How damaging was the 1937 Soviet officer Purge?

[Shinsu]

The so called "Great Purge" during 1936-1938 in the Soviet Union is generally stated as one of the reasons for the losses that the Soviets faced during the early stages of Barbarossa. A significant amount of the Soviet officer class were killed, imprisoned, sent into labor camps etc. and commissars were attached to individual units that held roughly the same power as the officers themselves, both of which reduced the effectiveness of the Red Army. The purge also removed a good amount of the men that were supposed to train new officers, so the act of training and replacing was further slowed.

However, many will state that the Officer purge was not damaging at all to the Red Army and actually made it vastly Superior since many of the officers "couldn't" be trained in the new tactics and so had to be removed for the new tactics that modern warfare called for to be implemented into the army.

What are your thoughts?

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Read Glantz's "Stumbling Colossus". It was one of several factors that led to the utter disaster that was 1941, but it was one of the critical factors that made the situation so bad. It could have been mitigated to a point by not expanding and reorganizing the army at the same time, but that would have come with it's own costs come Barbarossa.
Still, it should be remembered that the purging continued pretty continuously from from 1937-41, the worst of it being in 1937-38. IMHO anyone that claims that the purges were a long term good is engaging in pretty rank Stalin apologia. You can fire officers that perform poorly, that isn't a purge; murdering on faked charges a huge part of your officer corps is beyond the pale. All it did was ensure that Stalin faced no significant opposition from anyone in Soviet society no matter how bad things got from there on out.

 

[SsgtC]

However, many will state that the Officer purge was not damaging at all to the Red Army and actually made it vastly Superior since many of the officers "couldn't" be trained in the new tactics and so had to be removed for the new tactics that modern warfare called for to be implemented into the army.

I would really love to see someone state that the purges weren't damaging. Stalin gutted his military. In what world is that a good thing?

 

[TheCoolCucumber]

However, many will state that the Officer purge was not damaging at all to the Red Army and actually made it vastly Superior since many of the officers "couldn't" be trained in the new tactics and so had to be removed for the new tactics that modern warfare called for to be implemented into the army.

I don't think I have every heard of anyone seriously saying that the Purges helped the Red Army.

 

[Ratmancampidori]

I don't think I have every heard of anyone seriously saying that the Purges helped the Red Army.

I remember someone saying it on here in fact, pretty sure they got banned for being a tankie though. Can’t remember who it was.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

I don't think I have every heard of anyone seriously saying that the Purges helped the Red Army.

Oh I have, a Russian historian to boot.

 

[Seandineen]

The climate of fear was dangerous the lost of the experienced leadership corps.

 

[Shinsu]

I don't think I have every heard of anyone seriously saying that the Purges helped the Red Army.

Richard Overy (A British historian) essentially stated that it didn't really do harm in his book "Russia's War" pg 32 "By 1941, over 100,000 officers were entering the Soviet armed forces each year. The purges certainty removed some men of talent at the top of the military establishment, but it is questionable whether the aggregate effect was to make the average performance of the officer corps much worse than it had been beforehand, or to make the tank and air war any less capable of realization"

" The destruction of the cadres of young officers around the reformer Tukhachevsky is usually taken as evidence that the Soviet Union took a giant leap backward in military effectiveness and levels and preparedness. Plausible though it seems, the strengths and weaknesses of the Soviet military position in the late 1930's were not the result of the purges"

While this isn't him saying that it was directly beneficial, it's essentially saying that nothing was lost by doing it, and the ineffectiveness was instead caused by the expansion of the Red Army.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Richard Overy (A British historian) essentially stated that it didn't really do harm in his book "Russia's War" pg 32 "By 1941, over 100,000 officers were entering the Soviet armed forces each year. The purges certainty removed some men of talent at the top of the military establishment, but it is questionable whether the aggregate effect was to make the average performance of the officer corps much worse than it had been beforehand, or to make the tank and air war any less capable of realization"

" The destruction of the cadres of young officers around the reformer Tukhachevsky is usually taken as evidence that the Soviet Union took a giant leap backward in military effectiveness and levels and preparedness. Plausible though it seems, the strengths and weaknesses of the Soviet military position in the late 1930's were not the result of the purges"

While this isn't him saying that it was directly beneficial, it's essentially saying that nothing was lost by doing it, and the ineffectiveness was instead caused by the expansion of the Red Army.

If he really can't tell the difference between a bunch of rushed raw recruits and experienced upper level officers, I don't know what to say.

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

Oh I have, a Russian historian to boot.

Ditto. Used to read a lot on a forum where a number of Russians, Urkrainians, & others of the Slavic languages would post. A couple of those argued the purge was aimed at getting rid of the underperformers and old crocs, & Did just that, improving the army.

One of that lot argued Stalin saved us all from the horrors had Trotsky taken power.

 

[Carl Schwamberger]

Oh I have, a Russian historian to boot.

Ditto. I've seen a couple of Russians argue the purges were not political and aimed at improving leadership.

 

[ObssesedNuker]

and the ineffectiveness was instead caused by the expansion of the Red Army.

Overy's arguement ignores that while the expansion of the Red Army is another of the factors Wiking mentioned which contributed, it was a factor that itself was impacted by the purge as the expansion was planned and executed by a officer corps that was suffering from experience, training, and manning problems directly related to the purges. Overy's statement also ignores that the purges had greater effects beyond the immediate loss of skilled personnel. The total disruption of the evolving Soviet training regimens is one example and that was something the Red Army had only just managed to put back on track in 1941 when the German invasion destroyed it all over again. Had the purges not happened then the progression of training from individual skills to sub-unit drills to unit and formation level maneuvers over the intervening years would have been an improvement of war altering value, easily the single biggest change one would see in a "no-purge" situation. Had the Soviets entered June 1941 with divisions that could actually fight as actual divisions then, even with all else being equal, they would have halted the German advance at Pskov-Minsk-Kiev instead of at Leningrad-Moscow-Rostov like they did OTL.

 

[King Augeas]

Turning the question around... how much better would the Red Army have performed in 1941 without the purges?

I mean, the thought comes to mind that the deployment and stance of the Red Army made it inherently vulnerable to Barbarossa. While better tactical leadership would surely have led to better tactical results, capable of snowballing into better theatre-wide performance, it sounds like the Red Army still gets its face absolutely kicked in.

 

[Jack Brisco]

Ditto. I've seen a couple of Russians argue the purges were not political and aimed at improving leadership.

If that was so, why did the Red Army bring back as many officers from the GULAG as possible after the German invasion? I remember a General Rokossovsky who'd been in the camps, pretty roughly handled. Stalin got him out, cleaned him up, and made him an army (three divisions, equal maybe to a US corps) commander. Rokossovsky stayed out of the camps, finished as a marshal, became a Defense Minister of postwar Poland.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Konstantin_Rokossovsky

 

[ObssesedNuker]

Turning the question around... how much better would the Red Army have performed in 1941 without the purges?

There are multiple instances in June/July 1941 of Soviet tank divisions which by all rights should have annihilated their German opposition instead falling apart and only attacking one company at a time because they lacked the training to mount a divisional-level attack, allowing the Germans to easily destroy them in detail. Had these divisions instead attacked as divisions, the German forces in front of them would have easily been overwhelmed and destroyed, threatening German supply lines more, diverting more forces from the spearheads, and on the whole immensely taking a lot of future punch out of the German attack through losses inflicted on German combat power. The Soviet forces in question might not have been able to prevent themselves from being driven back from the border, but they would have been able to prevent themselves from being annihilated at the border. That is a much better performance by any reasonable definition.

I mean, the thought comes to mind that the deployment and stance of the Red Army made it inherently vulnerable to Barbarossa. While better tactical leadership would surely have led to better tactical results, capable of snowballing into better theatre-wide performance, it sounds like the Red Army still gets its face absolutely kicked in.

Well, one could also make argument that since Soviet military doctrinal theorists had just started to examine the prospects for defensive operations when the purges plunged Soviet military theoretical work into a deep freeze, it's likewise possible they could have developed better defensive doctrines in the intervening years. Similarly, if a number of Soviet engineers and scientists weren't purged and executed in 1937 and 1938, then they would have done better jobs on equipment. For example, the T-34 might have had several improvements that were planned for later (like torsion bar suspension and four man turrets) brought forward into the start of 1941. These are somewhat more speculative possibilities compared to my example about the disruptions to the training program above, but they remain possibilities nonetheless.

 

[iVC]

I have to express a separate opinion that although repressions did considerable damage to the armed forces of the USSR before the war, it should also be understood that the level of paranoia and mistrust of the army within the USSR increased after certain events in a certain country of the Iberian Peninsula, and the phrase "well,guys, we surely do have a very reliable officer corps and there cannot be any conspiracies inside" could not be anymore flatly accepted by the country's leadership -- year 1936 showed that you actually can be caught sleeping and miss the military coup blooming.

When the Belorussian military district was openly called "the personal army of Comrade Uborevich" in the troops, and when the troops of the Kiev military district, in reply to the congratulations of the commander Iona Yakir on the parade, answered "we serve Comrade Yakir!", then even the less irascible leaders than Joseph Stalin, could feel themselves worried.

Let's face it, in military districts there was an uncontrolled free man land for some time. Relaxation habits, rude behavior, yes-men and sycophants around the military leaders and permissiveness were everywhere, some military openly dared to oppose and believed that without them the Soviet state will not do. This was their tragic mistake, then it was a tragic mistake by the country's political leadership, which decided to start sifting its command staff, then it was a tragic mistake by the NKVD authorities who began to fight for promotions and fulfill and overfulfill the plan.

 

[iVC]

You can fire officers that perform poorly, that isn't a purge; murdering on faked charges a huge part of your officer corps is beyond the pale.

The main problem is that there were a very difficult questions - what to do with the officers left behind and, most importantly, what to do with former military leaders. Demotion was tried - it turned out badly. Tried to lay off for civil service - it turned out badly. I'll explain why.

For example, the pre-war leadership of the Air Force, from 1930 to 1937 did not even bother with the general question "why aviation is needed and how to implement the connection of aviation and ground forces". It was not decided whether we are doing frontline aviation, or strategic one. Instructions were not designed. Just drill trainings and army discipline lessons (the times of Alksnis).

The only intelligent expert on the combat use of aviation - died in 1938 (Alexander Nikolaevich Lapchinsky), and the rest were... not so good. Appointed from scraps, and they could not cope. Smushkevich was looking bright in the Far East, had real merits, but later showed himself in Khalkhin-Gol: he can not manage aviation (having three times more planes, the USSR in the air above Khalkhin Gol could barely bring air battles to the "draw", having lost more than Japanese, three quarters of the time it was the Japanese who dominated the air).

What the Rychagov did, you probably know. The question of the high accidents at takeoffs and landings of aircrafts was discussed, and as a result it was Rychagov who arbitrarily ordered the flight training to be stopped, so that the accident rate would improve. As a result, two years the air regiment simply were not flying and performing drills, so the accident statistics... was not spoiled. When it was discovered, Rychagov instantly faced huge problems. A genius approach - if you do not fly, then there will be no accidents.

Then problems of a different kind began. The bad performers was just nowhere to attach. The army of wartime has, unlike a peaceful one, plenty of places to send a person unable to command, so that he could be useful at this place (supply, military acceptance of products at the factories etc etc). In the tiny sized army of 1937-1938 there was simply no such "warm places".

Government tried to demote them, to appoint bad performers as merely a divisional commanders instead of executions. It turned out badly.

It turned out that this can not be done - first, we offend those who are honestly going through their careers and intend to take these positions in command INSTEAD of the mistreated "big masters", and secondly, it reduces the overall discipline - the principle of "there is no irreplaceables" ceases to work.

Then government began to change the most odious figures, in the first place the dreamer Tukhachevsky, who for 7 years did not bother with the simple matter of supplying ammunition and fuel for his "deep operations." Then the master of Minsk, Uborevich, who did not have the 'Red Army soldiers' in Belarus SSR, but called them "my own fighters".

Then government came to the Trans-Baikal governor Blucher (who after being reported that the Japanese have already been shelling the border guards for two days, said softly that it was not his business, but the business of NKVD and border guards).

I have here on my table two volumes of meeting minutes from the annual meetings of the military council at the People's Commissariat of Defense - years 1934 and 1937... Everything is the same - "statistics mistreatment, fraud, distortion of reality, failure to provide a realistic situation" - and still no repressions among the commanders yet. The commanders, whose affairs are dealt with by the commission, they themselves are burning each other - you drank with the Trotskyites, and you started providing prostitutes to the troops, and you ... Really disgusting cowardice, blaming everyone around and begging for a pardon, even there is no talking about executions yet... One of the most reasonable figures there is someone called Stalin I.V -- he moderates the blaming talks and tries to talk these commanders into the reason, while calling for a professional dispute, not the blame-shifting.

 

[RightHoJeeves]

Soviet deep battle doctrine had already been demonstrated effectively against the Japanese. So clearly the Red Army could still perform well despite the purges.

The initial results of Barbarossa stemmed mostly from Stalin refusing to believe an actual full scale Nazi invasion was happening. This allowed the Germans to completely disrupt Soviet command and control and seize air supremacy.

So I also don't believe that the purges played a major role in the disasters that befell the Red Army in 1941.

 

[David T]

As Stephen Kotkin writes in Stalin: Waiting for Hitler, 1929-1941: "The Red Army was immense, and the self-inflicted losses—-90 percent of the top ranks--represented just 0.5 percent of the whole. But a dearth of good officers to discipline, train, and lead conscripts was precisely its chief vulnerability." https://books.google.com/books?id=xTA7DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA430 No doubt the military capabilities of some of the executed generals have been exaggerated. (I've always thought Tukhachevsky was a bit overrated, for example. He did better against outnumbered Whites or Tambov peasants than against a stronger adversary like Poland...) But that's not really the point. Even if the purged officers were all mediocrities (which they weren't) and their replacements all geniuses (which they definitely weren't), the fact remains that it takes time to make a good officer and leader. That the Red Army could ultimately win despite the purges is to its credit, but some people have managed to paint good paintings even after losing an arm--which is not a good argument for cutting off one's arm.

 

[Deleted member 1487]

Turning the question around... how much better would the Red Army have performed in 1941 without the purges?

I mean, the thought comes to mind that the deployment and stance of the Red Army made it inherently vulnerable to Barbarossa. While better tactical leadership would surely have led to better tactical results, capable of snowballing into better theatre-wide performance, it sounds like the Red Army still gets its face absolutely kicked in.

It's tough to say given that there were other issues like the expansion, modernization, and reorganization all going on. It certainly wouldn't have hurt to have more experienced men running things...but no purge doesn't mean that a house cleaning of older officers wouldn't have happened anyway, as Stalin would likely have fired a bunch of officers anyway over Finland, among other things (like the issues with training surrounding the over-accelerated expansion/modernization of equipment/reorg). I do wonder if the army, without the purges, might not have told Stalin no a lot more during the 1941 campaign when ordering bonkers operations.

I don't know if we can put any specifics out there without knowing a lot more about what exactly is different, which would take a lot of detailed analysis. The short answer is it would have performed somewhat better, perhaps campaign-alteringly so, especially if they don't follow Stalin's worst orders.