Marx-Engels | Lenin | Stalin | Home Page
To Stalin Top Secret Summaries Of The most important testimonies Of Those arrested 1937‐ 1938A summary of the most important testimonies of those arrested by the GUGB of the NKVD of the USSR for February 27, 1938.
Archive: AP RF. F. 3. Op. 24. D. 405. L. 132‐141.
March 2, 1938
SECRETARY of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b) comrade STALIN
I am sending you a summary of the most important testimonies of those arrested by the GUGB NKVD of the USSR for February 27, 1938.
Peopleʹs Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR Peopleʹs Commissar for
State Security (EZHOV)
Top secret
For the 5th DEPARTMENT
1.IP BELOV, former commander of the Belarusian military district. Interrogated by YAMNITSKY and KAZAKEVICH.
In addition, he testified that in 1931 he learned from BUKHARIN that the then commander of Privo DYBENKO was a member of the underground anti‐Soviet organization of the Rights.
From members of the military Socialist‐Revolutionary organization EFIMOV and VELIKANOV, BELOV knew about participation in the anti‐Soviet military conspiracy and the military‐SocialistRevolutionary organization of the commander of the ZakVO LEVANDOVSKY (arrested).
EFIMOV told BELOV that DYBENKO was conspired with LEVANDOVSKY.
EFIMOV told BELOV that DYBENKO and LEVANDOVSKY are supporters of the German orientation, and DYBENKO has been associated with the Germans since 1918, when he was detained by the
German invaders.
BELOV also testified that the employee of the headquarters of the Moscow Military District ROSHAL, recruited by him in 1936 into the military‐Socialist‐Revolutionary organization (arrested), is an English spy who was recruited in Turkey when he was the consul general there.
The BELOVs were instructed by ROSHAL to create a terrorist group to prepare terrorist acts against the leaders of the party.
The following persons were recruited by ROSHALEM into the military Socialist‐Revolutionary organization and prepared for a terrorist attack:
1. DENISOV ‐ Head of the Mob Directorate of the Moscow Military
District.
2. CHERNIKOV ‐ Head of the Kursk Region Mob Directorate.
3. BALUEV ‐ assistant chief of the 4th department of the headquarters of the Moscow Military District.
4. KUCHMISTY ‐ head of the Yaroslavl district mob‐department. All listed persons are installed. The attack was timed to coincide with the time of the armed uprising and was supposed to serve as a signal for an uprising.
ROSHAL, at the direction of BELOV, carried out sabotage in mobrabotka in MVO.
2. POKUS, former deputy. commander of the OKDVA
troops. Interrogated: AGAS and LORKISH.
In addition, he showed that he was recruited into an anti‐Soviet military conspiracy in 1934 by a former deputy. commander of OKDVA SANGURSKY (arrested), from whom he received the assignment to conduct subversive treacherous work in the army in order to surrender the Far East, primarily Primorye, to the Japanese. Similar work was carried out by a group of conspirators in Primorye, headed by PUTNA (convicted), who contacted his work with SANGURSKY.
In 1936, in connection with the strengthening of the defense capability of the Far East, the SANGURSKY were instructed to deploy sabotage in the army in order to weaken its combat effectiveness and prepare for defeat in case of Japanese intervention.
POKUS shows that in 1936 RYKOV came to the Far East, who was greeted with honors, a banquet was held, etc.
In connection with RYKOVʹs arrival in Khabarovsk, SANGURSKY told POKUS that RYKOVʹs arrival pursued a specific goal ‐ to popularize the ideas of the right‐wingers and that the army should show its positive attitude towards RYKOV.
3. BERZIN YK ., Former head of the Intelligence Directorate of the Red Army. Interrogated by YAMNITSKII and KAZAKEVICH.
He additionally showed that the Latvian fascist organization was associated not only with the Polish and Estonian nationalist organizations, as he had previously shown, but also with the fascist organization of the Volga Germans. BERZIN has known about this since 1931 from the words of the head of the center of the Latvian organization RUDZUTAK (arrested), connected directly with the head of the German organization, before the executive committee of the Republic of Volga Germans (BERZIN does not know his last name).
From the headquarters of the ʺvoenkaʺ (the military center of the Latvian organization), MEZIS (arrested) and ZHIGUR (arrested), who commanded a German regiment in the past, were associated with the German organization.
MEZIS, on the instructions of the Latvian nationalist centers (civil and military), as well as German intelligence, used his position as a member of the RVS PrivO to deploy German fascist personnel in leadership positions in the German division.
In addition, he also contributed to the systematic fascist propaganda, which was carried out in the German division by the members of the organization.
Among the leaders of the military‐fascist German organization,
BERZIN names the following persons:
1. PLAU ‐ Commissar of the 12th Rifle Corps (arrested).
2. BUCHHOLTZ ‐ early. the political department of the Volga German division.
3. PALLO ‐ German regiment commander (not arrested).
4. BERG ‐ employee of the German division (arrested).
FISHMAN was also associated with the German fascist organization ‐ the former head of the Himupra of the RKKA (arrested), a participant in an anti‐Soviet military conspiracy, associated with the German military attachés in the USSR NIDERMAYER and KESTRING.
FISHMAN, and later ZHIGUR, assisted the German officers not only in their experimental work at the Volsk test site, but also in the simultaneous nationalist work among the Volga Germans. This work was carried out by special persons who came from Germany under the guise of ʺinternsʺ, ʺscientistsʺ, etc.
Mezis, who had worked since 1932 as a member of the RVS PrivO, on the instructions of the German General Staff worked out, together with the leadership of the fascist organization of the Volga Germans, a plan for a joint anti‐Soviet action by both anti‐Soviet organizations.
4. SHNITMAN LA, former military attaché in Czechoslovakia. Interrogated: Kascheev.
In addition, he showed that he had been a German spy not since 1934, but since 1927. He was recruited as a major in the German intelligence service YUSTOM during the period of SHNITMANʹs work as a pom. military attaché in Berlin.
In the same 1927, SHNITMAN was recruited for espionage work for German intelligence by the former head of the Intelligence Directorate BERZIN (arrested). The latter, for three years (27‐29), transmitted to the Germans through SHNITMAN a note on the combat training of the Red Army, the peacetime states of individual units of the Red Army, a report on the maneuvers of the Moscow military district in 1928, a report on the political and moral state of units of one of the military districts , correspondence about the artillery of the Red Army, about Osoaviakhim, intelligence materials of the Intelligence Agency for
Poland, France and Austria.
In 1932, SCHNITMAN, being reassigned to Germany as assistant. military attaché, contacted Major YUST, to whom for two years he handed over reports on the maneuvers of the Red Army in 1932 and 1933, a report on the maneuvers of the Leningrad and Moscow military districts, a note on the naval forces, a report on Osoviakhim, materials on the , airborne and chemical units of the Red Army, a report from one of the PUOKR on the political and moral state of the districtʹs units, materials on tactical exercises of the mechanized brigade, a note on conscription to the Red Army in 1932 and 1933. and intelligence materials of the Intelligence Agency for other countries.
5. DUBOVOY, former commander of the Kharkov military district. Interrogated by YAMNITSKY and KAZAKEVICH.
In addition, he showed that in order to prepare an anti‐Soviet coup, the military and rebel headquarters of the Ukrainian nationalist organization created a leadership in the regions, which united the regional rebel headquarters and was called the ʺheadquarters of the rebel army.ʺ
7 such ʺrebel armiesʺ were created in Ukraine, the leadership of which included: in the Kiev region ‐ corps commander BORISENKO; on Vinnitskaya ‐ division commander MISHUK; across Odessa ‐ corps commander PROKOPCHUK; on Kharkovskaya ‐ corps commander KVYATEK; on Dnepropetrovsk ‐ divisional commander 30 ZUBOK; across Chernihiv ‐ corps commander 15 TARASENKO.
All are arrested.
The rebel cavalry was to be led by corps commander KRIVORUCHKO
(arrested), creating the ʺUkrainian Cavalryʺ.
As political commissars in the future rebel groups were planned: in the right‐bank group ‐ SOKOLENKO, early. subjugation of the 45th mechanized corps (arrested); to the southern group ‐ ADAMENKO, commander 51 (not arrested); to the left‐bank group ‐ BUBLICHENKO, commander 23 (arrested).
Such a structure of the insurgent organization and personally named candidates for the leadership of the insurgency were discussed and sanctioned at a meeting with LYUBCHENKO in 1936, where LYUBCHENKO, DUBOVA, KOPULOVSKY, ZATONSKII and
PORAYKO were present (all four were arrested). In the same year, the chiefs of the ʺregional insurgent armiesʺ established contacts and began to lead the ʺregional insurgent headquartersʺ.
6. NOVOKRESCHENOV, former deputy head of the department store of Tsentrovoentorg . Interrogated by ELISAVETSKY and SILINTSEV.
He admitted that he was a member of the anti‐Soviet sabotage organization that existed in the Tsentrvoentorg system.
He was recruited into an anti‐Soviet sabotage organization in the fall of 1935 by the former head of Tsentrvoentorg V.P. Barkanov. (arrested).
He named a member of an anti‐Soviet sabotage organization known to him as deputy. Head of Voenpromtorg REIBARKH L.A. (not arrested).
On the instructions of the organization, he carried out sabotage in the field of disorganization and disruption of the Tsentrovoentorg trade turnover.
11th DEPARTMENT
1. NIKOLA‐KONITS, a former member of the Communist Party of Romania, France, Germany, until 1933 a citizen of Romania, since 1933 a citizen of the USSR, former proofreader of the 7th printing house. Interrogated: PETROV.
Gave additional testimony that in 1933 he left Berlin for Moscow, having from the Romanian intelligence mission on espionage in the
USSR
Upon arrival in the USSR, he established contact with a group of Trotskyites political emigrants‐Bessarabians, whom he knew even earlier in Romania and France.
In 1936 he was recruited into the Trotskyist group M. CORDIER (former employee of the MOPR executive committee, arrested). I knew from CORDIER that the group was preparing an act of terrorism on the instructions of DORIO against Comrade. STALIN.
As the members of the terrorist group he named: CORDE, PALEVSKY, SHORA (arrested), Gekhta and Rafalovich.
In terms of preparing a terrorist act against comrade. STALINY KORDIER outlined 3 options:
1. An assassination attempt on Red Square at a time when the leaders of the CPSU (b) and the government will go to the mausoleum. The physical performer was to be CORDIER.
2. Assassination attempt during a ceremonial meeting at the Bolshoi Theater.
3. In case of failure of the first two options for the assassination attempt had to be used the departure of Comrade. STALIN from the Bolshoi Theater, when CORDIE, PALEVSKY and Rafalovich were to use bombs.
The terrorist act in 1937 was twice frustrated due to the fact that the group could not receive weapons in time.
2. Weinstein G.Ya., a former member of the French Communist Party and the All‐Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, a former Orgmetall engineer. Interrogated by POLYAKOV and KHOROSCHUK.
He testified that in 1927, before leaving for the USSR, he was recruited for espionage activities by an agent of ʺSurte‐Generalʺ and received assignments from French intelligence on espionage in the USSR.
For espionage activities in the USSR, he was associated with Trotskyists by agents of the ʺSurte‐Generalʺ FIKHMAN, SHOR L. and
TOBACHNIK (arrested).
He gave the French intelligence secret information about the project of transferring a number of workshops of the Stalingrad Tractor Plant to the production of tanks, about the production of guns at the plant in Podlipki and about aircraft factories No. 18 and 22.
Head of the Secretariat of the NKVD of the USSR, senior major of state security (SHAPIRO)