25. In late 1929, during the party purge, several targeted Leningrad officials fought back, demanding Kirov be sacked for prerevolutionary work on behalf of what they called a “Cadet” (bourgeois-liberal) newspaper: Kirov’s signed articles—which his attackers dug up in the public library—had welcomed the Provisional Government. Orjonikidze defended Kirov, divulging that Stalin himself, at Pravda, had not been anti-Provisional Government in early 1917. Kirov’s denouncers were removed, but Stalin had Kirov’s prerevolutionary political “error” recorded in his party file. Khlevniuk, Politbiuro, 120 (citing RGASPI, f. 17, op. 162, d. 8, l. 24–5: Dec. 11, 1929); Khlevniuk, Stalin i Orzhonikidze, 19–20; Khlevniuk, In Stalin’s Shadow, 26–9; Rosliakov, Ubiistvo, 108–10; Lenoe, Kirov Murder, 93–106. See also Ciliga, Russian Enigma, 120–1; and Tokaev, Betrayal of an Ideal, 109, 241.
26. Vladimir Loginov, Teni Stalina, 97. Artyom concurred: “Kirov after Nadezhda Sergeevna was the closest person to Stalin.” Sergeev and Glushik, Besedy o Staline, 59–60.
27. Molotov also noted of Kirov: “He was a weak organizer. He was a good mass agitator.” He dismissed the notions that Stalin could have killed Kirov (“odiousness”) or that Kirov could have taken Stalin’s place. (“Absurd! . . . look, pretty speeches of a secondary character. That was not enough.”) Chuev, Molotov, 377.
28. Kirov won the Order of Lenin (March 31, 1931) for helping fulfill the oil industry five-year plan in 2.5 years.
29. Sergeev and Glushik, Besedy o Staline, 71–3.
30. Chukhin, Kanaloarmeitsy, 18 (no citation).
31. The canal laborers gave their name (“zek” or zakliuchennyi kanalstroia) to all Gulag prisoners. Chukhin, Kanaloarmeitsy, 189–209. Yagoda built a large number of critical objects, from the country’s first-ever stadium (Dynamo) in Moscow to new administrative buildings for the NKVD itself.
32. Murin, Stalin v ob”iatiiakh, 44 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1552, l. 19).
33. Aug. 27, 1933.
34. Chigirin, Stalin, 84–5 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 1482, l. 53: Aug. 25 to Sept. 2, 1933).
35. Kvashonkin, Sovetskoe rukovodstvo, 249–52 (RGASPI, f. 667, op. 1, d. 16, l. 8–12: Aug. 27, 1933), 252–3 (f. 74, op. 2, d. 41, l. 63–71: Aug. 30), 253–4 (l. 72–3: Sept. 7). See also Kvashonkin, Sovetskoe rukovodstvo, 255 n1 (RGASPI, f. 74, op. 2, d. 41, l. 74; GARF, f. R-3316, op. 1, 3d. 18, l. 168).
36. RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 80, l. 68.
37. In summer 1931, the first high-frequency phone lines were installed between Moscow and Leningrad and Moscow and Kharkov. The scramblers and encrypters were purchased in Germany from Siemens and Halske AG and AEG, copied and adapted. Moscow would soon be connected to Smolensk and Minsk (1932), Gorky and Rostov (1933), Kiev (1934). Other systems grew in parallel: the Kremlin self-dialing ATC (“vertushka”); the NKVD state security first directorate (bodyguard) telephone station; etc.
38. Na prieme, 107–12.
39. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 330 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 80, l. 87).
40. Khlevniuk et al., Stalin i Kaganovich, 315 (RGASPI, f. 558, op. 11, d. 741, l. 7–12: Aug. 26, 1933), 319 (f. 81, op. 3, d. 100, l. 107–8: Aug. 29), 323 (f. 558, op. 11, d. 80, l. 66: Sept. 1), 325–7 (d. 741, l. 20–6: Sept. 2); Rees, Iron Lazar, 119 (citing RGASPI, f. 54, op. 1, d. 100, l. 107–8); Kosheleva, Pis’ma Stalina Molotovu, 248–9 (Sept. 12, 1933), 247–8n2 (RGASPI, f. 17, op. 3, d. 929, l. 21; d. 930, l. 13); Lih et al., Stalin’s Letters to Molotov, 234–5, 233n2; Kvashonkin, Sovetskoe rukovodstvo, 261–3 (RGASPI, f. 85, op. 27, d. 214, l. 25–30: Sept. 30); Khlevniuk et al., Stalinskoe politbiuro, 133; Davies et al., “The Politburo and Economic Decision Making,” 110.
41. The dacha had been constructed in 1932–33 in a mad rush (the construction director, from the central executive committee of Abkhazia, begged for more labor power). Lakoba Papers, Hoover Institution Archives, 1–65. Lakoba, Yenukidze, his deputy N. I. Pakhomov, and Pauker conducted a final inspection in early July 1933.
