117-462: Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin (Russian: Николай Иванович Бухарин , IPA: [nʲɪkɐˈlaj ɪˈvanəvʲɪdʑ bʊˈxarʲɪn] ; 9 October [ O.S. 27 September] 1888 – 15 March 1938) was a Russian revolutionary, Soviet politician, and Marxist theorist . A prominent Bolshevik described by Vladimir Lenin as a "most valuable and major theorist" of the Communist Party , Bukharin
234-581: A bear hug and immediately began to tell them about a public library which stayed open late at night and which he proposed to show us at once" dragging the tired Trotskys across town "to admire his great discovery"). At the news of the Russian Revolution of February 1917 , exiled revolutionaries from around the world began to flock back to the homeland. Trotsky left New York on 27 March 1917, sailing for St. Petersburg. Bukharin left New York in early April and returned to Russia by way of Japan (where he
351-466: A decade earlier. Bukharin's support for the continuation of the NEP was not popular with higher Party cadres, and his slogan to peasants, "Enrich yourselves!" and proposal to achieve socialism "at snail's pace" left him vulnerable to attacks first by Zinoviev and later by Stalin. Stalin attacked Bukharin's views, portraying them as capitalist deviations and declaring that the revolution would be at risk without
468-583: A demonstration organized by Father Gapon . ) and with the participation of Pyotr Rutenberg . Many historians, such as the German Konrad Heiden and the Russian historian Mikhail Lepekhine maintain that Matvei Golovinski , a writer and Okhrana agent, fabricated the first edition of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (1903). The organization also fabricated documentation connected with
585-546: A double team of interrogators. Bukharin's confession and his motivation became subject of much debate among Western observers, inspiring Koestler's acclaimed novel Darkness at Noon and a philosophical essay by Maurice Merleau-Ponty in Humanism and Terror . His confessions were somewhat different from others in that while he pleaded guilty to the "sum total of crimes", he denied knowledge when it came to specific crimes. Some astute observers noted that he would allow only what
702-608: A former Okhrana officer and relative of the director of the Russian police department Stepan Petrovich Beletsky , both Malinovsky and Joseph Stalin reported on Lenin as well as on each other although Stalin was unaware that Malinovosky was also a penetration agent. Malinovsky won the seat and led the Bolshevik delegation in the Fourth Duma until 1914, but even with the information Malinovsky and other informants provided to
819-580: A former ally and friend of Bukharin, wrote that in spring 1929, Bukharin told him that he had formed an alliance with Zinoviev and Kamenev, and that they were planning to use individual terror (assassination) to get rid of Stalin. Eventually, Bukharin lost his position in the Comintern and the editorship of Pravda in April 1929, and he was expelled from the Politburo on 17 November of that year. Bukharin
936-568: A general change in policy, after mass collectivization was largely completed and the worst was over. Although Bukharin had not challenged Stalin since 1929, his former supporters, including Martemyan Ryutin , drafted and clandestinely circulated an anti-Stalin platform, which called Stalin the "evil genius of the Russian Revolution". However, Sergey Kirov , First Secretary of the Leningrad Regional Committee
1053-581: A leading Bolshevik and close associate of Vladimir Lenin ), Yevno Azef (1869–1918), Roman Malinovsky (1876–1918) and Dmitry Bogrov (1887–1911). The Okhrana tried to compromise the labour movement by setting up police-run trade unions , a practice known as zubatovshchina . The Communists blamed the Okhrana in part for the Bloody Sunday event of January 1905, when Tsarist troops killed hundreds of unarmed protesters who were marching during
1170-516: A letter dated "12/22 Dec. 1635". In his biography of John Dee , The Queen's Conjurer , Benjamin Woolley surmises that because Dee fought unsuccessfully for England to embrace the 1583/84 date set for the change, "England remained outside the Gregorian system for a further 170 years, communications during that period customarily carrying two dates". In contrast, Thomas Jefferson , who lived while
1287-621: A liability than an asset. The Assembly of Working Men, a police-run union with about 6,000–8,000 members, formed by the alleged Okhrana agent Father Georgy Gapon , sparked the Bloody Sunday massacre of January 1905, a milestone in the Revolution of 1905 when union members marched peacefully on the Winter Palace in St. Petersburg and were fired upon by Imperial soldiers. The Okhrana complemented police socialism and other projects to prevent
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#17327648727861404-748: A major Bolshevik theorist. His work Imperialism and World Economy influenced Lenin, who freely borrowed from it in his larger and better-known work, Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism . He and Lenin also often had hot disputes on theoretical issues, as well as Bukharin's closeness with the European Left and his anti-statist tendencies. Bukharin developed an interest in the works of Austrian Marxists and heterodox Marxist economic theorists, such as Aleksandr Bogdanov , who did not agree with Lenin . Also, while in Vienna in 1913, he helped
1521-818: A member of its Bolshevik faction. With Grigori Sokolnikov , Bukharin convened the 1907 national youth conference in Moscow, which was later considered the founding of Komsomol . By age twenty, he was a member of the Moscow Committee of the party. The committee was widely infiltrated by the Tsarist secret police, the Okhrana . As one of its leaders, Bukharin quickly became a person of interest to them. During this time, he became closely associated with Valerian Obolensky and Vladimir Smirnov . He also met his future first wife, Nadezhda Mikhailovna Lukina, his cousin and
1638-403: A program of rapid industrialization and forced collectivization because he believed that the NEP was not working fast enough. Stalin felt that in the new situation the policies of his former foes—Trotsky, Zinoviev, and Kamenev—were the right ones. Bukharin was worried by the prospect of Stalin's plan, which he feared would lead to "military-feudal exploitation" of the peasantry. Bukharin did want
1755-511: A single country, even one as underdeveloped as Russia. This new theory stated that socialist gains could be consolidated in a single country, without that country relying on simultaneous successful revolutions across the world. The thesis would become a hallmark of Stalinism . He is an unprincipled intriguer, who subordinates everything to the preservation of his own power. He changes his theory according to whom he needs to get rid of. Bukharin on Stalin's theoretical position, 1928. Trotsky,
1872-911: A start-of-year adjustment works well with little confusion for events before the introduction of the Gregorian calendar. For example, the Battle of Agincourt is well known to have been fought on 25 October 1415, which is Saint Crispin's Day . However, for the period between the first introduction of the Gregorian calendar on 15 October 1582 and its introduction in Britain on 14 September 1752, there can be considerable confusion between events in Continental Western Europe and in British domains. Events in Continental Western Europe are usually reported in English-language histories by using
1989-615: A strong policy that encouraged rapid industrialization. Having helped Stalin achieve unchecked power against the Left Opposition, Bukharin found himself easily outmaneuvered by Stalin. Yet Bukharin played to Stalin's strength by maintaining the appearance of unity within the Party leadership. Meanwhile, Stalin used his control of the Party machine to replace Bukharin's supporters in the Rightist power base in Moscow, trade unions, and
2106-490: A symbol of the Party" even though he "is not a man, but a devil". In Dan's account, Bukharin's acceptance of the Soviet Union's new direction was thus a result of his utter commitment to Party solidarity. To his boyhood friend, Ilya Ehrenburg , he expressed the suspicion that the whole trip was a trap set up by Stalin. Indeed, his contacts with Mensheviks during this trip were to feature prominently in his trial. Stalin
2223-491: A violent repression of the revolution, only to call off the effort for lack of manpower. Since these attempts at repression never reached fruition, they only served to aggravate the already enraged Russian populace and to deepen their distrust of the Imperial government. Trepov's replacement by P.N. Durnovo in late-October ushered in a period of even more vicious repression of the revolutionaries. Indicative of this new period
2340-536: Is 9 February 1649, the date by which his contemporaries in some parts of continental Europe would have recorded his execution. The O.S./N.S. designation is particularly relevant for dates which fall between the start of the "historical year" (1 January) and the legal start date, where different. This was 25 March in England, Wales, Ireland and the colonies until 1752, and until 1600 in Scotland. In Britain, 1 January
2457-495: Is extremely important. I don't know what words I should summon up in order to entreat you to grant me this as an act of charity. After all, politically, it won't really matter, and, besides, no one will know a thing about it. But let me spend my last moments as I wish. Have pity on me! In his letter of 10 December 1937, Bukharin suggests becoming Stalin's tool against Trotsky, but there's no evidence Stalin ever seriously considered Bukharin's offer. If, contrary to expectation, my life
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#17327648727862574-509: Is some evidence that Bukharin was thinking of evolution toward some kind of two-party or at least two-slate elections. Boris Nikolaevsky reported that Bukharin said: "A second party is necessary. If there is only one electoral list, without opposition, that's equivalent to Nazism." Grigory Tokaev , a Soviet defector and admirer of Bukharin, reported that: "Stalin aimed at one party dictatorship and complete centralisation. Bukharin envisaged several parties and even nationalist parties, and stood for
2691-445: Is the embodiment of chaste but self-absorbed laboratory craftsmanship". His speech was greeted with wild applause, though it greatly offended some of the listeners, such as the communist poet Semyon Kirsanov , who complained: "according to Bukharin, all the poets who have used their verses to participate in political life are out of date, but the others are not out of date, the so-called pure (and not so pure) lyric poets". When Bukharin
2808-519: Is the head of the St. Petersburg Special Section, A.V. Gerasimov's, strike on the St. Petersburg Soviet. To Emperor Nicholas II 's delight, Gerasimov arrested delegates of the Soviet en masse on December 3, 1905. Along with this repression and the end of the Revolution of 1905 came a shift in the political police's mentality; gone were the days of Nicholas I 's white-gloved moral police : post-1905
2925-667: Is to be spared, I would like to request (though I would first have to discuss it with my wife) the following: While Anastas Mikoyan and Vyacheslav Molotov later claimed that Bukharin was never tortured and his letters from prison do not give the suggestion that he was tortured, it is also known that his interrogators were given the order: "beating permitted". Bukharin held out for three months, but threats to his young wife and infant son, combined with "methods of physical influence" wore him down. But when he read his confession amended and corrected personally by Stalin, he withdrew his whole confession. The examination started all over again, with
3042-673: The Comintern 's executive committee. Following Stalin's decision to proceed with agricultural collectivisation in the Great Break , Bukharin was labelled as the leader of the Right Opposition and was removed from Pravda , the Comintern, and the party leadership in 1929. After a period in lower positions, in 1934 Bukharin was reelected to the Central Committee and became editor of the newspaper Izvestia . He
3159-615: The February Revolution of 1917, Bukharin returned to Moscow and became a leading figure in the party, and after the October Revolution became editor of its newspaper, Pravda . He led the Left Communist faction in 1918, and during the civil war wrote The ABC of Communism (1920; with Yevgeni Preobrazhensky ) and Historical Materialism: A System of Sociology (1921), among other works. Bukharin
3276-734: The Georgian Bolshevik Joseph Stalin write an article " Marxism and the National Question " at Lenin's request. In October 1916, while based in New York City, Bukharin edited the newspaper Novy Mir ( New World ) with Leon Trotsky and Alexandra Kollontai . When Trotsky arrived in New York in January 1917, Bukharin was the first of the émigrés to greet him. (Trotsky's wife recalled, "with
3393-587: The International Communist Opposition , though it became better known as the Right Opposition , after a term used by the Trotskyist Left Opposition in the Soviet Union to refer to Bukharin and his supporters there. Even after his fall, Bukharin still did some important work for the Party. For example, he helped write the 1936 Soviet constitution , which he believed would guarantee real democratization. There
3510-601: The Okhrana (Russian: Охрана , IPA: [ɐˈxranə] , lit. 'The Guard') was a secret police force of the Russian Empire and part of the police department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) in the late 19th century and early 20th century, aided by the Special Corps of Gendarmes . Formed to combat political terrorism and left-wing politics and revolutionary activity,
3627-546: The Russian Empire and the very beginning of Soviet Russia . For example, in the article "The October (November) Revolution", the Encyclopædia Britannica uses the format of "25 October (7 November, New Style)" to describe the date of the start of the revolution. The Latin equivalents, which are used in many languages, are, on the one hand, stili veteris (genitive) or stilo vetere (ablative), abbreviated st.v. , and meaning "(of/in) old style" ; and, on
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3744-470: The antisemitic Beilis trial of 1913. Suspects captured by the Okhrana were passed to the judicial system of the Russian Empire . The Okhrana was perpetually underfunded and understaffed; before 1914 it had just 49 employees split between seven offices and never had more than 2,000 informants at any one time. It never received more than 10% of the total police budget. Despite the reforms in
3861-678: The 19th century, a practice that the author Karen Bellenir considered to reveal a deep emotional resistance to calendar reform. Okhrana The Department for the Protection of Public Safety and Order ( Russian : Отделение по охранению общественной безопасности и порядка , romanized : Otdelenie po okhraneniyu obshchestvennoy bezopadnosti i poryadka ), usually called the Guard Department (Russian: Охранное отделение , romanized : Okhrannoye otdelenie ) and commonly abbreviated in modern English sources as
3978-539: The 4th century , had drifted from reality . The Gregorian calendar reform also dealt with the accumulated difference between these figures, between the years 325 and 1582, by skipping 10 days to set the ecclesiastical date of the equinox to be 21 March, the median date of its occurrence at the time of the First Council of Nicea in 325. Countries that adopted the Gregorian calendar after 1699 needed to skip an additional day for each subsequent new century that
4095-603: The Bolsheviks at the expense of other revolutionaries, the Okhrana helped Roman Malinovsky (a police spy who had managed to rise within the Bolshevik hierarchy and gain Lenin's trust) in his bid to become a Bolshevik delegate to the Duma in 1912. To this end, the Okhrana sequestered Malinovsky's criminal record and arrested other candidates for the seat. According to the transcribed recollections of Nikolay Vladimirovich Veselago,
4212-870: The Bolsheviks sought to exploit to start a revolution, Zubatov hoped the unions would mollify factory workers with improvements in working conditions and thus prevent workers from joining revolutionary movements that threatened the monarchy. To this end, Zubatov set up the Moscow Mechanical Production Workers' Mutual Aid Society in May 1901. After Zubatov became head of the Special Section in 1902, he expanded his trade unions from Moscow to St. Petersburg and to Southern Russia. Zubatovite trade unions achieved moderate success at channeling workers' political agitations away from revolutionary movements and toward labor improvements, especially in
4329-510: The Bolsheviks were in the majority in Moscow. Furthermore, the Moscow Regional Bureau was formally responsible for the party organizations in each of the thirteen central provinces around Moscow – which accounted for 37% of the whole population of Russia and 20% of the Bolshevik membership. While no one dominated revolutionary politics in Moscow during the October Revolution as Trotsky did in St. Petersburg, Bukharin certainly
4446-583: The Boyne was commemorated with smaller parades on 1 July. However, both events were combined in the late 18th century, and continue to be celebrated as " The Twelfth ". Because of the differences, British writers and their correspondents often employed two dates, a practice called dual dating , more or less automatically. Letters concerning diplomacy and international trade thus sometimes bore both Julian and Gregorian dates to prevent confusion. For example, Sir William Boswell wrote to Sir John Coke from The Hague
4563-515: The British Isles and colonies converted to the Gregorian calendar, instructed that his tombstone bear his date of birth by using the Julian calendar (notated O.S. for Old Style) and his date of death by using the Gregorian calendar. At Jefferson's birth, the difference was eleven days between the Julian and Gregorian calendars and so his birthday of 2 April in the Julian calendar is 13 April in
4680-410: The British colonies, changed the start of the year from 25 March to 1 January, with effect from "the day after 31 December 1751". (Scotland had already made this aspect of the changes, on 1 January 1600.) The second (in effect ) adopted the Gregorian calendar in place of the Julian calendar. Thus "New Style" can refer to the start-of-year adjustment , to the adoption of the Gregorian calendar , or to
4797-644: The Bukharin trial marked their final break with Communism and even turned the first three into passionate anti-Communists eventually. Bukharin wrote letters to Stalin while imprisoned, attempting without success to negotiate his innocence in the case of the alleged crimes, his eventual execution, and his hoped for release. If I'm to receive the death sentence, then I implore you beforehand, I entreat you, by all that you hold dear, not to have me shot. Let me drink poison in my cell instead (let me have morphine so that I can fall asleep and never wake up). For me, this point
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4914-543: The Comintern. Bukharin attempted to gain support from earlier foes including Kamenev and Zinoviev who had fallen from power and held mid-level positions within the Communist party. The details of his meeting with Kamenev, to whom he confided that Stalin was " Genghis Khan " and changed policies to get rid of rivals, were leaked by the Trotskyist press and subjected him to accusations of factionalism. Jules Humbert-Droz ,
5031-481: The Department of Police were organized in 1906. The centralized Security Section of the Department of Police was created on February 9, 1907; it was located at 16, Fontanka, St. Petersburg. The exposure of Yevno Azef (who had organized many assassinations, including that of Plehve ) and Dmitri Bogrov (who assassinated Stolypin in 1911) as Okhrana double agents put the agency's methods under great suspicion;
5148-1105: The Department of State Police under Ministry of the Interior (MVD) and transferred part of the Special Corps of Gendarmes and the Third Section of the Imperial Chancellery to the new body. The position of Chief of Gendarmes was merged with that of the Minister, and Commander of the Corps was assigned as a Deputy of the Minister. Still, these measures did not prevent the assassination of Alexander II in March 1881. In an attempt to implement preventive security measures, Emperor Alexander III ( r. 1881–1894 ) immediately set up two more Security and Investigation (охранно-розыскные) secret-police stations, supervised by Gendarme officers, in Moscow and Warsaw ; they became
5265-591: The General Staff and of the Army . Just as the Okhrana had once sponsored trade unions to divert activist energy from political causes, so too did the secret police attempt to promote the Bolshevik party, as the Bolsheviks seemed a relatively harmless alternative to more violent revolutionary groups. Indeed, to the Okhrana, Lenin seemed to actively hinder the revolutionary movement by denouncing other revolutionary groups and refusing to cooperate with them. To aid
5382-623: The Gregorian calendar. For example, the Battle of Blenheim is always given as 13 August 1704. However, confusion occurs when an event involves both. For example, William III of England arrived at Brixham in England on 5 November (Julian calendar), after he had set sail from the Netherlands on 11 November (Gregorian calendar) 1688. The Battle of the Boyne in Ireland took place a few months later on 1 July 1690 (Julian calendar). That maps to 11 July (Gregorian calendar), conveniently close to
5499-466: The Gregorian calendar. Similarly, George Washington is now officially reported as having been born on 22 February 1732, rather than on 11 February 1731/32 (Julian calendar). The philosopher Jeremy Bentham , born on 4 February 1747/8 (Julian calendar), in later life celebrated his birthday on 15 February. There is some evidence that the calendar change was not easily accepted. Many British people continued to celebrate their holidays "Old Style" well into
5616-430: The Julian and Gregorian dating systems respectively. The need to correct the calendar arose from the realisation that the correct figure for the number of days in a year is not 365.25 (365 days 6 hours) as assumed by the Julian calendar but slightly less (c. 365.242 days). The Julian calendar therefore has too many leap years . The consequence was that the basis for the calculation of the date of Easter , as decided in
5733-581: The Julian calendar had added since then. When the British Empire did so in 1752, the gap had grown to eleven days; when Russia did so (as its civil calendar ) in 1918, thirteen days needed to be skipped. In the Kingdom of Great Britain and its possessions, the Calendar (New Style) Act 1750 introduced two concurrent changes to the calendar. The first, which applied to England, Wales, Ireland and
5850-517: The Julian date of the subsequent (and more decisive) Battle of Aughrim on 12 July 1691 (Julian). The latter battle was commemorated annually throughout the 18th century on 12 July, following the usual historical convention of commemorating events of that period within Great Britain and Ireland by mapping the Julian date directly onto the modern Gregorian calendar date (as happens, for example, with Guy Fawkes Night on 5 November). The Battle of
5967-562: The Moscow City Committee and also became a member of the Moscow Regional Bureau of the party. To complicate matters further, the Bolsheviks themselves were divided into a right wing and a left wing. The right-wing of the Bolsheviks, including Aleksei Rykov and Viktor Nogin , controlled the Moscow Committee, while the younger left-wing Bolsheviks, including Vladimir Smirnov , Valerian Osinsky , Georgii Lomov , Nikolay Yakovlev, Ivan Kizelshtein and Ivan Stukov, were members of
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#17327648727866084-709: The Moscow Regional Bureau. On 10 October 1917, Bukharin was elected to the Central Committee , along with two other Moscow Bolsheviks: Andrei Bubnov and Grigori Sokolnikov . This strong representation on the Central Committee was a direct recognition of the Moscow Bureau's increased importance. Whereas the Bolsheviks had previously been a minority in Moscow behind the Mensheviks and the Socialist Revolutionaries, by September 1917
6201-440: The NEP reintroduced money and allowed private ownership and capitalistic practices in agriculture, retail trade, and light industry while the state retained control of heavy industry. After Lenin's death in 1924 , Bukharin became a full member of the Politburo. In the subsequent power struggle among Leon Trotsky, Grigory Zinoviev , Lev Kamenev and Stalin, Bukharin allied himself with Stalin, who positioned himself as centrist of
6318-648: The NKVD charged an ever-growing group of former oppositionists with Kirov's murder and other acts of treason, terrorism, sabotage, and espionage. In February 1936, shortly before the purge started in earnest, Bukharin was sent to Paris by Stalin to negotiate the purchase of the Marx and Engels archives, held by the German Social Democratic Party (SPD) before its dissolution by Hitler. He was joined by his young wife Anna Larina , which therefore opened
6435-422: The Okhrana as a Russian security service included the Secret Prikaz ( Taynyy Prikaz [ ru ] ) (1654–1676), the Preobrazhensky Prikaz [ ru ] (1686–1726), the Secret Chancellery [ ru ] (1731–1762), the Secret Expedition [ ru ] (1762–1801), and the Third Section of His Imperial Majesty's Own Chancellery (1826–1880). The first special security department
6552-452: The Okhrana had focused on interfering with the activities of relatively small, and distinct, revolutionary groups. The Revolution of 1905, characterized by seemingly spontaneous marches and strikes, exposed the Okhrana's inefficacy at controlling mass popular movements. Not only did the Okhrana lack the capacity to prevent the mass movements of 1905, or even to contain them once they began, the Okhrana's misguided attempts may even have worsened
6669-683: The Okhrana operated offices throughout the Russian Empire, as well as satellite agencies in a number of foreign countries. It concentrated on monitoring the activities of Russian revolutionaries abroad, including in Paris , where Okhrana agent Pyotr Rachkovsky (1853–1910) was based 1884–1902 before he returned to service in Saint Petersburg 1905–1906. The Okhrana deployed multiple methods, including covert operations , undercover agents , and "perlustration" —the reading of private correspondence. The Okhrana's Foreign Agency also monitored revolutionary activity. The Okhrana became notorious for its agents provocateurs , including Jacob Zhitomirsky (born 1880,
6786-409: The Okhrana quickly and quietly disappeared. Some Okhrana functionaries continued their activities in the civil-war period (1917–1923) within the White Armies , notably in the OSVAG [ ru ] ( Russian : ОСВАГ – ОСВедомительное АГентство , romanized : OSVAG – OSVedomitel'noe AGentsvo , lit. 'Information Agency'). After the 1917 October Revolution ,
6903-435: The Okhrana's activities even contributed to the wave of domestic unrest and revolutionary terror that they were intended to quell. Perhaps most paradoxical of all was the Okhrana's collaboration with revolutionary organizations. Early Okhrana agents to work alongside revolutionaries included Lieutenant-Colonel Georgy Sudeykin of the St. Petersburg Special Section, who, in 1882, set up an illegal printing operation to publish
7020-429: The Okhrana's persistent focus on revolutionary groups may have resulted in the secret police not fully appreciating the deep-seated popular unrest brewing in Russia. The revolutionaries identified the Okhrana as one of the main symbols of Tsarist repression , and its headquarters were sacked and burned on 27 February 1917. The newly formed Provisional Government then disbanded the whole organization and released most of
7137-443: The Okhrana, the police were unprepared for the rise of Bolshevism in 1917. Although the secret police had agents within the Bolshevik organization, other factors contributed to the Okhrana's inefficacy at averting the events of 1917. Among these factors was the ban on police spies within the military promulgated by the Deputy Minister of the Interior Vladimir Dzhunkovsky , who found the practice dishonorable and damaging to morale. While
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#17327648727867254-429: The Party and supported the NEP against the Left Opposition , which wanted more rapid industrialization, escalation of class struggle against the kulaks (wealthier peasants), and agitation for world revolution. It was Bukharin who formulated the thesis of " Socialism in One Country " put forth by Stalin in 1924, which argued that socialism (in Marxist theory, the period of transition to communism) could be developed in
7371-419: The Soviet Union to achieve industrialization but he preferred the more moderate approach of offering the peasants the opportunity to become prosperous, which would lead to greater grain production for sale abroad. Bukharin pressed his views throughout 1928 in meetings of the Politburo and at the Communist Party Congress, insisting that enforced grain requisition would be counterproductive, as War Communism had been
7488-494: The Soviet state. Photostatic evidence shows that Stalin's first impulse was to simply exile Bukharin, without sending him to trial. In the end, Bukharin was killed, but according to historian Alec Nove , "the road to his demise was not a straight one". Bukharin was tried in the Trial of the Twenty One on 2–13 March 1938 during the Great Purge , along with ex-premier Alexei Rykov, Christian Rakovsky , Nikolai Krestinsky , Genrikh Yagoda, and 16 other defendants alleged to belong to
7605-422: The Transitional Period (1920) and Historical Materialism (1921). By 1921, he changed his position and accepted Lenin's emphasis on the survival and strengthening of the Soviet state as the bastion of the future world revolution. He became the foremost supporter of the New Economic Policy (NEP), to which he was to tie his political fortunes. Considered by the Left Communists as a retreat from socialist policies,
7722-594: The active intervention of Bukharin. The journey to Armenia , our apartment and ration cards, contracts for future volumes – all this was arranged by Bukharin." Bukharin wrote to Stalin, pleading clemency for Mandelstam, and appealed personally to the head of the NKVD , Genrikh Yagoda . It was Yagoda who told him about Mandelstam's Stalin Epigram , after which he refused to have any further contact with Nadezhda Mandelstam, who had lied to him by denying that her husband had written "anything rash" – but continued to befriend Pasternak. Soon after Mandelstam's arrest, Bukharin
7839-447: The age of four, often asked him to recite poetry for family friends. His childhood is vividly recounted in his mostly autobiographic novel How It All Began . Bukharin's political life began at the age of sixteen, with his lifelong friend Ilya Ehrenburg , when they participated in student activities at Moscow University related to the Russian Revolution of 1905 . He joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party in 1906, and became
7956-419: The basis of the later Okhrana. The Imperial Gendarmerie still operated as security police in the rest of the country through their Gubernial and Uyezd Directorates. The Emperor also established the Special Conference under the MVD (1881), which had the right to declare a State of Emergency Security in various parts of the Empire (which was actively used in the time of 1905 Revolution ) and subordinated all of
8073-426: The beginning of World War I in 1914 moved the Okhrana's attentions initially from countering revolutionaries to countering German espionage, the focus quickly shifted back as it emerged that the Germans were heavily funding Russian revolutionary groups in order to destabilize the Russian Empire. Despite the renewed attention, the Russian Revolution of 1917 took the secret police, and the country, by surprise. Indeed,
8190-406: The campaign. Instead of going mad, they accepted terror as a normal administrative method and regarded obedience to all orders from above as a supreme virtue. ... They are no longer human beings. They have truly become the cogs in a terrible machine." Yet to another Menshevik leader, Fyodor Dan , he confided that Stalin became "the man to whom the Party granted its confidence" and "is a sort of
8307-488: The cities of Minsk and Odessa , with one high-ranking official noting that many revolutionaries and workers were joining the unions. However, Zubatov, if not police socialism, became discredited in the summer of 1903 after the Okhrana officer in charge of the Odessa union allowed a strike to get out of hand, causing a mass movement which paralyzed the region. Although the police-run unions continued to operate after Zubatov's ousting, without Okhrana funding, they proved more
8424-492: The combination of the two. It was through their use in the Calendar Act that the notations "Old Style" and "New Style" came into common usage. When recording British history, it is usual to quote the date as originally recorded at the time of the event, but with the year number adjusted to start on 1 January. The latter adjustment may be needed because the start of the civil calendar year had not always been 1 January and
8541-546: The conditions in which revolutionary movements could take hold by pursuing initiatives to curtail the activities of existing organizations. Yevno Azef , the notorious Okhrana provocateur who became the head of the Socialist Revolutionary Fighting Organization (SRFO), epitomized the Okhrana's inscrutable practice of revolutionary-group infiltration. While the Okhrana managed to imbed many of its agents in revolutionary organizations,
8658-408: The early 19th century, the practice of torture was never truly abolished. Possibly, the formation of the Okhrana led to increasing use of torture, due to the Okhrana using methods such as arbitrary arrest , detention and torture to gain information. Claims persisted the Okhrana had operated torture chambers in places like Warsaw , Riga , Odessa and most of the urban centres. Forerunners of
8775-543: The end of the following December, 1661/62 , a form of dual dating to indicate that in the following twelve weeks or so, the year was 1661 Old Style but 1662 New Style. Some more modern sources, often more academic ones (e.g. the History of Parliament ) also use the 1661/62 style for the period between 1 January and 24 March for years before the introduction of the New Style calendar in England. The Gregorian calendar
8892-744: The government of the RSFSR under Vladimir Lenin replaced the Okhrana with a Soviet security organisation – the much larger and more efficient Cheka in December 1917, supplemented by the GRU (military intelligence) from October–November 1918. The Cheka and its successor organizations (notably the GPU and the OGPU ) eventually became the KGB (1954–1991) after the death of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin in March 1953. After
9009-613: The great might of the U.S.S.R. become clear to all. Old Style and New Style dates Old Style ( O.S. ) and New Style ( N.S. ) indicate dating systems before and after a calendar change, respectively. Usually, they refer to the change from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar as enacted in various European countries between 1582 and 1923. In England , Wales , Ireland and Britain's American colonies , there were two calendar changes, both in 1752. The first adjusted
9126-506: The highest degree of power during the 1926–1928 period. He emerged as the leader of the Party's right wing , which included two other Politburo members ( Alexei Rykov , Lenin's successor as Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars and Mikhail Tomsky , head of trade unions) and he became General Secretary of the Comintern 's executive committee in 1926. However, prompted by a grain shortage in 1928, Stalin reversed himself and proposed
9243-647: The imperial police forces to the Commander of the Gendarmes (1882). The rise of the socialist movements led to the integration of security forces. From 1898 the Special Section (Особый отдел) of the Department of Police succeeded the Gendarmes in the role of gaining information from domestic and foreign agents and " perlustration ". Following the Socialist-Revolutionary Party's assassination of MVD Minister Dmitry Sipyagin on April 2, 1902,
9360-417: The innovations of one Okhrana bureau chief, Sergey Zubatov . While P.I. Rachkovsky , as head of the Okhrana's Foreign Agency, had long ordered Okhrana agents to infiltrate and influence revolutionary movements abroad, Zubatov brought these tactics to a new level by setting up Okhrana-controlled trade unions, the foundation of police socialism. Perhaps recognizing the same discontent among factory workers that
9477-541: The leader of the Left Communists in bitter opposition to Lenin's decision to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk . In this wartime power struggle, Lenin's arrest had been seriously discussed by them and Left Socialist Revolutionaries in 1918. Bukharin revealed this in a Pravda article in 1924 and stated that it had been "a period when the party stood a hair from a split, and the whole country a hair from ruin". After
9594-461: The lying-in-state of the Soviet police chief, Vyacheslav Menzhinsky in May 1934, when Pasternak was seeking help for his fellow poet, Osip Mandelstam , who had been arrested – though at that time neither Pasternak nor Bukharin knew why. Bukharin had acted as Mandelstam's political protector since 1922. According to Mandelstam's wife, Nadezhda, "M. owed him all the pleasant things in his life. His 1928 volume of poetry would never have come out without
9711-601: The maximum of decentralisation." In the brief period of thaw in 1934–1936, Bukharin was politically rehabilitated and was made editor of Izvestia in 1934. There, he consistently highlighted the dangers of fascist regimes in Europe and the need for "proletarian humanism". One of his first decisions as editor was to invite Boris Pasternak to contribute to the newspaper and sit in on editorial meetings. Pasternak described Bukharin as "a wonderful, historically extraordinary man, but fate has not been kind to him". They first met during
9828-606: The new Minister Vyacheslav von Plehve gradually relieved the Directorates of Gendarmes of their investigation power in favor of Security and Investigation Stations (Охранно-розыскное отделение) under respective Mayors and Governors (who as a matter of fact were subordinate to the MVD Minister). The Okhrana used many seemingly unorthodox methods in the pursuit of its mission to defend the Tsarist monarchy; indeed, some of
9945-528: The organisation was further compromised by the discovery of many similar double agents -provocateur. In Autumn 1913, all of the Security Stations except the original Moscow, St Petersburg and Warsaw ones were dismissed. The start of World War I in 1914 marked a shift from anti-revolutionary activities of the Department of Police to counter-intelligence ; however, the efforts of the department were poorly synchronised with counter-intelligence units of
10062-456: The other, stili novi or stilo novo , abbreviated st.n. and meaning "(of/in) new style". The Latin abbreviations may be capitalised differently by different users, e.g., St.n. or St.N. for stili novi . There are equivalents for these terms in other languages as well, such as the German a.St. (" alter Stil " for O.S.). Usually, the mapping of New Style dates onto Old Style dates with
10179-499: The police preferred to slowly gather intelligence and to attempt to interfere with revolutionary work surreptitiously rather than to arrest known revolutionaries immediately. This policy led to numerous dubious acts on the part of police spies, who needed to participate in revolutionary activities to avoid suspicion, as when Yevno Azef, as head of the SRFO, ordered the assassination of V. K. Plehve on July 15, 1904. For over twenty years,
10296-512: The political police feared that the Russian people were as eager to destroy them as to depose the Emperor. Following the outbreak of the 1905 Revolution and assassination of Plehve, Pyotr Stolypin , as the new MVD Minister and Chairman of the Council of Ministers, set up a nationwide net of Security Stations. By 1908 there were 31 Stations, and more than 60 by 1911. Two more Special Sections of
10413-455: The political prisoners held by the Tsarist regime. Revelations of the Okhrana's earlier abuses heightened public hostility towards the secret police after the 1917 February Revolution and made it very dangerous to be a political policeman. That fact, along with the St. Petersburg Soviet 's insistence on the dissolution of the regular Tsarist police force, as well as of the political police, meant that
10530-481: The possibility of exile, but he decided against it, saying that he could not live outside the Soviet Union. Bukharin, who had been forced to follow the Party line since 1929, confided to his old friends and former opponents his real view of Stalin and his policy. His conversations with Boris Nicolaevsky , a Menshevik leader who held the manuscripts on behalf of the SPD, formed the basis of "Letter of an Old Bolshevik", which
10647-579: The prime force behind the Left Opposition, was defeated by a triumvirate formed by Stalin, Zinoviev, and Kamenev, with the support of Bukharin. At the Fourteenth Party Congress in December 1925, Stalin openly attacked Kamenev and Zinoviev, revealing that they had asked for his aid in expelling Trotsky from the Party. By 1926, the Stalin-Bukharin alliance ousted Zinoviev and Kamenev from the Party leadership, and Bukharin enjoyed
10764-559: The promise of world revolution . In the Russian turmoil near the end of World War I , when a negotiated peace with the Central Powers was looming, he demanded a continuance of the war, fully expecting to incite all the foreign proletarian classes to arms. Even as he was uncompromising toward Russia's battlefield enemies, he also rejected any fraternization with the capitalist Allied powers : he reportedly wept when he learned of official negotiations for assistance. Bukharin emerged as
10881-524: The ratification of the treaty, Bukharin resumed his responsibilities within the party. In March 1919, he became a member of the Comintern's executive committee and a candidate member of the Politburo . During the Civil War period, he published several theoretical economic works, including the popular primer The ABC of Communism (with Yevgeni Preobrazhensky , 1919), and the more academic Economics of
10998-520: The revolutionary People's Will literature with Okhrana funds. Sudeykin and his colleague, a revolutionary-turned-police-informant named Sergey Degayev , passed drafts of the publication through Okhrana censors before printing. This episode marked the beginning of the Okhrana's efforts to surreptitiously observe, but also influence and undermine, revolutionary movements. This focus on infiltrating and influencing revolutionary groups, rather than merely identifying and arresting their members, intensified with
11115-591: The sister of Nikolai Lukin , who was also a member of the party. They married in 1911, soon after returning from internal exile. In 1911, after a brief imprisonment, Bukharin was exiled to Onega in Arkhangelsk , but he soon escaped to Hanover . He stayed in Germany for a year before visiting Kraków ( Poland ) in 1912 to meet Vladimir Lenin for the first time. During the exile, he continued his education and wrote several books that established him in his 20s as
11232-654: The so-called "Bloc of Rightists and Trotskyites". In a trial meant to be the culmination of previous show trials , it was alleged that Bukharin and others sought to assassinate Lenin and Stalin from 1918, murder Maxim Gorky by poison, partition the Soviet Union and hand out her territories to Germany, Japan, and Great Britain. Even more than earlier Moscow show trials, Bukharin's trial horrified many previously sympathetic observers as they watched allegations levelled against someone who had been so close to Stalin and Lenin. For some prominent Communists such as Bertram Wolfe , Jay Lovestone , Arthur Koestler , and Heinrich Brandler ,
11349-644: The start of a new year from 25 March ( Lady Day , the Feast of the Annunciation ) to 1 January, a change which Scotland had made in 1600. The second discarded the Julian calendar in favour of the Gregorian calendar, skipping 11 days in the month of September to do so. To accommodate the two calendar changes, writers used dual dating to identify a given day by giving its date according to both styles of dating. For countries such as Russia where no start-of-year adjustment took place, O.S. and N.S. simply indicate
11466-477: The tables into an anti-trial of Stalinism (while keeping his part of the bargain to save his family). While his letters to Stalin – he wrote 34 very emotional and desperate letters tearfully protesting his innocence and professing his loyalty – suggest a complete capitulation and acceptance of his role in the trial, it contrasts with his actual conduct in the trial. Bukharin himself speaks of his "peculiar duality of mind" in his last plea, which led to "semi-paralysis of
11583-479: The unrest. D. F. Trepov , the Assistant Minister of the Interior in charge of police affairs, and P. I. Rachkovsky, now in charge of all domestic political-police operations, attempted to mount an aggressive offensive against those they believed to be responsible for the unrest, namely zemstvo employees, in May 1905, but backed down three months later. In October of that year, Trepov again attempted
11700-407: The whole case") and saying that "the confession of the accused is not essential. The confession of the accused is a medieval principle of jurisprudence" in a trial that was solely based on confessions, he finished his last plea with the words: ... the monstrousness of my crime is immeasurable especially in the new stage of struggle of the U.S.S.R. May this trial be the last severe lesson, and may
11817-546: The will" and Hegelian " unhappy consciousness ", which likely stemmed not only from his knowledge of the ruinous reality of Stalinism (although of course he could not say so in the trial) but also of the impending threat of fascism. The result was a curious mix of fulsome confessions (of being a "degenerate fascist" working for the "restoration of capitalism") and subtle criticisms of the trial. After disproving several charges against him (one observer noted that he "proceeded to demolish, or rather showed he could very easily demolish,
11934-596: Was a principal architect of the 1936 Soviet Constitution . During the Great Purge , Bukharin was accused of treason in February 1937 and executed after a show trial in 1938. Nikolai Bukharin was born on 27 September (9 October, new style), 1888, in Moscow . He was the second son of two schoolteachers, Ivan Gavrilovich Bukharin and Liubov Ivanovna Bukharina. According to Nikolai his father did not believe in God and, from
12051-520: Was active in the Soviet leadership from 1917 to his purge in the 1930s. Bukharin joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party in 1906, and studied economics at Moscow Imperial University . In 1910, he was arrested and internally exiled to Onega , but the following year escaped abroad, where he met Lenin and Leon Trotsky and built his reputation with works such as Imperialism and World Economy (1915). After
12168-480: Was altered at different times in different countries. From 1155 to 1752, the civil or legal year in England began on 25 March ( Lady Day ); so for example, the execution of Charles I was recorded at the time in Parliament as happening on 30 January 164 8 (Old Style). In newer English-language texts, this date is usually shown as "30 January 164 9 " (New Style). The corresponding date in the Gregorian calendar
12285-444: Was arrested two years later, Boris Pasternak displayed extraordinary courage by having a letter delivered to Bukharin's wife saying that he was convinced of his innocence. Stalin's collectivization policy proved to be as disastrous as Bukharin predicted, but Stalin had by then achieved unchallenged authority in the party leadership. However, there were signs that moderates among Stalin's supporters sought to end official terror and bring
12402-484: Was assassinated in Leningrad in December 1934, and his death was used by Stalin as a pretext to launch the Great Purge , in which about 700,000 people were to perish as Stalin eliminated all past and potential opposition to his authority. Some historians believe that Kirov's assassination in 1934 was arranged by Stalin himself, despite the lack of evidence to plausibly posit such a conclusion. After Kirov's assassination,
12519-596: Was celebrated as the New Year festival from as early as the 13th century, despite the recorded (civil) year not incrementing until 25 March, but the "year starting 25th March was called the Civil or Legal Year, although the phrase Old Style was more commonly used". To reduce misunderstandings about the date, it was normal even in semi-official documents such as parish registers to place a statutory new-year heading after 24 March (for example "1661") and another heading from
12636-548: Was delegated to prepare the official report on poetry for the First Soviet Writers' Congress, in August 1934. He could not any longer risk mentioning Mandelstam in his speech to the congress, but did devote a large section of his speech to Pasternak, whom he described as "remote from current affairs ... a singer of the old intelligensia ... delicate and subtle ... a wounded and easily vulnerable soul. He
12753-417: Was for a long time undecided on Bukharin and Georgy Pyatakov . After receiving Nikolay Yezhov 's written evidence denouncing Bukharin, Stalin declined to sanction his arrest. After the trial and execution of Zinoviev, Kamenev, and other leftist Old Bolsheviks in 1936, Bukharin and Rykov were arrested on 27 February 1937 following a plenum of the Central Committee, and were charged with conspiring to overthrow
12870-528: Was forced to renounce his views under pressure. He wrote letters to Stalin pleading for forgiveness and rehabilitation, but through wiretaps of Bukharin's private conversations with Stalin's enemies, Stalin knew Bukharin's repentance was insincere. International supporters of Bukharin, Jay Lovestone of the Communist Party USA among them, were also expelled from the Comintern. They formed an international alliance to promote their views, calling it
12987-549: Was implemented in Russia on 14 February 1918 by dropping the Julian dates of 1–13 February 1918 , pursuant to a Sovnarkom decree signed 24 January 1918 (Julian) by Vladimir Lenin . The decree required that the Julian date was to be written in parentheses after the Gregorian date, until 1 July 1918. It is common in English-language publications to use the familiar Old Style or New Style terms to discuss events and personalities in other countries, especially with reference to
13104-426: Was in the written confession and refuse to go any further. There are several interpretations of Bukharin's motivations (besides being coerced) in the trial. Koestler and others viewed it as a true believer's last service to the Party (while preserving the little amount of personal honor left) whereas Bukharin biographer Stephen Cohen and Robert Tucker saw traces of Aesopian language , with which Bukharin sought to turn
13221-605: Was initially a proponent of war communism , but in 1921 supported the introduction of the New Economic Policy (NEP) and became its chief theorist and advocate, supporting the party leadership against Trotsky and the Left Opposition . By late 1924, this stance had positioned Bukharin favourably as Joseph Stalin 's chief ally, with Bukharin soon elaborating Stalin's theory of " socialism in one country ". From 1926 to 1929, Bukharin served as General Secretary of
13338-604: Was temporarily detained by local police), arriving in Moscow in early May 1917. Politically, the Bolsheviks in Moscow were a minority in relation to the Mensheviks and Social Democrats. As more people began to be attracted to Lenin's promise to bring peace by withdrawing from the Great War, membership in the Bolshevik faction began to increase dramatically – from 24,000 members in February 1917 to 200,000 members in October 1917. Upon his return to Moscow, Bukharin resumed his seat on
13455-530: Was the Department on Protecting the Order and Public Peace under the Head of St. Petersburg , set up in 1866 after a failed assassination attempt on Emperor Alexander II , with a staff of 12 investigators. Its street address, Fontanka , 16, was publicly known in the Russian Empire. After another failed assassination attempt, on August 6, 1880, the Emperor, acting on proposals made by Count Loris-Melikov , established
13572-592: Was the most prominent leader in Moscow. During the October Revolution, Bukharin drafted, introduced, and defended the revolutionary decrees of the Moscow Soviet. Bukharin then represented the Moscow Soviet in their report to the revolutionary government in Petrograd. Following the October Revolution, Bukharin became the editor of the party's newspaper, Pravda . Bukharin believed passionately in
13689-587: Was very influential in contemporary understanding of the period (especially the Ryutin Affair and the Kirov murder), although there are doubts about its authenticity. According to Nicolaevsky, Bukharin spoke of "the mass annihilation of completely defenseless men, with women and children" under forced collectivization and liquidation of kulaks as a class that dehumanized the Party members with "the profound psychological change in those communists who took part in
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