III The Rise and Fall of the Camp-Industrial Complex 1940-1986,
[with subheadings: 19. The War Begins; 20. "Strangers"; 21. Amnesty — and Afterward; 22. The Zenith of the Camp Industrial Complex; 23. The Death of Stalin; 24. The Zeks Revolution; 25. Thaw and Release; 26. The Era of dissidents; 27. The 1980's: Smashing Statues.]
When the Nazi-Soviet war broke out June 22-nd, 1941, the news created horror for political prisoners, with a reason — "enemies of the people" were singled out for increased repression and execution. (Prisoner mortality rates were highest for 1942 and 1943 in the Gulag's history; 352,560 in 1942; 267,826 in 1943).
As the German invasion proceeded with shocking speed, in some cases the NKVD simply panicked, mostly in the newly acquired territories of Poland and the Baltic States, where jails were overflowing with “political” prisoners.
One of the more interesting chapters is "Strangers", dealing with the foreign prisoners. "With no warning, the NKVD plucked Poles, Balts, Ukrainians, Belorussians and Moldavians out of their bourgeois or peasant world, and dumped them in large numbers into the Gulag and exile villages." Their arrests began after the occupation of Poland, Romania, Baltic States. The NKVD goal was for security and Sovietization — they targeted people whom they thought would likely oppose the Soviet regime. These arrests and deportations did fit neatly into Stalin's grand plan to populate the remote northern regions of Soviet Union.
Also, some minority groups of the Soviet Union joined the Poles and Balts — Volga Germans, Finns in Karelia, small Caucasian nations like Karachai, the Balkans, the Kalmyks, the Chechens, the Inguish, Crimean Tartars, Meshketian Turks, Kurds, as well as small groups of Greeks, Bulgarians and Armenians.
The deportation of these nationalities was argued by the Soviets as not a genocide — there were no mass executions...
At the Yalta Conference in February 1945, Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin agreed that all Soviet citizens must be returned to the Soviet Union. This happened against the will of many.
Then, in 1944, at the height of the Soviet-American friendship, the Vice-President of U.S.A., Henry Wallace, visited the Kolyma Gulag, "... and never knew that he was visiting a prison..." Soviet propaganda was in high gear in the presentation of the life of Kolyma. Before leaving, at the banquet for his honour, Wallace stated: "Both the Russians and the Americans, in their different ways, are groping for a way of life that will enable the common man everywhere in the world to get the most good of modern technology. There is nothing irreconcilable in our aims and purposes. Those who so proclaim, are wittingly or unwittingly looking for war — and that, in my opinion is criminal." Obviously, this had some effect on the political climate.
In this context, Walter Duranty's (the New York Times correspondent in the Soviet Union, 1922-1941) contribution to the (deliberately) misleading information about the Soviet Union and the Gulag should be mentioned: he was a propagandist for Stalin. Once he remarked that a few million dead Russians were not important given the "sweeping historical changes there underway", and, "...you cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs." Duranty received the Pulitzer Prize for his coverage . Outcry deminds it be reviewed. The Pulitzer Board considered to revoke it, but did not carry it through. (Globe and Mail, Oct. 25-2003). Thus, this is another example of the factors influencing the historical perception of the Soviet system.
In July 1941, the NKVD started to release certain categories of prisoners directly into the Red Army, "those sentenced for missing work, for ordinary and insignificant administrative and economic crimes". This had an enormous impact on demography of the camps: new prisoners poured into the camps, mass amnestia freed the others, and millions died, making statistics-keeping deceptive.
The Cold War threat was an excuse for Stalin to tighten his control over people. The NKVD was reorganized; the Ministry of Interior Affairs (MVD) continued to control the Gulag and exile villages, becoming indeed a ministry of forced labour. KGB would control the counter intelligence and foreign intelligence, border guards and surveillance of the regime's opponents. New arrests were made (particularily at the end of the 1940's). Gulag did expand. The number of special exiles also grew, due to major deportations from Baltic States, Moldavia and Ukraine, deliberately designed to complete the "Sovietization".
The Nature of politicals had changed too. The politicals arrested in 1930's had been intellectuals, party members and ordinary workers. In the postwar years, the politicals included former Red Army soldiers, Polish Home Army officers, Baltic and Ukrainian partisans. Many were openly anti-Soviet and anti-communist.
The Gulag had a dilemma by that time: crack down on the criminal recidivists, to ensure the production (and profit) and functioning in the camp's enterprise, but they wanted to isolate counter-revolutionaries in order to prevent them inflating other prisoners with their dangerous views. It had become clear to the authorities that the camps were wasteful, corrupt and unprofitable. But nobody dared to take action during Stalin's lifetime.
When Stalin died March 5th, 1953, then on the next day Beria announced a reorganization of the secret police. Its responsibilities for the Gulag were handed over to the Ministry of Justice, keeping only the special camps for politicals within the jurisdiction of MVD. Many other Gulag enterprises were transferred over to ministries of forestry, mining and manufacturing.
Beria made also some other changes: the secret police was forbidden to use physical force against the arrested; attempted to liberalize policy towards Western Ukraine, the Baltic States, even East Germany; reversing the policies of Sovietization and Russification. Whatever the motives, Beria moved too quickly; his colleagues were disturbed, particularily Khruschev. Beria was arrested; by the end of 1953 he was dead.
After Stalin's death, a general confusion of the state reflected in the camps, resulting in revolutionary movements. Well organized anti-Stalinist, anti-Soviet communities in the camps grew. For instance, in Minlag the Balts had "a tight organization but without well-run hierarchy; the Ukrainians, mostly ex-partisans, were extremely well organized. In Minlag, the prisoners managed even to put out a secret underground newspaper, handwritten. In other camps, like Rechlag and Gorlag, organized strikes followed.
In July 1954, the Central Committee established the 8 hour working day, simplified the camp regimes, and made it easier for prisoners to earn early release through hard work. The special camps were dissolved. A wider debate of Stalinist justice started, revealing also statistics. By MVD own account, 3,777,380 people had been found guilty fermenting counter-revolution. Of these, 2,369,220 had been sent to camps. 765,180 sent to exiles, and 624,980 executed...
In February 1956, Kruschev openly attacked Stalin and the "cult of personality" which surrounded him. This shook Soviet Union to its core; within weeks the atmosphere in the camps changed; rehabilitation and releasing was speeded up.
(To be continued)
Filling in an historical void
Archived Articles | 28 Nov 2003 | Viktor VirakEWR
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