BB-029 / State Terror
Great Purge
The Act
The NKVD under Stalin arrested, executed, or sent to the Gulag hundreds of thousands of people, including party officials, military officers, ethnic minorities, and ordinary citizens accused of political crimes. Show trials and extrajudicial killings were routine.
The Response
After Stalin’s death, Khrushchev’s “Secret Speech” partially acknowledged the crimes. Later Soviet and post-Soviet governments opened some archives. Memorial organizations have documented victims, though full accountability was never achieved.