Medvedev

Goldman

McLaughlin/McDermott

Higher ups in the Communist

Party, Army, Industry, Sciences,
What is their understanding etc.
of the groups most at risk,
the reasons for the arrests, Close possible opponents of
role of Communist Party
Stalin
leaders, and the issue of
mass participation?
**

Everyone, but especially those

with more risk factors. Relatives
with

Very much targeted, many times

personally by Stalin. See driving
Do the sources conceive of Ordzhonikidze and Krupskaya
the arrests as random or
crazy, destruction of old
targeted?
Bolsheviks

Semi-Targeted, but spreads like a Definitely Targeted, yet indiscriminate

disease because of the implication - Targeted in the same sense that an
of relatives and coworkers
Artillery barrage is targeted.

**

Catch 22 of needing to report,

prisoner's dilemma.

Mass & National Ops. Account for

majority of the victims, so class
enemies (of the 1930s) and foreigners,
particularly foreign communists, and
any group that might include spies.
p.143 there is relatively little
crossover between public party
denunciations and executions and the
massoperati (other than the occasional
use of zaivlenii to top off quotas)

Almost all arrest campaigns

directly ascribed to Stalin.
(doesn't know about massoperati)
Some allowances (p. 437) to logic
of the terror

How do they portray the

reactions of ordinary
people at the time? Did
people believe that the
arrests were justified?
***

Interestingly enough, we can look Fear, suspense, disbelief

No mention of this topic.
at Medvedev's attitude itself as
being an indicator of popular
-Lots of people thought that Stalin
understanding.
was unaware and that the NKVD
was at fault.
p. 415 non-party members slept
soundly, thought it was fine.
416-417: Some party stayed
loyal, others could see no way
out

Stalin, Ezov, and the Politburo.

How do you think that each
of the sources would
Stalin wanted to purge dudes to
summarize the reasons for solidify his position for WW2
the terror? Where do they
lay responsibility?
*

Intended killing of subject groups Stalin at the top, but also local
Accidental infection due to
party/NKVD which propagated the
Zaivelinie and policy on arrests. whole thing. p.134-beatings &forgery
of interrogation docs
The final breaking crest of
longstanding policies to destroy groups
that did not fit into the stalinist regime.
Zealousness causes this to spill over in
many areas into common population
folk.

Having not known about the

How would you personally massoperati, overplays stalin's
assess these various views? importance, but still a useful
critique nonetheless (focus on
Intersperse into everything. high positions)

Perhaps ascribes too much import to

massoperati, and especially plays down
the importance of the way that standard
public confessions worked together
with massoperati