda and Izvestiia, Aug. 28 and Sept. 3, 1935.

146. G.N. Sevost’ianov, “Sud’ba soglasheniia Ruzvel’t—Litvinov o dolgakh i kreditakh”; Maddux, Years of Estrangement, 27–43; Browder, Origins of Soviet-American Diplomacy, 204–13.

147. Dodd and Dodd, Ambassador Dodd’s Diary, 277–8 (Nov. 19, 1935). Bullitt would return to Moscow in Feb. 1936, but leave for good in April 1936 without informing Soviet officials that he was not coming back.

148. No meetings are recorded in Stalin’s office from Aug. 10, 1935, through Nov. 2, 1935. Na prieme, 171.

149. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 527 (RGAPSI, f. 81, op. 3, d. 100, l. 89–90: Aug. 19, 1935).

150. Kaganovich and others sent a telegram to Sochi with a recommendation to make the funeral broader than just a Comintern event, and to send the ashes to Paris. Stalin agreed, pending the wishes of Barbusse’s relatives. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 83, l. 139.

151. Barbusse, Stalin. Barbusse’s book contained numerous names of people who would turn out to be enemies of the people, and within two years, all copies would be pulled. Medvedev, Let History Judge, 817–8.

152. The regime would claim a harvest of 90 million tons, based on inflated yield estimates. Davies et al., Years of Progress, 254–5 (citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 977: April 29, 1936; RGAE, f. 4372, op. 35, d. 467, l. 85–6), 258; Danilov et al., Tragediia sovetskoi derevni, IV: 615 (Oct. 18, 1935); Sochineniia, XIV: 93–9.

153. Kaganovich added that “the smartest of the foreign correspondents, Duranty, had written: ‘in America they make noise about the Comintern Congress and do not see the most decisive main thing that was published yesterday in the newspapers—the report of the Azov–Black Sea territory about the completion of grain procurements.’” Khlevniuk et al., Stalinskoe politbiuro, 145–6 (RGASPI, f. 85, op. 27, d. 93, l. 1–11). See also Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 553–5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 743, l. 29–36: Sept. 5).

154. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 553–5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 743, l. 29–36), 558 (f. 81, op. 3, d. 100, l. 91–4: Sept. 8, 1935), 558n3 (APRF, f. 3, op. 64, d. 663, l. 128–9: Kandelaki to Stalin, Sept. 3).

155. “Since Yenukidze does not admit his fall, and does not suffer from humility, he is trying to control the local organizations, assigning them tasks, distributing holidaying comrades among the sanatoriums, giving them their residences,” Stalin explained, adding that this had spurred talk Yenukidze had not been sent to Kislovodsk “as punishment but on holiday.” Stalin also noted that local comrades Yevdokimov and Sheboldayev had objected to Yenukidze’s appointment in Kislovodsk, and that Kalinin and Shkiryatov (head of party control), holidaying in Sochi, agreed. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i kaganovich, 557–8 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 89, l. 71–76). Agranov (Sept. 5, 1935) wrote to Stalin about an anonymous letter sent early in the summer to “the Moscow party organization, Khrushchev personally,” which stated of the Kremlin Affair that “the whole plan consists in removing that odious figure who now blocks even the sun.” Stalin wrote in “Stalin” next to the words “odious figure.” In another passage, which referred to “that cook,” he also wrote in “Stalin.” The letter blamed Lominadze’s suicide (still not publicly announced) on “the new tyrant” and expressed concern that Yenukidze would commit suicide, too. The NKVD checked hundreds of people via handwriting analysis and arrested B. I. Shilikhin, who until 1930 had worked in Kalinin’s reception office and in 1935 was a jurist in the metal import office. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChk, 683–6 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 238, l. 86–93), 821n163. The letter to Khrushchev was dated June 4, 1935.

156. The decree was dated Sept. 10–11, 1935, but Yenukidze stalled his relocation from Kislovodsk. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 557–8 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 89, l. 71–76), 558 (RGASPI, f. 81, op. 3, d. 100, l. 91–4: Sept. 8, 1935), 560 (f. 558, op. 11, d. 89, l. 89; f. 17, op. 3, d. 971, l. 30), 580 (f. 558, op. 11, d. 90, l. 41: Sept. 22), 583 (l. 55: Sept. 23). Yenukidze would be arrested on Feb. 11, 1937. Much later Stalin would state, “I recommended that he be expelled from the party already back then, but they did not believe me, thinking that as a Georgian I am severe toward Georgians. But the Russians, you see, they decided to defend ‘this Georgian.’” RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1120, l. 28–57 (at 46–7: Stalin, June 2, 1937, Main Military Council).

157. Yezhov sought permission to conspire behind Yagoda’s back with Yagoda’s first deputy Agranov to get to the bottom of things. Agranov, it seems, fell ill, so Yezhov schemed with others in the NKVD. Pavliukov, Ezhov, 162–3, 170–1 (citing RGASPI, f. 671, op. 1, d. 28, l. 177–81); Pavliukov, Ezhov, 172; Khaustov and Samuelson, Stalin, NKVD, 91.

158. The politburo decreed that Yezhov take a two-month holiday, and approved hard currency worth 3,000 rubles for him to go abroad for medical treatment with his wife. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 572n5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 743, l. 37–9; d. 755, l. 39; d. f. 17, op. 163, d. 1079, l. 63; op. 3, d. 971, l. 57).

159. Chigirin, Stalin, 83 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1482, l. 51ob.).

160. Valedinskii, “Organizm Stalina vpolne zdorovyi,” 72. The incident is not dated; Shneiderovich saw Stalin in 1934–6.

161. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1479, l. 14–8.

162. Soviet diplomats noted cold, distant attitudes of the French officials with whom they interacted, while in Sept. 1935, a Soviet military mission to France received a favorable reception and were shown the Maginot Line (which was to be operational the next year) but came away unimpressed. Gamelin evaded being drawn into political discussions. Alexander Sedyakin (b. 1893), deputy head of the general staff responsible for Red Army training, concluded that the Soviets had next to nothing to learn from the French. DVP SSSR, XVIII: 505–6 (Potyomkin, Sept. 11, 1935), 659n212 (Hirschfeld to Krestinsky, Sept. 11); Castellan, “Reichswehr et armée rouge,” at 254–5; Orlov, “V poiskakh soiuznikov.” France had sharply curtailed military spending beginning in 1932. Jackson, “French Strategy,” 63.

163. Kievskii Krasnoznamenyi, 101–6 (citing RGVA, f. 25580, op. 74, d. 25, l. 12; d. 29, l. 332–3, 373–6); Dubynskii, “Bol’shie kievskie manevry,” 157–69; Eremenko, V nachale voiny, 7–13 (esp. 9 and 13, illustrations); Orlov, “V poiskakh soiuznikov,” 48; Sovetskaia voennaia entsiklopediia, V: 121–2; Grechko et al., Istoriia Vtoroi mirovoi voiny, I: 299; Kokoshin, Armiia i politika, 95, 192–6; Ziemke, Red Army, 194; Erickson and Simpkin, Deep Battle.

164. Kvashonkin, Sovetstskoe rukovodstvo, 311–2 (RGASPI, f. 74, op. 2, d. 37, l. 94–6). Voroshilov studied the assembled foreign reactions. Samuelson, Plans for Stalin’s War Machine, 242n43 (citing RGVA, f. 33987, op. 3, d. 740, l. 193–208). On the Red Army’s internal assessment and subsequent extended discussion: RGVA, f. 4, op. 15, d. 5, l. 419–23 (Sept. 22, 1935); op. 18, d. 52 (Dec. 8–14, 1935). General Ludvík Krejčí, head of the general staff, led the Czechoslovak delegation.

165. Loizeau’s observations were reported in Le Temps, Sept. 20, 1935. See Loizeau’s meeting with Tukhachevsky: DVP SSSR, XVIII: 518–21 (Sept. 25, 1935); Samuelson, Plans for Stalin’s War Machine, 242n44 (citing RGVA, f. 33987, op. 3, d. 687, l. 64–74: Sept. 25); Izvestiia, Sept. 27, 1935.

166. Dreifort, “French Popular Front,” 219, citing General Lucien Loizeau, “Une Mission militaire en U.R.S.S.,” Revue des Deux Mondes, Sept. 15, 1955: 275.

167. Habeck, Storm of Steel, 231 (citing RGVA, f. 4, op. 15, d. 5, l. 419–23: Sept. 22; l. 163, 165–6: Dec. 28, 1935).

168. Habeck, Storm of Steel, 231 (citing PA-AA, R31683K, pp. 134–39: report from Hagemeier, German Consulate in Kiev, “Inhalt: Herbstmanover der Roten Armee bei Kiew,” Oct. 2, 1935).

169. In his final remarks Hitler repudiated those who said, “The Führer, yes—but the party, that’s a different matter.” “No, gentlemen! The Führer is the party, and the party is the Führer.” Der Parteitag der Freiheit vom 10.-16. September 1935, 287.

170. It also forbade employment of German females under forty-five in Jewish households. Pätzold, Verfolgung, Vertreibung, Vernichtung, 113–4.

171. Kershaw, Hitler: 1889–1936, 569–71; Domarus, Hitler: Reden, I: 536–7.

172. Goebbels, Kommunismus ohne Maske, 5, 7. See also Bamsted, Goebbels and National Socialist Propaganda.

173. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 567 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 89, l. 122: Sept. 15, 1935), 569 (l. 114–7: Sept. 15). In response to Kaganovich’s and Molotov’s proposed list of Soviet journalists to be sent to Prague at the invitation of Czechoslovakia, Stalin wrote, “It is necessary to include . . . one or two female journalists, one more Ukrainian writer, one or two Belorussian writers; in that connection, it’s not required to send editors of newspapers, it’s possible to send just popular writers.” Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 567 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 89, l. 110–110ob.), 571 (l. 152: Sept. 17), 571 (l. 154: Sept. 17).

174. Holmes, Stalin’s School, 167 (citing interview of Krasnogliadova, who referred to conversations with Belogorskaya).

175. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 53–4 (APRF, f. 45, op. 1, d. 1553, l. 7–8).

176. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 183–4 (Svanidze diary: Nov. 17, 1935), 185 (Dec. 4).

177. Leushin, “Staliniada,” 105 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 754, l. 112–3).

178. The upshot was a drop between 1927 and 1935 in the ratio of dependents to earners from 2.5 to 1.6. Goldman, Women, the State and Revolution, 103. “I like good clothes,” Sophie Kienya, a technician of Shaft 82, Metro Construction, was quoted as telling a foreign resident. “At work underground I wear rubber waders, breeches, and tie up my hair in a handkerchief. But at home and on free days I want my dresses to be fashionable and pretty and to fit well. All our girls like pretty clothes. At the theater or at parties when you meet girls from the Metro you would never think that they spent their days working underground . . . Our shoes are now excellent, but our factories should pay more attention to producing elegant buttons, trimmings, bags, gloves.” Malnick, Everyday Life, 221.

179. Kaganovich assured Stalin that “many workers made a calculation and themselves pointed out that, since previously they were buying supplementary meat and butter at markets, now they were gaining. Now, it seems, we will need to pay attention to shops and organizing sales.” Davies et al., Years of Progress, 174–6; Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 589–90 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 743, l. 40–4: Sept. 26, 1935). See also Davies and Khlevniuk, “Otmena kartochnoi sistemy v SSSR,” 127.

180. Suvenirov, Tragediia RKKA, 34.

181. Osokina, Ierarkhiia potrebleniia; Osokina, Za fasadom; Hessler, Social History of Soviet Trade; Randall, Soviet Dream World.

182. “Moscow restaurants left nothing to be desired,” wrote Juri Jelagin, a violinist at the Vakhtangov Theater, of an evening meal that, with entertainment, could easily cost two weeks of a worker’s salary. “Magnificent, live Volga sturgeons swam in a pool in the center of the dining room at the Metropol on Theater Square. The patrons could select the fish they wanted in the clear water.” Ziegler’s Czech jazz band played at the Metropol and Tsafman’s and Utyosov’s bands at the National, while gypsies sang at the Prague on the Arbat. Jelagin, Taming of the Arts, 136–8. Charles Thayer, the U.S. embassy official, recalled, “a good dinner at the Metropol or the Medved Restaurant was cheap enough.” Thayer, Bears in the Caviar, 106.

183. Martelli, Italy Against the World; Hardie, Abyssinian Crisis; Robertson, Mussolini as Empire Builder; Strang, Collision of Empires. See also Durand, Crazy Campaign.

184. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 545 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 89, l. 2–2ob.: Sept. 2, 1935). The Abyssinian invasion also did not inhibit Soviet participation in Milan’s first international air show (Oct. 12–28, 1935), where the Soviets exhibited their well-designed Il-15 biplane, which impressed as best in show. Their Il-16, a low-wing cantilever monoplane, was then the fastest fighter in the world, but the international audience dismissed its performance data as too good to be true. 1 Salone Internazionale Aeronautico; Ziemke, Red Army, 193. The story would make the rounds that Stalin mischievously ordered one of his NKVD attendants to get Ras Kasa—a tribal leader in the resistance to Italian forces—on the phone, and when the operative returned distraught, unable to connect to the mountain Ethiopian, Stalin was said to have replied, “And you are still working in security?” Gromyko, Memoirs, 103 (no citation).

185. The USSR had lost to Mexico by a single vote. Stalin added that “now you couldn’t chase Litvinov from the assembly presidium with a broom.” Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 561–2 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 89, l. 92–3: Sept. 11, 1935), 562–3 (l. 93: Sept. 11), 563 (l. 103: Sept. 12), 563–4 (l. 99–102: Sept. 12). See also DVP SSSR, XVIII: 523–4 (telegram to Litvinov, Oct. 4, 1935), 525–6 (Potyomkin speech Oct. 10), 661 (Potomykin telegram, Oct. 11); Adibekov et al., Politbiuro TsK RKP (b)—VKP (b) i Evropa, 329–30 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 18, l. 173), 330 (l. 175), 330–1 (l. 178), 332 (l. 187), 333 (op. 162, d. 19, l. 14), 334 (l. 32), 337–8 (d. 20, l. 4, 8); and Walters, History of the League of Nations, I: 358–9. Stalin allowed Litvinov to support sanctions against Italy, but the politburo instructed him to “follow an independent Soviet line . . . and avoid anything that could be interpreted as a subordination of our line to the position of Britain.” Adibekov et al., Politbiuro TsK RKP (b)—VKP (b) i Evropa, 331 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 18, l. 178: Oct. 15, 1935).

186. DGFP, series C, IV: 778–9 (Oct. 29, 1935).

187. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 183 (Svanidze diary: Nov. 17, 1935).

188. She was either 75 or 77 (Keke’s birth year remains uncertain because of a possible effort to increase her age at marriage). Stalin had visited her, briefly, in 1921 and in 1927.

189. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 16–7 (l. 45–6: March 24, 1934). “I. V. profoundly suffered from the loss of his wife and friend,” Vlasik would recall. Loginov, Teni Stalina, 97. Artyom recalled an incident when Vasily told his father that he and his buddies had seen old women crossing themselves and praying, and how they threw a firecracker at their feet. Stalin erupted: “Why, why did you do that?! Vasily: “Why were they praying?!” Stalin: “Do you respect grandmother? Do you love her? She prays. Because she knows something that you do not know!” Sergeev and Glushik, Besedy o Staline, 89–96; Moskovskii komsomolets, Aug. 3, 2004.

190. Sukharev, “Litsedeistvo,” 106 (citing PA IIP pri TsK KP Gruzii, f. 8, op. 1, d. 17, l. 20, 24: G. V. Khachapuridze, 54).

191. A visiting Moscow inspector had just approved the plans. Sokolov, Beriia, 97–8 (Sept. 1935).

192. Stalin, in a letter to his mother (June 11, 1935), mentioned she was ill (“Do not be afraid of illness, get strong, it shall pass”). Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 18 (APRF, f. 45, op. 1, d. 1549, l. 55–6). Beria had had a journalist transcribe and edit what were purported to be Keke’s “memoirs,” which he evidently intended to use to flatter Stalin. (Instead, they were buried in the Georgian party archive.) The interviews took place on Aug. 23, 25, and 27, 1935. Dzhugashvili, Moi syn Iosif Stalin. See also the hearsay about Stalin in Georgia at this time: Blagoveshchenskii, “V gostiakh u P. A. Sharii,” 472n28.

193. The same source has Stalin saying, “Mama, do you remember our tsar? Well, I’m something like the tsar.” “You’d have done better to become a priest,” Keke is said to have replied. Radzinsky, Stalin, 24 (recollections of N. Kipshidze, a doctor who treated Keke, quoted without citation).

194. On the supposed lingering influence of Georgian literary styles on Stalin, see Vaiskopf, Pistael’ Stalin, 130–1, 181–98.

195. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 92, l. 22–3.

196. Dorofeev, “Mat.” One observer in the same issue reminisced that “whoever has met comrade Stalin even just once, will never forget his modesty, wisdom, and ability to size up events quickly and offer correct, clear directives, will never forget his sagacity, his ability to cultivate in a person a lifelong selfless dedication to the cause of the working class, implacability against all enemies of the revolution.” Here was a self-portrait in another’s words.

197. “Beseda s mater’iu tovarishcha Stalina,” Pravda, Oct. 27, 1935; Zaria vostoka (Oct. 28).

198. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 92, l.82.

199. DGFP, series C, IV: 482–3 (July 26, 1935), 493–6 (July 27), 507–10 (July 30), 596–8 (Aug. 29), 618–20 (Sept. 5), 825–9 (Nov. 18), 833–5 (Nov. 19), 835–7 (Nov. 19), 841–2 (Nov. 20), 847–9 (Nov. 22), 849–51 (Nov. 23), 859–62 (Nov. 27), 866–8 (Nov. 30), 872–4 (Dec. 8), 925–6 (Dec. 18). The French Assembly would ratify the pact with the USSR on Feb. 27, 1936 (353 votes to 164); the Congress of Soviets would do so on March 8, 1936.

200. DGFP, series C, IV: 778–9 (Oct. 28, 1935), 783–4 (Nov. 1), 811–3 (Nov. 11, 1935); Na prieme, 171; Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 221–2. Schacht and Kandelaki haggled over how much of existing debts the Soviets needed to pay in gold and hard currency.

201. Functionaries had dug out the old tsarist emblems and made sketches for Soviet versions. Stalin also allowed the “staff” to become once again the “general staff.” Solov’ev, “Tetrady krasnogo professor, 1912–1941 gg.,” IV: 183; Erickson, Soviet High Command, 366–403, 445–6; Zaloga, “Soviet Tank Operations,” note 2.

202. The decree creating the marshal rank was issued on Sept. 22, 1935, and the rank was ceremoniously conferred on Nov. 20; Pravda’s account (the next day) sought to smother the whiff of tsarism: “Kliment Voroshilov is a proletarian to the marrow, a Bolshevik in every movement, a theoretician and practitioner of the military art, a cavalryman, a sharpshooter, one of the best orators in the party, a thoughtful and hardworking organizer of the immense defense machine.”

203. Suvenirov, Tragediia RKKA, 51–4.

204. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 822n166.

205. By fall 1935, 16,000 people had received a USSR state medal, such as the Order of Lenin or Order of the Red Banner. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 81n6 (citing GARF, f. R-3316, op. 65, d. 144, l. 5). The regime would introduce a “director’s fund” in 1936 for payment of “bonuses.”

206. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 183 (Svanidze diary: Nov. 17, 1935).

207. Yevgeny was born Jan. 10, 1936. At some point Yakov acknowledged him and his last name was changed from Golyshev to Jughashvili. Golysheva received money from the Jughashvili household for the boy.

208. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 183–4 (Svanidze diary: Nov. 17, 1935).

209. Norm-busters appeared in automobiles (Alexander Busygin), machine tools (I. I. Gudov), textiles (Yevdokiya and Maria Vinogradov), and the Gulag, but it was Stakhanov’s name that got affixed to the “movement.” Siegelbaum, Stakhanovism; Benvenuti, “Stakhanovism and Stalinism”; Davies and Khlevniuk, “Stakhanovism”; Davies et al., Years of Progress, 164–9; Kvashonkin, Sovetskoe rukovodstvo, 310–1 (RGASPI, f. 85, op. 29, d. 460, l. 2–3: Orjonikidze to Sarkisov, Sept. 6, 1935); Goriaeva, “Veilkaia kniga dnia,” 301 (RGAKFD, no. Sh-192, Vr. Zv. 02:00).

210. Soldatenkov, Politicheskie i nravstvennye posledstviia, 82–8 (citing TsGAIPD StP., f. 24, op. 2, d. 1190, l. 6: Zhdanov, April 5, 1936).

211. In 1937, the mine’s party organizer, Konstantin Petrov (b. 1908), would replace the mine boss, Iosif Zaplavsky, who ended up in Norilsk, a Gulag site.

212. Mikoyan advised that “if one is to study by the capitalists, then in the first instance it is necessary to study by the Americans.” Pervoe soveshchanie rabochikh; Mikoian, V polose velikogo pod”ema, 15.

213. Pravda, Nov. 22, 1935; Sochineniia, XIV: 79–102 (at 89–91).

214. Stakhanov made the cover of Time on Dec. 16, 1935. Stalin also pushed through a campaign against managers’ “sabotage” in late 1935, which, like Stakhanovism, he largely abandoned by spring 1936. See also Stakhanov, Rasskaz o moei zhizni.

215. Raskol’nikov, O vremeni i o sebe, 476–86. Raskolnikov’s acquaintances were phoning with congratulations, having somehow heard news of Stalin’s treatment of him. He and Molotov had once studied together at the St. Petersburg Polytechnic and worked together at Pravda before the revolution. Bulgaria was Raskolnikov’s fourth ambassadorship. In between, he had chaired the state repertory committee, which oversaw live theater, and himself tried his hand at writing plays.

216. Raskolnikov mentions that he encountered Mikhail Koltsov in the reception area; in fact, Koltsov was received by Stalin just before RaskolniIov. Raskol’nikov, O vremeni i o sebe, 486–8; Na prieme, 174–5.

217. Roediger (deputy head of the German foreign ministry’s Eastern Department) told Bessonov that “except for the ideological hostility between Germany and the USSR there are no differences and we certainly welcome expansion of economic relations.” On Dec. 12, Hermann Göring told Bessonov that War Minister Blomberg and Schacht had “agreed a readiness to supply the USSR with any military equipment, including the most advanced,” under a new credit, which Bessonov continued to view as the key to unlocking political rapprochement, rather than as entirely separate, the way the Germans treated it. Abramov, “Osobaia missiia Davida Kandelaki,” 147 (citing AVP RF, f. 082, op. 18, pap. 81, d. 7, l. 360–5); DGFP, series C, IV: 870–2 (Dec. 4, 1935), 897–9 (Dec. 10), 931–3 (Dec. 21). See also Nekrich, 1941, 23; and Fischer, Russia’s Road, 240. Litvinov wrote to Surits (Dec. 19, 1935) that he was skeptical of any movement on the German side, while Krestinsky wrote to Surits (Jan. 11, 1936), “it seems to me we shall reach agreement with the Germans on this 500-million credit. As for the question of the Germans changing their political position in relation to us, there has been no indication of any changes in this direction neither in Berlin nor in Moscow nor any other points on the planet.” DVP SSSR, XVIII: 595–7, XIX: 25–6.

218. DGFP, series C, III: 306–9 (Aug. 10, 1934), 556–8 (Nov. 1); DBFP, 2nd series, VI: 883 (July 31). The British were still waiting for a German response to the Feb. 1935 Anglo-French proposals; Hitler claimed he had already responded. Orme Sargent and Wigram had written a long memorandum (Nov. 21, 1935) rejecting both inaction toward and encirclement of Germany, and concluding that “a policy of coming to terms with Germany in Western Europe might enable Britain and France to moderate the development of German aims in the Centre and East.” Medlicott, Britain and Germany, 19 (citing C7752/55/18 FO 371/18851).

219. The German notetaker has Hitler characterizing Phipps’s suggestion for engagement as analogous to “having plague germs shut up in a cupboard and then believing that one could make them less dangerous by opening the door and letting the germs loose on mankind.” DBFP, 2nd series, XV: 488–93 (Phipps to Hoare, Dec. 16, 1935). DGFP, series C, IV: 917–9 (Neurath account, Dec. 14). Hitler told a ministerial conference after meeting Phipps that he could not agree to arms limitations with Britain and France so long as the Soviet Union freely armed, or take part in any Western European treaty system in which the Soviet Union took part. DGFP, series C, IV: 913–4.

220. The renaming was official on Dec. 17, 1935. A writers’ union plenum dedicated to poetry had been planned for Dec. 1935 in Minsk but was postponed to February 1936, likely in connection with Stalin’s sudden elevation of Mayakovsky. Fleishman, Boris Pasternak, 293.

221. Stalin added: “I am ready if my help is needed.” Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 270–2 (APRF, f. 45, op. 1, d. 729). Back at the writers’ congress the previous year, Stetsky had said, “I also don’t know of any decisions of the party and government about the canonization of Mayakovsky.” Pervyi vsesoiuznyi s”ezd sovetskikh pisatelei, 614.

222. V. A. Katanian would recall that Mekhlis, editor of Pravda, “did not evince any particular enthusiasm. On the literary page of Pravda, dedicated to Mayakovsky, which appeared a few days later (Dec. 5), two sentences from that resolution, which soon gained worldwide fame, were printed with a mistake. Instead of ‘the best and most talented’ it read ‘the best and talented.’” Pravda issued a correction, however (Dec. 17). Katanian, “Ne tol’ko vospominaniia,” 224–5.

223. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 275 (APRF, f. [4]5, op. 1, d. 788, l. 107–110ob.). An affirmation of Stalin’s praise was hastily arranged in the form of a letter, in the name of several Soviet poets then on a trip to Paris, and published in Moscow (it was written by Aragon, whose name was left off). “Sovetskie poety v Parizhe,” Literaturnaia gazeta, Dec. 9, 1935; Maksimenkov, Sumbur, 17–8 (RGASPI, f. 88, op. 1, d. 512, l. 1).

224. Seishirō Itagaki, who as Kwantung Army intelligence chief had helped stage the Mukden incident to seize Manchuria and was promoted to Kwantung vice chief of staff, “urged Japanese predominance in Inner Mongolia, to deny the USSR a platform (like it enjoyed in Xinjiang) and to serve as a springboard for conquest of Outer Mongolia, which would allow takeover of the Soviet Far East almost without fighting.” Haslam, Threat from the East, 48–9 (citing Hoover Institution Archives, International Military Tribunal, the Far East Documents, 7830–33: prosecution document no. 1466, exhibit no. 761–A). Stalin decided to support Sheng, and NKVD operatives brought the leader of the anti-Sheng Muslim rebellion, General Ma Zhingying, to the Soviet Union, both to deflate the rebellion and for insurance. Primakov, Ocherki, III: 216–8; Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 594–5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 90, l. 119, Oct. 1, 1935). On further developments, see Milward, Eurasian Crossroads, 200ff; and Ledovskii, SSSR i Stalin v sud’ba Kitaia, 190–1.

225. Baabar, Twentieth-Century Mongolia, 338–9. The Soviet Union continued to fudge the recognition question, so as not to anger Chiang Kai-shek’s government (which claimed “Outer” Mongolia as part of China), but Japan quietly hinted at recognizing Mongolia’s independence. In late Nov. 1935, the Mongols, following Soviet orders, had broken off a months-long Mongolia-Manchukuo conference to regulate their disputed border, citing Manchukuo’s demands for diplomatic recognition. DVP SSSR, XVIII: 649–50n172; Pravda, Nov. 21, 1935.

226. Chang and Halliday, Mao,139.

227. Haslam, Threat from the East, 61–5; DVP SSSR, XVIII: 587–8 (Dec. 9, 1935), 601–3 (Dec. 28). In Jan. 1936, the Soviet Union and Xinjiang signed an agreement on military and economic aid that excluded access to “third powers.” Hasiotis, Soviet Political, Economic, and Military Involvement, 100.

228. Haslam, Threat from the East, 50 (citing FRUS, 489–90: Henderson in Moscow to Hull in Washington, Dec. 14, 1935). The follow-up border incident took place on Dec. 19.

229. The Soviet foreign trade commissariat had sent Choibalsan 20 Gorky Factory (GAZ) automobiles, which the Moscow loyalist awarded as patronage to other Mongol ministers. Genden had felt constrained to send a lengthy report to Stalin, Molotov, and Voroshilov on implementation of Stalin’s recommendations, but also noted that 96.4 percent of Mongolia’s 731,686 people were illiterate, and expressed concern about Japanese war provocations. RGANI, f. 89, op. 63, d. 16, l. 1–33 (Oct. 14, 1935).

230. Baabar, Twentieth-Century Mongolia, 344–6.

231. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 185–6 (Svanidze diary: Dec. 26, 1935), 189. Kun, Stalin, 227. The polar explorer Belyakov witnessed an evening of dancing at Stalin’s Black Sea dacha: “He played many records, mostly Georgian folk songs. He explained to us that Georgians sing on their way to the market.” RGASPI, f. 558, op. 4, d. 668.

232. As of July 1935, the party had 1.66 million full members and 681,245 candidates. By the time the exchange process was all done, about a quarter million party cards would be confiscated. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 2, d. 561, l. 127–64; Khlevniuk, 1937–i, 56–7. Yezhov’s report was published: Pravda, Dec. 26, 1935; Partiinoe stroitel’stvo, 1936, no. 2: 9–23. According to the NKVD date, as of Oct. 20, 1935, 255 “spies” had been expelled from the party, but the NKVD of Eastern Siberia and the Soviet Far East—the front line with Japan—together had found only one spy in the party ranks. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 822–3n169 (TsA FSB, f. 3, op. 2, d. 3, l. 131–4), 724–31 (op. 3, d. 62, l. 129–44).

233. Beria followed him to the dais, boasted that the South Caucasus NKVD had arrested 1,020 enemies through this month, and congratulated himself. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 2, d. 561, l. 143, 146, 162.

234. Damage of machinery while operating it as well as the production or supply of poor quality goods became crimes of sabotage too. Andreyev gave the main report, for which he had been copiously supplied with NKVD materials on “sabotage” of the Stakhanovite movement. Other speakers cited cases of anti-Stakhanovite “sabotage” in their regions. Davies et al., Years of Progress, 171–2 (citing RGASPI, f. 73, op. 1, d. 141, l. 205; f. 17, op. 2, d. 561, l. 32: Ryndin); Pravda, December 29, 1935.

235. Pravda, Dec. 27, 1935. Yagoda reported an expansion in Polish agents crossing Soviet borders in pursuit of information on weapons depots and other secrets. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 712–4 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 248, l. 80–4: Dec. 27, 1935).

236. Harrison and Davies, “Soviet Military-Economic Effort,” 370, citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 19, l. 16: Dec. 15, 1935; GARF, f. 5446, op. 57, d. 38: Dec. 16, 372; Cooper, “Defence Production,” 35.

237. The Mongols complained that it was very difficult to struggle against the lamas “when some officials believe in and pray to god.” RGANI, f. 89, op. 63, d. 17, l. 1–5.

238. RGANI, f. 89, op. 63, d. 17, l. 6–8.

239. Baabar, Twentieth-Century Mongolia, 347–8 (citing the eyewitness Luvsansharev, a secretary of the Mongolian Central Committee, speaking at the 2nd plenum [March 11–20, 1936], in connection with Genden’s removal). See also Dashpürev and Soni, Reign of Terror, 34. Another version has Genden chasing Stalin around the table, yanking his pipe out of his mouth, and dashing it to the floor. Sandag and Kendall, Poisoned Arrows, 77.

240. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiakh, 186 (Svanidze diary: Dec. 7, 1936: erroneous dating, more likely Jan. 7).

241. Molotov himself said it was “up to the German government to draw practical conclusions.” Izvestiia, Jan. 12, 1936.

242. DGFP, series C, IV: 967–72 (Jan. 6, 1936).

243. The foreign office forwarded the report to Chilston in Moscow for comment. The British in Moscow were skeptical. Hochman, Failure of Collective Security, 110 (citing DBFP/Russia Correspondence, F.P. 371/19460, 142–8: Dec. 7, 1935; F.P. 371/20346, 150–2: Jan. 29, 1936).

244. Bezymenskii, Gitler i Stalin, 98, 100–1; Brügel, Stalin und Hitler, 38. Hitler soon forbade new sales of military technology to the Soviets. DGFP, series C, IV: 1033 (Jan. 24, 1936). Schacht omitted any mention of Kandelaki or the negotiations in his memoir. Schacht, My First Seventy-Six Years.

245. It is not out of the question that the NKVD tasked the Swiss-born Olberg, who had been expelled from the German Communist party in 1932 for Trotskyism, with infiltrating Trotskyite circles in Europe, then decided he needed to serve another purpose. On Olberg, see Chase, Enemies within the Gates?, 134 (citing RGASPI, f., 495, op. 175, d. 105, l. 9). Vyshinsky wrote to Stalin and Molotov (Jan. 8) of a separate case of a “Trotskyite group” just turned over to the courts with supposed plans for a “terrorist” act against the dictator Stalin on Red Square back during the Revolution Day parade, while Yagoda and Vyshinsky together wrote to him (Jan. 11, 1936) about the liquidation of a Zinovievite organization of thirty-four people, asking how should they be tried. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 715–6 (APRF, f. 3, op. 58, d. 230, l. 65–65ob.), 716–20 (l. 68–76), 723 (l. 64).

246. Jansen and Petrov, Stalin’s Loyal Executioner, 46–8.

247. Baabar, Twentieth-Century Mongolia, 346–7. On the evening of Jan. 7, 1936, Stalin had received the Mongols again, in Molotov’s office, and repeated his demands. Stomonyakov summarized the discussion about the lamas to the Soviet envoy in Mongolia (Tairov), noting, “comrade Stalin said that in a difficult moment one does not liberate criminals but punishes them or holds them under lock and key, like a hostage.” RGANI, f. 89, op. 63, d. 18, l. 1–9; d. 19, l. 1–8: Jan. 10. On Jan. 29, a Manchukuo border company killed its Japanese officers and successfully defected to the Soviet Union. The next day, two Japanese companies crossed the Soviet border in belated pursuit, killing three Soviet border guards and suffering dozens of casualties in a gun battle. They retreated. Shishov, Rossiia i Iaponiia, 424–68; Erickson, Soviet High Command, 414. In Jan. and Feb. 1936, the politburo authorized the building of new roads, petrol stations, aircraft and artillery repair installations, shipbuilding plants, oil storage facilities, and a refinery capable of making airplane fuel in the Soviet Far East. Davies et al., Years of Progress, 278 (citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 19, l. 27–9: Jan. 11, 1936, 73–5, 93–7: Feb. 18, 81–2).

248. Dawson, “Convenient Medical Death,” 1445; Rose, King George V.

249. Castellan, “Reichswehr et Armée Rouge,” 244. Göring would tell the Poles in February that “Marshal Tukhachevsky, when on his way through Germany, had not been received, although he had clearly wanted to get in touch with military circles.” DGFP, series C, IV: 1201–2 (Feb. 26, 1936).

250. In late Jan., Uborevičius traveled via Warsaw to Paris, ostensibly to link up with Tukhachevsky, and met an aide to the German military attaché in Poland, from whom he requested a meeting on his return from Paris with an authoritative German military official such as War Minister Blomberg. McMurry, Deutschland und die Sowjetunion, 320–1.

251. Tukhachevsky had never accepted German officers’ professions of friendship at face value. “I spoke especially long with Tukhachevsky,” Ambassador Dirksen had written to a friend (Oct. 17, 1931). “He is far from the direct and sympathetic person who speaks openly in support of a German orientation, as does Uborevičius.” In 1933, Tukhachevsky did profess profound friendship, to rescue the relationship. D’iakov and Bushueva, Fashistskii mech kovalsia v SSSR, 121; Bushueva and D’iakov, “Reikhsver i sovety, tainyi soiuz,” 183 (no citation).

252. Castellan, “Reichswehr et armée rouge,” 217–8 (citing Köstring); Gamelin, Servir, II: 196; Erickson, Soviet High Command, 412. The strongly anti-German French journalist Geneviève Tabouis, who was present at a farewell banquet at the Soviet embassy, would later allege that Tukhachevsky, while entertaining Édouard Herriot, the French foreign minister Joseph Paul-Boncour, and the Romanian foreign minister Nicolae Titulescu, among others, had rhapsodized about Nazi Germany (“They are already invincible, Madame Tabouis!”). Ambassador Potyomkin was present but appears to have reported nothing of the kind to Litvinov. Neither did French diplomatic sources. Tabouis, They Called Me Cassandra, 257; Erickson, Soviet High Command, 413. Tukhachevsky, seeking rubber-stamp approval for the military budget at the Central Executive Committee (Jan. 15, 1936), had stressed that Germany could attack the USSR even without a common border, as it had attacked France—smashing through Belgium—in 1914. Tukhachevskii, Zadachi oborony SSSR, 6, 14–5.

253. Sipols, “SSSR i problema mira,” 50–1 (citing PRO 418/81: 55, 78–79: Jan. 11, 1936). Maisky did not desist: DVP SSSR, XIX: 62–4 (Feb. 5, 1936), 206–11 (April 2).

254. Buryat-Mongol households individually held between twenty and seventy cattle. “The collective farmers’ relation to labor has changed fundamentally,” the leaders’ report boasted, praising the expansion of skilled personnel, schools, and theaters. Gatagova et al., TsK RKP (b)—VKP (b) i natsional’nyi vopros, II: 164–6 (RGASPI, f. 78, op. 1, d. 585, l. 25–8: D. Dorzhiev, Council of People’s Commissars, M. Yerbanov, party secretary).

255. The Mongol-Buryat pageant had been preceded by collective farmers of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Kara-Kalpak, when Stalin, Molotov, and Kaganovich were photographed in the national costumes, including head covering, for the first time. At a Dec. 4, 1935, Kremlin reception for forty-three Tajik and thirty-three Turkmen collective farmers in national dress, honored for the cotton harvest, a ten-year-old girl, Mamlakat Nakhangova, presented Stalin with the Tajik translation of his Questions of Leninism, and a photograph was taken of her in her head shawl, her arm around a seated Stalin’s shoulder. Pravda, Dec. 6, 1935; Kun, Stalin, 220–1. See also Levushin, “Dokumenty VKP (b) kak istochnik po istorii istoricheskoi nauki,” 386–9; Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 247–72; and RGASPI, f. 558, op. 1, d. 4314, l. 2–4. Whereas in Pravda’s coverage of the First All-Union Congress of Collective Farm Shock Workers, one-third of the photographs were of non-Russians, by the second gathering two years later in 1935, the ratio was reversed: Central Asians, Ukrainians, and Belorussians accounted for two-thirds of the photographs and illustrations. Brooks, “Thank You, Comrade Stalin!” 75.

256. “Comrades, there is one thing more valuable than cotton—that is the friendship of the peoples of our country,” Stalin was quoted as remarking during the Tajik-Turkmen reception. The tsarist legacy, “a savage, wolf-like policy,” had been overcome. “While this friendship lives and flourishes, we are afraid of no one, neither internal nor external enemies. You can have no doubt about this, comrades. (Stormy applause, all present stand and shout, ‘Stalin, Hurrah’).” “Rech’ tovarishcha Stalina na soveshchanii peredovykh kolkhoznikov i kolkhoznits Tadzhikistana i Turkmenistana,” Pravda, Dec. 5, 1935; Sochineniia (Hoover), XIV: 113–5. Molotov’s speeches at the many Kremlin national receptions were published as a pamphlet: Velikaia druzhba narodov SSSR (Moscow: Partizdat, 1936).

257. Pravda, Dec. 21 and 31, 1935; Jan. 24 and 30, 1936.

258. This was not his first photograph with children, a shift first visible in schoolbooks for children, which had rendered Stalin overtly fatherly. Rasskazy o Staline. Unlike the fatherly tsars, Stalin was called otets, not batushka.

259. Pravda, Aug. 3, 1935 (credited to Vlasik). Stalin visited a children’s home in Moscow as well. Heizer, “Cult of Stalin,” 169; Plamper, Stalin Cult, 44; Plamper, “Georgian Koba or Soviet ‘Father of Peoples,’” 131. Maria Osten wrote to Stalin requesting permission to republish the photograph in her book Hubert in Wonderland, about adopting a son in the Saarland under the Nazis and bringing him to the USSR. “This would be such a pleasure for all little grown-up readers of my book in the USSR and the entire world!” she wrote. Stalin acceded (“I agree”). RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 781, l. 126.

260. Kun, Stalin, 316.

261. During the first Five-Year Plan images of modernity in the borderlands—railroads, factories, workers—had predominated, but in the 1920s, even the most modern architects, who generally eschewed any hint of ornamentation, when outside Russia proper had chosen to incorporate folkloric “national” flourishes in public buildings, such as Moisei Ginzburg’s administrative center in Alma-Ata or others in Baku. Bliznakov, “International Modernism,” 112–30. Ginzburg had lived in Crimea and studied Tatar art there. On females and backwardness, as well as nurturing, see Stites, Russian Popular Culture, 83–4; and Iğmen, Speaking Soviet, 66.

262. The RSFSR was the only union republic without its own Communist party, and although it had state institutions, they often overlapped with those of the USSR (Kalinin was the head of both the RSFSR and the USSR central executive committees of the Soviet). Although there had been some institutions for ethnic Ukrainians and ethnic Belorussians in the RSFSR, these were abolished or allowed to lapse, which seems to have further spurred some ethnic Ukrainians and Belorussians in the RSFSR to identify as ethnic Russians. Martin, Affirmative Action Empire, 403–6.

263. Back on Dec. 15, 1925, at a central Committee plenum, Stalin had lauded the Russians as “the most industrial, the most active, and the most Soviet of all nations in our country,” a statement partly in response to unexpected resistance to the alteration of the party’s name from all-Russian to all-Union, but also reflecting deep conviction. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 205, l. 5. In his furious letter (Dec. 12, 1930) to Bedny over the latter’s mocking Russians warming themselves on stoves, Stalin had called the Russian working class “the advanced guard of Soviet workers, its acknowledged leaders, having conducted a more revolutionary policy and activist politics than any other proletariat of the world could dream of.” On July 6, 1933, at one of his Moscow dachas, in the presence of the portraitists Yevgeny Katsman and Isaak Brodsky, Stalin had toasted Russians as “the boldest Soviet nation, which achieved the socialist revolution before others.” Nevezhin, Zastol’nye, 42 (RGALI, f. 2368, op. 2, d. 36, l. 16). For the impressions of one of the artists (“What a colossal man! To me he seems as immense and beautiful as nature”), see Plamper, Stalin Cult, 92 (RGASPI, f. 74, op. 1, d. 292, l. 92–92ob.: July 15, 1933).

264. Ryutin had derided Stalin’s regime as “national Bolshevism,” a designation originated in a positive sense by the anti-Marxist nationalist émigré Nikolai Ustryalov (b. 1890). “Platforma ‘Soiuza marksistov-lenintsev’ (‘Gruppa Riutina’),” (1990, no. 9), 76.

265. The demolition had taken place on Dec. 5, 1931. Conceived in the wake of the defeat of Napoleon by Alexander I, it had been consecrated in 1883 on the day Alexander III had been crowned. Its valuable gold (half a ton from the cupola alone) was removed before demolition, whereas its marble went into the Moscow metro construction. Once the rubble was cleared, the crater was supposed to see erection of a grandiose Palace of Soviets designed by Boris Yofan, who sketched a neoclassical stepped colossus of porphyry, marble, and jasper, which aimed to be taller than the Eiffel Tower, at more than 1,300 feet, topped by a 260-foot statue of Lenin, making it resemble a pedestal. Construction of even the foundation was delayed by the grandiosity, and would finally commence in 1937, with the foundation completed in 1939, but nothing else after that. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 827, l. 9 (May 25, 1931); d. 828, l. 17 (June 5); Kvashonkin, Sovetskoe rukovodstvo, 158 (RGASPI, f. 667, op. 1, d. 17, l. 95–7: Molotov to Yenukidze, Aug. 24, 1931); Lebedeva, “O snose khrama Khrista Spasitelia,” 14; Iofan, “Dvorets s”ezdov SSSR.” See also Tarkhanov and Kavtaradze, Architecture of the Stalin Era; Paperny, Architecture in the Age of Stalin. Before the revolution, Moscow counted 460 Orthodox churches; already by Jan. 1, 1933, this stood at perhaps 100.

266. Arfon Rees correctly noted that “the significant aspect of Stalinist ideology was not the extent to which it adjusted to a nationalist perspective . . . but the extent to which . . . a Marxist-Leninist perspective, modified over time, remained the dominant ideology.” Rees, “Stalin and Russian Nationalism,” 102–3. Carr wrongly called Russian nationalism “the only political creed which moved [Stalin] at all deeply.” Carr, Russian Revolution, 170.

267. “‘Neizmennyi drug’—eto obiazyvaet . . . : pis’ma O. I. Sobalevoi-Mikhal’tsevoi,” 113 (APRF, f. 345, op. 34 1, d. 2731118, l. 7149: Dec. 10, 1935); Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 279–80. The writers’ union was a trade union and its members wrote to management seeking all manner of material help. Even some of the published writers said they could not make a living and requested additional employment (as editors or reviewers). Osip Mandelstam wrote from internal exile in 1936 to the poet and union management official Nikolai Tikhonov, “I am seriously ill, abandoned by everyone and destitute . . . I cannot translate either, because I have become very weak, and even the worry about my verse, which I cannot lay aside, is costing me palpitations.” Antipina, Povsednevnaia zhizn’, 12–3 (citing RGALI, f. 631, op. 15, d. 637, l. 136), 13–21.

268. Golubev, “Esli mir obrushitsia na nashu Respubliku,” 64 (citing TsAODM, f. 3, op. 50, d. 75, l. 38).

269. The censor organ was organized into four sectors: political-economic, artistic, agricultural, and regional (or provincial). In late 1935, according to a party commission probe, the political-economic sector did not have even a single economist, and the artistic sector lacked anyone with specialized arts training. “And if the situation with the censor in the center is blatantly unsatisfactory,” the commission report concluded, “in locales, and especially in the counties, it is utterly catastrophic.” Zhuravlev, Obshchestvo i vlast’, 114–6. Locally, almost every member of the censor staff had to work other jobs concurrently.

270. Shcherbakov composed a long analysis of the situation in literature (Jan. 2, 1936), professing optimism about recent and forthcoming literary works, but complaining that his deputy Stavsky was going behind his back (something Stalin encouraged). Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 284–8 (RGASPI, f. 88, op. 1, d. 474, l. 1–8). Shcherbakov had sent two memoranda to Stalin, Kaganovich, and Yezhov about a struggle to the death of “two camps” inside the underperforming Moscow Art Theater, “‘Priniat’ srochnnye mery k ozdorovleniiu’: 122–3 (APRF, f. 3, op. 35, d. 24, l. 10–1: Aug. 3, 1935), 125–6 (l. 18–21: Sept. 17), 131–2 (l. 33–4); Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 265–6, 267–9, 288–9, 327–31 (APRF, f. 3, op. 35, d. 24, l. 45–51: Oct. 11, 1936).

271. The committee was approved on Dec. 16, 1935, and Kerzhentsev named on Jan. 17, 1936. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 281 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 973, l. 3); Pravda, Jan. 18, 1936. See also Maksimenkov, Sumbur, 69 (RGASPI, f. 77, op. 1, d. 557, l. 1). Kerzhentsev must have been glad to escape radio, where the NKVD had turned up “anti-Soviet class alien elements, climbers, and hacks.” Goriaeva, Radio Rossii, 158–9 (APRF, f. 3, op. 35, d. 14, l. 44–60, 70–1: May 9, 1935); RGASPI, f. 17, op. 114, d. 588, l. 9–10. In 1937, Stalin would subordinate the Bolshoi, Maly, Moscow Art Theater, Vakhtangov State Theater, Kirov ballet, and others to the committee. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 114, d. 588, l. 12.

272. Maksimenkov, Sumbur, 77–9 (RGALI, f. 962, op. 10, d. 13, l. 12–3). Gorky had reached his wit’s end with Shcherbakov (“Literature for him is alien, a secondary matter”) and the bureaucratic machinations in the writers’ union. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 276–8 (RGASPI, f. 73, op. 2, d. 44, l. 17–20: Dec. 8, 1935); Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 413–5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 720, l. 101–6). In Sept. 1936, Shcherbakov would be sent back to Leningrad as second secretary. He was replaced at the writers’ union by Stavsky.

273. Maksimenkov, Sumbur, 88–112. Samosud’s production of Shostakovich’s Lady MacBeth had premiered in Moscow at the Bolshoi affiliate on Dec. 26, 1935, but Stalin had not attended. Soviet press accounts had been ecstatic. A third festival production, Bright Stream, also elicited superlatives; Stalin did not see that one either before it had closed. On Jan. 16, 1936—the same day as the government decree appointing Kerzhentsev to the new committee—Stalin, in the company of Kerzhentsev, Molotov, and others, returned for the final performance of Quiet Flows the Don. Again he showed himself applauding in the imperial box. Stravinsky would deem the opera Lady MacBeth “lamentably provincial.” Pravda criticized its sympathetic portrait of the murderess. Taruskin, “Opera and the Dictator,” 34–40.

274. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 307–8 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 976, l. 56). Of the Bolshoi dancers, only Igor Moiseyev (then 30 years old) remained, but the Leningraders commenced intrigues against him. Kerzhentsev enabled him to establish what would become a celebrated folk dance ensemble.Moiseev, Ia vospominaiu, 292–4.

275. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 829, l. 69–72. Pravda (Feb. 29, 1936) celebrated the achievements of Soviet film music.

276. RGALI, f. 962, op. 6, d. 42, l. 6. The NKVD’s Molchanov reported that most cultural figures properly understood the Pravda article, but named and quoted a number who had reacted with “anti-Soviet” remarks. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 290–5 (TsA FSB, f. 3 op. 3, d. 121, l. 31–8: Feb. 11, 1936). Gorky wrote to Stalin (March 1936) complaining of the vicious campaign against Shostakovich. Gorky also complained that the theater of “the genius Meyerhold” semed to exist solely for his lover, the actress Raikh, while the theater of “the genius Tairov” seemed to exist solely for the actress Koonen. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 300–2; Literaturnaia gazeta, March 10, 1993.

277. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 289–90 (APRF, f. 3, op. 35, d. 32, l. 42). See also Maksimenkov, Sumbur, 110–2. The day before Shostakovich was received, another attack had appeared in Pravda (Feb. 6, 1936) titled “Balletic Falsity” (about Bright Stream). See also Glikman, Pis’ma k drugu, 317.

278. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 308–9 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 163, d. 1108, l. 125–6: May 19, 1936); Maksimenkov, Sumbur, 227–8.

279. On Feb. 18, Bulgakov met with the new Moscow Art Theater director Mikhail Arkadyev, who asked about his next project. Bulgakov, according to his wife, “answered that the sole subject that interested him at the moment was Stalin.” This referred to a planned play, Batum, likely inspired by recent publications about Stalin’s days in the underground. Losev and Ivanovskaia, Dnevnik Eleny Bulgakovoi, 112, 114. The critic Osaf Litovsky had mercilessly attacked previews of Molière in the journal Sovetskoe iskusstvo (Feb. 11, 1936). Other vicious denunciations followed in lesser periodicals by Bulgakov rivals (Alexander Afinogenov, Yuri Olyesha, Vsevolod Ivanov).

280. “‘Polozhenie ego deistvitel’noe bezyskhodnoe,’” 117–9 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 163, d. 1099, l. 96–8: Feb. 29, 1936); Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 298–300 (otdel rukopisi GPB, f. 562, k. 19, d. 33). See also Sakharov, Mikhail Bulgakov, 439. In 1933, Bulgakov had authored a life of Molière in the series Lives of Remarkable People, a popular prerevolutionary staple which Gorky and Koltsov had revived, but the manuscript was rejected.

281. Pravda, March 9, 1936. (Yelena wrote in her diary: “When we read it, M. A. said, ‘the end of Molière is the end of Ivan Vasilevich.’”) Literaturnai gazeta followed suit (March 10). Kerzhentsev summoned Bulgakov on March 16, an encounter that lasted ninety minutes inside the just opened grandiose new Council of People’s Commissars building, on Hunters Row. Elena deemed it a “senseless meeting.” Losev and Ivanovskaia, Dnvenik Eleny Bulgakovy, 116, 118.

282. Losev and Ivanovskaia, Dnevnik Eleny Bulgakovoi, 72, 120–1. Whether the Bulgakovs knew that Kerzhentsev had been the author of the anonymous article against Bulgakov and the ban on his works is unclear. Maksimenkov, Sumbur, 184, 187–90. In Sept. 1936, Bulgakov would resign from the Moscow Art Theater and take a nominal position at the Bolshoi as a consultant-librettist, rewriting the illiterate works submitted by Soviet librettists who retained the credit for them.

283. Stalin inserted “in connection with the 20th anniversary of the October Revolution.” Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 295–6 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 163, d. 1101, l. 65–6).

284. Miller, Soviet Cinema, 26–9.

285. Pravda, July 3, Aug. 20, 21, and 25, 1935; Doklad komissii B. Z. Shumiatskogo, 150; Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 1026–7 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 828, l. 55–56ob.). After Shumyatsky had returned, he wrote to the Council of People’s Commissars, on Sept. 29, 1935, requesting hard currency to purchase copies of Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times. Molotov indicated it was for the politburo to decide. (Kaganovich wrote on the document: “I do not object, though we should know its content.”) It turned out to be a smash hit in the USSR. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 286–7 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 163, d. 1082, l. 114–5; op. 3, d. 972, l. 14: Oct. 7, 1935); Pravda, Dec. 2, 1935.

286. Stalin, with Svetlana and Vasily present, watched Girlfriends, written and directed by Leningrad’s Lev Arnstham, with music by Shostakovich. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 1031–3 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 829, l. 64–6).

287. Shumyatsky explained the enormous efficiencies of having producers for each film and centralized studios—a single Hollywood studio was outproducing all Soviet cinema—and argued that a single location would enable economies of scale and eliminate the costly trips around the USSR in search of sites for each film. Just 45 Soviet films had been completed in 1935, against a plan of 130, and 46 would be made in 1936, against a plan for 165. For its Hollywood, the government settled on the Lapsi valley near Foros in Crimea, with an initial budget of 400 million rubles. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 312–14 (APRF, f. 3, op. 35, d. 63, l. 23–6: Shumyatsky to Stalin, March 26, 1936), 327 (RGASPI, f. 82, op. 2, d. 958, l. 15, 16: Shumyatsky to Molotov, July 15, 1936); Taylor, “Ideology as Mass Entertainment,” 215–6; Kino, July 4, 1936: 4.

288. In their letter to Stalin, which he forwarded to Shumyatsky and the politburo, the satirists pointed out that in Hollywood directors did not use natural light anyway, shooting their works on indoor sets. Stalin dismissed their letter as blowing hot air. But Shumyatsky found himself on the receiving end of Kerzhentsev’s denunciations for insubordination. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 302–5 (APRF, f. 3, op. 35, d. 63, l. 23–7: Ilf and Petrov to Stalin, Feb. 26, 1936), 1050–1 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 829, l. 94–6); Deriabin, Letopis’ rossiiskogo kino, 1930–1945, 399, 408, 419. Hearsay has Beria learning of the proposed construction in Sukhum of a cinema city, and instigating the Ilf and Petrov opposition letter. On Dec. 26, 1935, Chiaureli had screened The Last Masquerade for Stalin, Beria, Svetlana, and Vasily. Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 1033–4 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 828, l. 67–8); Fomin and Deriabin, Letopis’ rossiiskogo kino, II: 391–2; Minchënok, Isaak Dunaevskii, 302–19 (no citations).

289. Ilf and Petrov were in the United States Sept. 19, 1935, to Jan. 22, 1936, and accredited as correspondents of Pravda. Ilf, with his Leica, took a wealth of photographs, which he and Petrov published along with eleven light, satirical installments about their travels in the illustrated mass magazine Ogonyok. They found ordinary America provincial and ignorant of the outside world. Ilf and Petrov, Odnoetazhnaia Amerika; Wolf, Ilf and Petrov’s Road Trip, 136 (quotation); Ilf and Petrov, “Amerikanskie fotografii”; Rodchenko, “Amerikanskie fotograiia Il’ia Il’fa.”; Anderson et al., Kremlevskii kinoteatr, 1050–1 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 829, l. 94–6).

290. These data were for Jan. 1, 1937. Zemskov, “GULAG,” 11 (GARF, f. 9401, op. 1, d. 4157, l. 201–5), reproduced in Davies et al., Years of Progress, 432. Mikoyan had pushed for the construction of large meat factories in Moscow, Leningrad, Orsk, and Semipalatinsk, on the model of Chicago slaughterhouses, and Stalin backed him. The machinery was to be imported from Germany, the labor to come from the Gulag. Pavlov, Anastas Mikoian, 73 (citing RGASPI, f. 84, op. 1, d. 135, l. 1–2).

291. Yagoda sent a directive (April 2, 1936) to all camp commandants demanding they combat insect infestation, wash barrack floors and clothes, reduce the interminable queues and food poisonings at mess halls, and ensure that forced laborers, especially skilled ones, were employed properly. Kokurin and Petrov, “Gulag,” 113–7. The regime was cutting costs and mortality statistics with mass releases of invalids and the chronically ill, and incentivizing productivity with early release of inmates who earned the designation “shock worker.”

292. From inception in 1932 through 1941, Dalstroi would produce 430 tons of pure gold. Shirokov, Dal’stro, 141 (citing GAMO, f. R-23ss, op. 1, d. 5, l. 14–5); Khlusov, Ekonomika Gulaga, 74–7 (GARF, f. 5446, op. 20a, d. 9496, l. 2–3, 6, 58: Oct. 30, 1937). The steep rise in gold production enabled the USSR to export 411 gold rubles’ worth of precious metals between 1932 and 1936. Dohan, “Economic Origins of Soviet Autarky,” 610.

293. Khaustov, “Deiatel’nost’ organov,” 67 (TsA FSB, f. 8os, op. 1, d. 80, l. 39, 51). Yagoda also noted that the ranks of the regular police in 1935 were still only half the total in 1913 (albeit for a somewhat smaller country: no Poland, Baltic states, or Bessarabia). Shearer, “Social Disorder, Mass Repression,” 518 (citing GARF, f. 5446, op. 18a, d. 904, l. 2–14).

294. Paris Midi, Feb. 28, 1936. This was only Hitler’s second interview for the French press, and the first since fall 1933. For a detailed chronology of Nazi foreign policy through 1938, see Jacobsen, Nationalsozialistische Aussenpolitik, 765–841.

295. DBFP, 2nd series, XVI: 73–7 (Feb. 28, 1936); Toynbee, Acquaintances, 279–82; Medlicott, Britain and Germany, 24 (C1814/4/18 FO 371/19891). Toynbee was director of studies at Chatham House, at Balliol College, Oxford University, from 1924. McNeill, Arnold J. Toynbee. Surits, the Soviet envoy, desperately scoured the German press for any lessening of hostility and wrote to Moscow (late Feb. 1936) that it was widely believed in the diplomatic corps “that German military circles continue to follow a special line in German policy toward the Soviet Union.” Abramov, “Osobaia missiia Davida Kandelaki,” 149, (citing AVP RF, f. 082, op. 19, pap. 83, d. 4, l. 36).

296. Ambassador von Moltke reported that Göring’s “declaration was received with obvious satisfaction.” DGFP, series C, IV: 1201–2 (Feb. 26, 1936).

297. Shillony, Revolt in Japan; Crowley, Japan’s Quest for Autonomy, 244–300.

298. Trotsky would seize upon the Roy Howard interview (“the export of revolution is nonsense”) to reassert his “gravedigger” portrait of Stalin. Revolution Betrayed, 186.

299. New York World Telegram, March 4, 1936; Pravda, March 5, 1936, reprinted in Sochineniia, XIV: 116–31. In mid-March 1936, returning from a trip through Western Europe, Uborevičius told a gathering of the Communist Youth League in the Western province that he expected war in the Far East “at any moment” and that “in this year or the next, or in two to three years, it’s unavoidable that we will have an encounter with German fascism. . . . The fascists cannot not unleash war. Without war they cannot long exist.” “Dva ochaga opasnosti: vystupeniie komanduiushchego Belorusskim voennym okrugom komandarma 1 ranga I. P. Uborevicha na soveshchanii v Zapadnom obkome VLKSM v 1936 g.” See also Erickson, Soviet High Command, 397–400.

300. War minister Blomberg and the German brass were apprehensive and instituted extensive air-raid precautions, spreading the anxiety. Hossbach, Zwischen Weltkrieg und Hitler, 97–8; Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 262.

301. Fröhlich, Tagebücher von Joseph Goebbels, III/ii: 30 (March 2, 1936).

302. Medlicott, Britain and Germany, 24–5 (citing CP73[36], CAB24, 261, extract in FO 371/19889); DBFP, 2nd series, XV: 713–36.

303. The German ambassador reported that the war minister, Duff Cooper, had told him “that though the British people were prepared to fight for France in the event of a German incursion into French territory, they would not resort to arms on account of the recent occupation of the German Rhineland.” DGFP, series C, V: 57–8 (Hoesch, March 9, 1936); The Times, March 13, 1936. “With two lunatics like Mussolini and Hitler you can never be sure of anything,” Prime Minister Baldwin would observe. “But I am determined to keep the country out of war.” Jones, Diary with Letters, 191 (April 30, 1936).

304. DBFP, 2nd series, XVI: 45–226; Braubach, Der Einmarch deutscher Truppen, 26–8; Emmerson, Rhineland Crisis, 97–8; Gunsburg, Divided and Conquered, 301–1; Bell, France and Britain, 205–6; Adamthwaite, France, 37–9; Höhne, Zeit der Illusionen, 325. “The need, and yet the difficulty, for Britain and France to work in tandem was the dominant feature of Anglo-French relations,” one scholar aptly noted of the interwar period. Davis, Anglo-French Relations, 189.

305. Kershaw, Hitler: 1889–1936, 581–9. The United States did not bother to register a protest.

306. Shirer, Berlin Diary, 49–51. The ambassadors of Britain, France, the Soviet Union, and Poland chose not to attend. Dodd and Dodd, Ambassador Dodd’s Diary, 318 (March 7, 1936). Hitler, at the opera house, had proposed “negotiations” to demilitarize both sides of the Rhine, and yet again offered nonaggression pacts to all and sundry. Then, he dissolved the Reichstag and called for new elections (the Nazis would win a publicly announced 98.7 percent of the vote). Litvinov wrote to Maisky (March 9) castigating the British for rewarding aggressors by intending to enter negotiations with Germany now, pronounced “collective security” and the League of Nations in grave danger, and noted (March 10) Hitler’s finesse in driving a wedge between Britain and France. DVP SSSR, XIX: 130, 134.

307. DDF, 2e série, II: 15–6 (April 1, 1936).

308. The treaty specified “military aid” in the event of a third-party attack on either country. Article 3 stipulated that troops “will be withdrawn from that territory as soon as the danger is passed, just as took place in 1925 with respect to the withdrawal of Soviet troops.” The Soviets published the treaty with a delay, following a major border clash near Tamsagbulag that involved tanks and aircraft. Izvestiia, April 8, 1936; Tisminets, Vneshniaia politika SSSR, IV: 99–104. The Soviet-Mongolia treaty did not mention Chinese sovereignty over Mongolia (recognized in a 1924 Sino-Soviet agreement) and Chiang Kai-shek’s government sent two diplomatic notes of objection. Stalin played it both ways. “No other country except us recognizes Mongolia,” Stalin had told Genden. “You are still a part of China. We have no obligation to help you at all.” Friters, Outer Mongolia, 203–4 (citing Chinese Year Book, 1938, 321–2); China Weekly Review, April 7, 1936: 227, April 25: 270; Baabar, Twentieth-Century Mongolia, 347–8. The treaty was signed by Amar (head of state) and Genden (prime minister), but not long after the signing, Amar displaced Genden, whom the Mongol leadership resolved to send to Moscow as ambassador. Genden, upon arrival, would refuse to take up the post and would be sent to Crimea on “medical leave,” effectively taken hostage. RGANI, f. 89, op. 63, d. 21, l. 1–3, d. 25, l. 1; Dashpürev and Soni, Reign of Terror in Mongolia.

309. Stalin’s informal adviser Varga had been propagating the thinking that “the imperialists” might go after each other. Varga, “Konets Locarno.” Mistakenly, George Kennan surmised that Stalin had decided upon a great purge of the upper ranks (his potential opposition) following the March 1936 German reoccupation of the Rhineland, in order to gain a free hand to deal with Germany. But in foreign policy he already had a free hand, and the terror was not a single decision. Kennan, Russia and the West, 286–90. Kennan’s argument was repeated by Ulam, Stalin, 404–7.

310. DDF, 2e série, II: 15–6 (April 1, 1936).

311. Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, 78 (citing FSB archives). See also Sibley, “Soviet Industrial Espionage.”

312. Le Temps, March 19, 1936; Izvestiia (March 24, 1936), reprinted in Molotov, Stat’ i rechi, 231–3, and DVP SSSR, XIX: 166–72. See also Watson, Molotov, 133–4. Also in 1936, Eliava, deputy commissar for foreign trade, let on to the Soviet embassy staff in Berlin that in Moscow, “at the top,” they evaluate Hitlerism “differently.” Gnedin, Iz istoriia otnoshenii, 37; Nekrich, 1941, 23. See also Hilger and Meyer, Incompatible Allies, 267–8.

313. Molotov reverted to Georgian at the end: “Gaumardzhos saakartvelos mshromel khakhs!” “Long live the toilers of Georgia!” Pravda, March 21, 1936; Molotov, Velikaia druzhba, 55–60.

314. Paustovsky, Story of a Life, 133–4.

315. Chukovsky, who spoke at the congress, had spotted Pasternak, whom he fetched to take an open seat next to him. Chukovskii, Dnevnik, 141 (April 16 and April 22, 1936). See also Baruzdin, “O Kornee Chukovskom,” 111–21; Bode, “Humor in the Lyrical Stories”; Luk’ianova, Kornei Chukovskii, 624–6. Also in April 1936, Stalin allowed the imprisoned Victor Serge to leave the USSR for the West, despite understanding that Serge would campaign against the Stalinist line, with the credibility of a firsthand observer. His release testified to the importance Stalin attached to the fellow-travelers, especially Rolland. So improbable did Serge’s release seem that Krivitsky, the Soviet spy in the Hague, suspected Serge of being an NKVD plant sent to infiltrate the Trotskyites. But Stalin did not need to pay the cost of international defamation by Serge to infiltrate the Trotskyists; he had already done so. Krivitsky, MI5 Debriefing, 40–9 (letter to Boris Nicolaveksy, Paris, Oct. 25, 1938). Like Trotsky, Serge would die in a Mexican villa (in Serge’s case, in 1947, of a heart attack, just short of fifty-seven years old).

316. Pravda’s account omitted Voroshilov’s improvisational references to Bolshevik vigilance in the context of filling glasses. Stalin altered the wording for the newspaper of his toast for Voroshilov, eliminating “to the Supreme Leader [vozhd’] of the Red Army.” There was only one Supreme Leader of the army as well as the country. Nevezhin, “Bol’shie Kremlevskie priemy Stalina” (no. 3), 134–6 (citing RGASPI, f. 74, op. 1, d. 164, l. 206–13); Pravda, May 4, 1936; Krasnaia zvezda, May 4, 1936.

317. Voennye arkhivy Rossii, 62; Isserson, “Zapiski sovremennika o M. N. Tukhachevskom,” 73–5; Vinogradov, “1937: pokazaniia marshala Tukhachevskogo,” (no. 9), 63. “The neutrality of the Baltic states plays a very dangerous role for us,” Tukhachevsky would explain at length in prison in 1937, and underscore the need for a proper base far better than Kronstadt on the Baltic. He would add that “war against Finland presents a completely independent problem, difficult to a sufficient degree for us.” Vinogradov, “1937: pokazaniia marshala Tukhachevskogo” (no. 8) 48 (no. 9), 62.

318. Tukhachevsky replaced Alexander Sedyakin, who had been the subject of relentless criticism, not least from Tukhachevsky himself. Ken, Mobilizatsionnoe planirovanie, 350. More broadly, see Gareev, “Ob opyte boevoi podgotovki voisk.”

319. Vinogradov, “1937: pokazaniia marshala Tukhachevskogo,” (no. 8), 48 (between May 26 and June 10, 1937). If, in 1914, the tsarist army foresaw 360 train cars per day for its mobilization goals in the West (the number would reach 560 per day by 1917), the USSR in the mid-1930s in the western theater could perhaps count on 436 per day. Menning, “Sovetskie zheleznye dorogi,” 363.

320. Simonov, Voenno-promyshlennyi kompleks SSSR, 91–2; Reese, Stalin’s Reluctant Soldiers; Mawdsley, review of Roger Reese, War in History, 7/3 (2000): 375–7. Despite the vast buildup, some exhibited a startling lack of confidence. “Of course, the USSR is not prepared to fight a war, neither politically nor economically, we need to gain at least three to five years,” Ivan Kutyakov, deputy commander of the Volga military district, had written in his diary (Jan. 9, 1936). Viktorov, Bez grifa “sekretno,” 258–9.

321. Stalin had met with Tukhachevsky six times in 1931, eight times in 1932, seven times in 1933, twice in 1934, and three times in 1935. Stalin again received him on July 21, 1935, with Voroshilov and Yegorov, among others. Na prieme, 154, 718. In April 1936, Banner of Russia, a Russian-language monthly published by the emigration in Prague, concluded a sensational four-part series about “Kraskomov,” said to be a clandestine organization of Red Army commanders plotting a putsch. The April issue offered responses to letters received doubting Kraskomov’s existence and wondering, if it did exist, why Banner of Russia would expose it. A military coup to save Russia from Communism was a long-standing fantasy of the emigration, which was penetrated by the Soviet secret police. Lukes, Czechoslovakia between Stalin and Hitler, 92–4; Znamia Rossii, Dec. 1935, Feb., March, and April 1936. In parallel, Voroshilov had received a convoluted secret report that insinuated a “secret connection” between Red Army and Nazi military circles would enable the Germans to bring forth a “friendly” regime in Moscow. The report, said to be by a White Russian officer for the French General Staff, had been shared with the Czechoslovak staff, which, in turn, passed it to Moscow. Samuelson, Plans for Stalin’s War Machine, 185–6 (RGVA, f. 33987, op. 3, d. 740, l. 170–5: Dec. 6–7, 1935).

322. The trade protocol was signed on April 29, 1936. DGFP, series C, V: 488–94. See also Ericson, Feeding the German Eagle, 35–6; and DGFP, series C, IV: 1009–10 (Jan. 18, 1936). On April 19, Litvinov had fretted to Surits in Berlin that any new large trade deal with Germany would alienate France and “play into Hitler’s hands.” Abramov, “Osobaia missiia Davida Kandelaki,” 149 (citing AVP RF, f. 010, op. 11, pap. 68, d. 34, l. 85 –7).

323. Bessonov’s offer included walking back criticism (made by Litvinov in Geneva) of the Rhineland militarization. DGFP, series C, V: 512 (Andor Hencke: May 6, 1936). Bessonov was accompanied by Yevgeny Gnedin, who would later falsely deny the involvement of himself or the foreign affairs commissariat in efforts to win over Nazi Germany. Gnedin, Katastrofa i votrooe rozhdenie, 34–5. Andor Hencke had been German consul in Kiev, and witnessed the famine.

324. Schacht, who was trying to rein in expenditures and inflation, miscalculated in suggesting Göring’s appointment. Overy, Göring, 40. Stalin had received Kandelaki without foreign affairs commissariat personnel on March 16, 1936; again, five days later, with a slew of police, intelligence, and military men; and finally, with Litvinov and Stomonyakov on April 4. Na prieme, 181, 183.

325. DGFP, series C, V: 571–3 (May 20, 1936).

326. Niclauss, Die Sowjetunion, 192 (citing Dirksen report, May 19, 1936).

327. DGFP, series C, V: 572.

328. Dembski, “Pol’sko-Sovetskie otnosheniia,” 196–7 (citing Akten zur Deutschen Austwärtigen Politik [ADAP], series C, VI/1: doc. 341); and Archiwum Akt Nowych, Warszawa, MSZ, Kabinet Ministra, 108, A.T. II, k. 47–8). Germany remained in arrears on paying transit costs for freight through the Polish Corridor, owing to hard currency shortages. On May 22, 1935, during a monologue with Polish ambassador Lipski, Hitler alluded to the need to build a railroad through the Polish Corridor, according to the Polish record—information Stalin received. Morozov, Pol’sko-Chekhoslovatskie otnosheniia, 242 (citing AVP RF, f. 02, op. 1, d. 35, l. 162–9: Lipski from Berlin, May 27, 1935). Von Moltke had broached the railroad idea to Beck back on May 26, 1934. Wojciechowski, Stosunki polsko-niemieckie, 200–1, 232.

329. Golubev et al., Rossiia i zapad, 157 (citing RGASPI, f. 78, op. 1, d. 636, l. 73). Leopold Trepper, the military intelligence operative, recalled Berzin saying that “here we talk the whole time about the Nazi threat, but it is envisioned as something very far off.” Trepper, Bol’shaia igra, 79.

330. Robertson, “Hitler and Sanctions.” Mussolini had given approval for Hitler’s Rhineland remilitarization in advance.

331. The British, despite everything, were still trying to restart negotiations for an air-force arms limitation agreement with Germany. The Italians had mobilized half a million men and lost just 3,000 killed. On May 5 Italian troops took Addis Adaba. Bosworth, Mussolini’s Italy, 396–7. Ethiopia never officially surrendered. On June 18, 1936, Britain would end the limited economic sanctions imposed in 1935. The Soviet Union, along with China, the United States, and three others, would not recognize Italy’s annexation. Italy would use far more aerial bombing and chemical weapons in Ethiopia after the nine-month war of conquest, during the period of “rule.”

332. Medlicott, Britain and Germany, 26–7 (citing C3662–3/4/18 FO 371/19905). The remark is absent from the German record: DGFP, series C, V: 547–9 (May 14).

333. Weinberg, Foreign Policy, I: 363 (citing U.S., 1936, I: 300–1).

334. Sats, Sketches from My Life, 210–27. Attendance at opening night “was poor,” the composer lamented to himself, and it “failed to attract much attention”—a problem of venue. Prokofiev, Autobiography, 89.

335. Morrison, People’s Artist, 29–49. See also Morrison, Sergey Prokofiev and His World. Prokofyev would compose a series of “mass songs” (op. 66, 79, 89), adapting the lyrics of poets who were in favor, and in 1939 the oratorio Zdravitsa or Hail to Stalin (op. 85).

336. The orchestra portrayed the decadent world that the woman leaves behind, a trope borrowed from Chaplin’s Modern Times. A black doll was used for the infant son. During the filming of Marion Dixon’s escape from the American troupe, Orlova tripped on the slag under the railroad tracks, ripping her stockings and skirt and bloodying her knees. She got up and shouted, “Is the baby alive?” The film’s long-gestating appearance coincided with the opening of an outdoor cinema in Moscow’s Gorky Park called “Giant,” which had a three-story screen and a 400-watt imported sound system (instead of the usual Soviet-made 8–10 watts), and which could hold up to 20,000 people on wooden benches. Salys, Films of Grigorii Aleksandrov, 5, 123–200; Taylor, “Illusion of Happiness”; Kushnirov, Svetlyi put´, 145–6; Malkov, “Charlie Chaplin i Dunaevskii.”

337. Kuromiya, Freedom and Terror, 184–200.

338. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 829, l. 84–5; Pyr’ev, Izbrannye proizvedeniia, I: 74–5. Stalin, after previewing the film (Feb. 28), had introduced a new denouement whereby Anna learns of the villain’s dark past and turns a gun on him, at which point the local party chief tells us the villain had killed the Communist Youth League activist and is a foreign spy, and the NKVD escort him away. The film would be shown in the United States beginning in July. After the film, Pyryev was suspended by Mosfilm, for reasons that are unclear, but managed to relocate to Ukraine. Iurenev, introduction to Ivan Pyr’ev v zhizni i na ekrane, at 32.

339. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 19, l. 78 (Feb. 27, 1936); “O tak nazyvaemom ‘antissovetskom ob’edinennomn Trotskistsko-Zinov’evskom tsentre,” 83 (Léopold, March 25, 1936); no. 9: 35 (Vyshinsky’s comment to Stalin on Yagoda’s letter, March 31).

340. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 753 (APRF, f. 3, op. 24, d. 223, l. 1–2: April 29, 1936). The ones found with Trotsky’s Bulletin were Eduard Goltsman and A. N. Safonova.

341. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 756 (APRF, f. 3, op. 24, d. 224, l. 130); RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 19, l. 172.

342. Khaustov et al., Lubianka: Stalin i VChK, 757–63 (APRF, f. 3, op. 24, d. 225, l. 71–86).

343. RGASPI, f. 17, op. 2, d. 572, l. 34ob.–35; APRF, f. 3, op. 22, d. 150, l. 129; Davies et al., Years of Progress, 301–2.

344. Pravda, June 5, 1936.

345. Getty and Naumov, Road to Terror, 231–5 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 2, d. 572, l. 67–73).

346. Gorky visited his son’s grave on May 27, 1936. Stalin managed to see Gorky on June 8 and June 12. Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 420 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 720, l. 121); Rossiiskaia gazeta, June 17, 2011. Mekhlis had written to Stalin (May 27) that Gorky had submitted an article for Pravda, “The History of the Young Person in the 19th Century,” which he judged full of philosophical issues that “raise doubts.” Stalin ordered Mekhlis to publish the essay without changes. Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 418 (citing RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 720, l. 119).

347. Pravda, June 21, 1936; Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 310 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 978, l. 55); Yedlin, Maxim Gorky, 214.

348. Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 310 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 978, l. 55); Letopis’ zhizni i tvorchestva A. M. Gor’kogo, IV: 599. Gorky had requested in his will to be buried next to his son. Shentalinsky, Arrested Voices, 276.

349. MacNeal, Stalin, 206; Tucker, Stalin in Power, 364.

350. Shentalinsky, Arrested Voices, 274.

351. The most authoritative study of Gorky’s death, by the then head of IMLI, inclined towards natural causes, without ruling out foul play: Barakhov, “M. Gor’kii,” 191. Gorky had returned to Moscow from his dacha in Tesseli, Crimea, on May 26, 1936. Malraux had visited Gorky at Tesseli March 7–10, in the company of Koltsov, who wrote of Gorky: “He was not well.” Babel, also present, found Gorky alone and depressed. Letopis’ zhizni i tvorchestva A. M. Gor’kogo, IV: 575–6, 586–93, 600–1; Shentalinsky, Arrested Voices, 269. Koltsov had conveyed a request from Malraux to see Stalin; Stalin chose not to grant an audience. Maksimenkov, Bol’shaia tsenzura, 411–2 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 754, l. 77–77ob.).

352. Kuskova, “Na rubezhe dvuh epoch.” Carr, in an obituary in the Spectator (June 26, 1936), wrote that “posterity will not place Gorky with Dostoevsky, Chekhov and Tolstoy.” See also Schroeder, Mit der Menschheit auf Du und Du, 83–5; and Trotsky, Portraits, 160–3 (July 9, 1936). That same day, Gide lunched with Babel and Eisenstein in Babel’s Moscow apartment. Gide praised the USSR to the skies, but after he left, according to an informant for the NKVD, Babel said, “Do not believe the rapture. He is cunning, like the devil . . . Upon return to France he could conjure up some devilish piece.” Artizov and Naumov, Vlast’, 316–8 (TsA FSB, f. 3, op. 3, d. 65, l. 225–8: July 5, 1936). Mikhail Apletin, the head of all-Union society of foreign cultural ties, noted of Gide, “he’s not a simple writer like Rolland.” Clark, Moscow, 140 (RGALI, f. 631, op. 14, d. 5, l. 18).

353. Kotkin, “Modern Times.”

354. Vastly increased organization of society by the state under Stalin was one of the main reasons for the marked increase in his state’s capacity. Kotkin, Magnetic Mountain. Hannah Arendt’s characterization of the Nazi and Soviet regimes as almost condemned “to organize everyone and everything within its framework and to set and keep them in motion” was apt. Arendt, Origins of Totalitarianism, 361, 326. Barrington Moore noted the coincidence in Soviet politics of heavy coercion and grass-roots activism. Moore, Soviet Politics, 403. See also Gelb, “Mass Politics under Stalin.”