WI: Beria purged

[Mort the Reaper]

Lavrentiy Beria is infamous as one of the most downright loathsome people to ever be part of Stalin's inner circle (which is quite the achievement, all things considered). There were hardly any mourners when he was executed in 1953.

But he could very well have died earlier. Nikolai Yezhov, one of the main architects of the Great Purge and whom he would later work for at the NKVD, ordered him arrested in 1938 when he was party secretary in Georgia. However, Georgian NKVD chief Sergei Goglidze warned him of Yezhov's plans, and Beria flew to Moscow and persuaded Stalin to spare his life.

What if Beria had ended up as one of the Great Purge's many victims?

 

[Court Jester]

Stalin finds someone else to take over NKVD, once Yezhov outlives his usefulness.

 

[tallthinkev]

We'ed have a thread, of What if Beria wasn't purged?

 

[AdA]

Some body else would do his job. There is never a shortage of Berias

 

[Unkown00]

This reminds me of a lot of that movie, "The Death of Stalin"

 

[Bellacinos]

I may be wrong here but as much as a monster Beria was, wasn’t he the most pro west and pro capitalist member of Stalins inner circle.

 

[Mort the Reaper]

Stalin finds someone else to take over NKVD, once Yezhov outlives his usefulness.

Some body else would do his job. There is never a shortage of Berias

Who might be likely candidates?

 

[AdA]

Who might be likely candidates?

Teaching a communist how to purge is like teaching a fish how to swim. Basically any party member who could read a death list would do the job. Besides all the good NKVD agents had been killed when the service was purged.

 

[AdA]

I may be wrong here but as much as a monster Beria was, wasn’t he the most pro west and pro capitalist member of Stalins inner circle.

He was the one with the best Intel and therefore the one with the most respect for the capabilities of the western countries.

 

[Clandango]

This reminds me of a lot of that movie, "The Death of Stalin"

Just from the trailer I wish to never see it. Seems too much like The Hangover. I did read the graphic novel it was based in and very much enjoyed that, especially pointing it how Stalin was not the the only one who did the horrible things, same as Beria. They were mostly all accomplices.

 

[marathag]

Just from the trailer I wish to never see it. Seems too much like The Hangover. I did read the graphic novel it was based in and very much enjoyed that, especially pointing it how Stalin was not the the only one who did the horrible things, same as Beria. They were mostly all accomplices.

It still is an enjoyable watch, even with the liberties taken. Great Casting, too.
Jason Isaacs is awesome as Zhukov, and Steve Buscemi is better at playing Khrushchev that I thought possible

 

[gaitskellitebevanite]

Who might be likely candidates?

Malenkov was Stalin's original choice to succeed Yezhov. Malenkov was a very different figure from Beria, one of the most intelligent members of Stalin's inner circle, after Stalin's death Malenkov acted as a liberal reformer, but whilst Stalin was alive Malenkov was an accomplice in Stalin's crimes, particularly in the Leningrad Case, where he killed a number of Andrei Zhdanov's proteges in order to strengthen his own power. Beria was quite close to Stalin, mainly because both were Georgian, I doubt the Russian Malenkov would develop quite as close a relationship with Stalin.

 

[David T]

In OTL, Pyotr Kapitsa refused to work on the Soviet atomic bomb program (for which he was put under house arrest for several years). He later explained that he was not a pacifist and did not object to the bomb on principle--he just objected to working under Beria. So maybe without Beria, the Soviet nuclear program benefits from Kapitsa's cooperation.

 

[Cudymcar]

Beria was an architect of the first rehabilitation process in 1939-1940, when 150-200 thousand people were aquitted and released from prison.
In the mid-1938 Yezhov was already quite unhinged. Drunk from blood and afraid for his future, he was considering a coup against Stalin. If he's not replaced by Beria before 1939, it may be too late, NKVD was becoming too powerful for the Party to control.

 

[redjirachi]

Some body else would do his job. There is never a shortage of Berias

That's a chilling thing to say

 

[PobreCesar]

Drunk from blood and afraid for his future, he was considering a coup against Stalin.

I suppose there would be a sort of poetic justice to that. But what would the USSR look like afterward? I can't see the NKVD doing a particularly good job of running the country. How would they interact with the army?

That's a chilling thing to say

It's certainly sobering. But remember, Beria himself was a replacement for Yezhov.

 

[RousseauX]

Who might be likely candidates?

it's pretty hard to tell tbh, Beria was pretty obscure provincial NVKD official until Stalin promoted him and he brought in his ethnic cliche specifically to get rid of Yezhov.

He probably would have done the same with some other obscure provincial official: promoting someone already at the center is a bad idea: you want a NKVD chief reliant on your patronage and not someone with real political power and connections of their own.

 

[Arcavia]

I suppose there would be a sort of poetic justice to that. But what would the USSR look like afterward? I can't see the NKVD doing a particularly good job of running the country. How would they interact with the army?

Let's suppose that Yezhov launches a coup that successfully removes Stalin, complete with show trial.

On the one hand, I can't imagine the Red Army staying still and allowing the NKVD to go nuts--OTL I would argue that Stalin never truly lost control of the purges, and after all he was able to put a stop to them quickly when he chose to. On the other, there will be aversion to carrying out an open coup, given that nobody wants to validate the narrative of 'subversive elements in the Red Army'.

The key figure is likely going to be Voroshilov, who at the time was People's Commissar for Defense. IOTL, Voroshilov was complicit in the coup, but did try to at least protect some officers and disputed the narrative that the Red Army was infested with saboteurs--overall, I get the vibe that he was doing it to save his own skin and preserve his position rather than out of any paranoid fervor, like Stalin was (obviously not morally justified, but very different in many respects). If the NKVD goes nuts, I imagine that he'll stop this co-operation and things will eventually escalate to a tense political standoff between the Red Army and the NKVD, with popular support generally behind the latter. I think it would be likely that eventually some incident occurs to give Voroshilov the pretense to order Yezhov's arrest, after which the purge dies down and the Red Army takes control, though I imagine that they'll try and create a pretense of civilian government. Who might lead such a government is an open question; I believe that Malenkov and possibly Molotov are too close to Stalin to survive Yezhov going nuts, though on the off-chance Molotov makes it through he might become a dominant figure. Otherwise, it is possible that Voroshilov "invites" Kalinin to take a more active role in government.

 

[Cudymcar]

I can't see the NKVD doing a particularly good job of running the country

Not for long, in any case. Yezhov is not a dictator material.

 

[NOMISYRRUC]

...and Steve Buscemi is better at playing Khrushchev that I thought possible.

Even better than Brian Glover! That's a feat and a half!

FWIW Beria was played by David Suchet in Red Monarch. That was before he was Blott on the Landscape or Hercule Poirot.