Good morning Michael: So I suppose there is never a perfect time, with all going on. I did not quite have enough time to completely re-do a full literature search. But - if not now, it won't happen - so I will plop down what I have come to in my mind. So on Tukhachevsky (in some sources Tukhachevskii ). 1. Deutscher's assessment Since you start your note above with Isaac Deutscher, so will I ( notwithstanding the criticisms of him from many sides of the left- see Paul Flewers (2023) Isaac Deutscher and his left-wing critics, Critique, 51:4,515-563). I think Paul F was/is still on the list..? ].
Deutscher: "The Prophet Outcast 1929-1940; Volume 3 of his 'Trilogy on Trotsky'; 1963; Oxford; p. 386-7 : "Marshall Tukhachevsky, the deputy Commissar of Defence.. and actual Commander-in-chief of the Red Army".. (and 6 others..Ed) - no light has been thrown on the background to this purge. According to anti-Stalinist sources, Tukhachevsky, alarmed by the terror which was sapping the nation's morale and defences had planned a coup d'etat in order to overthrow Stalin and break ... the G.O.P.; but he had done this without any connection with Trotsky, let alone with Hitler or any foreign power. Trotsky did not believe that there had been any plot, but described Tukhachevsky's fall as a symptom of a conflict between Stalin and the officer corps, a conflict which would place a military coup 'on the order of the day'. >From Isaac Deutscher "Stalin A Political Biography"; NY, 1966 2nd Ed; FN No.1 >p. 421: "Tukhachevsky's warning (-on Hitler-ed) sharply contrasted with Stalin's ambiguity"... p.421 "Until Hitler's rise to power Soviet diplomacy pursued by and large the policy of Rapallo.. The politburo authorized Trotsky and Tukhachevsky to enlist German Military skill, the skill of unemployed officers and technicians, in the training of the Red Army"; p. 409 "The truth is that the officers' corps of the Red Army had been the only organization in the state upon which Stalin had not brought to bear the full measure of totalitarian pressure. ... Military art was one of the few politically important domains in which Stalin encouraged the original and experimenting mind, in which he did not impose the do's and don'ts of his pseudo-dialectical catechism. Until 1937 he had allowed Tukhachevsky a free hand.." p. 494. My summary, despite the implicit and explicit assumption that indeed Stalin controlled all events in the USSR - include these: i) Trotsky assumed it was logical that there was at some stage going to be a military coup d'etat; ii) Tukhachevsky was not impeded much by Stalin up till 1937; iii) Tukhachevsky - quite consistently with his position, had built up many contacts with the German military. I think Michael - thus far it seems to me unlikely anything too much controversial. If any Trotsky quotes are relevant and contrary, I am sure they will be cited by the List members. 2. Prevailing views about Marshall Tukhachevsky In this format here on the list, I'll be very synoptic and I'll first give what I think is a common prevailing view, and then give some contrary view below each section of that. I'll conclude with some speculation, which I think is the best that I can do. Right now, simply speaking - that is the best I can do. i) This so-called "plot" was so outlandish that it could not have been real and could not have happened, it was a figment of Stalin's warped and deadly imagination. As for Stalin's mental state - I cannot take seriously such Simon Sebag Montefiore-Robert Conquest - Daily Mirror type of views. There is far too much contrary evidence with many shrewd and insightful antagonists who actually met him or had to negotiate with him. I do not think that whoever states or believes that such a plot could not have existed, can be aware of what happened after the evidence of a 'fifth column' emerged in Spain. The term was coined by either one of two fascists generals of the Spanish army - General Franco or General Mola, to describe hidden columns: "Franco had claimed that there were four Nationalist columns approaching Madrid, and a fifth column waiting to attack from the inside." [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_column ]. The same source adduces places in Europe and also in the USA - with a brewing war that was widely felt - where this phenomenon had resonance: "In a speech to the House of Commons ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/House_of_Commons_of_the_United_Kingdom ) that same month, Winston Churchill ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winston_Churchill ) reassured MPs ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Member_of_Parliament_(United_Kingdom) ) that "Parliament has given us the powers to put down Fifth Column activities with a strong hand." [22] ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_column#cite_note-23 ) In July 1940, Time ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_(magazine) ) magazine referred to talk of a fifth column as a "national phenomenon". "In August 1940, The New York Times ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_York_Times ) mentioned "the first spasm of fear engendered by the success of fifth columns in less fortunate countries". One report identified participants in Nazi "fifth columns" as "partisans of authoritarian government everywhere", citing Poland ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poland ) , Czechoslovakia ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Czechoslovakia ) , Norway ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norway ) , and the Netherlands ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netherlands ). During the Nazi invasion of Norway ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norwegian_Campaign ) , the head of the Norwegian fascist party, Vidkun Quisling ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vidkun_Quisling ) , proclaimed the formation of a new fascist government in control of Norway, with himself as Prime Minister, by the end of the first day of fighting. The word "quisling" soon became a byword for "collaborator" or "traitor". Hence - Why is it so strange to think of this happening in the USSR? We saw above that per Isaac Deutscher, Trotsky had thought a coup d'etat was likely. ii) The Military Tribunal Trial against the Marshall fatally removed defences of the USSR against invasion The proof the pudding was in the eating - a favourite expression of Engels - and applicable here. But I return to this at the end, because no doubt it did hinder the USSR defence initially. However, there is one underlying assumption of this general view. That is the assumption that Tukhachevsky was a uniquely brilliant military strategist. We first really know of Tukachevsky from the Polish war. What happened there? Non-Stalinist military strategists have placed responsibility for the failed attack on Warsaw and the Red Army assault on Poland post First WW - squarely on Tukhachevsky. Not on Stalin - several dissections have examined tihs closely (For referencing see "Historians lay the blame for defeat" towards end at: https://mlrg.online/history/soviet-polish-relations-from-the-soviet-polish-war-to-the-warsaw-uprising-of-1944/ and amongst those cited references a more recent one is given here: Stephen Brown, “Lenin, Stalin and the Failure of the Red Army in the Soviet-Polish War of 1920”; Chapter 11; in Geoffrey Jensen (Ed), “Warfare in Europe 1919–1938” London 2008." Now - all of us can certainly make mistakes, perhaps especially in the context of a enormously important situation such as war. Perhaps Tukhachevsky just had to learn a bit more. There is however evidence that he was somewhat over-'fantastic' and 'pipe-dreaming'. David Stone is a military historian (and anti-Stalinist) who acknowledges that Tukhachevsky was a "maze of contradictions". He was undoubtedly an incredibly smart far-seeing strategist, but one who had major ambition to be the sole and un-restrained command of the army. This included removal of all political control. This had led to his rise in the army suddenly being halted: "Tukhachevsky had become Chief of Staff-the second most powerful Soviet military-by 1925. His rapid rise came to an abrupt halt, however, 1928 he was shunted off to command the Leningrad Military District... in itself no mean post.. ( But - ed ) for Tukhachevsky it meant that he was taken the whirl of Moscow politics and the Red Army's central administration, him from direct influence on Soviet military policy. Tukhachevsky's would end only in 1931 when he returned in triumph to Moscow to become of Armaments, coordinating the Red Army's relations with industry and of weaponry and equipment as well as military research." ( David R. Stone, "Tukhachevsky in Leningrad: Military Politics and Exile, 1928-31": Europe-Asia Studies , Dec., 1996, Vol. 48, No. 8 (Dec., 1996), pp. 1365-1386 ). But it more complex. Because the demotion, and subsequent re-promotion of Tukhachevsky revolved around two contradictory aspects. First his wish to be "dominant": "Documentary evidence suggests a new interpretation of Tukhachevsky's disgrace and return to glory. The true reason for his removal as Chief of Staff was his outspoken advocacy of the need for the Staff (and by implication, Tukhachevsky himself) to assume a dominant role in the Red Army..." ( ibid ) Around this time also, both main opposing groups within the Red Army had obtained the withdrawal of political commissars co-commanding the army forces. It was actually only regained after the start of the German invasion in 1941. ( Alexander Werth, "Russia at War 1941-1945"; 1964 NY; p.426 ). Tukhachevsky's return to prominence in Moscow - revolved around what was a theoretical plan that according to Stone, was "increasingly divorced from reality": "... however, Tukhachevsky increasingly turned his attention to military industry, and advocated vast production programmes, visualising a Red Army unleashing tens, even hundreds of thousands of planes and tanks against any enemy. Increasingly divorced from reality, Tukhachevsky's economic ideas were initially recognised for the fantasies they were..." ( ibid ). While Tukachevsky's plans were "unreal" - an element of value was seen in it by Stalin and/or echelosn of the Red Army. Evidently - since he was finally brought back to high position in Moscow. iii) Stalin did not have any common sense concerning the military purges but was taken up by blood lust Showing this not to be true, is the following data. Actually Stalin had already rejected an earlier note from the OGPU: " in 1930 when Tukhachevskii was incriminated in the OGPU’s operation vesna that ‘exposed’ a major military conspiracy among former imperial officers serving in the Red Army. On receiving news that Tukhachevskii had been incriminated as a counterrevolutionary on 10 September 1930, Stalin initially hesitated. He wrote to Sergo Ordzhonikidze two weeks later noting that the truth of Tukhachevskii’s incrimination ‘could not be excluded’ but that it was ‘necessary to think about this carefully’. Stalin postponed the issue until October when a face-to-face confrontation between Tukhachevskii and his accusers was arranged. Following this, Stalin was satisfied that Tukhachevskii was innocent, commenting to Molotov that he was ‘100% clean’. Stalin decided to tread carefully in 1930 and may have chosen to do so again in 1937 when the stakes were even higher. For details of the Tukhachevskii’s incrimination, Stalin’s initial reaction, and his final verdict, ( RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 778, ll.; Moscow, 1995, p. 231; Cited by Peter Whitewood, “ The Purge of the Red Army and the Soviet Mass Operations, 1937–38”;’ The Slavonic and East European Review, April 2015, Vol. 93, No. 2 (April 2015), p.305 ). iv) There was no objective reason to suspect Tukhachevsky of intrigue The most that we know of, is only at the level of what I would call circumstantial evidence. Note that the files are still closed as this was a military trial. They were not unsealed even by Khrushchev or Gorbachov. What is this circumstantial evidence? Incidents and non-Russian reports of Tukhachevsky in very close 'buddiness' to German military representatives are at this level ( Kotkin S; Volume 2 'Waiting for Hitler 1929-1941"; NY 2017; p. 269 ); and there are various reports of Tukhachevsky cosying up to various circles: "Marshal Tukhachevsky had been an observer at the autumn maneuvers of the German army in 1932. Accompanied by Litvinov he had attended the state funeral of King George V in London in January 1936, returning by way of Paris (where he spent a turbulent week as a guest of the French General Staff ), and Berlin, where it was rumored in Intelligence circles that he had made "secret" contacts with German officers and even with Russian emigres. Thus, Tukhachevsky the charge of heading up a conspiracy generals to overthrow Stalin." ( Paul W. Blackstock, "The Tukhachevsky Affair"; The Russian Review , Apr., 1969, Vol. 28, No. 2 (Apr., 1969), pp. 171-190 ). There are also various allegations of Tukhachevsky making anti-Jewish comments to various people and commenting on how Jewry would end once a Nazi-USSR alliance had been cemented. I do not cite those here, and these are clearly circumstantial. The same can be said of this note: "Bella Fromm's Blood and Banquets: A Berlin Social Diary, the entry for October 24, 1936, refers to a report by an agent, "Henry," of the French Ambassador's staff: "The Nazis snub the Russians in public, but I know that privately they have been in close contact with an extensive clique of Russian army officers. Quite a plot, too. Involves some of Marshal Tukhachevsky's highest staff officers. The clique entered into an agreement to effect the removal of Stalin. Afterward a pact with Germany against the world." ( Blackstock Ibid ). v) The Mastny-Benes note - and was this a 'planting of evidence'? The closest that we know of any substantive evidence is the so-called Mastny-Benes note. This is outlined as below: "In his memoirs Benes writes that Hitler to sign a secret nonaggression pact the knowledge of either the German For this purpose Benes had been approached twice, on November 13, and again on December 19, in the greatest secrecy by two special envoys, Count von Trauttmansdorff and Professor Haushofer, the Nazi "geo-political" expert. In the second half of January 1937 Benes received a report (apparently from his Ambassador, Mastny , in Berlin) of a conversation with Trautt- mansdorff in which the latter, "as a slip of the tongue," had un-wittingly revealed that Hitler was negotiating "with the anti- Stalin clique in the U.S.S.R., Marshal Tukhachevsky, Rykov and others. Hitler expected these negotiations to be successful and he was therefore not interested in bringing the discussions [about a secret nonaggression pact with Czechoslovakia] to a speedy conclusion ... I at once informed the Soviet Minister at Prague, Alexandrovsky, of what I had learned from Berlin. . ." What Benes calls "a slip of the tongue" by a high level Nazi official selected by Hitler to negotiate behind the back of his own Foreign Office has all the marks of a calculated leak. Apparently Hitler correctly assumed that the report would be promptly relayed by Benes to Stalin, and the way would be paved for forwarding the dossier of forged evidence as soon as it was ready." ( Blackstock Ibid ). Now we have to discuss the origin of those 'data' and 'reports' - which become more complex. There are (at least) three hypotheses that I have either read or that I have come up with on my account. No doubt I have not read all possible literature on this. I also must state that I have no Russian, other than through the uselessness of google translate. The first hypothesis is that this whole story should be taken at complete face-value and that indeed Tukhachevsky was in such a plan. ThIs is the analysis put by Ludo Martens ( 'Another view of Stalin', Antwerp 1996 ), Kenneth Neill Cameron " Stalin Man of Contradiction" Toronto 1987; Grover Furr (' Trotsky's Amalgalms" Kettering Ohio 2015) , and others. The second hypothesis is that they were divulged by the German Intelligence in the hopes that Benes would forward these in the then very 'hot' and threatening (to Czechoslovakia) environment to Stalin as the USSR or France was the Czech hope - and France was pretty ' soft '. The German hope in this scenario was that Stalin would then knock off the named generals and thus weaken potential defenses against Germany. This is the analysis taken by a number of academics, including Blackstone as above. The very often insightful Geoffrey Roberts (' Stalin's Wars' Yale 2006, p.17 ) seems to incline to this as he says "What is certain that the purged officers were innocent". While this is undoubtedly true, it it is also true that an intact 5th column would have been both disastrous and completely pivotal at the German entry into the USSR. And also, it must be noted that many of the purged officers of the Red Army and ranks were reappointed afterwards ( Roger R Reese '"The Red Army and the Great Purge"; in "Stalinist Terror New Perspectives"; Ed J.Arch Getty & Roberta T. Manning; Cambridge 1993; pp. 198-215 ). The third and final hypothesis I can come up with for what we know i- s that it was the Yezhov led Secret Services who had initially leaked this 'information; to the Germans to help them in turn 'tip off' Benes' who would be more believed that the forces within the USSR led by Yezhov. In 1966, a Soviet General Staff source, Dachichev, made these remarks : "Now for a word about the trial of our military leaders (the Tukhachevsky-Yakir group). The false evidence which was designed to permit their condemnation was prepared by the Gestapo; but the idea was Stalin's. He suggested it to the fascist leaders through the intermediary of General Skoblin. Unfortunately, the documents concerning this affair are inaccessible." Winston Churchill also suggests something similar ( Blackstock Ibid). My Interim Conclusions Undoubtedly the Khrushchev and Gorbachov regimes had their interests in not getting this file out. And yet so many of the Archives were in fact opened. My own view right now, is that the Yezhov-ites leaked the files to the Germans, who did their own part. I think that Stalin was in this, forced into a corner and was 'stung'. I think that he post-facto, realised this and assisted with reinstating many army officers. Getting rid of Yezhov and putting Beria in his place, in my view, was the key lever in this. I do not think that his academic biographer Amy Knight's book disproves this. But the full story will only emerge with the opening of those military court transcripts. Anyway - sorry Michael - wee bit tedious reading this I am sure. (Wee bit tedious writing it actually). It started with a "Good Morning", but various tasks and events accrued throughout the day - to make it an ending of Good Evening. Be Well, H -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#29653): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/29653 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/105034294/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. #4 Do not exceed five posts a day. -=-=- Group Owner: marxmail+ow...@groups.io Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [arch...@mail-archive.com] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
