PC/WI: Stalin is Purged By Accident

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Is it plausible that a clever soviet subordinate could have been able to sneak Stalin's name on one of the lists that marked people to be jailed or executed during the Great Purge? (possibly even one signed by him)

If so, and then he is hilariously executed, what happens next?
 
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_38869213_coffin_body_ap.jpg


Is it plausible that a clever soviet subordinate could have been able to sneak Stalin's name on one of the lists of names that marked people to be jailed or executed during the Great Purge? (possibly even one signed by him)

If so, and then he is hilariously executed, what happens next?

I highly doubt it. Any list with Stalin's name on it would be double-checked. Your "clever soviet subordinate" could find himself six feet under in a hurry.
 
This reminds me of a comedy TV show Blackadder (specifically the second season) where due to the lord executioner accidentally signing his name on a wrong sheet of paper he gets executed and Blackadder (played by Rowan Atkinson) has to replace him.

Back on the OP I think the actual plausibility would be on the low end due to it requiring the individual to have access to the purge list.
 
It's basically impossible for this to happen. The execution lists were checked multiple times: by the person who composed them, by Stalin (who was a serious micromanager, personally going over 357 lists and crossing out names and adding instructions such as "beat, beat") or one of his subordinates, and finally by the people whose job it was to carry out the arrests and executions. Over the course of that someone is going to notice that Stalin's name is on the list and alert him. At that point whoever composed the list, Yezhov, and any subordinate who signed the list are going to be executed.
 
and finally by the people whose job it was to carry out the arrests and executions.

So what if one of those people tried to add Stalin's name to the list once it has already been signed and approved by Stalin, after it has passed Yezhov's and Stalin's desks?

Still highly unlikely such a stunt is going to end with anything other than the "clever soviet subordinate" being arrested and executed, but if there's any way there's a remote chance that this could work it would have to be after Stalin looks over the list, and obviously not before. The final list usually had all sorts of amendments, such as a name crossed out who Stalin knew from childhood, or added handwritten instructions such as "beat up". So a name added to the list wouldn't stand out that much during the Great Purge. Unless of course that name is Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin.
 
This is ASB mostly because it accepts as fact the lie that Stalin wasn't autocrat that everyone knew was in charge. The bureaucrat would just end up purged and erased from history even if Stalin signed off on it. It's not like his attack dogs in the NKVD or his sycophantic followers in the Upper bureaucracy will ever even think about carrying that out.
 
This is ASB mostly because it accepts as fact the lie that Stalin wasn't autocrat that everyone knew was in charge.

Quite. The system Stalin set-up basically rigidly defined the heiarchy of power within the Soviet state with himself at the very precipices. If not for the fact the man was a slave to his own paranoia, he would have basically been the only free person in the entire Soviet Union.
 
So what if one of those people tried to add Stalin's name to the list once it has already been signed and approved by Stalin, after it has passed Yezhov's and Stalin's desks?

Still highly unlikely such a stunt is going to end with anything other than the "clever soviet subordinate" being arrested and executed, but if there's any way there's a remote chance that this could work it would have to be after Stalin looks over the list, and obviously not before. The final list usually had all sorts of amendments, such as a name crossed out who Stalin knew from childhood, or added handwritten instructions such as "beat up". So a name added to the list wouldn't stand out that much during the Great Purge. Unless of course that name is Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin.

Here's the thing though. NKVD agents weren't stupid. If they saw the order was to arrest Stalin they'd note that's extremely irregular and alert it to any superior who would just tell Stalin. Then anyone involved after the process after his own reading of the list is dead. Probably also the people who compiled the list too.

The mumming of legality was just a mumming, the reality was a system which could be kafkaesque madness for the accused, unless the person accused was someone who Stalin didn't want purged in which case it was often corrected. Everyone involved was conscious the purpose was not whatever pretense was used at the moment, but to shore up Stalins power base and ensure his continued leadership of the state.
 
This reminds me of a comedy TV show Blackadder (specifically the second season) where due to the lord executioner accidentally signing his name on a wrong sheet of paper he gets executed and Blackadder (played by Rowan Atkinson) has to replace him.

Back on the OP I think the actual plausibility would be on the low end due to it requiring the individual to have access to the purge list.

Blackadder - "He should have told them they had the wrong man."

Melchett - "He did. But they didn't have the wrong man, they had the right man. And they had the document to prove it."
 
_38869213_coffin_body_ap.jpg


Is it plausible that a clever soviet subordinate could have been able to sneak Stalin's name on one of the lists that marked people to be jailed or executed during the Great Purge? (possibly even one signed by him)

If so, and then he is hilariously executed, what happens next?

No, this is not possible. No member of the Politburo (0f which Stalin was the most senior and important member) was arrested, much less tried or executed, until the rest of the Politburo had put their signature to the arrest order. And no member of the Politburo would dare propose such an order without prior clearance from Stalin. From there, the order was routed to the head of NKVD via Stalin's secretariat, a group headed by his most loyal and trusted subordinate. And Stalin kept a VERY firm grip on the whole process, right to the end of his life. He isn't about to accidentally order his own arrest.

For people much further down on the totem pole, the scenario wasn't impossible. I recall reading about a lowly secretary at NKVD who held a petty grudge against some person who had been picked up for a minor offense. She added his name to an execution list, and the poor sap got the traditional send-off. Beria sent her to the Gulag for violating administrative procedures. Some variation on this must have happened countless times, but not to bigwigs. Those arrests and killings never happened by accident.
 
How do you get purged when you are the one creating the purge lists? Everyone was terrified of him, if they saw his name pop up they'd probably distance themselves very quickly from whoever gave it to them last/report them. They'd assume it was a soon-to-be-a-non-person's terrible idea of a joke. No NKVD officer is going to go "derp thorry mithster sthalin orders are orders derp".
 
How do you get purged when you are the one creating the purge lists? Everyone was terrified of him, if they saw his name pop up they'd probably distance themselves very quickly from whoever gave it to them last/report them. They'd assume it was a soon-to-be-a-non-person's terrible idea of a joke. No NKVD officer is going to go "derp thorry mithster sthalin orders are orders derp".

Well, Stalin didn't write the list. He had subordinates who compiled the list from a huge number of reports and people getting turned in by friends and neighbors. Stalin just micromanaged his subordinates like crazy and personally read over their lists. Again, the problem here is that they're not stupid and they know this is all a bare bones imitation of legal proceedings based on more than whim.
 
I think the more sensible case would be if someone told those under his command that "chain of command has instructed us to kill Stalin" kind of scenario.
 
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