Brian Martin and Wendy Varney, Nonviolence Speaks: Communicating against Repression (Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press, 2003), chapter 3 (prepublication version)

3 Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression

The Soviet Union provides an intriguing case history in nonviolent action and many of the Chronology of significant events issues relevant to it. The Union was largely in the Soviet Union born of nonviolent actions (along with parallel violence) in 1917, when strikes, factory February 1917: Dictatorial ruler Tsar Nicholas occupations, demonstrations in the street, and II abdicates under huge public pressure. A other forms of resistance resulted in a coup provisional government is established. d’état by the Bolsheviks. Ironically, street demonstrations and massive social resistance October 1917: The Bolsheviks (Communist led to the defeat of another coup in 1991, Party), led by Lenin, seize power from the signaling the end of the Soviet Union. provisional government. In between 1917 and 1991 (see chronol- ogy), there was much repression and the 1918–1920: Civil war between the Bolsheviks emergence of numerous strategies to deal with and the anti-Bolsheviks (the Whites). The the repression in its varied stages. This chapter West supports the Whites. provides an overview of the forms and roles of dissent in the Soviet Union, focusing espe- 1922: Stalin is elected General Secretary of the cially on nonviolent resistance to the 1991 Communist Party. The Union of Soviet attempted coup. It discusses how resistance Socialist Republics (USSR) is formed. differed during the different stages of repres- sion that characterized the Soviet Union’s 1924: Lenin dies and is succeeded by Alexei years and poses possible reasons for the Rykov as Premier of USSR. Zinoviev and relatively low levels of action, before Kamenev form triumvirate with Stalin to rule assessing what was and what might have been USSR. useful, what specific problems were faced, and how they might have been overcome. The role 1928: After outmaneuvering the left, then the of international observers and supporters and right, Stalin becomes the nation's leader. The their relative inaction through many of the first Five Year Plan is established. worst times is also considered. Three periods of particularly harsh repres- 1929: Agricultural collectivization begins and, sion stand out in the history of the Soviet with it, terrorization of peasants. Union: (1) forced collectivization; (2) the Stalin Terror; and (3) “re-stalinization” under 1932: Second Five Year Plan begins. Death Brezhnev. Each of these was met with penalty degree passed for stealing from resistance in some form but the impact of that collectives. resistance was not always even or clear. But before examining these three periods, we start 1933: Famine devastates USSR, largely as a with a discussion of the 1991 coup. result of rural turmoil.

1934: Kirov — a possible challenger to Sta- lin’s power — is killed. The Great Purges begin.

1936: Beginning of show trials of Party leaders, including Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bukharin, and Rykov.

50 Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 31

1986: Gorbachev introduces mechanisms for a 1941: Germany invades the Soviet Union, more open society (glasnost) and for economic which undergoes huge losses and is crucial in restructuring (perestroika). the Allies’ victory. 1989: People power topples Eastern European 1945: Germany surrenders. Western leaders communist regimes. look to the Soviet Union to help defeat Japan but are worried at the prospect of the USSR 1990: Following growth of the Baltic nation- “sharing” in the triumph of that defeat. To alist movement, Lithuanians elect a pro- hasten Japan's surrender before full Soviet independence parliament and begin protesting involvement, atomic bombs are dropped on strongly for independence. Boris Yeltsin Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Cold War com- becomes chairman of the Russian Supreme mences building and continues until 1989. Soviet and declares that Russian laws take precedence over Soviet laws. 1953: Stalin dies and is replaced by Nikita Khrushchev. 1991: In response to Gorbachev's announce- ment that the leaders of 10 republics have 1956: The Twentieth Party Congress hears in a agreed on a new Union treaty, an Emergency “secret speech” by Khrushchev that Stalin was Committee is formed and attempts a coup. responsible for genocide and terror, allowed Nonviolent action begins immediately. Several by a Cult of Personality which had developed days later the coup is defeated but the event around him. Soviet troops invade Hungary. weighs heavily against Gorbachev and the Emergence of a questioning sub-culture in the Communist Party, bringing about the eventual USSR. collapse of the Soviet Union.

1964: Khrushchev becomes the first Soviet leader to be dismissed. He is replaced by Leonid Brezhnev. Resisting the 1991 coup

1968: Soviet troops invade Czechoslovakia. In August 1991 a group calling itself the Soviet citizens are arrested for protesting and Emergency Committee detained Soviet Presi- are sent to labor camps. Dissent becomes more dent Michael Gorbachev in his Crimean dacha organized, especially with first publication of and attempted a coup. Headed by Vice-Presi- the Chronicle of Current Events. dent Gennadi Yanayev, the coup was largely an effort to block moves by Gorbachev to 1979: Soviet troops invade Afghanistan. decentralize the Soviet Union, with ultimate independence for the republics. However it 1982: Yuri Andropov is elected General also stemmed from apprehension by political Secretary of Communist Party, following conservatives about the new democratic terrain Brezhnev's death. into which Gorbachev had led the USSR. Some top Communist Party officials and 1984: Andropov dies and is replaced by bureaucrats felt that power was slipping away Konstantin Chernenko. from the party, from them personally, and from the Soviet government which had long 1985: Michail Gorbachev is elected as leader, tried to assert the Soviet Union as a leading after Chernenko’s death. nation in world directions and political thought. The collapse of the Eastern bloc had been made possible by Gorbachev’s declared

32 Nonviolence Speaks unwillingness to support the previously en- prepared a Moscow command bunker for use trenched Brezhnev doctrine whereby the by the coup leaders if the need arose.3 Soviet government intervened in the political On awaking to the news that Gorbachev affairs of its neighbors to ensure that its own was ill and that an Emergency Committee had interests prevailed1. This had led to the demise taken over, many citizens realized that there of the Cold War, which had propped up a great had been a coup. Muscovites had the tanks in many myths, ideologies, and rationales in both the street to further demonstrate that likeli- the US and the USSR. These had lost their hood. Resistance started immediately, with credibility with subsequent repercussions on many workers striking or simply staying away the Soviet home front. But Gorbachev had also from work. This took place across the USSR, introduced a wide range of reforms domesti- from the coal-mining regions of Siberia to the cally. After many years of stagnation under huge military-industrial complexes of Gorky.4 previous policies, these reforms did not run People gathered at major city points in altogether smoothly, allowing conservatives to Moscow, such as Manezh Square and outside complain that the nation was in shambles. the Russian Parliament. When the state- Thus the coup leaders justified their controlled television program Vremya showed August actions by reference to the troubled an uncensored snippet of Yeltsin on a tank state of affairs throughout the Soviet Union. outside the Russian parliament, many more The Committee voided what it deemed to be people were roused to join the protests. “unconstitutional laws,” banned strikes, rallies, Faced with huge opposition, the coup and demonstrations, closed down all liberal leaders issued plans for the demonstrations to newspapers and those it felt it could not trust, be broken up. One factory was ordered to dispatched columns of tanks to Baltic capitals urgently send a quarter of a million pairs of and to Moscow and Leningrad, and announced handcuffs to Moscow in readiness for mass the takeover of the media and many other arrests. Vladimir Kruchkov, one of the facilities. members of the Emergency Committee and Among the first moves of the Emergency head of the KGB, ordered two floors of the Committee was to put all military units on Lefortovo Prison in central Moscow to be alert, ordering them to occupy Moscow and cleared. There is no question that the coup prepare for battle. Although an elite unit was leaders intended to move forward with their ordered to arrest Boris Yeltsin, this was never plans but these became unstuck at the point of carried out, probably due to divisions in the execution and even prior to it. For instance, the ranks of those ordered to make the arrest.2 By putschists’ plans were leaked to Yeltsin and 9am Moscow time, the first military units were demonstrators at the Russian Parliament were taking up strategic positions in the capital, given fliers outlining the plans for how their with a column of 25 armored personnel resistance was to be crushed. Many wept and carriers, staffed with paratroopers, parked troops present had an opportunity to contem- outside Moscow City Hall. The KGB (secret plate what role they might play for or against police) had been put on early alert and had the coup as the orders came down. There was also the story of at least one KGB agent walking around the city, ensuring that he was incommunicado so that he could not be ordered to take part in the putschists’ plot.

1 See Ralph Summy and Michael E. Salla (eds.), Why the Cold War Ended: A Range of Interpreta- 3 Jeff Trimble and Peter Vassiliev, “Three days tions (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1995). that shook the world,” U.S. News & World Report, Vol. 111, 18 November 1991, pp. 54–62. 2 Monica Attard, Russia: Which Way Paradise? (Sydney: Doubleday, 1997), p. 175. 4 Attard, Russia: Which Way Paradise?, p. 184. Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 33

A tense situation saw three people shot By late morning of 21 August the tanks dead at Manezh Square on the second day of that had been patrolling the Kremlin had been the coup when soldiers became frightened. recalled. The putschists tried to escape but The crowd expressed anger, fear, and grief. were arrested in a sure sign that the coup had This may have led other soldiers to ponder failed. Several top officials and party heads what they would do in a similar situation. who had supported the coup suicided, at least Many of them were already empathizing with one also killing his wife.7 These suicides/kill- the demonstrators. By the third day many of ings probably constitute the bulk of the deaths them were openly saying that they would not related to the coup (though they are of course shoot the protesters. This was in fact the final much less celebrated than the deaths of blow to the coup. protesters at Manezh Square). In confrontations such as those between If the coup leaders made one crucial the protesters and the Soviet soldiers there are mistake, it was thinking that the Soviet complicated dynamics at work. It is crucial to citizenry would simply go along with the fate success that resisters, as much as possible, decided for them at higher levels. It seems avoid a process whereby each party constructs they also misjudged the amount of military an image of the other as enemy. James A. Aho support they would get, although this itself has identified a number of ingredients in such was, arguably, connected with the strength of a process. Among those relevant to encounters the resistance which signaled to the armed between soldiers and citizens are myth making forces that this was not a coup to be supported. that too easily categorizes the other party and The air force in particular was anxious not to expects certain negative behavior on their part become involved in an attack on Soviet to be inevitable and predictable. These can citizens and many mayors and other leaders become self-fulfilling prophecies as each party were appealing directly to the military to defy responds to the other within ritualistic patterns the Emergency Committee’s orders. that confirm their worst suspicions.5 Those The resistance could be seen as a mixture who view themselves as acting righteously — of indignation, ingenuity, and hardened and each of the parties are likely to regard resolve to reject a return to repression. It bore themselves so — “respond ‘appropriately’ to the signs of a people having had a taste of those they have designated as evil [or as freedom under glasnost and not wanting to enemy] — with secrecy, caution, cunning, and, retreat, as illustrated by one Muscovite who if necessary, cruelty. To act in any other way joined the protests, declaring that “… for years would be imprudent.”6 We would not expect nothing but obedience and inertia was nonviolent activists to act cruelly, of course, pounded in to my brain.” But now that a but soldiers who believe the worst of these government that she had help elect was under demonstrators may still view them as threat- threat, she vowed to ignore the curfew and let ening in other more subtle but poorly under- tanks roll over her if necessary.8 stood ways. Also evident were signs of the re- It is important, therefore, to treat soldiers emergence of previously used techniques of with respect, appeal to their humanity and underground organization, such as publication decency, and hope it has not been extinguished of underground newspapers and people pulling by military training and indoctrination. their old short-wave radios out of mothballs. Citizens commented that they hadn’t used

5 James A. Aho, This Thing of Darkness: A Sociology of the Enemy (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1994), pp. 29–30. See also Sam 7 Attard, Russia: Which Way Paradise?, pp. 197– Keen, Faces of the Enemy: Reflections of the 202. Hostile Imagination (San Francisco: Harper & 8 Gladys D. Ganley, Unglued Empire: The Soviet Row, 1986). Experience with Communications Technologies 6 Aho, This Thing of Darkness, p. 31. (Norwood, NJ: Ablex, 1996), p. 144.

34 Nonviolence Speaks these for years but were pleased not to have symbolic, supportive, and designed to influ- got rid of them. The experience from earlier ence others. Some of these categories obvi- days of dissent served the resisters well and ously overlap. For instance, when the crowd at the fact that short-wave radios were plentiful Moscow’s Manezh Square joined hands to was of further benefit to the struggle. block the entry of armored personnel carriers, However, if dissidents of previous eras this fell across all categories, being highly had come largely from the intelligentsia, albeit visible, obviously nonviolent, displaying and with a diversity of interests, concerns, and invoking group solidarity, and making it ideologies but all with the common desire to psychologically difficult, though certainly not express their opinions freely, those who re- physically impossible, for the armed troops to sisted the coup appeared to have come from a proceed. Overlap of categories is also seen in more diverse background. While the intelli- leaflets and posters, which involved organiza- gentsia and middle classes made up a large tion in terms of getting them produced, proportion of the resistance, workers also reproduced, and disseminated but which were joined the demonstrations and played their also aimed at gaining support of others and own role. The trade union movement in influencing those who were wary about Leningrad was particularly strong in the joining the actions. resistance, with calls for strikes widespread on Strikes, although usually of an organiza- workers’ placards at the large demonstration in tional nature with their economic ramifications Palace Square, where at least 100,000 people and political potential, can be highly symbolic. gathered. The city’s Kirov tractor factory, with This was certainly the case with the one- 30,000 workers, became a strong center of person strike conducted by Vladimir Petrik, resistance, using its fax machines to transmit chief of an assembly division at a factory speeches of defiance and support. Workers at implicated in military equipment.9 Petrik, at that factory spoke openly and enthusiastically risk of jeopardizing his job, was determined to of a campaign of civil disobedience. oppose the passive acceptance evident at his Media workers played their own role and factory and to show that a person can take an were involved in ways that had not been individual stand on issues. possible during the pre-glasnost days, using One of the most active groups was the ploys of broadcasting and reporting details and Memorial Society, established to assist victims information which surely went against the of Stalin. Members collected all the paper they coup initiators and constantly showed them to could gather from offices and elsewhere, be on shaky ground. In a threatening situation produced a vast number of leaflets, and such as a coup, especially if there is a distributed them on the streets. One distributor background such as the Soviet Union had, expected trouble when he was approached by many people inevitably lie low and see which two policemen. But it turned out that they way the wind blows, fearing that, if there is a were eager to have the leaflet to keep abreast new wave of repression, the regime may of the news, suggesting the widespread retaliate against open opponents. The part support for the resistance.10 played by media workers served to embolden Communication was paramount, from the those who, even though ideologically opposed slogans and hastily made placards demanding to the coup, may otherwise have been inclined "No to the Fascist Junta!" to the 20,000 copies to lie low . The nonviolent actions undertaken by the 9 Vladimir Petrik, “Moscow’s MV Khrunichev resisters warrant discussion, both for their machine-building factory reacts to the August having been shaped, to some extent, by the coup,” in Victoria E. Bonnell, Ann Cooper, and history of resistance in the Soviet Union, as we Gregory Freidin (eds.), Russia at the Barricades: shall later see, and for what they tell us about Eyewitness Accounts of the August 1991 Coup how coups may be resisted generally. Resis- (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1994), pp. 111–119. tance fell into the categories of organizational, 10 Ganley, Unglued Empire, p. 156. Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 35 of Yeltsin’s decrees run off by the Mayor of only recently been popularly elected as Presi- Ryazan, to the ham radios that kept events dent of Russia and many soldiers were thought alive. It was not just about convincing trusted to have voted for him. As he clambered on the friends, as had so often been the thrust of the tanks and spoke forcefully against the coup, communicative efforts of previous Soviet many of the soldiers would therefore have dissidents. Photocopies announcing the considered him to represent the voice of demonstration at the Russian White House legitimate Russian authority.12 Nevertheless, were pasted up on the Metro walls and at least the discussions initiated and pleas made one woman heading towards the demonstra- directly to the soldiers by the demonstrators, tion begged people heading the other way to who sought to identify with the soldiers and join the demonstration.11 Those opposing the seek a show of humanity, seem to have been coup knew they had to act swiftly and deci- crucial. Numerous nonviolent struggles, sively to maximize the effectiveness of their especially against repressive regimes, have efforts. They had to convince great numbers of succeeded or failed largely on the basis of total strangers, including, perhaps most im- whether they have been able to overcome the portantly, the soldiers who had been sent to image of themselves as the enemy in their oppose them. In convincing the soldiers of the encounters with armed forces. Arguably, this worthiness of their cause, or at least that there was a telling factor in Burma in 1988 when, were no real grounds for animosity and that despite the determined efforts of nonviolent the soldiers should not shoot if ordered to do protestors who knelt before soldiers and so, the demonstrators had several advantages, pleaded with them to join their cause, the ironically linked to militaristic and imperialis- soldiers massacred the demonstrators.13 Soviet tic policies of the Soviet Union. citizens seem to have been more successful, One was that, due to the Soviet Union’s even without any prominently outspoken program of national (military) service, most leaders of nonviolence. This suggests that the troops were conscripts who did not have the issue of seeking solidarity with soldiers who strong commitment to their job that might might otherwise see resisters as enemies is a generally be expected of those who join the delicate and complex one. Some of the armed services voluntarily. Opponents there- protesters sought to define the moral grounds fore felt they could appeal to them more of the encounter, with one woman asking a convincingly. Additionally, many civilians had soldier: “Do you know what you’re doing?” their own experience of military service which When he shook his head, she responded “Then provided insights into how best to apply go back to your barracks like a noble Soviet pressure to the troops. Secondly, the Soviet soldier and leave us in peace!”14 government, with a somewhat imperialistic As well as pleading, arguing, and joking attitude towards many of the smaller and with the soldiers, protesters shared sweets and further flung republics, had a history of trying cigarettes with them and tried to find common to “Russify” the country. As part of this grounds for a relationship in which they could process, Soviet leaders gave heavy priority to not easily be perceived as enemy. A row of having the Russian language taught and under- women held a sign: “Soldiers! Don’t shoot stood as widely as possible. This meant that protesters could converse with most of the troops, regardless of where they were from. 12 Geoffrey Hosking, “The roots of dissolution,” Of course, the bulk of the armed forces New York Review of Books, Vol. 39, No. 1–2, 16 sent to the Russian White House were Russian January 1992, pp. 34–38. and this itself was important. Boris Yeltsin had 13 Alan Clements, “Introduction,” in Aung San Suu Kyi, The Voice of Hope: Conversations with Alan Clements (Harmondsworth, Penguin, 1997), 11 Jeremy Gambrell, “Seven days that shook the pp. xi–xx, at pp. xiii–xiv. world,” New York Review of Books, Vol. 38, No. 15, 26 September 1991, pp. 56–61. 14 Attard, Russia: Which Way Paradise?, p. 181.

36 Nonviolence Speaks your people.” These sorts of appeals may well The symbolism of the barricades was have reached their target as, when a foreign evident by the piles of rubble and material reporter climbed on to a tank and asked a taken from unfinished buildings, plentiful commander if he would shoot, if ordered, he around Moscow.19 The hastily torn-up roads stopped and thought before replying “You and fragments of reinforced concrete sent sure know, I’m Russian, just like all of them. I signs that behind them stood those who were think I’d rather go to jail for treason than shoot willing to resist. Following initial confronta- at my own people.”15 tion with soldiers, there were flowers adorning Discussing the issues with soldiers was the tanks at the barricade and children climb- not confined to the barricades, although that ing over them, playing, giving evidence of the was a telling point of the encounter between nonviolent nature of the resistance and the potentially opposed forces. Moscow-area likelihood that their actions had almost Supreme Soviet deputies organized themselves certainly been successful. This military to visit military bases and installations in their equipment had been transformed, “if not into region to acquaint armed forces personnel with ploughshares, then into a heavy-duty tenement Yeltsin’s address and decrees and to win jungle gym.”20 support. The All-Union Soviet of the Parents Organizational aspects were just as promi- of Military Personnel tried collective parental nent with a mobile medical treatment center persuasion in calling on all officers, soldiers, established at the large Moscow demonstration and sailors to oppose the coup.16 and ambulances on standby in case of the The barricades took on important attack that was expected. People were in- functional and symbolic roles. In Leningrad a structed in how to best deal with gas attacks caravan of water trucks blocked approaches to and makeshift equipment towards this end was the Palace Square, an activity that was self- shared around. Some set up stalls where coffee generated, as many of the activities were.17 and other refreshments were dispensed free to Taking a more offensive approach, Leningrad the demonstrators to keep up their morale and taxi drivers, using their taxi radios to co- physical strength. Strategies were employed to ordinate their movements, organized them- protect the demonstrators and the broadcasting selves into a fleet to scout around the suburbs equipment on the White House. All the lights looking for tanks or other early signs of attack at the White House were turned off at night, so so that prior warning could be given to that they would not illuminate the broadcasters demonstrators. In Moscow, couriers on bikes and make them easy targets for snipers who sped through the city and around the obstruc- were reported to have been set up across the tions, bringing news and messages to and river in the Ukraine Hotel.21 among resisters. A hot line was set up so These examples show how diverse the people could report troop movements in their resistance was in terms of both action and neighborhoods and give information on where deliberate non-action. It included physical stations could be heard, to overcome jam- obstruction, graffiti, slogans, pleading with ming.18 soldiers, defying curfews, refusal to obey orders, compromising and re-interpreting orders, seeking outside support, and attending 15 Attard, Russia: Which Way Paradise?, pp. 182– to the physical needs and morale of demon- 83. strators. It also seems very likely to have 16 Coup in the Soviet Union. Day 1. 18–19 August included some intentional inefficiency. While 1991. A Minute-By-Minute Chronology, http://artne t.net/~upstart/1819aug.html. 19 Gregory Freidin, “To the barricades,” in 17 Valerii Zavorotnyi, “Letter from St Petersburg,” Bonnell, Cooper, and Freidin, pp. 71–77, at p. 74. in Bonnell, Cooper, and Freidin, Russia at the Barricades, pp. 147–157, at p. 155. 20 Freidin, “To the barricades,” p. 74. 18 Gambrell, “Seven days that shook the world.” 21 Gambrell, “Seven days that shook the world.” Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 37

Martin Malia claims that “… the cabinet, the throw their weight behind the coup to the Party leadership, the three high officers of the presence of a strong civilian resistance. KGB and the Army … had to be capable of Even where television centers were closed ineptitude and miscalculation on a Homeric down or their broadcasting severely curtailed, scale,”22 it seems more plausible that at least media workers, as mentioned, contributed to a some of these displayed “deliberate inepti- tide of anger against and ridicule of the coup. tude,” something much closer to disobedience. The ridicule included careful attention to For instance, although the KGB did close showing Yanayev’s shaking hands at the press Radio Moscow, they did not arrest Yeltsin, as conference called by the putschists, as well as ordered. Indeed they provided positive several embarrassingly blunt questions being support, a network of informers passing on to put.25 These would have been an encouraging him intelligence on the plotters’ plans.23 It is sign to those who wanted to openly oppose the difficult to separate ineptitude from noncoop- coup. There was also feigned inability to edit eration, much more again to guess the motiva- from the press conference those pieces that the tions for noncooperation. This is especially the coup leader requested be cut, as well as subtle case since some in the KGB, and especially in selection of music to accompany the television its upper echelons, may have had more sinister blackout. For instance, a concert hall produc- motivations than those of the protesters who tion of Boris Godunov, “an operatic blast at essentially wanted democracy to prevail. There regicides, silent majorities and pretenders” was are many conflicting claims about whether an among these.26 order for Yeltsin’s arrest was issued and, if so, Newspaper workers also took a stand, whether it was rescinded or ignored. Victor including workers for those few newspapers Karpukhin, Commander of the KGB's special that were officially allowed to remain operat- Alpha Team, claims that he was responsible ing and that the Emergency Committee felt it for seeing to Yeltsin's arrest but boasts “I did could trust. Printers at Izvestia refused to print everything I could to do nothing,” a good the paper unless it contained Yeltsin’s anti- recipe for noncooperation, even if his inten- coup declaration. Meanwhile, journalists from tions were not clear.24 suspended radical newspapers immediately Likewise, there were examples of the started producing makeshift newspapers and military both acting against and for the coup, leaflets. When workers from the independent confirming ambivalence in the upper ranks. newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta, banned by Some television and radio centers were closed the Emergency Committee, prepared a four- down while others were left open, especially in page proof for Monday’s edition, only to find further out towns such as Irkutsk and Tomsk, that the state printing office, fearing repercus- where political leaders opposing the coup sions, would not print it, the edition was faxed appeared on television denouncing the to France for translation and publication there. putschists and inviting people to join demon- Liberation of Paris faxed the Gazeta workers, strations. Mayor Sobchak of Leningrad attrib- urging them to “keep up the good work.”27 uted the KGB’s and military’s reluctance to Twenty-five Gazeta workers then stayed at the office through Monday night, putting together a new edition of A Chronicle of Events of 22 Martin Malia, “The August Revolution,” New August, a play on the name of the samizdat York Review of Books, Vol. 38, No. 15, 26 publication of the Brezhnev era. One thousand September 1991, pp. 22–27. copies were posted in prominent places around 23 Trimble and Vassiliev, “Three days that shook the world.” 25 Reddaway and Glinski, The Tragedy of 24 Peter Reddaway and Dmitri Glinski, The Russia’s Reforms, p. 214. Tragedy of Russia’s Reforms: Market Bolshevism 26 Freidin, “To the barricades,” p. 72. against Democracy (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2001), p. 205. 27 Ganley, Unglued Empire, p. 155.

38 Nonviolence Speaks

Moscow, along with other newsletters, many passing on information within the country.30 of which had been published by other banned GlasNet, a dial-up network and joint interna- newspapers. tional venture commenced in the glasnost and Also acting in the tradition of samizdat, perestroika era, provided information on journalists from prohibited newspapers ille- events in Moscow and Leningrad via news gally edited and published a paper called feeds from CNN and the BBC. The volume of Obshchaya Gazeta, translating as United traffic became so heavy that networkers were Newspaper. It was distributed all over asked not to flood the lines with questions but Moscow, free of charge, and played a strong to leave the lines open for posting vital part in keeping the population up to date with information.31 events and resistance to the coup.28 The staff RELCOM, a provider of e-mail and news of Rosier set themselves up at the Russian and linked with EUnet, the European UNIX White House, from where they produced one network, also proved useful. One resister, who edition of their newspaper and 42 different was busily using this service while others were leaflets, as well as duplicating dozens of out at demonstrations, commented “… Thank Yeltsin’s appeals and decrees. Heaven, they don’t consider RELCOM mass Efforts to maintain broadcasts were an- media or they simply forgot about it.”32 other area where resisters needed to outwit the Clearly, a wide array of strategies were plotters. The independent radio station used and available technologies, while cer- Moscow Echo continuously transmitted tainly not as advanced or as widespread as in Yeltsin’s declarations, despite being closed many countries, appear to have been used to down by the junta several times. Ham radio their maximum. There were far more Soviet operators, to stay on air, had to constantly citizens with technical know-how than there change frequency to circumvent jamming, was sophisticated equipment, yet for commu- further outwitting the would-be jammers with nication purposes the will to communicate and use of jargon.29 The whole resistance move- the ability to think of ways and means to do ment was remarkable for its ability to think this most effectively, including overcoming creatively and improvise, as had often been the jamming and circumventing other obstacles, is case in a country where people adapted probably much more important than the available materials to meet their needs, technology itself. including making their own satellite dishes The West appears to have played a and using the emulsion of discarded x-ray relatively minor role in the resistance, except plates to make recordings. in the area of communication where its Not that new technologies were scorned involvement may have been crucial. Even or forgotten, at least not by resisters. Although prior to the coup, US intelligence agencies had e-mail and fax facilities were recent to the been helping Yeltsin improve his personal Soviet Union and still scarce, people took security arrangements and the security of his great advantage of these wherever they were communication system. During the coup the available, sending messages overseas and asking for international support, as well as 30 Bob Travica and Matthew Hogan, “Computer networks in the X-USSR: technology, uses and social effects,” Proceedings of the ASIS Annual Meeting, Vol. 29, 1992, pp. 120–135. 28 We thank Valentin Bazhanov (personal 31 Travica and Hogan, “Computer networks in the communication, July 2000) for this information. X-USSR,” p. 128. 29 Anton Rebezov and Dima Guskov, “The ‘White 32 David Alan Bozak and Larry Press, “The House’ Operation,” QST (official monthly journal Internet as an information resource,” http://www. of the American Radio Relay League), November funet.fi/pub/culture/russian/politics/coup/papers/Bo 1991. zakPress. Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 39

US Embassy sent a communication specialist Some of the lessons which can be drawn to the Russian White House with portable from the success of the resistance relate to the telephone equipment to enable Yeltsin to make possible vulnerability of the military forces for secure phone calls to military commanders and any group staging a coup; the volatility of others. The US National Security Agency, in a situations, so that initial, well organized rare display of its everyday monitoring skills, resistance can gather momentum and force the made available to Yeltsin real-time reports of coup organizers to retreat; the importance of calls made by members of the Emergency symbolism; and the benefits of thinking Committee on their special government tele- innovatively and planning ahead. phones.33 Years before the Soviet coup, Adam While this information possibly contrib- Roberts made the point that coups have a uted to defeating the coup, it must be stressed certain vulnerability, not least among the that Yeltsin had access to it only because the armed forces, and that this might be even more US government had by then deemed it to be in so where the military forces have a large its own interests. Nonviolent activists cannot component of conscripts.35 There is an irony in normally count on such assistance and may that nonviolent activists are usually opposed to even have cause to worry about the motiva- conscription, yet here, as with the forced use tions of those who provide such information. of Russian language throughout the USSR, Meanwhile anti-coup activists sought a opponents were able to use this to their own different sort of assistance from the West and advantage. used available communication technology It is clear that symbolism, where used, towards these ends. As the coup perpetrators enhanced the resistance efforts. One of moved to close down the liberal media and symbolism’s contributions can be to provide a jam short-wave radios, Soviet resisters found it succinct sense of what the problem is and what helpful to directly tell their story outside of the needs to be done, where censorship, physical Soviet Union, hoping that this would not only obstructions, and time restraints might stop the bring pressure to bear from the West but that, full gamut of arguments from being put. The probably more importantly, the news would throngs with their arms linked bravely as they find its way back in to a multitude of confronted the tanks that might run them recipients. This seems to have worked well down, the flowers decking the tanks, and the and there is no doubt that the resistance was posters pasted over the normally scrupulously pleased to have the ear of the outside world. unmarked walls of the metro stations ex- However, there was no direct overseas support claimed loudly that a resistance was underway for the resistance. It was mainly psychological and nonviolent in nature. Where symbols support and complementary media support. At clearly expressed that nonviolence, they may a US college a Chinese student with have been even more effective. experience of the protests in Tiananmen Even from the successes, we can see how Square summed it up: “Western sympathy things might have been done better. One of our amounts to little in changing the situation. The areas of discomfort about the remarkable and Soviet people are their own savior.”34 praiseworthy defeat of the coup was that Yeltsin appears to have been too strong a focus. There are several problems with this. Had he been arrested — and perhaps it was 33 Reddaway and Glinski, The Tragedy of only by some stroke of fate and a particular Russia’s Reforms, p. 203. Reddaway and Glinski point out that the National Security Agency opposed sharing intercepted information with http://www.funet.fi/pub/culture/russian/politics/cou Yeltsin, fearing it would compromise future p/papers/Cadenhead. surveillance. 35 Adam Roberts, “Civil resistance to military 34 Rogers Cadenhead, “Computer networks kept coups,” Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 12, 1975, information flowing during coup,” 22 August 1991, pp. 19–36, at p. 31.

40 Nonviolence Speaks personality in the KGB that he wasn’t — might be in similar circumstances. They at could the protesters have rallied in the same least had some experience of the sorts of way? We will never know, of course, but it measures introduced by the Emergency makes good sense not to be too reliant on a Committee and some sort of equipment and particular personality. The transmission of his knowledge of how to move into underground decrees appeared to have taken up a great deal mode. One resister boasted how quickly they of the energy and direction of the underground had been able to “shift to underground,” media. It would be nice to think that, without having organized “reserve nodes, backup these decrees, they could have put together channel and hidden locations. They’ll have a strong and powerful arguments of their own. hard time catching us!”37 This ability to move Their case certainly deserved that. swiftly to new modes of operation may have Another of the problems with the appeals considerable advantage. It is an advantage that to and reliance on Yeltsin is that much of what nonviolent activists can work towards with he said was nationalistic, directed at replacing forethought and preparation. the Soviet Union as the “motherland” with Another major lesson is about aiming for Russia. This was not the root of the problem inclusiveness of as many groups as possible and at times it seems that there was a risk of and taking notes of their strengths, talents, and confusing the issues of democracy and weaknesses. Resistance may come from some patriotism. Moreover, history has shown sections of the population more than others Yeltsin to be a perpetual opportunist with little and in the case of the Soviet coup it was more commitment to democracy, despite the rhetoric widespread among the intelligentsia and he used at times.36 middle classes. There can also be considerable Historically the Russian people have fre- geographical variations. Leningrad was by far quently expected and even turned to strong the most outspoken city against the coup, leaders and there can be some advantages to perhaps partly because of the influence of this. A strong nonviolent leader can be critical Mayor Sobchak but mainly because of its to the success of a campaign, providing strong revolutionary tradition.38 Preparation direction, eliminating confusion, and becom- for nonviolent action might then include ing a symbol of resistance that aids mobiliza- consideration of the strengths, weaknesses, tion. However, Yeltsin was neither Gandhi nor and possible roles of different regions and Martin Luther King and appears to have used cities, particularly those where it seems that the mobilization for his own purposes. support for nonviolent resistance might be Activists need to be watchful of emerging strongest, for instance where the trade union leaders and to constantly reassess their movement has been heavily involved in social commitment to the cause and to nonviolence, as well as industrial issues and where there is for leaders’ prominence and status can be used civic pride about that social consciousness. as fast lanes to their own self-interested goals. Perhaps Mayor Sobchak best summed it One of the major lessons is about prepar- up: “… it might have been a successful coup, edness. It is a characteristic of coups that the with far-reaching implications, had the people resistance is usually not prepared for them. remained silent.”39 Soviet citizens, despite the warning of ex- Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze several months earlier that a coup was in the offing, were still largely caught by surprise. However, while they might not have been mentally or 37 Bozak and Press, “The Internet as an informa- organizationally prepared, nor were they tion resource.” caught as short of preparation as some others 38 Joseph Scholmer, Vorkuta (New York: Henry Holt, 1954), p. 256. 36 Reddaway and Glinski, The Tragedy of 39 Ganley, Unglued Empire, p. 134. Emphasis in Russia’s Reforms. the original. Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 41

Early cases of resistance to Soviet grain for sale abroad in order to generate power foreign currency to support its plans for rapid industrialization. The peasants, already feeling At many times in the USSR’s history, a great squeezed, resisted these attempts and became many people have been silent and others have generally less supportive of the Bolsheviks spoken out, sometimes at great cost. These and their program, though many of them had periods tell us something about successful previously been enthusiastic about the resistance and the reason for a relative dearth Revolution.41 However, rather than ease the of action. The first period of marked oppres- pressure, Stalin launched attacks on the sion was when forced collectivization took agricultural sector and especially the kulaks, place.40 the better-off peasants. The leaders of the The history of the Soviet Union was Soviet Union had a vision for agriculture, beleaguered by agricultural crises. An old joke heavily influenced by rationalist ideas and quipped “What are the four greatest problems notions that bigger is better, and they conceded facing Soviet agriculture?” The answer: little to the peasantry in terms of acknowl- “Winter, spring, summer, and autumn.” The edging their experience and in-the-field joke gives evidence of the common belief that knowledge of agriculture.42 the problems were other than (or at least Part of Stalin’s speech to agrarian additional to) the largely inhospitable climate Marxists in 1929 hints at his callousness and of much of the region which made up the willingness for terror: “Taking the offensive Union, and that Soviet leaders had a penchant against the kulaks means preparing for action for blaming anything but their own policies. to deal the kulak class such a blow that it will This was certainly the case with Stalin’s no longer rise to its feet. … When the head is forced collectivization and his accusation that off, one does not grieve for the hair.” He the kulaks were the source of all agricultural further went on to question whether kulaks woes. should be allowed to join collective farms, During most of the 1920s there were answering his own question: “Of course not, debates among the Bolsheviks as to whether for they are the sworn enemies of the collec- agricultural collectivization should be pushed tive farm movement.”43 This meant the kulaks ahead rapidly or whether it should be a slower could neither continue farming privately nor process, taking into account the anxieties of join collectives. Instead they were deported, peasants and trying to educate them rather than along with others who resisted collectiviza- force them into collectives against their tion, to labor camps in the far north and in wishes. The peasants had already had a bad Siberia. Kulaks were almost completely liqui- time of it during the Civil War which followed dated in the course of 1930.44 the Revolution when Soviet power was Collectivization did not affect all parts of challenged from both within and from abroad, the USSR equally. Stalin used the policy to and the “Scissors Crisis” which was the name intimidate Ukrainians and give them their given to the situation resulting from the prices paid to peasants for their surplus having been kept low while the price of materials they 41 Jerry F. Hogan and Merle Fainsod, How the needed to purchase rose dramatically. Because Soviet Union is Governed (Cambridge, MA: the USSR had no foreign sources of financial Harvard University Press, 1979), p. 72. credit, the government sought to maximize 42 James C. Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition

Have Failed (New Haven, CT: Yale University 40 For a full account of the forced collectivization Press, 1998), pp. 193–222. and its impacts, particularly the resulting famine, 43 Martin McCauley, The Soviet Union, 1917–1991 see Robert Conquest, The Harvest of Sorrow: (London: Longman, 1993, 2nd ed.), pp. 81–82. Soviet Collectivization and the Terror-Famine (London: Hutchinson, 1986). 44 McCauley, The Soviet Union, 1917–1991, p. 82.

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“come-uppance.” The Ukraine was one of the Resistance at times took on a more more productive agricultural regions so the pointed and spectacular form, not always particularly harsh treatment meted out there nonviolent. For instance, 30,000 fires were resulted in seriously decreased production, registered in Russia alone during just one year contributing greatly to the ensuing famine. of the forced collectivization and many, Another particularly affected area was perhaps most, of these were attributed to arson Kazakhstan where a large nomadic population as many peasants set fires of destruction as with no knowledge or experience of cereal part of their protest.48 Among the campaigns cropping was forced into collectivized cereal of protests were actions by peasant women, farms with disastrous results. Between 1.3 and referred to as bab’i bunty, loosely translated as 1.8 million Kazakh nomads are estimated to “women’s riots.” These often took the form of have died through this collectivization.45 what was judged to be “female hysteria, It is not surprising that there was irrational behavior, unorganized and inarticu- resistance. Historian Sheila Fitzpatrick has late protest, and violent actions.”49 However, noted that Russian peasants had a tradition of L. Viola has made a strong case that the violent rebellions against landowners and women were taking advantage of gender officials.46 Much of the resistance to forced stereotypes, particularly via the greater leeway collectivization was of a limited and short- given to women protesters. term nature, aimed at making the new The nature of one bab’i bunt in the collectives unworkable. The feeling among the Ukraine illustrates how women dealt with the resistant peasants was that, if they weren’t day-to-day realities of forced collectivization allowed to keep their livestock and imple- being forced upon them: ments, then they would ensure that the collective would not get them either. There are A crowd of women stormed the kolkhoz stories of peasants breaking their implements, [collective farm] stables and barns. They slaughtering all their livestock and gluttoniz- cried, screamed, wailed, demanding their ing on the meat of their kill. “The peasants had cows and seed back. The men stood a way a feast. Between 1928 and 1933 they slaugh- off, in clusters, sullenly silent. Some of tered 26.6 million cattle or 46.6 per cent of the the lads had pitchforks, stakes, axes total Soviet herd.”47 Such behavior was an tucked in their sashes, The terrified invitation to famine, an impact that they granary man ran away; the women tore off perhaps thought would stop the government in the bolts and together with the men began its tracks. Unfortunately, Stalin did not abound dragging out the bags of seed.50 with rationality, humanity, or common sense. A serious famine did occur, the collectiviza- Viola claims that the bab’i bunty demon- tion continued, and that part of the protest — strated a significant degree of organization and to the extent that it was a protest — seems to conscious political opposition and that they have been largely ineffective in halting the may well have played an important role in the program, although Stalin, in his usual erratic way, did relax the collectivization efforts for some time in 1930, at least to allow the spring sowing. 48 L. Viola, “Bab’i bunty and peasant women’s protest during collectivization,” in Chris Ward (ed.), The Stalinist Dictatorship ( London: Arnold, 45 Robert Service, A History of Twentieth Century 1998), pp. 213–231, at p. 214. Russia (London: Allen Lane, 1997), pp. 201–202. 49 Viola, “Bab’i bunty and peasant women’s 46 Sheila Fitzpatrick, The Russian Revolution protest during collectivization,” p. 213. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), p. 20. 50 Viola, “Bab’i bunty and peasant women’s 47 McCauley, The Soviet Union, 1917–1991, p. 83. protest during collectivization,” p. 224. Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 43 amendment of policies and practices.51 market,”54 all the normal meeting places where Certainly, they posed problems for the local peasant women would meet and exchange cadres whose task it was to put Stalin’s news and views and keep abreast of local collectivization plans into practice.52 There events. To be equipped with as much knowl- were instances of women peasants bringing edge as possible about what had been their children to protests with them, thus happening and the issues at stake and to have causing further headaches to the cadres, and the opportunity to discuss possible strategies also of the women laying down in front of against unwelcome events proved as useful for tractors to block collectivization. They were the peasant women as for any group of people also often nominated by the men as the setting out to resist policies to which they spokespeople of the movement against collec- object. tivization, with men insisting that the women Nevertheless, successes seem to have would simply make a larger din if they were been small, sporadic, and short-term, and pale not allowed to voice their opposition. Women against the overriding trend. Although there also took advantage of the tendency for were common forms of resistance such as women not to be prosecuted under the relevant foot-dragging, “failure to understand instruc- article of the criminal code when their opposi- tions,” and refusal to take initiative, these tion led to court actions.53 It was often the appear to have eventually given way to passive women who would initiate that opposition and and active accommodation, suggesting resig- they would take it through particularly those nation.55 Resistance appears to have worked parts of the resistance process where women best when it was thought through and had were thought to have less vulnerability than some achievable goal, as in re-securing confis- men. Once more they were taking advantage cated grain and equipment. By comparison, of gendered stereotypes whereby women were simply killing off livestock and breaking not presumed to play such a key role in implements appears to have been ineffective opposition but nor were those who were meant and, with its contribution to the horrific famine to quell opposition always culturally prepared that ensued, seems to have added to the to deal with them as they would deal with tragedy that was forced collectivization. men. One of the problems was that, though the Traditional means of communication brutality was widespread, Ukrainians had little appear to have played important roles. “Heated in common with Kazakhs (other than their discussions took place in village squares, at obvious victimization), some peasants may the wells, in the cooperative shops and at the have happily joined in the campaign against the kulaks while others did not, and generally there were divisions and confusion. As well as there being a lack of the necessary solidarity, access to information seemed relatively poor in this case. Both these factors — solidarity 51 Viola, “Bab’i bunty and peasant women’s and access to relevant information — stand out protest during collectivization,” p. 227. as momentous advantages in nonviolent 52 Not that the cadres alone were in charge of resistance, enforcing collectivization. According to Service, A History of Twentieth Century Russia, p. 180, men from the factories, militia, and the Party were called to venture into the villages to enforce collectiviza- tion. They were given neither limits on the use of 54 Viola, “Bab’i bunty and peasant women’s violence nor detailed instructions on how to distin- protest during collectivization,” p. 217. guish the rich, middling, and poor peasants from 55 Sheila Fitzpatrick, Stalin's Peasants: Resis- each other. tance and Survival in the Russian Village after 53 Viola, “Bab’i bunty and peasant women’s Collectivization (New York: Oxford University protest during collectivization,” pp. 224–225. Press, 1994), pp. 5–10.

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The Stalin Terror repression and terror.58 While most of those in the upper echelons, including the Politburo There can be little doubt that “the Terror” and the Central Committee, survived, unleashed by Stalin in the mid 1930s was the members of the Sovnarcom (the Council of most vicious and all-encompassing of all the People's Commissars) were decimated, as periods of repression faced in the Soviet were the upper ranks of the army. During the Union.56 Between 1935 and 1941 more than Great Purge of 1937–38, two-thirds of the 19 million people were arrested, seven million army’s marshals, corps, and division of them shot and the remainder sent to the commanders were arrested.59 Gulag (the term used for a state of exile, which In the republics, many party and state could take place in numerous areas, most of leaders disappeared, as did many managers of them bitterly inhospitable), where many of the economy. Diplomats or anyone who had them died.57 Following World War II and up contact with the West, whether through until the time of Stalin’s death in 1953, there friends, colleagues, or relatives, were immedi- was another wave of mass arrests, directed ately under suspicion on that premise alone.60 often at Jews. Among the officials shot or sent to Siberia, for The years of terror under Stalin were, in instance, was the Foreign Ministry’s head of many ways, an intensification and expansion protocol who was under suspicion for of what he had done to the peasants in his “connections with foreigners” which was, of efforts to collectivize agriculture. The expan- course, his job.61 In the lower classes, as in the sion of terror was extraordinary in that it upper strata, people were cajoled to spy on one targeted highly placed party and government another and inform on the slightest suggestion officials as well as ordinary people. Indeed, so of ideological non-conformity or aberration. many bureaucrats were liquidated during the One woman who dreamt that she had sexual terror that the period was noted for high social relations with the Commissar of Defense was mobility, as those killed left gaps into which taken to a labor camp after mentioning the others could move, creating career opportuni- dream to a friend who reported her to the ties. This is one of the reasons that many NKVD.62 people did not want to acknowledge “the Terror” or their own tenuous positions. As well as shootings — often of highly 58 NKVD was the People’s Commissariat for placed officials — and the running of “show Internal Affairs, which combined the secret police trials” involving those who had been in the and interior commissariat. Ironically, it was forefront of the Revolution, there were mas- modeled partly in the secret police of Ivan the sive intakes into labor camps of people across Terrible. A full description of its role in the Terror all different social strata. Stalin’s secret police can be found in Robert Conquest, Inside Stalin’s — the NKVD, a forerunner to the KGB — Secret Police: NKVD Politics, 1936–39 (Basing- stoke: Macmillan, 1985). unleashed and directed a campaign of severe 59 Mark Galeotti, Gorbachev and his Revolution (London: Macmillan, 1997), p. 8. 60 Meanwhile, diplomats from other countries were often cautious not to mix with local people for fear that they might be “responsible for an 56 Robert Conquest, The Great Terror: Stalin’s innocent Russian’s death or exile”: Harold Eeman, Purge of the Thirties (London: Macmillan, 1968); Inside Stalin’s Russia: Memories of a Diplomat Zbigniew K. Brzezinski, The Permanent Purge: 1936–1941 (London: Triton, 1977), p. 45. Politics in Soviet Totalitarianism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1956). 61 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, p. 110. 57 Adam Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost: Russians 62 Andrei Sinyavsky, Soviet Civilization: A Remember Stalin (London: Serpent’s Tail, 1994), p. Cultural History (New York: Arcade Publishing, xi. 1988), p. 90. Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 45

Under such conditions of terror, within a were interrogating and were themselves culture where all people were encouraged to dragged off to labor camps. inform and where there was great adulation of Yet we know that there were at least some Stalin, organizing any form of open resistance activists who took the grave risks involved. was something akin to suicide. Opponents Suzanna Pechuro was part of a group of six were picked off and shot — along with a great teenagers who, unlike so many others who many others who were not even opponents — were arrested, were actually involved in before any significant level of organization strategies against Stalin. Pechuro makes light could be accomplished. Even opposition to the of what the group did: “What did we manage Terror inside the Party is difficult to piece to do? Practically nothing. We issued two together since Stalin operated with tight leaflets. We developed a program.”64 Such secrecy and few were willing to risk breaking actions were brave in the context of what was ranks from the silence. At the 17th Party happening in the Soviet Union at that time. Congress in 1934, before Stalin’s repression The group refused to continue participating in moved onto its most bloodthirsty phase, there a literary group where they were not allowed was a push for relaxation of both economic to read out poems unless the director had first development and of party discipline, though checked them. Instead the teenagers formed the stenographic reports of this secret congress their own group, setting themselves assign- were not published. Opposition to Stalin’s ments to read, making synopses, and meeting excesses had its center in the Party in Lenin- to discuss their findings and views. Though grad, with Sergei Kirov emerging as the leader they had to be extremely careful, they would of this more liberal faction. At the congress it also raise issues with other friends. Pechuro was proposed that Stalin be stripped of his notes that, although the period is known as a General Secretary status and given a less time of mass betrayals and cowardice, none of embracing role, with Kirov taking up Stalin’s her group was ever betrayed by their friends. other duties. Stalin no doubt perceived this as The group realized that, if each person a slight. spoke to others about what they knew and In December 1934, Kirov was assassi- what they had learned and those in turn told nated, a killing that was generally thought to other trusted friends, then a process of have been on Stalin’s orders, though recently questioning would be underway. “Our task released documents suggest otherwise. In any was to get the process going,” Pechuro has case, this eliminated the person whom Stalin explained. She claimed group members knew feared as a possible rival. Subsequently, Stalin it was imperative that they not be intimidated, used Kirov’s death to step up the terror and to even though each of them knew the risks launch a ferocious political campaign against involved.65 The group of six was eventually his enemies. arrested and charged with plotting against With such ruthless determination to eradi- Stalin, as were eleven of their friends who cate all opposition, even within the upper were under suspicion by virtue of their friend- echelons, it is apparent how difficult it would ships. Of the six, three were shot and the have been for ordinary Soviet citizens to others sent to labor camps. In the labor camps, organize full-scale and effective resistance. Pechuro had the chance to resist in smaller and Citizens could be taken for interrogation different ways. Her fellow prisoners taught her anywhere or at any time. There were secret, a number of strategies for survival and for unmarked doors in train stations and other communication, involving tapping on the wall places and people recall that by-standers would look the other way if someone was taken through one of these doors.63 Sometimes interrogators gave assistance to those they 64 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, p. 31. 63 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, p. 129. 65 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, p. 32.

46 Nonviolence Speaks to the next cell, using a code to spread critical judgments and even intuitions. Cen- messages to other prisoners.66 sorship and state control went hand in hand Clearly the obstacles faced by resisters with the mass arrests. If ever there was a under Stalin’s reign of terror had much more strong case for carefully planned and orches- to do with betrayal, fear, and trauma than with trated pressure from outside of the country, the actual technology of communication. this would seem to be such a case. The part Nevertheless it is interesting to see that played internationally will be discussed later. Pechuro’s group of resisters made a hecto- graph, a primitive printing machine, a descrip- Relaxation born of resistance tion of which they found in the memoirs of a nineteenth-century revolutionary. With this Although Stalin died in 1953, there was no they were able to print 250 copies of anything automatic release of political prisoners from needing to be circulated, although 250 copies the labor camps. On the contrary, there were may arguably have been an optimistic number slow and tedious re-evaluations of prisoners, to have circulated in those days of mass with many questions asked, many details informing and NKVD terror. taken, and a bureaucratic process undertaken Some of the resistance to Stalin took the to decide whether each particular prisoner form of just trying to escape being arrested might have been arrested and exiled “mistak- and thus avoid falling victim to his pogrom, enly.” One survivor of the camps explained though this is obviously not a strategy that that, had all the political prisoners been initially involved actively confronting the declared innocent, “… it would be clear that regime. One couple developed a special way the country was not being run by a legal of ringing the doorbell, so as to ensure the government, but by a group of gangsters — other that it was not the NKVD coming to take which, in point of fact we were.”69 However, them away.67 A few others who thought that there were also economic reasons for the the NKVD might come for them changed their continuation of the camps which had been set names and kept on the move. This could be up in the 1920s and greatly expanded under quite successful, especially since it has been the reign of Stalin. He had used this cheap and noted that the forte of the organization was involuntary labor for projects such as railway inspiring terror and it was often quite poor at and canal building, tree felling, and mineral detective work.68 extraction. Some of the most inhospitable These conditions were among the most areas of the Soviet Union were rich in miner- difficult for nonviolent activists. Not only was als, including uranium which posed another arrest and execution a constant threat — and threat to the inmates of the labor camps, some the continual disappearance of so many was a of whom suffered severe radiation exposure. reminder of this — but the culture of Stalinism The period following Stalin’s death, with would have made resistance seem as futile as it its ongoing repression for masses of political was dangerous. prisoners in camps, brought strong resistance. The very symptoms fed into the structures At first, news that the dictator was dead was which made it so difficult to oppose or even kept from the prisoners, but it eventually question dominant views. Stalinism was a cult trickled through. There were rebellions inspired by massive propaganda and a state- involving thousands of people in some of the promoted image of Stalin as loving, all-wise, largest camps.70 In Kengir prisoners took over and deserving of his power. The leader was deified, with believers suppressing normal

69 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, p. 223. 66 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, p. 36. 70 A brief account of the strike is found in Michail 67 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, p. 96. Baitalsky, “Rebellion in the Northern Camps,” in 68 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, p. 276. Stephen F. Cohen (ed.), An End to Silence: Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 47 the camp complex for 40 days, setting up their notes that the strikers were generally dealt own newspaper and theatre. News of these with much less harshly than many of them rebellions reached other camps via such expected, though this is clearly relative. methods as desperate messages chalked on the Having already endured a great deal, many had inside walls of freight cars by inmates in other grave anticipations about their fate. One of the camps who had loaded or unloaded them. The important factors in their having some negoti- methods of Stalinism were still in force. In ating power was that these Vorkuta prisoners Kengir women rebels were driven from their were a crucial cog in the Soviet economy, barracks and ridden over by Red Army tanks, providing much of the energy requirements for with 700 prisoners killed. In Norilsk the camps Leningrad, which was quickly plunged into a were bombed and in Vorkuta the inmates were power shortage during the strike. shot, en masse.71 One reason that the strikes should not be On paper the rebellions looked like considered failures is that from them sprang failures but one inmate of one of the camps Khrushchev’s relaxation which in turn gave that was involved in the strike at Vorkuta rise to the Soviet dissident movement. This throws a different light on this. Joseph movement is usually dated from 1956 when Scholmer, a German prisoner in Vorkuta Khrushchev read his speech to the Twentieth Camp 6, claims that the strike “destroyed the Party Congress condemning the cult of Stalin myth that the system was unassailable.” He and acknowledging, to at least some extent, points out that the strike enjoyed the support that there had been terror.73 However, at least of the 10,000 prisoners directly involved and one inmate from the camps at the time of the much of the civilian population who quickly rebellions believes that Khrushchev’s relaxa- learned of the strike. Scholmer claims that tion was directly related to the resisters’ most of the soldiers were sympathetic, as were refusal to cooperate. She explains: the local peasantry.72 The Vorkuta strike lasted for several All the 1956 reforms and the shutting weeks, with organizing committees being set down of the camps were caused by those up and pamphlets and slogans used to achieve rebellions! It was no longer possible to the fairly modest demands of the activists. keep this army of people in obedience. Scholmer claims the strike could not have When the camps rebelled, coal-mining been possible without the prior existence of output dropped, timber-cutting also. underground resistance groups. Nevertheless, Nobody was at work. Gold and uranium there was little direct experience the strikers — no one was working. Something had to could call on, a factor which he claims led to be done. Nikita Khrushchev released us. its demise. As soon as the strike was over, the What else could he do? We managed to resistance groups began analyzing their make them release us.74 actions, seeking to understand what might have been done better. It was felt that a better In this way the dissidence should be per- and more effective campaign might have been ceived as ongoing, although certainly going run from inside the pit, “the exclusive preserve through different phases and taking different of the prisoners.” Instead the prisoners were in forms. Also from the time of Khrushchev’s the camps where the NKVD were able to “sort speech dissent grew among a new sector of out, isolate and remove the most active people, who had not been in the camps, elements in the strike.” In any case, Scholmer particularly intellectuals. The speech gave the impetus around which people could express

Uncensored Opinion in the Soviet Union (New York: Norton, 1982), pp. 98–100. 73 Sinyavsky, Soviet Civilization, pp. 227–28. 71 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, pp. 38–39. 74 Susanna Pechuro, cited in Hochschild, The 72 Scholmer, Vorkuta, pp. 234–269. Unquiet Ghost, p. 39.

48 Nonviolence Speaks their disgust but it was also a point of conflict course writers did not want to bother the because the party was not taking any of the government but previously they had had to blame that dissidents felt it should.75 The submit their works to the government censor.78 loosening of repression gave rise to networks This change resulted in a flux of works critical of people, kompanii, who would gather of the Soviet Union being published overseas, regularly to socialize and discuss issues. These including a number by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn were the breeding grounds for inakomsla- whose The Gulag Archipelago described the yashchie, as dissidents were known, though conditions in some of the worst camps.79 the Russian word has a meaning not precisely Khrushchev, under pressures from conser- the same as dissident. vatives, later retreated on some of these Dissident Ludmilla Alexeyeva claimed reforms. Criticism of Stalinism was curtailed that it was these kompanii which in turn gave and relations cooled between the leader and rise to samizdat. In the mid-1950s a poet some of the dissenting artists and writers folded blank sheets of paper and typed poems whom he had encouraged.80 on all four sides, then sewed the pages together as in a booklet and wrote samsebya- Consolidation of repression izdat, an acronym for “I published myself” on the front. This was a parody of gozpolitizdat, Khrushchev was ousted in 1964. Under Leonid the name of an official publishing house in the Brezhnev, who was president from then until USSR.76 The practice became popular not just 1982, there were serious moves away from in the Soviet Union but throughout the Eastern liberalization and some signs of restaliniza- bloc and the name became shortened to tion. This period was characterized by a samizdat. Samizdat was used to publish first tightening of censorship, introduction of new poetry and memoirs, particularly of those who laws that put dissidents at greater risk, and had been in labor camps for political reasons, harsher persecution of political and religious but later it was used for translations and for dissidents. Brezhnev also halted the rehabili- circulating banned writings, petitions, and tations of Gulag victims that Khrushchev had various documents.77 Using the humble commenced. Under the new head of the KGB, typewriter, carbon paper, and very thin paper, Yuri Andropov, who was later to become dissidents would type up as many copies as leader, the KGB took on a more sophisticated would be legible. These would be circulated to approach to dissidents, which included many others who often would themselves type of them being locked up in psychiatric multiple copies and distribute these. hospitals or even deported from the country.81 Accompanying his censure of Stalin, But the period of relaxation had allowed Khrushchev took a more flexible stance on dissidents to grow more knowledgeable and to literature, urging writers not to “bother the resolve that there would be no return to the government” but to decide among themselves past. The resistance that the new clamping the worth of their peers’ manuscripts. Of down met was more mature and became better organized, especially around 1968, with several significant events. Sovietologist Peter 75 Donald Filtzer, The Khrushchev Era: De- Reddaway notes that about this time people Stalinisation and the Limits of Reform in the USSR, 1953–1964 (London: Macmillan, 1993), p. 29. 78 McCauley, The Soviet Union, 1917–1991, p. 76 Ludmilla Alexeyeva and Paul Goldberg, The 256. Thaw Generation: Coming of Age in the Post-Stalin 79 Alexander Solzhenisyn, The Gulag Archipel- Era (Toronto: Little, Brown, 1990), pp. 97–98. ago, 1918–1956 (London: Collins, 1975). 77 Alexeyeva and Goldberg, The Thaw Generation, 80 Filtzer, The Khrushchev Era, pp. 28–29. pp. 97–99; Marshall S. Shatz, Soviet Dissent in Historical Perspective (Cambridge: Cambridge 81 Galeotti, Gorbachev and his Revolution, pp. 24– University Press, 1980), p. 128. 25. Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 49 dared to think and act independently of Another significant event occurred in authorities.82 This was a time when there was a 1968: the first publication of the Chronicle of significant protest and push for social change Current Events, a samizdat journal committed around the world and dissidents in the USSR to reporting on events relating to human or no doubt took heart from this. Dissidents national rights. Editorial policy was to avoid created formal and semi-formal associations value judgments and to keep readers abreast of and began to intercede on behalf of persecuted new works being circulated in samizdat. It individuals and groups. They also formed contributed hugely to systematically docu- networks to help dissidents in prison or in menting human rights abuses in the Soviet psychiatric hospitals and to assist their Union and enjoyed considerable credibility families. both among those Soviet citizens who came On 25 August 1968 Pavel Litvinov led a into contact with it and among concerned small group of Soviet dissidents in a demon- groups overseas. stration in Red Square against the Soviet Samizdat as a method of communication invasion of Czechoslovakia. One woman may seem laborious and time-consuming pushed a baby carriage and had two banners compared with printing, mimeograph and, written on strips of cloth, one written in Czech later, photocopying. However, it had some and proclaiming “Long live free and inde- advantages in that it gave rise to particular pendent Czechoslovakia!”, the other “To your forms of writing. Hungarian George Konrád freedom and ours!”83 Less than twenty noted that samizdat “is not an appropriate minutes after their demonstration began and vehicle for lengthy analyses and descriptions; the banners were unfurled, the protesters were the samizdat cannot afford to be boring. … taken away by the KGB, put on trial, and Samizdat is a medium, and perhaps a genre as sentenced to three years in prison camps. The well. It is not cheap, it is relatively difficult to next day an editorial of the Literarni Listy read, one cannot prattle, it has to be worth newspaper in Prague declared “Those seven one’s while.”86 The conciseness that was people on Moscow’s Red Square are at least essential for samizdat, for the typists’ benefit, seven reasons why we will never be able to also served the medium well in that writing hate the Russians.”84 The Czechoslovaks were which is to the point and does not waffle not the only people to admire the bravery of probably encourages a larger and more the seven dissidents. According to Alexayeva, attentive readership, including readers who are members of the national liberation movements very busy and who are unable to read through in the Ukraine and Baltic states spoke of their voluminous material. Samizdat works were admiration “… when you go out protesting in widely circulated and discussed during the the open, without weapons, just seven of you 1970s. Even some members of the bureauc- against the world, well, that takes a special racy and political leadership were among the brand of courage.”85 readers. Arguably, this contributed strongly to 87 glasnost, which will be discussed later. Slightly more sophisticated technologies 82 Peter Reddaway, “The development of dissent further enabled dissidents to communicate and opposition,” in Archie Brown and Michael news and views that would not have otherwise Kaser (eds.), The Soviet Union Since the Fall of been given an airing. As cassette players Khrushchev (London: Macmillan, 1975), pp. 121– became more available, they were used in a 156, at p. 126. 83 Alexeyeva and Goldberg, The Thaw Generation, p. 219 86 George Konrád, “Informing on ourselves,” The 84 Alexeyeva and Goldberg, The Thaw Generation, Nation, Vol. 244, 28 February 1987, pp. 237–239. p. 220 87 Stuart Anderson, “Gorbie’s choice: Perestroika's 85 Alexeyeva and Goldberg, The Thaw Generation, dissident roots,” The New Republic, Vol. 200, No. p. 222. 16, 17 April 1989, pp. 11–12.

50 Nonviolence Speaks samizdat fashion, with people making tapes, Glasnost then making copies for others, who would then copy the cassettes in turn.88 This allowed As mentioned, samizdat and the ideas of the satirical songs and other protest music to also dissidents played a crucial role in glasnost, be circulated, known as magnitizdat. A huge introduced by President Gorbachev in the mid demand for tape recorders grew in the Soviet 1980s. Even the term glasnost was taken up by Union during the 1960s and the state happily Gorbachev after being used by some dissidents satisfied the demand, believing that the uses to as a key demand for a new sort of society. which the technology was being put were Indeed Gorbachev not only pushed ahead with more “innocent” than was the case.89 Short- many of the political and economic reforms wave radios were hugely important and that the dissidents had argued for, but he used became very popular from 1968 when remarkably similar terms and arguments, dissidents used them to listen to groups in suggesting that he had been significantly Czechoslovakia and to hear about what influenced by them. A number of the ideas in a demonstrations were taking place in the United Nations speech he made in December USSR.90 Their popularity remained after the 1988, for instance, had appeared in dissident reformist period known as the Prague Spring Andrei Sakharov’s 1968 samizdat work had been squashed and contributed to the Progress, Co-existence and Intellectual dissent that demanded and brought the next Freedom.91 period of relaxation. Under glasnost, Gorbachev not only As well as sending information to the allowed but encouraged a diversity of views. editors of the Chronicle of Current Events, Not that repression died out under his leader- dissidents similarly gave material to foreign ship. There were several instances of disturb- journalists, tourists, and diplomats in the hope ing state repression, much of it revolving of spreading their cause and gathering support around the increasingly vexed question of for their push for human rights. Reddaway independence for the republics that had been claims that it was also about this time that under Russian rule for decades and sometimes Soviet citizens started to listen systematically centuries. Eighteen people died when to foreign radio stations and circulate infor- commandos stormed first the Lithuanian TV mation thus obtained and to propose to center and then the headquarters of the Latvian authorities carefully drafted proposals for law Interior Ministry. Nor was the repression all reform. Clearly these activities signaled a new the state’s doing. In some of the republics level of activism. Dissidents were now being tensions arose and prejudices overwhelmed much more than victims. They were active social relations so that national groups, protagonists of change. impassioned by the nationality issue being on the agenda, fought each other, with loss of life and increasingly disharmonious relations. Gorbachev also found that his encourage- ment to criticize was sometimes turned against him. In the May Day march of 1991 some placards demanded his resignation. The road 88 Shatz, Soviet Dissent in Historical Perspective, to political freedom was not going to be p. 129. smooth, nor did it enjoy wholehearted support. This became most obvious when the democra- 89 Gene Sosin, “Magnitizdat: uncensored songs of dissent” in Rudolf L. Tökes (ed.), Dissent in the tization process threatened to come to a halt USSR: Politics, Ideology, and People (London: with the 1991 coup. With one fell swoop, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975), pp. 276– repression was restored. 309, at p. 278. 90 Alexeyeva and Goldberg, The Thaw Generation, 91 Anderson, “Gorbie’s choice: Perestroika's p. 222 dissident roots,” p. 11. Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 51

The role of international support for Murmansk in 1918; US, Serbian, and Italian resistance troops were stationed in the north; US, British, Japanese, and Czech troops were in Siberia; International support for Soviet resistance British troops were in the Caucasus; and movements has not always been what it might French troops were in the Crimea. Although have been. The period of most success was these troops seldom engaged in direct battle from 1968 and through the years of the against the Reds,93 their very presence and the Brezhnev era, when dissidents placed heavy postures of hostility by their home govern- reliance on international efforts to make the ments set the stage for an acrimonious rela- Soviet government abide by its human rights tionship. Thus, as historian McCauley notes, obligations. Much of the dissidents’ energy “The Bolshevik regime was fashioned by the was aimed at getting information to the West exigencies of Civil War.”94 The party’s inter- and hoping that that strategy would both put nal disagreements about freedoms and open pressure on the Soviet government and also dissent tended to be set aside as the more allow the information to come back into the pressing question of survival took precedence. country via short-wave radio and communica- This was in contrast to the early days of the tions from foreigners. This appears to have Revolution, when there was popular participa- worked well. tion, workers’ control, and considerably However, at other periods international greater tolerance for disagreement. support was minimal and sometimes even Although the Red Army had been set up misdirected. The main problems seem to have in keeping with the spirit of the revolution, the been: hostility directed towards the Soviet Union • Western foreign policy was linked less from outside drove the army towards a differ- with concern for the people of the Soviet ent model. In 1917 there had been soviets of Union than with Western governments’ own soldiers and a move away from the rigid perceived political interests; hierarchies of the Czarist army, but this was • there was a misplaced belief in reversed as Trotsky took control and reorgan- militarism as the best form of diplomacy; ized the army along more traditional hierarchi- • both the right and left held to their own cal lines. Tens of thousands of former Czarist rigid ideologies; officers were put into positions of command. • little reliable information came out of This effectively brought about a militarization the USSR, a problem to which ideological of the revolution, which in turn impacted on supporters of the Soviet Union and foreign the society which was emerging in the newly diplomats there themselves contributed. formed Union. The conventionally organized The building of the Soviet system took army could be used to repress challenges to the place under extraordinary isolation. Interna- increasingly centralized Bolshevik rule. tionally, there was a great deal of hostility As further crises arose, important ques- towards the Bolshevist regime from the tions of liberty and open criticism were beginning. Several Western governments habitually put on the backburner so that, in the supplied money and guns to the counter- years between 1926 and 1929 especially, revolutionaries in the Civil War that ensued in Stalin was able to amass more power than 1918 to 1920.92 This was despite workers in many in the party wanted him to have. Lenin many of these countries, and particularly the had earlier warned of this power accruing to UK, feeling strongly that the new Soviet Stalin but the hostility from outside worked regime should be given a chance to implement against it being addressed. its programs. Allied troops were also sent: British troops landed in Archangel and

93 McCauley, The Soviet Union, 1917–1991, p. 28. 92 Service, A History of Twentieth Century Russia, p. 117. 94 McCauley, The Soviet Union, 1917–1991, p. 30.

52 Nonviolence Speaks

Ironically, the disastrous agricultural pol- provements. This gradually resulted in loss of icy of the USSR during the 1920s and early popular support for the Soviet government. 1930s was related in no small way to attempts We should not assume, however, that it is by foreign governments to crush the Soviet only governments that can influence outcomes Union. By supporting the counter-revolution- in other countries. The international movement aries and cutting off access to many raw against apartheid, in response to the actions materials, intervening governments gave the and requests of the people of South Africa, Soviet leaders cause to feel under siege. There shows otherwise. Groups of activists and was a fear that the West would attack. The individuals, especially if they are well-known only answer was seen to be rapid industriali- and enjoy notoriety, can have a significant zation, at which point increasing pressure was impact on swaying public opinion or in put on the peasantry, as discussed earlier. boosting the morale of those facing problems Hostilities against the Soviet Union took in their home countries. Unfortunately, people many forms and surfaced numerous times. in such a position, for the most part, failed Such was the strength of the suspicion and badly in regard to what they might have done hostility that in the build-up to World War II in respect to repression in the Soviet Union, the British government saw the Soviet Union particularly during the years of Stalin’s rule. as a larger threat than fascism. Some even felt Many writers, social commentators and that fascism had some benefits in that it might others who had an interest in international be able to squash Communism.95 politics and who were of a left persuasion, Following initial military intervention in chose to believe that Stalin was something the Soviet Union in the early days, there were akin to the god-like figure painted of him in further encounters of a militaristic nature, with the USSR. They had a view of how they the result invariably being that the Soviet wanted the Soviet Union to be and they government would strengthen its own military preferred to make their beliefs fit the ideal capabilities. This was particularly the case in rather than to see the country for what it was. the earlier years of the Cold War and also of This included a great many people who the period in the 1980s when US President traveled to the Soviet Union during some of its Ronald Reagan engaged in constant aggressive most repressive and disruptive years and yet posturing, as well as “upping the nuclear saw only what they were allowed to see, what ante.” Of course, during both the 1950s and they were told by those who organized their 1980s the US government itself used the visits, and what they wanted to believe. David increased militarization of the Soviet Union to Caute has written of many of these “fellow justify its own increased expenditures on travellers” as having had “commitment at a weaponry and on the military sector generally. distance,” the distance being not only geo- Each military escalation would justify the graphical but emotional and intellectual.96 The other’s paranoia about its objectives, thereby Soviet Union, during its darkest years, made plunging each into a spiral of increased risk of good use of such people, pointing out that their war. While both the East and West paid objectivity was beyond question since they dramatically in terms of loss of social welfare usually belonged to no political party, or at and other more useful programs to which the least not the Communist Party.97 expenditure could have been redirected, the But, as Adam Hochschild points out, the Soviet Union, with its constantly troubled split between those who saw clearly and those economy, arguably paid a greater price with who chose to deny did not always lie along little left over for much needed social im-

96 David Caute, The Fellow-Travellers: A Post- script to the Enlightenment (London: Weidenfeld 95 D. F. Fleming, The Cold War and Its Origins, and Nicolson, 1973), p. 3. 1917–1960, Vol. 1, (London: Allen & Unwin, 1961). 97 Caute, The Fellow-Travellers, p. 7. Nonviolent resistance to Soviet repression 53 ideological lines. He identifies two of the the other that there could be nothing bad about worst deniers as being major US establishment it. This polarization stifled any possible figures. New York Times correspondent Walter understanding of the real situation there. It Duranty and US ambassador Joseph Davies also fed into the Cold War and the military each sent home messages from the Soviet build-up both in the Soviet Bloc and else- Union that all was well there. Acknowledging where. If we speak of relatively low levels of that there had at least been some sort of action in opposition to repression in the Soviet purging, they both agreed that this had been Union, then part of the responsibility lies with necessary and served the country well by Western governments and the Western left. cleansing it and ridding it of treason. Only during the Brezhnev years, as Moreover, these men were not tourists. They mentioned, did the West prove useful to Soviet lived in Russia and must have had more first dissidents and even then it was often the hand knowledge than some who simply flitted enemies of socialism who took up the cause through the country, being shown what was while left wingers preferred to close their eyes deemed that they should see.98 to Soviet repression or at least insist that it was Others who chose to overlook the situa- a low priority on the scale of global oppres- tion in the Soviet Union during its terrors of sion. The role of the West faded somewhat forced collectivization and the Great Purge under glasnost as the nation was liberalized, were believers in the ideal of communism. although US leaders often liked to think that They wished to see the Soviet Union as a the liberalization was due to the history of country moving forward with the blessing of Western belligerence rather than despite it. all its citizens. The reality was so far different from their constructed view that they chose to Conclusion ignore it. Some of these had good reason to know about the reality, whereas others may The Soviet people may have been their own have had less understanding of the situation. savior in the defeat of the 1991 coup but Many reports about the Soviet Union were repressed people around the world request, presented from an anti-communist perspective, expect, and deserve assistance in their strug- giving supporters of the Soviet government gles. The end to apartheid came because of the some reason — though not necessarily struggle of the South African majority but, sufficient reason — to doubt what they heard. arguably, it came more quickly due to the Others chose not to know. solidarity shown on the international stage — Directly after the Second World War, and probably would have come more quickly when the Soviet government geared up for a again had that support been greater earlier. new wave of terror, similar to that unleashed Solidarity strikes us as being one of the major in the late 1930s, there was much ill feeling in factors in social struggles. the Western world about socialism and those Glancing back at the different periods of who wished to defend it in principle felt that, Soviet repression, we can glean that networks, in the polarized ideological environment, they where and when they existed, were particu- must defend it also in practice, no matter what larly useful, and that actions with well thought warped practices came from socialist states. through goals had the best chance of success. Among the pro-Soviet left in the West, there If one ingredient for resistance was missing was little honest and free discussion and more than any other during the Stalinist apparently no strategy to promote greater Terror, it was networks of resistance. The freedom in the Soviet Union. NKVD had formed a massive and powerful There were, in essence, two polarized apparatus of repression, while individuals blocs in the West, one saying that there could lived in either fear or denial, both seriously be nothing good about the Soviet Union and isolating frames of mind. Often family members dared not speak among themselves of their concerns, for fear that children might 98 Hochschild, The Unquiet Ghost, p. 271.

54 Nonviolence Speaks report them to their teachers or unwittingly lenges can lie ahead. Social struggle is clearly repeat something said at the dinner table. Both an ongoing process. Citizens of the ex-Soviet networks and open communications had Union are today trying to come to grips with a obviously broken down at their most funda- society with very different sorts of problems. mental level. They can be both proud of their 1991 Networks of dissidents, the kompanii achievement and bewildered that they must founded in the 1950s, were among the most start afresh, finding new ways of having a important developments in the Soviet dissident voice. movement. From them grew widespread samizdat, international pressure for human rights, and an imposing dissident literature that laid the foundation for glasnost. Glasnost itself played an important role in providing psycho- logical preparation for resisting the coup. Another lesson comes from dissident Vladimir Bukovsky who recommends using systems against themselves. Pointing out the extremely bureaucratic nature of the Soviet system, he has described how even those in Soviet prisons could turn the system against itself. He and his fellow prisoners nearly brought their prison to a standstill with an avalanche of complaints which, under Soviet law, they were entitled to make. Because of the highly bureaucratized rules and rituals surrounding the receipt of complaints and dealing with them, this caused huge prob- lems.99 The message is to know each system and its weaknesses and to think creatively about how these might be utilized towards one’s goals. Nonviolent goals should always involve nonviolent means to their achievement. It is telling that, during the 1991 Soviet coup, the three deaths of protesters in Moscow were at a venue where Molotov cocktails (home-made explosives) had been thrown. For even just a few people to use violence can create fear and confusion and hinder the winning over of guards, soldiers, or other potential oppressors. But perhaps the greatest lesson is about the nature of social struggle. Both 1917 and 1991 can be seen as successes for nonviolent action. Yet they remind us that, following social change brought about by mass actions (whether violent or nonviolent) major chal-

99 Vladimir Bukovsky, To Build a Castle — My Life as a Dissenter (Washington, DC: Ethics and Public Policy Center, 1978), pp. 35–39.