The history of the Gulag is closely intertwined with the entire Soviet era, but especially with its Stalinist period. A network of camps stretches across the country. They were visited by various groups of people accused of the famous 58th article. The Gulag was not only a system of punishment, but also a layer of the Soviet economy. The prisoners carried out the most ambitious projects of the first five-year plans.
The origin of the Gulag
The future gulag system began to take shape immediately after the Bolsheviks came to power. During the Civil War, Soviet power began to isolate its class and ideological enemies in special concentration camps. Then they did not shy away from this term, since he received a truly monstrous assessment during the atrocities of the Third Reich.
At first, the camps were run by Leon Trotsky and Vladimir Lenin. The mass terror against "counter-revolution" included the mass arrests of the wealthy bourgeoisie, manufacturers, landowners, merchants, church leaders, etc. Soon the camps were given to the Cheka, chaired by Felix Dzerzhinsky. They organized forced labor. This was also necessary in order to raise the ruined economy.
If in 1919 there were only 21 camps on the territory of the RSFSR, then by the end of the Civil War there were already 122. There were seven such establishments in Moscow alone, to which prisoners were transported from all over the country. In 1919 there were more than three thousand people in the capital. It was not yet the Gulag system, but only its prototype. Already then there was a tradition, according to which, all activities in the OGPU were subject only to interdepartmental acts, and not to general Soviet legislation.
The first labor camp in the Gulag system existed in emergency mode. Civil war, the policy of war communism led to lawlessness and violation of the rights of prisoners.
Solovki
In 1919, the Cheka created several labor camps in northern Russia, or rather, in the Arkhangelsk province. Soon this network was called the ELEPHANT. The abbreviation stands for "Northern Special Purpose Camps." The Gulag system in the USSR appeared even in the most remote regions of a large country.
In 1923, the Cheka was transformed into the GPU. The new department has distinguished itself by several initiatives. One of them was the proposal to establish a new forced camp on the Solovetsky archipelago, which was not far from the very Northern camps. Prior to that, on the islands in the White Sea was an ancient Orthodox monastery. It was closed as part of the fight against the Church and the “priests”.
So one of the key symbols of the Gulag appeared. It was the Solovetsky special purpose camp. His project was proposed by Joseph Unshlikhtom - one of the then leaders of the Cheka-GPU. His fate is indicative. This man contributed to the development of the repressive system, of which he eventually became a victim. In 1938, he was shot at the famous Kommunarka firing range. This place was the summer residence of Heinrich Yagoda, the People's Commissar of the NKVD in the 30s. He was also shot.
Solovki became one of the main camps in the Gulag of the 20s. According to the order of the OGPU, it was supposed to contain criminal and political prisoners. A few years after the emergence of Solovki grew, they had branches on the mainland, including in the Republic of Karelia. The Gulag system was constantly expanding at the expense of new prisoners.
In 1927, 12 thousand people were kept in the Solovetsky camp. The harsh climate and unbearable conditions led to regular deaths. Over the entire existence of the camp, more than 7 thousand people were buried in it. At the same time, about half of them died in 1933, when famine raged throughout the country.
Solovki were known throughout the country. They tried not to bring out information about problems inside the camp. In 1929, Maxim Gorky, at that time the chief Soviet writer, arrived on the archipelago. He wanted to check the conditions of the camp. The writer’s reputation was impeccable: his books were printed in huge print runs, he was known as a revolutionary of the old school. Therefore, many prisoners hoped that he would publicize everything that happens within the walls of the former monastery.
Before Gorky ended up on the island, the camp went through a total cleanup and was put in decent condition. Bullying of prisoners ceased. At the same time, the prisoners were threatened that if they spoke to Gorky about their life, they would face severe punishment. The writer, having been in Solovki, was delighted with the way prisoners were re-educated, accustomed to work and returned to society. However, at one of these meetings, in the children's colony, a boy approached Gorky. He told the famous guest about the bullying of the jailers: torture in the snow, overtime work, standing in the cold, etc. Gorky left the hut in tears. When he sailed to the mainland, the boy was shot. The Gulag system brutally cracked down on any dissatisfied prisoners.
Stalin's Gulag
In 1930, the Gulag system under Stalin was finally formed. She was subordinate to the NKVD and was one of the five main departments in this People’s Commissariat. Also in 1934, all correctional institutions that previously belonged to the People’s Commissariat of Justice moved to the Gulag. Labor in the camps was legislatively approved in the Correctional Labor Code of the RSFSR. Now, numerous prisoners had to implement the most dangerous and ambitious economic and infrastructure projects: construction projects, digging canals, etc.
The authorities did everything so that the Gulag system in the USSR seemed to the free citizens the norm. For this, regular ideological campaigns were launched. In 1931, the construction of the famous Belomorkanal began. It was one of the most significant projects of the first Stalinist five-year plan. The Gulag system is also one of the economic mechanisms of the Soviet state.
In order for the layman to learn in detail about the construction of the White Sea Canal in positive colors, the Communist Party instructed well-known writers to prepare a laudatory book. So the work “Channel named after Stalin” appeared. A whole group of authors worked on it: Tolstoy, Gorky, Pogodin and Shklovsky. Of particular interest is the fact that the book spoke positively about bandits and thieves, whose work was also used. The Gulag in the system of the Soviet economy occupied an important place. Cheap bonded labor made it possible to quickly realize the objectives of the five-year plans.
Political and criminals
The GULAG camp system was divided into two parts. It was a world of political and criminals. The last of them were recognized by the state as "socially close." This term was popular in Soviet propaganda. Some criminals tried to cooperate with the camp administration in order to facilitate their existence. Moreover, the authorities demanded from them loyalty and surveillance of the political.
Numerous "enemies of the people", as well as those convicted of alleged espionage and anti-Soviet propaganda, did not have any opportunities to defend their rights. Most often, they resorted to hunger strikes. With their help, political prisoners tried to draw the attention of the administration to the difficult living conditions, abuse and bullying of jailers.
Solitary hunger strikes did not lead to anything. Sometimes the NKVD officers could only increase the suffering of the convict. To do this, hungry plates were set with delicious food and scarce foods.
Fight against protest
The camp administration could pay attention to a hunger strike only if it was massive. Any concerted action by the prisoners led to the fact that among them were looking for the instigators, who were then dealt with with particular cruelty.
For example, in Ukhtpechlag in 1937, a group of those convicted of Trotskyism went on a hunger strike. Any organized protest was considered as counter-revolutionary activity and a threat to the state. This led to the fact that the camps reigned an atmosphere of denunciation and distrust of prisoners to each other. However, in some cases, the organizers of the hunger strike, on the contrary, openly announced their initiative because of the simple despair in which they found themselves. In Ukhtpechlag, the instigators were arrested. They refused to testify. Then the three NKVD sentenced the activists to be shot.
If a form of political protest in the Gulag was rare, then riots were common. Moreover, their initiators were, as a rule, criminals. Convicts under article 58 often became victims of criminals who complied with orders from their superiors. Representatives of the underworld were relieved of their jobs or held an inconspicuous position in the camp apparatus.
Skilled labor in the camp
This practice was also related to the fact that the GULAG system suffered from shortages of professional personnel. NKVD officers sometimes had no education at all. The camp authorities often had no choice but to put the prisoners themselves in the economic and administrative-technical positions.
Moreover, among political prisoners there were a lot of people of various specialties. “Technical intelligentsia” was especially in demand — engineers, etc. In the early 1930s, these were people who had been educated in tsarist Russia and remained specialists and professionals. In successful cases, such prisoners could even establish a trusting relationship with the administration in the camp. Some of them with access to freedom remained in the system already at the administrative level.
However, in the mid-30s, the regime tightened, which was reflected in highly skilled convicts. The situation of specialists who were in the intra-camp world became completely different. The well-being of such people depended entirely on the nature and degree of corruption of a particular boss. The Soviet system created the Gulag system also in order to completely demoralize its opponents - true or imaginary. Therefore, there could be no liberalism with regard to prisoners.
Sharashka
More fortunate to those specialists and scientists who fell into the so-called sharashka. These were closed-type scientific institutions where they worked on secret projects. Many famous scientists fell into camps for their freethinking. For example, such was Sergei Korolev - a man who became a symbol of the Soviet conquest of space. Designers, engineers, people associated with the military industry got into sharak.
Such institutions are reflected in the culture. The writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who visited Sharashka, after many years wrote the novel "In the first circle", which described in detail the life of such prisoners. This author is best known for his other book - The Gulag Archipelago.
The Gulag as part of the Soviet economy
By the beginning of World War II, colonies and camp complexes became an important element in many industrial sectors. The Gulag system, in short, existed wherever slave labor of prisoners could be used. It was especially in demand in the mining and metallurgical, fuel and forestry industries. An important area was capital construction. Almost all the large buildings of the Stalin era were erected by convicts. They were a mobile and cheap labor.
After the war ended, the role of the camp economy became even more important. The scope of forced labor has expanded due to the implementation of the atomic project and many other military tasks. In 1949, about 10% of the country's production was created in camps.
Unprofitable camps
Before the war, in order not to undermine the economic efficiency of the camps, Stalin canceled parole in the camps. At one of the discussions about the fate of the peasants who ended up in the camps after dispossession of the dekulak, he said that it was necessary to come up with a new incentive system for productivity in labor, etc. Parole often awaited a person who either excelled in exemplary behavior or became another Stakhanovite.
After the Stalinist remark, the system of offsetting working days was canceled. According to it, prisoners reduced their sentence by going to production. The NKVD did not want to do this, as the refusal of offsets deprived convicts of motivation to work hard. This, in turn, led to a drop in the profitability of any camp. Nevertheless, the offsets were canceled.
It was the loss-making of enterprises within the Gulag (among some other reasons) that compelled the Soviet leadership to reorganize the entire system, which before that existed outside the legal framework, and was under the exclusive responsibility of the NKVD.
The low labor efficiency of prisoners was also due to the fact that many of them had health problems. This was facilitated by poor diet, difficult living conditions, bullying of the administration and many other adversities. In 1934, 16% of prisoners were unemployed, and 10% were sick.
Liquidation of the Gulag
The rejection of the Gulag took place gradually. The impetus for the beginning of this process was the death of Stalin in 1953. The elimination of the Gulag system was begun a few months after that.
First of all, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR issued a decree on mass amnesty. So, more than half of the prisoners were released. As a rule, these were people whose term was less than five years.
At the same time, most political prisoners remained behind bars. The death of Stalin and the change of power inspired many convicts with confidence that soon something would change. In addition, prisoners began to openly resist the oppression and abuse of the camp authorities. So, there were several riots (in Vorkuta, Kengir and Norilsk).
Another important event for the Gulag was the XX Congress of the CPSU. It was attended by Nikita Khrushchev, who shortly before that had won the internal apparatus struggle for power. From the rostrum, he condemned the cult of personality of Stalin and the numerous atrocities of his era.
Then, special commissions appeared in the camps, which began to review the affairs of political prisoners. In 1956, their number was three times less. The liquidation of the Gulag system coincided with its transfer to the new department - the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs. In 1960, the last head of the GUITK (Main Directorate of Forced Labor Camps) Mikhail Kholodkov was sacked.