purges of the 1930s

• Causes of the Great Terror

  • Opposition from the Politburo
  • Economic problems
  • Events during the Congress of Victors
  • Kirov's murder
• Opposition from the Politburo


  A group of moderates associated with Sergei Kirov, head of the Communist Party in Leningrad, were able to force some changes in policy in the early 1930s
• Kirov's defence of Ryutin


  1. Ryutin had circulated a document critical of Stalin's policies

  2. Kirov and Politburo moderates argued successfully that Ryutin should be sent to prison instead of executed
• Kirov's growing authority within the Party

  Was a challenge to Stalin
• Economic problems


  • Senior figures within government were aware of the problems with Stalin's industrial and agricultural policies, which undermined Stalin's authority in government
  • Stalin could blame workers and managers for the problems by accusing them of being wreckers and saboteurs
  • Stalin used wreckers and saboteurs as an army of slave labour in Gulags to build factories or mine resources
• Events during the Congress of Victors in February 1934 indicated that Stalin's position was under threat
• Kirov received 1225 votes compared to Stalin's 927 in the vote at the end of the Congress which elected the new Central Committee
• Senior members of the Party approached Kirov, urging him to stand against Stalin as General Secretary, but Kirov refused
• Kirov's murder in December 1934 was a useful pretext for launching the terror
• Some historians speculate that Stalin ordered the attack on Kirov, but no proof has ever been found
• Kirov's murder allowed Stalin to claim there was a dangerous conspiracy that aimed to overthrow the Communist Government
• The Great Terror


  1. Started in Leningrad in December 1934 after Kirov's murder

  2. Spread throughout the USSR in 1936 and reached its peak in 1937
• Show trials during the Great Terror

  • The Trial of the 16 in 1936
  • The Trial of the 17 in 1937
  • The Trial of the 21 in 1938
• Show trials


  • Removed Stalin's rivals
  • Destroyed the reputations of the key defendants, who confessed to plotting to murder Kirov and working with capitalist nations to overthrow the USSR
  • Were a tiny fraction of the Great Terror, which affected all aspects of the Party and the government
• 95% of those affected by the Great Terror were men between the ages of 30 and 45 who held senior positions in the Party or an important role in the economy
• Secret trials of the Red Army's leaders

  1. In 1937, 8 senior generals were tried for plotting to overthrow the government

  2. All were executed

  3. Following the trial more than 37,000 officers were purged from the army