约瑟夫-斯大林对苏联军队的清洗及其后续影响

作者：Ewan Leslie，六中

约瑟夫-斯大林对苏联军队的清洗及其后续影响

1935年，苏联的前五位元帅，即苏联的最高军事级别。约瑟夫-斯大林很快就会在他对红军的 "大清洗 "中处决其中的三位元帅。

1935年11月，苏联的五位元帅（红军的最高军衔）合影留念。在最左边，42岁的米哈伊尔-图哈切夫斯基元帅是一位年轻的、具有创新精神的军官，他提出了开创性的军事战术。3在他旁边，谢苗-布迪永尼元帅和克里门-沃罗希洛夫元帅是稳定的、老练的领导人，他们在近二十年前的俄罗斯内战中服役。在最右边，瓦西里-布柳赫尔元帅和亚历山大-叶戈罗夫元帅在红军高层中担任重要职务，主要负责红军机构和各军事战线的运作。4在这五位元帅的领导下，红军和苏联的未来似乎充满希望。然而，独裁的苏联总书记约瑟夫-斯大林（Joseph Stalin）将打破这种局面，他进行了一系列的清洗，导致图哈切夫斯基、布柳赫尔和叶戈罗夫元帅被处决，在未来几年内损害了红军的能力。

1937年2月，斯大林在中央委员会全体会议上对政府和军队的主要官员发表了讲话。5在讲话中，斯大林谈到了据说已经渗透到红军中的许多反革命团体对苏联构成的迫在眉睫的危险。纳粹德国和法西斯意大利在欧洲的崛起导致了苏联对红军中法西斯分子的担忧。在国内，斯大林警告说，一个新的、危险的 "第五纵队 "正在崛起，这是一个由任何敢于反对斯大林铁腕权力的人组成的团体。6具体而言，斯大林担心他的历史对手列昂-托洛茨基在苏联政治家和红军军官中获得了巨大的影响力，现在他威胁到了斯大林的权力。为了打击这种感知到的威胁（并缓解他日益增长的偏执狂），斯大林主张并实施了一系列针对苏联社会各阶层（包括红军）的大清洗，试图消除对其政权的任何潜在威胁。这些清洗被统称为 "大清洗 "和 "大恐怖"，它们导致了25000多名红军军官的失宠，其中许多人被处决或被送往臭名昭著的苏联古拉格工作营。

斯大林的大清洗不仅对苏联民众产生了灾难性的影响，而且还大大损害了红军的效率。许多有创意的军官被处决，使红军没有能力打一场现代战争。大清洗后留下来的军官采用了过时的战术，武装部门的士气降到了历史最低点。因此，当苏联在20世纪30年代末打仗的时候，清洗的灾难性后果充分显示出来，这并不令人惊讶。苏联在1939-1940年冬季战争中的表现是大清洗影响的早期迹象，永久地损害了红军的声誉。

此外，苏联在1941年德国入侵期间的惊人失败，进一步暴露了清洗造成的深刻创伤。大清洗后留下的红军领导层采用了无效和过时的战术，而缺乏有效的军官意味着红军对德军现代化的快节奏进攻毫无办法。9 因此，苏联遭受了灾难性的失败，德军在入侵的头几个月里俘虏或杀害了超过一百万的苏联士兵。此外，德军还成功地占领了大片俄罗斯领土，包括乌克兰、白俄罗斯和波罗的海，他们的入侵只是在莫斯科城门外被阻止了。尽管苏联人最终能够把德国人从莫斯科逼退，但这需要对他们的战术进行全面改革，并撤换许多主张大清洗的将军，改用新的和创新的将军。

By Ewan Leslie, VI Form

Joseph Stalin’s Purge of the Soviet Military and Its Subsequent Consequences

The first five Marshals of the Soviet Union, the USSR’s highest military ranking, in 1935. Joseph Stalin would soon execute three of these Marshals in his “Great Purge” of the Red Army.1 

In November, 1935, the five Marshals of the Soviet Union, the highest military rank in the Red Army, posed for a photograph.2 These marshals made up a diverse group of military leadership. On the far left, 42 year old Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevksy was a young, innovative officer who was proposing groundbreaking military tactics.3 Next to him, Marshals Semyon Budyonny and Kliment Voroshilov were steady, veteran leaders who served in the Russian Civil War almost two decades earlier. On the far right, Marshals Vasily Blyukher and Alexander Yegorov served important positions within the Red Army hierarchy, mainly concerning the running of the Red Army apparatus and its various military fronts.4 With these five Marshals anchoring the Red Army leadership, the future of the Red Army and the Soviet Union seemed promising. However, Joseph Stalin, the dictatorial General Secretary of the Soviet Union, would disrupt this situation by instituting a series of purges that led to the executions of Marshals Tukhachevsky, Blyukher, and Yegorov, damaging the Red Army’s capabilities for years to come. 

In February 1937, Stalin spoke to key government and military officials in a plenum of the Central Committee.5In his speech, Stalin addressed the impending danger to the Soviet Union posed by numerous counter-revolutionary groups who had supposedly infiltrated the Red Army. The rise of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy in Europe had led to Soviet fears of fascists in the Red Army. Domestically, Stalin warned of the rise of a new and dangerous “fifth column,” a group made up of anyone who dared to oppose Stalin’s iron grip on power.6 Specifically, Stalin feared that his historic rival, Leon Trotsky, had gained substantial influence amongst both Soviet politicians and Red Army officers, and that now he threatened Stalin’s power. To combat this perceived threat (and to assuage his growing paranoia), Stalin advocated for and implemented a series of purges against various sectors of Soviet society, including the Red Army, trying to eliminate any potential threats to his regime. These purges are known collectively as the “Great Purge” and the “Great Terror,” and they led to the disgracement of over 25,000 Red Army officers, many of whom were executed or sent to the infamous Soviet Gulag work camps.7 The Great Purge also claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of Soviet civilians who were deemed “counterrevolutionary”. 

Stalin’s purges not only had disastrous effects on the Soviet populace, but they also significantly harmed the Red Army’s effectiveness. The execution of many innovative officers left the Red Army incapable of fighting a modern war. The officers who remained after the purges employed outdated tactics, and the armed services’ morale dropped to an all time low. Therefore, it is not surprising that, when it was time for the Soviet Union to fight in the late 1930s, the purges’ disastrous consequences were on full display. The Soviet performance during the Winter War of 1939-1940 was an early indication of the purge’s effects, permanently damaging the Red Army’s reputation.8 

Moreover, the stunning Soviet defeats during the German invasion in 1941 further exposed the deep wounds that the purges caused. The Red Army leadership that remained after the purges utilized ineffective and outdated tactics, and a lack of effective officers meant that the Red Army had no answer to the German’s modern and fast-paced attack.9 As a result, the Soviets suffered catastrophic defeats, with the Germans capturing or killing over a million Soviet soldiers within the first few months of their invasion. Additionally, the Germans were successful in capturing large swaths of Russian territory, including the Ukraine, Byelorussia, and the Baltics, and their invasion was only halted just outside Moscow’s gates. Even though the Soviets were able to eventually push the Germans back from Moscow, it required an overhaul of their tactics and the removal of many of the generals who advocated for the purges in favor of new and innovative ones.10