Chapter 4: Impact Of The Great Terror

Question 1

What were the impacts of the show trials?

Answer 1

Provided Stalin’s opponents were corrupt

Bukharin, Kamenev, Zinoviev

Question 2

What was the political impact of the terror?

Answer 2

Divert attention away from problems
Give drama autonomy and remove blame
Stalin encouraged the ‘little people’ to hold their bosses to account

Question 3

How many party members sacked in Leningrad?

Answer 3

Greater than 1,000

Question 4

How many party members in Leningrad were arrested?

Answer 4

200 arrested and charged with being traitors - Confessions extracted using the conveyor belt system

Question 5

How were Jews viewed?

Answer 5

Potential spy and traitor, as they were more loyal to Jews than Russia. Purge against any ‘cosmopolitan’ Russian

Question 6

What was the percentage decrease in Jewish senior managers from 1945 to 1951?

Answer 6

12% to 4%

Question 7

During what years were the Jewish senior managers fall from 12% to 4%?

Answer 7

1945 to 1951

Question 8

How many people did Yagoda’s NKVD convict between 1935-36?

Answer 8

Half a million

Question 9

During what period had Yagoda’s NKVD convicted half a million people?

Answer 9

1935-36

Question 10

How many were shot by Yagoda’s NKVD between 1935-36?

Answer 10

2,300 people

Question 11

How many people were sent to the Gulag by Yagoda’s NKVD between 1935-36?

Answer 11

405,000

Question 12

How many officers were shot by Yagoda’s NKVD between 1935-36?

Answer 12

35,000

Question 13

During what period had Yagoda’s NKVD shot 2,300 people?

Answer 13

1935-36

Question 14

During what period had Yagoda’s NKVD send 405,000 people to the Gulag?

Answer 14

1935-36

Question 15

During what period had Yagoda’s NKVD shot 35,000 army officers?

Answer 15

1935-36

Question 16

During what period had Yagoda’s NKVD killed 23,000 NKVS agents?

Answer 16

1935-36

Question 17

How many NKVD agents were killed by Yagoda’s NKVD between 1935-36?

Answer 17

23,000

Question 18

When was Yeszhovs blood bath?

Answer 18

1937-38

Question 19

What happened between 1937-38?

Answer 19

Yezhov blood bath

Question 20

What percentage of adult males were executed or sent to labour camps?

Answer 20

10%

Question 21

What happened to 10% of the adult male population?

Answer 21

Sent to labour camps or executed

Question 22

What kinds of males were targeted?

Answer 22

Urban and educated population. Also, males aged 30-45 and in professional positions

Question 23

How many were arrested at the height of the terror?

Answer 23

1.5 million

Question 24

At the height of the terror, how many were exiled?

Answer 24

635,000 exiled

Question 25

How many were shot at the height of the terror?

Answer 25

680,000

Question 26

What was the impact of the 1945 Yalta Conference?

Answer 26

Prisoners of war returned home

Question 27

When allowed prisoners of war returned home?

Answer 27

1945: Yalta Conference

Question 28

What happened to the 1.5 million soldiers, former prisoners of war, who returned home?

Answer 28

Interrogated and exiled and guilty for disobeying Stalin’s direct order not to allow themselves to be captured ‘breach of discipline’. Punished them to years of hard labour

Question 29

What happened to members of trade unions?

Answer 29

Many accused of being enemies of the state

Question 30

What happened in 1937?

Answer 30

Party was purged

Question 31

What happened in the Yaroslav trial?

Answer 31

Rubber factory accused management of malpractice and therefore led to a show trial. They accused bosses of being ‘wrekcers’

Question 32

What would happen to the wives of top party officials when they were arrested?

Answer 32

They were arrested as well and lost their jobs

Question 33

Where did many wives queue?

Answer 33

To find out information about their husbands

Question 34

What happened to children?

Answer 34

Expelled from uni Humiliated Renounce parents especially in the Komsomol

Question 35

What was the economic impact?

Answer 35

Eliminated the experienced economic planners and wiped away industrial managers

Question 36

What did Alec Nove say about the purges?

Answer 36

‘Swept away technicians, statisticians and planners leading to a shortage of workers’

Question 37

What happened to coal production between 1936-40?

Answer 37

It didn’t grow