Book Review: The Great Terror by Robert Conquest

Introduction: Why The Great Terror Matters

Robert Conquest's The Great Terror: A Reassessment is an absolute must-read for anyone interested in the history of Communism and, more importantly, the issue of human rights. The book can be considered one of the most powerful arguments in favor of human liberty, rights, and democratic government. It is also worth noting that Conquest's work contains the only truly exhaustively researched historical record of the reign of terror unleashed by Stalin's purges. Although Conquest wrote the original The Great Terror some twenty years before this reassessment, the revised version assumes greater importance given new evidence that emerged during the glasnost period. That new evidence also helps put to rest earlier doubts over the accuracy of Conquest's source material (Conquest, 1990, p. viii), as well as speculation that he had derived his material from the Information Research Department, a known source of information tailored to spread anti-Communist propaganda (Wikipedia).

Lenin's Legacy and the Roots of Soviet Terror

Conquest's narrative begins with a description of the historical roots of the Great Terror, including the development of the Party, the consolidation of the dictatorship, and the dominant ideas of the Stalin period that resulted in extreme policies. Interestingly, though Stalin himself was primarily responsible for the atrocities inflicted on millions of innocent Soviet citizens, Conquest traces the roots of the Great Terror to the establishment of "the system of rule by a centralized Party against all other social forces — Bolsheviks centralized and disciplined" by Lenin. The Civil War that followed contributed to transforming the new mass party into a hardened and experienced machine in which loyalty to the organization came before any other consideration (Conquest, 1990, pp. 4–5). By taking into account external events as well as the machinations of political leaders, Conquest skillfully demonstrates to the student and lover of history the role played by both individuals and the fortuitous coincidence of external events in shaping a political culture.

Conquest goes on to explain that Bolshevik rule did not exclude all political opposition in its early years. After the Civil War, the Mensheviks and the Socialist Revolutionaries quickly began to gain ground among the trade unions and the peasantry, turning anti-Bolshevik. Rather than legalizing and recognizing these opposition parties, Lenin and his supporters chose suppression, including forbidding the formation of rival groups within the Communist Party itself. Thus the groundwork for a culture in which Party members denounced fellow members hostile to Party policies was in fact laid during Lenin's era. Lenin justified his policies on the grounds that "neither freedom, nor equality, nor labor democracy, if they are opposed to the interests of the emancipation of labor from the oppression of capitalism," should be recognized (Conquest, 1990, pp. 5–6). This early account of Soviet history is valuable because it shows that by creating a party that relied on dogma alone, Lenin laid the foundation for Stalin's later fanaticism, abuse of party power, totalitarianism, and reign of terror.

Conquest's analysis is thought-provoking in that it clearly demonstrates Lenin's failure to see that ideology alone was insufficient, and that imposing such ideology by force would be tantamount to a reign no better than that of the Tsars: "the use of political power to promote equality tended to become less and less concerned with the liberty side," reaching a stage where it became — in Thomas Sowell's words — "the grand delusion of contemporary liberals that they have both the right and the ability to move their fellow creatures around like blocks of wood, and that the end results will be no different than if people had voluntarily chosen the same actions" (Conquest, February 1999). Had Lenin possessed the foresight to envisage the consequences of creating a framework vulnerable to power-hungry individuals, Soviet history might have taken a very different turn. In tracing the roots of the Great Terror, Conquest succeeds in highlighting the importance not just of ideology in politics but of a system of government founded on true democratic principles.

Stalin's Rise and the Machinery of Power

The chronology of events that followed Lenin's death proves Conquest's point beyond dispute. After Lenin's death, Stalin unabashedly exploited the advantages of centralized, one-party rule. He ensured that his bid for power was unchallenged by systematically eliminating all likely rivals and opposition within the Politburo. Trotsky, Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bukharin, Rykov, and Tomsky all met their deaths, and by 1928 Stalin was entrenched as the supreme Soviet ruler. Surrounding himself with men known for their ruthlessness — Kaganovich, Zhdanov, Malenkov, Beria, and Yezhov — Stalin is on record as saying that "he preferred people to support him from fear rather than from conviction, as conviction could change" (Conquest, 1990, p. 13).

Stalin then proceeded to implement his own particular vision of socialism, which entailed acceptance of the Party line by force. Collectivization of agriculture was imposed on a reluctant and resistant peasantry by brute force, leading to "a civil war in the rural areas — the beginning of a whole new era of terror" (Conquest, 1990, p. 18). While forcing peasants to relinquish their landholdings was itself a form of terrorism, the policy took on inhuman proportions when the state also seized their grain, leading to a terrible famine in 1932: "The death toll among the peasantry from 1930 to 1933 was around 10 million — higher than the dead of the First World War" (Conquest, 1990, p. 20).

Agriculture was not the only area to see the implementation of Communist ideology by force. Stalin's campaign of rapid industrialization alienated the very proletariat that the Party was supposed to represent, stripping workers of basic labor rights and even imposing the death penalty on any worker found stealing state property. Soviet industry grew, but it was achieved through inhuman methods. These moves generated some opposition within the Politburo, which Stalin crushed by ruthlessly expelling or arresting all known or suspected traitors to the Party: "general purging of the Party — more than 800,000 members were expelled, and another 340,000 in 1934" (Conquest, 1990, p. 26).

Conquest's account of Stalin's purges of his own party members is compelling because it also highlights the human dimensions of the crisis and the profound irony of Politburo members opposing the death penalty for Party members on grounds of loyalty. As Conquest observes, "it is here that the true double belief of the Party moderates lay. It explains, as nothing else, the horrified resistance of many who had cheerfully massacred the Whites, uncomplainingly starved and slaughtered the peasantry, to the execution of prominent Party members — it reflects a double sense of morality comparable to the attitude of men in the ancient world to slaves" (Conquest, 1990, p. 27).

Conclusion: Human Cost and the Case for Democracy

While countries can perhaps recover from economic disasters, it is impossible for the millions of people who lost their lives or suffered untold deprivations at the hands of one despot to ever be compensated: "Khrushchev himself told us in his memoirs that ten million or more of our citizens paid with their lives in Stalin's jails and camps" (Conquest, 1990, p. 485). That figure alone is shocking, but the individual stories reported throughout the book are even more so. It is not just the number of dead that must be weighed, but also the suffering endured by those who survived in Stalin's enforced labor camps or as ordinary citizens living in fear. It is this dimension that makes The Great Terror a powerful statement in defense of human rights, liberty, and democracy.