Leningrad affair

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The Leningrad affair, or Leningrad case (Russian: Ленинградское дело, Leningradskoye delo), was a series of criminal cases fabricated in the late 1940s–early 1950s by Joseph Stalin in order to accuse a number of prominent Leningrad based authority figures and members of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of treason and intention to create an anti-Soviet, Russian nationalist, organization based in the city.[1][2][3] This happened in the aftermath of the Siege of Leningrad during the war, the victorious end of which led to the mayor, his deputies and others who kept Nazi German forces out of the city earning fame and strong support as heroes all over the USSR.

Preamble

Moscow and Leningrad were two competing power centers in the Soviet Union. Researchers

Russian Revolution, Russian Civil War, execution of Grigory Zinoviev and the Right Opposition. In this earlier time, among Stalin's competitors from Leningrad who were also assassinated were two former leaders of the city, Sergei Kirov and Leon Trotsky, whose appointed subordinates continued to work in the city government for years after they left office.[1][4][5] During the siege of Leningrad, the city leaders were relatively autonomous from Moscow.[3] Survivors of the siege became national heroes, and leaders of Leningrad again gained much clout in the Soviet central government in Moscow.[3]

Events

In January 1949

Khrushchev and Lavrentiy Beria. Over two thousand people from the Leningrad city government and regional authorities were arrested. Also arrested were many industrial managers, scientists and university professors.[citation needed] The city and regional authorities in Leningrad were swiftly occupied by pro-Stalin communists transplanted from Moscow. Several important politicians were arrested in Moscow and other cities across the Soviet Union.[8]

As a result of the first prosecution, on 30 September 1950,

Council of Ministers), Alexey Kuznetsov, Pyotr Popkov, Ya. F. Kapustin and P. G. Lazutin were sentenced to death on false accusations of embezzlement of the Soviet State budget for "unapproved business in Leningrad", which was labeled as anti-Soviet treason. Several of those prosecuted were also accused of Russian chauvinism for their desire to create a separate Russian Communist Party.[3][1]

Executions

The verdict was announced behind closed doors after midnight and the six main defendants, including the

death penalty in the Soviet Union on 12 January 1950; it had previously been repealed in 1947. It was applied to the accused retroactively.[9][10][11] Over 200 Leningrad officials were sentenced to prison terms from 10 to 25 years. Their families were stripped of rights to live and work in any major city, thus limiting their lives to Siberia and other remote regions of the country.[citation needed
]

About 2,000 of Leningrad's public figures were removed from their positions and exiled from their city, thus losing their homes and other property. All of them were

Lenin portraits.[12]

The Leningrad affair was organised and supervised by Malenkov and Beria. Executions and purges were done by

MGB
. The graves of the executed leaders of Leningrad were never marked and their exact locations are still unknown.

All of the accused were later rehabilitated during the Khrushchev Thaw, many of them posthumously.[13]

Council of Ministers, and Iosif Shikin
, the political director of the Red Army, survived but their political careers were hampered for some time.

References

  1. ^ a b c "Leon Trotsky: On the Kirov Assassination (1934)". www.marxists.org. Retrieved 28 December 2018.
  2. ISBN 0-7615-0718-3
  3. ^ a b c d e "Stalin and the Betrayal of Leningrad". www.bbc.co.uk. Retrieved 28 December 2018.
  4. ^ "The Affair of Leningrad Centre...", from Russian Encyclopedia Krugosvet (in Russian)
  5. ISBN 0-385-47954-9
  6. ^ Malenkov against Zhdanov. Games of Stalin's favourites. (in Russian)
  7. ^ The "Leningrad Affair" Archived 2007-10-11 at the Wayback Machine (in Russian)
  8. JSTOR 129824
    .
  9. ISBN 978-5-94373-034-4. Archived from the original
    on 2013-12-07.
  10. ^ ""Ленинградское" дело (политический процесс 40–50 гг. XX века)". Memorial. Archived from the original on 2014-02-22. Retrieved 2014-02-16.
  11. ISBN 978-5-459-01201-9
    .
  12. ISBN 0-292-76589-4
  13. ^ William Taubman, Khrushchev: The Man and His Era, London: Free Press, 2004
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