THE RED TERROR
VISHNIAK, MARK
The Red Terror Part 1 .— Dzerzhinsky and the Vecheka By Mark Vishniak This Is th* first of fir* articlM iWoa—lqr th* fiat run*—* cowpnhwasiv* picture at Ah* owroiuuie maftMnt ihtt hti busn p...
...But such is ,the representation of "white" terror .only, and .by 'Iwhite" terror they mean the one of Bourbon, Napolean XII, of Thiers...
...Even during the period of official suspension of the death penalty, however, it was in practice still used...
...But that death by shooting was continued even after the abolition of the death penalty is a well known fact...
...In Kiev...
...We are allowed everything for we were the first to take up the sword not in order to enslave and suppress, but in the name of liberty and liberation from slavery," stated the organ of- the All-Ukrainian Cheka The Red Sword (No...
...On January 17, 1920, the Soviet of People's Commissars and the AllRussian Central Executive Committee resolved to abolish the death penalty imposed by the various Chekas...
...The Cheka must have one aim only — .victory— and must'triumph over .the .enemy, even when its sword accidentally strikes some innocent heads...
...This decision was dispatched by telegraph throughout Russia, but was reversed on March 24 of the same year...
...In this is the meaning and essence of the Red Terror" Dzerzhinsky tried to prove that, "The Cheka does not mete out justice, it is only a protector of the Revolution, it cannot pay any attention to whether some individuals might suffer from it or not...
...The ini-* tial period sanctified by ¦ Lenin's' authority predetermined all subsequent periods...
...A special school .was created lor the training of .Chekists, featuring lectures .about the -best methods pf sleuthing, spying and capturing .the enenties of the Soviets...
...1, August 18, 1919...
...the fat belly must be ripped open," wrote the publisher of that ^publication, Leon Krainy...
...These official figures greatly underestimate the actual number...
...After the October Revolution the Soviets also had to resort to a short period of red terror...
...jMFRXNG THIS FIRST period the Soviets still had .the courage tp publicly .defend .their acts...
...There was of course no excuse whatever for the terror even in this first period of Soviet power...
...The following tortures were used: cold water, corkcovered celhy permanent electric light, pricking . with needles, standing facing a wall, . sitting on a chair for hours at a time, and so on...
...The, death penalty was reestablished once more...
...We are destroying the bourgeoisie as a class...
...Jubilee of the workers of Soviet organs of State Security, whom the Soviet people traditionally coll Chekists", only the names of the "great i^nin", of the "wise Stalin" and of "the first CheWet Dzerzhinsky, the famous fearless.knight of .the Revolution" were given...
...In each town and hamlet, a larger or smaller...
...To all heads of the Special' Division of .the Vecheka in view of the abolition of the Death penalty.1 Suggest that all thOse who had to be executed for different forms of crime, be sent to the front line as a' place to whfch the present decree on the'death penalty does not*apply...
...There were also special military tribunals and the so-called Revkoms, or Revolutionary Tribunals which increased the number...
...How many were actually shot is not known...
...Has no one among you considered what a hostage is...
...the Red Cross counted 8,000 people executed from February to August,' 1819...
...This was to answer the white terror directed against the Bolsheviks by the Socialist-Revolutionaries and other White elements" (Volume .64, page 180...
...This executions became an ordinary and vulgar .occurrence, from ,4(nioh the • mask of mystic fear was torn away," according to a famous Russian author...
...J\ ' ;,V '.' <Z$t:y...
...The orders to be followed were,those issued by Zinoviey, the most popular leader of .that time, and chairman of the Comintern...
...At this titne.the word ''execution...
...Because of his love for .the distant .brother — humanity—Dzerzhinsky .thought that it was not only his right hut his duty to repress all human feelings towards his nearer hrother.-- fellowman...
...was atm a .bugaboo for the Soviets, .and .they, jnwfcrred to tolk .of ,the "highest measure of punishment'' and of the "hlghest.measure of social defense...
...There were in Kiev, at one .time, sixteen different extraordinary commissions, each meting out death sentences...
...nlngs of the Soviet regime...
...Dated December 1, 1920, the letter reads: "Is there among you no one who could remind you that such measures, which are a return to the worst times of the Middle Ages and re~ liptous wars, are not worthy of a people who knew how to build a future society on Communist foundations, and that those for whom the future of Communism is dear, could not employ such measures...
...The first question you must ask is: 'What class do you "belong to, what is your origin, your education and profession?' These questions must deter- ' mine the culprit's fate...
...ViahnUk, who to^t)^s*rT*<l as —qretary of th* Russia's only d*mocraikally.*l*oi*d pasiiai»*ni—U now on th* staff of Jime...
...Altogether, Russia of that time had more than one thousand torture chambers...
...But, in fact, it was not openly re, vealing its actions but publicizing the Bed Terror as a "moral" weapon...
...The phraseological coyness, or uiordophopia, As still shared by the Soviets...
...Do not ybur comrades understand that it is equal to the reestablishment of torture, not only for hostages but for their relatives too...
...At the trial, do not seek proofs or documents of guilt that someone in words or deeds acted against the'Soviets...
...A telegram sent by the head of the Special Division of the Vecheka (dated April 15, 1920—Np...
...Dzerzhinsky'* closest aides, Latsis, Peters and some others, who became famous because of their extraordiary cruelty, published special papers in which they debated the problem of the admissibiliy of physical torture from the point of view of revolutionary Marxism, and in which were printed lyrical effusions of many a Ohekist...
...In an account published by the Cheka for 1918 and 1919, the number of people shot was given as 9,641 including 7,068 counter-revolutionaries — as the Soviets understand that term...
...People were killed en masse, without ceremony...
...Jui the name of the future—Socialism —he consid^redit amoral duty of each revolutionary-Bolshevik to send to death every opponent of the "ideal...
...People were, not killed publicly in city squares, as in earlier epochs, but secretly, in cellars, in the city suburbs, in dumping places...
...Signed: Yagoda...
...Data are incomplete...
...WHEN THE SOVIET press on December 20, 1947, hailed the "30th...
...WHEN THE SHOOTING of Postages in Moscow was imminent,* famous prince Peter Kropotkin, the* father of ideological Anarcho-Com-r munism, sent a letter to Lenin...
...For Dzerzhinsky: "The Vecheka was the best thing the party ever created...
...Hext VfeeK 'The QPV, OGPV «nd Meruhinajky...
...He destroyed many people — guilty and innocent...
...Such was the state of affairs from the very begin...
...The fiig Soviet Encuclopediq, 1948, furnishes the following definition of the .word "terror": "A policy of .systematic intimidation of the enemy until j(tbe point Of) .com-, plete physical destruction...
...Zinoviev recommended: "//, out of a hundred million population, ten million do not want to obey the Soviets they have to be destroyed physically...
...Dzerzhinsky and his henchmen concentrated on that task without respite...
...People, were shot by the hundreds and thousands in the Crimea' in' 1920-1921, and after...
...The victims of the shootings were sometimes buried when still alive together with the dead...
...325/16, 746) reads as follows: "Confidential circular...
...Jzuestia, Ng...
...IT IS IMPOSSIBLE to estimate the exact number of people destroyed by the Red Terror...
...w-^ZUT DZERZHINSKY experl-1,lenced the thick and thin si *¦ the October uprising, when various fanatics could still believe that ''shortening a man by a head's length" as Trotsky once said—could help progress and hasten the triumph of socialism...
...The Red Terror Part 1 .— Dzerzhinsky and the Vecheka By Mark Vishniak This Is th* first of fir* articlM iWoa—lqr th* fiat run*—* cowpnhwasiv* picture at Ah* owroiuuie maftMnt ihtt hti busn p q^trnfrttrf'tV feature of *uMi«'#*QUh*rUE "*xp*rimwoV Th* story of lb* orsanuuuicn thai siarxAd ** th* Chuk* and is now WD will b* fold by Mark VUhniafc emtoent historian And farmer <W>B»attftn*1 law...
...In reprisal for the attempt on Lenin's ilife people .were shot on -sight 40' all towns and...
...According to official data, .five hundred people were shot' in Petrograd alone...
...The Red Terror, or .the .Soviet version, is represented in almost idyllic terms, as if it were a thing of the past...
...He signed an unheard-wf number of death sentences and doing this felt neither pity nor...
...At the same-time, along with the executions, moral and physical tortures were restored...
...Besides the recorded executions, there were a countless number of "on the spot" executions carried out by the provincial, town, country and railroad Chekas...
...Following this, the central organ of the Vecheka The Weekly (Numbers 1 to 16 of 1918) reported penalties of shooting" for gambling, for celebrating masses for the dead and for Nikolai Romanov, for committing robberies, for the "crime" of bourgeois origins, etc...
...We do not wage war against individuals...
...Even many nonBolsheviks were at that time under the Influence of a Russian poem by Nekrasov: • "That heart will never learn to love Which has been tired of hating...
...villages .of Soviet Russia...
...The bourgeois snake must have its venomous tongue torn out forever, and if necessary the greedy mouth as well...
...115, 1920, published a statement to the effect that 521 persons were condemned to death by shooting from January 17 to March 20, 1920...
...compunction," according to the testimony of Drugov, one of his colleagues in the Vecbekar Dzerzhinsky sent people to death out-of fear of a counter-terror and risked his lite frequently...
...number of "counter-revolutionaries" ' were put to death...
...Hostages were taken, including women and children...
Vol. 32 • April 1949 • No. 18
