Letter to V.R. Menzhinsky (after October 2, 1930)

Source: Tom 17

Comrade Menzhinsky!

I received your letter of 2/X and the materials. Ramzin's depositions are very interesting. In my opinion, the most interesting thing in his depositions is the question of intervention in general and especially the question of the timing of the intervention. It turns out they planned the intervention for 1930 but postponed it to 1931 or even 1932. This is very probable and important. It is all the more important because it comes from a primary source, i.e., from the group of Ryabushinsky, Gukasov, Denisov, and Nobel, which represents the most powerful socio-economic group of all the groupings that exist in the USSR and in emigration -- the most powerful both in terms of capital and in terms of connections with the French and British governments. It may seem that the Toiling Peasant Party (TKP) or the "Industrial Party" or Milyukov's "party" represent the main force. But that is not true. The main force is the Ryabushinsky-Denisov-Nobel group, etc., i.e., "Torgprom." The TKP, the "Industrial Party," and Milyukov's "party" are errand boys for "Torgprom." All the more interesting, therefore, is the information about the timing of the intervention coming from "Torgprom." And the question of intervention in general, and of its timing in particular, is, as is well known, of paramount interest to us.

Hence my proposals:
a) To make one of the most important focal points of the new (future) depositions from the leadership of the TKP, the "Industrial Party," and especially Ramzin, the question of intervention and the timing of the intervention (1. Why was the intervention in 1930 postponed? 2) Was it not because Poland is not yet ready? 3) Perhaps because Romania is not ready? 4) Perhaps because the limitrophe states have not yet linked up with Poland? 5) Why was the intervention postponed to 1931? 6) Why "might" it be postponed to 1932? 7) And so on and so forth.)

b) To involve Larichev and other members of the "CC of the Industrial Party" in the case and to interrogate them most stringently about the same thing, having them read Ramzin's depositions.

c) To interrogate most stringently Groman, who, according to Ramzin's depositions, stated at one point in the "United Center" that "the intervention has been postponed to 1932."

d) To put the gentlemen Kondratyev, Yurovsky, Chayanov, etc., through the wringer -- they are artfully dodging the "tendency toward intervention" but are unquestionably interventionists -- and to interrogate them most stringently about the timing of the intervention (Kondratyev, Yurovsky, and Chayanov should know about this just as Milyukov knows, to whom they traveled for a "conversation").

If Ramzin's depositions are confirmed and made more concrete by the depositions of other accused (Groman, Larichev, Kondratyev and company, etc.), this will be a serious success for the OGPU, since the material thus obtained we will make, in one form or another, available to the sections of the Communist International and to the workers of all countries, we will conduct the broadest campaign against the interventionists, and we will achieve the paralysis and undermining of intervention attempts for the next 1-2 years, which is of no small importance for us. Is that clear?

Regards!

I. Stalin.

Source: Kommunist. 1990. No. 11. Pp. 99-100.

TsA FSB RF. F. 2. Op. 9. D. 388. L. 270-271.

NOTE

On October 25, 1930, having heard Stalin's report "On the Use of Depositions of Wreckers Concerning Intervention," the Politburo resolved:

"a) To recognize the necessity of immediately bringing to trial the counter-revolutionary united center, making the central issue at the trial the depositions of wreckers about the preparation of intervention.

b) To create a commission consisting of Comrades Litvinov, Voroshilov, Stalin, Menzhinsky, and Krylenko to review in the shortest possible time the depositions of wreckers about intervention, with a view to publication in the press."