Chapter 271 Justice VI

September 17, 1939, Ukraine, Cherkassy Ferry. Four pontoon bridges for tanks and trucks have been built. Borisov, a member of the Military Committee of the Ukrainian Front, accompanied Khrushchev, the first secretary of the Ukrainian Communist Party, and Merkulov, the first deputy people's commissar of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and director of the State Security Bureau, in a GAZ-M-1 military version of the car, swaying across one of the pontoon bridges.

Next to the car, a large group of "blue hats" were marching. They were the internal security forces jointly controlled by Khrushchev and Merkulov, who had the rank of a third-level state security commissioner (equivalent to a lieutenant general).

In order to implement Stalin's "tens of percent" anti-counterrevolutionary target, Khrushchev and Merkulov worked for several days and nights to modify the anti-counterrevolutionary plan and mobilize more internal security forces. At the same time, they had to talk to the first secretary and the head of the internal affairs department in charge of each "liberated state". Explain to them the "tricks of anti-counterrevolutionary work" - this is not easy! Compared with the crude method used by the German Nazis to send Jews to death camps to eliminate them, the Soviet Bolshevik Party's purge was a very meticulous and artistic work.

Unlike the work of exterminating European Jews, which was mainly carried out by the SS system in history, the purge in Ukraine cannot be carried out by relying on less than 150,000 "blue hats".

There will be millions of Ukrainians who need to be arrested in the Gulag. Although it seems not difficult to accomplish it with the power of the Red Army, it is not the line of GCism. The line of GCism is to rely on the people, not on a few secret police. Any cause of the Bolshevik Party cannot be separated from the support of the masses, even purge. Ukraine is no exception!

"We must rely on the Ukrainian working masses. In the bourgeois and landlord Ukraine, they are oppressed slaves. For them, we are liberators and their hope."

Although Khrushchev, who once presided over the purge work in the Left Bank Ukraine and Moscow State, was not the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, he was very experienced in purge work - purge work is by no means a few murderers and persecutors of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs who commit crimes behind the backs of the Party and the people.

This is a revolutionary work led by the Party, supported by the Soviet people, and carried out by the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs.

And it is not a criminal act, but a beneficial cleanup of Soviet society so that the Soviet Union can survive and develop in the cruel struggle.

Khrushchev said: "Therefore, it is very important to establish party organizations at all levels in Right Bank Ukraine. A strong party organization can not only ensure the high efficiency of the anti-counterrevolutionary work, but also suppress the counterattack of Ukrainian reactionary forces in the shortest time."

The first step of the Great Purge in Right Bank Ukraine was to organize the people of Right Bank Ukraine and develop Bolshevik party members among them. With the help of the Right Bank Ukraine party organization, the action of eliminating counter-revolutionaries will become easier-in fact, there has always been an underground Bolshevik organization in Right Bank Ukraine! Now we can rely on these "underground party members" and the Ukrainian cadres transferred from the Left Bank as the backbone to establish party organizations at all levels in Right Bank Ukraine.

Then these Ukrainian Bolshevik party organizations will lead the anti-counterrevolutionary work in Right Bank Ukraine!

Khrushchev emphasized: "Arrests should be small-scale at the beginning, and only those counter-revolutionaries with solid evidence and public resentment should be carried out... For the vast majority of right-bank Ukrainians, the first few months are reassuring. Because there are only a very small number of bad people, about 1%, no more than 1.5%. There must also be some people who are released after being arrested, who were arrested by mistake or who have made meritorious contributions. We must let the vast majority of people see the hope of living a good life, only in this way can the anti-counterrevolutionary work be carried out more easily.

And, there is one point I want to emphasize again. The anti-counterrevolutionary work must rely on the party organization, must rely on Ukrainian cadres, and must rely on the right-bank Ukrainian people. The representatives of the internal security forces and the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs are only the executors of the anti-counterrevolutionary work."

Yes, the entire People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs is just a tool for anti-counterrevolutionary work. The Great Purge was not decided by the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs, and the leaders of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs did not have such power. In fact, they themselves were sometimes victims of the Great Purge!

In the anti-counterrevolutionary work in Right-bank Ukraine, the role of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs is the same. Rely on the people (exposure), implement the party's decisions, and eliminate some people in a planned way. At the same time, the remaining people must be kept safe and feel hopeful... Even those who are arrested cannot be allowed to despair completely.

Because millions of people will not be sent to the gas chambers, this is not the Soviet style.

The Bolsheviks did not want to eliminate people, but to reform them. The future waiting for most of the arrested Ukrainians is not execution, but long-term labor reform. Even if they are sentenced to death by the "Three-Man Committee", they have the opportunity to get a commutation of sentence through appeal (the probability of commutation is very high, 95% or more), and sometimes they can get a commutation of sentence without appealing, because no one actually reads the submitted appeals, and the cadres responsible for commutation of sentence only complete the task according to the indicators.

Of course, many people will die in the process of reform, and some will persist until they are released (most people, no matter how long they are sentenced, will not be released until Khrushchev becomes the number one boss of the Soviet Union). However, some people will be released in the middle of the process. Joining the Red Army in the Great Patriotic War is one way (the most dangerous tasks will be waiting for them), and restoring reputation is also a way - there are also indicators for restoring reputation, which is an encouragement to those who have been arrested and those who are actively arrested. Because most people believe that they are innocent and think that the organization has made a mistake...

...

"Old man, can Kiev hold on for 6 months?"

Just as Comrade Khrushchev crossed the river, in Kiev, which was about to fall into the encirclement, the two most reactionary people in the right bank of Ukraine, Petliura and Yevkhan Konovalets, were talking in a bunker next to a temporary airport converted from a main road in the center of Kiev.

The dull roar continued to come, which was the Soviet bombers dropping bombs - the Ukrainian Defense Forces did not have an air force, so air supremacy fell into the hands of the Soviet Red Army from the beginning.

However, the bombing of the Soviet Red Air Force was expected. It took the Ukrainians 20 years to turn Kiev from a metropolis into a large fortress, and they naturally expected to face a large bombing. Most of the citizens and factories of Kiev have moved to Lviv in the past 20 years. Almost all the Ukrainian Defense Forces officers and soldiers who remain in Kiev are in uniform, and there are enough air-raid shelters to hide.

"Simon, I think you know the answer." Yevhan Konovalec, the second-in-command of the Ukrainian "White Bandits", smiled bitterly, "Although we have a lot of people, our weapons and equipment and training are not good, and we don't have enough officers."

Although the Ukrainian Free State is one of the main bodies of the Polish Federation, the Poles do not really trust the Ukrainians, and naturally they have to restrict the Ukrainian force. Therefore, the Ukrainian Defense Force has always been Poland's "miscellaneous army" without any good weapons, and the Polish military academy has few places for Ukrainians.

However, there are heavy weapons in Kiev. After all, this is a fortress that the Polish army has operated for nearly 20 years. Naturally, there are many heavy artillery, all of which are old artillery aided by the French. Most of them are 1890-style and 18-gun cannons, with a range of only 6-7 kilometers, and there are 121 of them. In addition, there are a small number (18) of Schneider 155mm 1917-style long-barreled cannons, which were donated to Poland by France in 1938.

These 129 heavy guns are placed in the artillery forts carefully designed by French engineers, and are not easy to destroy.

In addition, the number of water-cooled machine guns and mortars is sufficient. However, there are not many anti-tank guns, medium and light field artillery and mountain artillery. As for tanks, there is not even one!

The main anti-tank weapon is a simple firearm - pour gasoline into a wine bottle, seal the bottle mouth with a cloth strip, and light it on fire and throw it out during combat.

"If 6 months doesn't work, then 3 months will do," Petliura patted Yevkhan Konovalets, "We can only rely on delaying and waiting for changes... When Germany and the Soviet Union turn against each other, we Ukrainians will have a chance!"

The way to delay is to defend the city. In addition to Kiev, Vinnitsa and Odessa have also made arrangements to hold on; and the other method is guerrilla warfare. Half of the Ukrainian Defense Forces have been divided into small units and scattered to various places to establish guerrilla strongholds.

However, the experience of the Soviet-Russian Civil War told "old white bandits" like Petliura and Yevkhan Konovalets that guerrilla warfare has little effect on the Bolsheviks. They have Cheka fighters and party organizations at all levels, which can suppress all resistance!

Therefore, holding on to the stronghold and moving the population to Western Ukraine as much as possible became the main means of resistance for Petliura and his people.

"Okay!" Yevkhan Konovalets nodded, "I will do everything I can to hold on... The city of Kiev has been transformed into a fortress, and it is our biggest trump card!"

Kiev was a big city in the Tsarist era, with many sturdy buildings, and now these buildings have been reinforced into fortresses. There are dozens of kilometers of tunnels connecting these sturdy buildings underground. It's not that easy to occupy!

"In addition," Petliura finally said to Yevkhan Konovalets, "Don't die in Kiev, Ukraine still needs you! When the airport in the city center is about to be lost, send a telegram to Lviv, and I will send a Junkers 52 to pick you up, land at night, and then leave immediately, just take a little risk."