The President of the Court grants leave to the State Prosecutor, Comrade A. Y. Vyshinsky, State Attorney of the U.S.S.R., to address the Court.

Vyshinski:  Comrades judges, comrades members of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the Soviet Union: For three days you have very carefully and with the greatest attention examined the evidence and proof submitted to you by the State Prosecution against the people sitting here in the dock charged with having committed the gravest crimes against the state. With the greatest possible care you have subjected to investigation and judicial scrutiny every one of these proofs, every fact, every event, every step taken by the accused, who in the course of many years added crime to crime in their struggle against the Soviet state, against the Soviet power, against our Party and against the whole of our Soviet people.

Andrei Vyshinsky (1883-1954), prosecutor. Vyshinsky was also representative for the Soviet Union in the United Nations 1946-49.

Horrible and monstrous is the chain of these crimes against our socialist fatherland; and each one of these crimes deserves the severest condemnation and severest punishment. Horrible and monstrous is the guilt of these criminals and murderers, who raised their hand against the leaders of our Party, against Comrades Stalin, Voroshilov, Zhdanov, Kaganovich, Orjonikidze, Kossior and Postyshev, against our leaders, the leaders of the Soviet state. Monstrous are the crimes perpetrated by this gang wich not only made preparations to commit terroristic acts, but actually murdered one of the best sons of the working class, one of the most devoted to the cause of socialism, one of the most beloved disciples of the great Stalin, the fiery tribune of the proletarian revolution, the unforgettable Sergel Mironovich Kirov.

But monstrous as these crimes are, and however profoundly we may have been stirred and digusted by this nightmare of horrible crime, you, comrades judges, as befits a Soviet court and Soviet justice, have been weighing and appraising very calmy the facts which came before you in connection with the criminal activities of these persons whose names have long ago been covered with contempt and disgrace in the eyes of the whole people.

We have now come to the end of our judicial proceedings. We are making the final summary. We are drawing our last deductions in preparation, within a few hours, perhaps, to hear your verdict, the verdict of the Court of the land of Soviets which demands and expects from you a just, unfaltering and implacably stern decision concerning the fate of these people, these contemptible murderers, these vile and insolent enimies of the land of Soviets,of the Soviet people.

We are building a new, socialist society, a new, Soviet state, under the difficult conditions of class struggle, amidst the fierse resistance of the last remnants of the exploiting classes which we have routed and utterly crushed.

Every step in our progress is accompanied by desperate resistance on the part of our enemies who rouse against us all the forces of the old world, all the filth, all the scum of the old society, who mobilize and throw into the struggle against us the most criminal, the most hardened, the most incorrigible, decayed and dishonest elements.

Lenin taught us that "there has never been a single deep and mighty popular movement in history without filthy scum,"^[1] without the bourgeois and petty-bourgeois element flighting against the Soviet Government, and resorting not only to the methods of the Savinkovs, the Gotzes, the Gegechkoris and Kornilovs, of plots and rebellions, of floods of lies and slander, but also utilizing all the elements of decay, and embarking upon every possible sordin and shameful crime.

Comrade Stalin warned us that:

"We must bear in mind that the growth of the power of the Soviet state will increase the resistance of the last remnants of the dying classes. It is precisely because they are dying, and living their last days that they will pass from one form of attack to another, to sharper forms of attack, appealing to the backward strata of the population, and mobilizing them against the Soviet power. There is no foul lie or slander that these 'have-beens' would not use against the Soviet power and around which they would not try to mobilize the backward elements. This may give ground for the revival of the activities of the defeated groups of the old counter-revolutionary parties: the Socialist-Revolutionaries, the Mensheviks, the bourgeois nationalists in the centre and in the outlying regions; it may give grounds also for the revival of the activities of the fragments of counter-revolutionary opposition elements from among the Trotskyites and the Right deviationists. Of course, there is nothing terrible in this. But we must bear all this in mind if we want to put an end to these elements quickly and without great loss."^[2]

Three years ago Comrade Stalin not only foretold the inevitable resistance of elements hostile to the cause of socialism, but also foretold the possibility of the revival of Trotskyite counter-revolutionary groups. This trial has fully and distinctly proved the great wisdom of this forecast.

The "heroes" of this trial have linked their fate with the fascists, with the agents of secret-police departments; these "heroes" have lost all scruples and gone to the uttermost limits of duplicity and deceit, elevated perfidy and treachery to a system, to the law of their struggle against the Soviet state.

This trial has completely revealed and has once again proved how great and boundless is the rage and hatred of our enemies toward the great cause of socialism; this trial has shown how insignificant are these enemies who rushed headling from one crime to another. A contemptible, insignificant, impotent group of trailors and murderers thought that by means of their sordid crimes they could cause the heart of our great people to cease to beat! This contemptible, insignificant group of adventurers tried with their mud-stained feet to trample upon the most fragant flowers in our socialist garden.

These mad dogs of capitalism tried to tear limb from limb the best of the best of our Soviet land. They killed one of the men of the revolution who was most dear to us, that admirable and wonderful man, bright and joyous as the smile on his lips was always bright and joyous, as our new life is bright and joyous. Thy killed our Kirov; they wounded us close to our very heart. They thought they could sow confusion and consternation in our ranks.

To the murderers' treacherous shot of December 1, 1934, the whole country replied with unanimous execration. The whole country, millions and tens of millions of people, were aroused and once again proved their solidarity, their unity, their loyalty to the great banner of the Party of Lenin-Stalin. The land of Soviets rose up like an unshakable, iron wall in defence of its leaders, its guides, for every hair of whose heads these criminal madmen will ansver with their lives. In this boundless love of millions of toilers for our Party, for its central Committee, and for our Stalin and his glorious Comrades -in-arms, in this infinite love of the people lies the strength of the defence and protection of our leaders, the guides of our country and Party, against traitors, murderers and bandits.

Our great fatherland is joyously flourishing and growing.The fields of innumerable collective farms are rich with a golden harvest. Thousands of new socialist, Stakhanov factories and works are pulsating with life. Harmoniously and wonderfully our railways are working for the welfare of our fatherland, and from end to end of the country Krivonoss passenger and freight trains are speeding over the glistening ribbons of steel. Firm as granite stands our Red Army, surrounded with the love of the people, guarding the frontiers of our native land. The names of our wonderful Bolsheviks, the tireless and gifted builders of our state - Sergo Orjonikidze, Klim Voroshilov, Lazar Moisseyevich Kaganovich, the leaders of the Ukrainian Bolsheviks - Kossior and Postyshev, and the leader of the Leningrad Bolsheviks, Zhdanov, are near and dear to the hearts of us and all those who are filled with filial love for their motherland. With great and unsurpassed love, the toilers of the whole world utter the name of the great teacher and leader of the peoples of the U.S.S.R. - Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin!

Under the leadership of the Soviet government and our Party, headed by Stalin, socialism has finally and irrevocably triumphed in our country. Under the leadership of our Party the proletariat of our country took the implements and means of production from the capitalists, abolished the capitalist system which is based on private property, on exploitation, on poverty and slavery.

Under the leadership of our Party and the Soviet government the peoples of the U.S.S.R. brought about the great industrialization of our contry, increased its means of production tenfold, multiplied its national wealth and thereby created the conditions for a happy and joyous life for all the toilers of the Soviet land of socialism.The victory of socialism is first and foremost the victory of our own Bolshevik Party, of its Leninist-Stalinist general line, of its Leninist-Stalinist leadership, of its Central Committee, headed by the great Stalin.

On the basis of these victories there has been created the indestructible union of all the toilers for the further reinforcement and development of socialism; there has been created and cemented the union and friendship of all the peoples of the U.S.S.R. for the building of socialism, for defence against our enemies, against the enemies of socialism. These victories have completely changed the entire face of our country, which has been raised to an unprecedented level of economic and cultural development.

These victories have brought the working class of the U.S.S.R. enormous improvement in their material well-being. It is now many years since unemployment has been eliminated and the seven-hour day, against which the "heroes" now in the dock always persistently and treacherously fought, has been introduced. Our country has achieved unprecedented successes, impossible in any capitalist country, in developing a new, really human, socialist culture.

These victories have brought our whole country, every factory worker and collective farmer, every office worker and intellectual, a happy and a well-to-do life. And these victories are the guarantee of the unity of all the Soviet people with our government, with our Party and with its Central Committee. Are not the wide,mass, popular conferences, conceivable only in our contry, of the leading people of our factories and works, of our transport system, of our cotton and sugar beet fields, of live-stock breeders, of combine and tractor drivers, of Stakhanovites and Krivonossites with the leaders of the Party and the government the best proof of this indestructible, genuine unity and solidarity of masses of the people with the great Stalin, with our Central Committee, with our Soviet government? This is a manifestation of genuine Soviet, true democracy! And is not the mighty wave of popular wrath, now sweeping from one end of the country to the other against these despicable murderers, a striking evidence of this unity?

During the preceding days of the trial these gentlemen tried to strike a "noble" attitude. They, or at all events their leaders, spoke about their terroristic plot with a certain pose; they sought and expected a political evaluation of their crimes, they talked about political struggle, about some kind of political agreements with some kind of alleged political parties. And although they admitted that in reality they had no political platform, that they did not even feel the need to draw up a political platform because, on their own admission, their platform could be written at one sitting, in a couple of hours, nevertheless, they tried to pose as genuine political figures. They do all they can to make it appear that they are standing on some political position, bespattered and battered, perhaps, but political none the less. These efforts are merely a false screen to conceal their political emptiness and lack of principle. And when they spoke about the interests of the working class, about the interests of the people, when they will speak about this, in their speeches in their defence and in their last pleas, they will lie as they have lied hitherto, as they are lying now, for they fought against the only people's policy, against the policy of our country, against our Soviet policy. Liars and clowns, insignificant pigmies, little dogs snarling at an elephant, this is what this gang represents!

But they know how to use guns, and therein lies the danger to society. This makes it necessary to adopt special and most severe measures against them. To chain them is not enough. We must adopt more determined and radical measures against them. Not political figures, but a gang of murderers and criminals, thieves who tried to rob the state, this is what this gang represents!

These gentlemen admitted that they had no program; but they did have some sort of a "program." They had a program both in home and foreign policy. In their home policy their program could be put in one word - to murder. It is true that they prefer to speak not of murder but of terror. But we must call things by their proper names. These gentlemen chose murder as a means of fighting for power. They were compelled to admit this here themselves, cynically and openly.

How did these gentlemen reconcile their alleged Marxism with the preaching of terror and terroristic activity? In no wise! And yet these people called themselves Marxists at one time! Probably the accused Zinoviev still considers himself a Marxist. He said here that Marxism could not be reconciled with terrorism; but Marxism can explain how they came to terrorism.

During this trial I asked the accused Reingold how they reconciled Marxism with the preaching of terror and terroristic activities, and he said: "In 1932, Zinoviev, in Kamenev's apartment, in the presence of a number of members of the united Trotskyite-Zinovievite centre, argued in favour of resorting to terror as follows: although terror is incompatible with Marxism, at the present moment these conciderations must be abandoned. There are no other methods available of fighting the leaders of the Party and the government at the present time. Stalin combines in himself all the strength and firmness of the Party leadership. Therefore Stalin must be put out of the way in the first place." Here you have a reply, frankly cynical, insolent, but absolutely logical. Here you have the sum and substance of Zinoviev's new "philosophy of the epoch."

Reingold said: "Kamenev enlarged on this theory and said that the former methods of fighting, namely, attempts to win the masses combinations with the leaders of the Rightists, and banking on economic difficulties, have failed. That is why the only method of struggle available is terrorism, terroristic acts against Stalin and his closest comrades-in-arms, Voroshilov, Kaganovich, Orjonikidze, Kossior, Postyshev and Zhdanov,"

This is frank and insolent, but at the same time it is logical from the point of view of the logic of the class struggle, from the point of view of the logic of our enemy who is fighting against the land of socialism.

Without the masses, against the masses, but for power, power at all costs, thirst for personal power - this is the whole ideology of the gang that is now in the dock.

The whole cynical unprincipledness of these people was frankly avowed here by Kamenev. In his explanations before the court he stated how and on what basis this terroristic conspiracy, as he called it, was organized.

Kamenev said: "I became convinced that the policy of the Party, the policy of its leadership, had been victorious in the only sense in which the political victory in the land of socialism is possible, that this policy was recognized by the masses of the toilers."

This statement is remarkable for its lack of principle and for its insolent cynicism: just because "the policy of the Party had been vicorious," they fought against its leaders.

Kamenev said: "Our banking on the possibility of a split in the Party also proved groundless, Two paths remained: either honestly and completely to put a stop to the struggle against the Party, or to continue this struggle, but without any hope of obtaining any mass support whatsoever, without a political platform, without a banner, that is to say, by means of individual terror. We chose the second path."

The accused Kamenev should have been more consistent: if he called the first path the path of honest renunciation of the struggle, then he should have called the second path the path of dishonest struggle with dishonest weapons.

He admitted: "We chose this second path. In this we were guided by our boundless hatred of the leaders of the Party and the country, and by a thirst for power, with wich we were once closely associated and from which we were cast aside by the course of historical development."

The accused Zinoviev said: "At the end of 1932 it became evident that our hopes had proved false . . . the fact was that the general line of the Party was winning." "Here," said Zinoviev, "the complete lack of principle and ideals which brought us to the bare and unprincipled struggle for power became strikingly apparent." (Vol. XII, p. 34.)

After this, can we speak with these people in any sort of political language? Have we not the right to say that we can speak with these people in one language only, the language of the Criminal Code, and regard them as common criminals, as incorrigible and hardened murderers.

Such was their "program" in the sphere of home policy, if one may so express it. Formerly, if only out of shame, they gave as grounds for their struggle against the leaders of the Soviet government and the Party, shortcomings, defects and difficulties. Now they have already thrown off this mask. Now they admit that they had become convinced that socialism in our country was victorious. They came to terrorism, to murder, because their position had become hopeless, because they realized that they were isolated from power, from the working class. They came to terrorism because of the complete absence of favourable prospects for them in the fight for power by other methods and by other means.

Kamenev admitted that the organization of terror was the only means by which they hoped to come to power and that it was precisely on this basis of terroristic struggle that negotiations which finally resulted in the union of the Trotskyites and Zinovievites were conducted and successfully concluded. Terrorism was the real basis on which the Trotskyites and Zinovievites united.

Not all of them want to admit that.

Comrades judges, in drawing up your verdict in your council chamber, you will carefully - I have no doupt about that - once again go over not only the material of the court investigation but also the records of the preliminary investigation and you will become convinced of the animal fear with which the accused tried to avoid admitting that terrorism was precisely the basis of their criminal activities.

That is why Smirnov wriggled so much here. He admits that he was a member of the centre, he admits that this centre had adopted a terroristic line of struggle, he admits that he himself received from Trotsky the instructions about this terroristic struggle. But at the same time he tries by every means in his power to prove that he, Smirnov personally, did not adopt terror, did not agree with it, and he even went so far as to say that he had left the Trotskyite-Zinovievite terrorist centre or bloc. 

I will come back to each one of the accused, including Smirnov, and try as fully, carefully and objectively as possible to analyze the evidence which proves that they committed the gravest crimes against the state. At present I merely wish to emphasize once again that the accused are not political infants, that they are hardened players in the political struggle; they know perfectly well that they must answer not only for recognizing terror "theoretically" - for this alone they should have paid with their heads - but for having translated this "theoretical" program into the language of terroristic practice, into the language of practical, criminal activity.

Terror was the basis of all their activities, it was the basis of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite union. This was quite unanimously testified to by people who were not directly connected with each other in their underground work. This was not only admitted here by Zinoviev and Kamenev, Smirnov and Ter-Vaganyan, Reingold and Pickel; it was stated also by Berman-Yurin, Fritz David and Valentine Olberg, that peculiar citizen of the Republic of Honduras, paid agent of Trotsky and simultaneously of the German secret police - the Gestapo.

All these persons, under the weight of evidence against them, could no longer deny and had to admit that the main, in fact the only means of struggle against the Soviet government and the Party which united their criminal activity was terror, murder.

Reingold said: "The Trotskyites and all the members of the bloc  insisted and agreed on this." It was precisely the removal through violence of the leaders of the C.P.S.U. and the Soviet government that was the fundamental aim of this Trotskyite-Zinovievite bloc,  which can be quite fairly called, as I called it in the indictment, an association of political assassins.

These terroristic sentiments which formed the basis of the organization of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite bloc  in 1932-36 were perhaps most distinctly and characteristically expressed by the accused Mrachkovsky, who stated both at the preliminary investigation and at this trial:

"Hopes for the collapse of the policy of the Party must be regarded as doomed. The methods of struggle applied up to now have not produced positive results. Only one path of struggle remained, and that was the path of removing by violence the leaders of the Party and the Government."

Mrachkovsky said: "The principal task is to put Stalin and the other leaders of the Party and the Government out of the way."

All their bestial rage and hatred were directed against the leaders of our Party, against the Political Bureau of the Central Committe, against Comrade Stalin, against his glorious comrades-inarms.

It was upon them, headed by Comrade Stalin, that the main burden of the struggle against the Zinovievite-Trotskyite underground organization lay. It was under their leadership, under the leadership of Comrade Stalin, that great executor and keeper of Lenin's will and testament, that the counter-revolutionary Trotskyite organization was routed. It was under their leadership, amidst fierce battles against Trotskyite counter-revolution that Trotskyite counter-revolution was finally crushed.

In the fighting against this Trotskyite counter-revolution, Comrade Stalin developed and undeviatingly carried out Lenin's teachings on the building of socialism in our country, having armed the vast millions of workers and collective farmers with these teachings.

That is why the Trotskyites and Zinovievites, as well as the other most frenzied counter-revolutionry elements, concentrated all their efforts and their hatred and rage against socialism on the leaders of our Party. That is why in March 1932, in a fit counter-revolutionary fury, Trotsky burst out in an open letter with an appeal to "put Stalin out of the way" (this letter was found between the double walls of Holtzman's suit case and figured as an exhibit in this case).

Trotsky addressed this despicable appeal with still greater frankness to number of his diciples abroad whom he had recruited as assassins to be sent to the U.S.S.R. for the purpose of organizing terroristic acts and attempts on the lives of the leaders of our Soviet state and our Party. This was related in detail here by the accused Fritz David. he stated that in November 1932 he had a conversation with Trotsky during which Trotsky said literally the following: "Now there is no other way out except the removal by violence of Stalin and his adherents. Terror against Stalin - that is the revolutionary task. Whoever is a revolutionary - his hand will not tremble." (Vol. VIII, p. 62.) For this purpose Trotsky recruited high-strung persons, impressing upon them that they must commit this counter-revolutionary act as if it were some sort of "historic mission."

Berman-Yurin testified here that Trotsky systematically and repeatedly said: "Until Stalin is removed by violence, there will be no possibillity of changing the policy of the Party; in the fight against Stalin we must not hesitate to adopt extreme measures - Stalin must be physically destroyed."

Fritz David and Berman-Yurin discussed with Trotsky the assassination of Stalin. They accepted Trotsky's commission and took a number of practical steps to carry it out. Does not this in itself deserve the sternest punishment provided for by our law - death by shooting?

Fritz David, Berman-Yurin, Reingold, V. Olberg, and I. N. Smirnov himself have in fact utterly exposed Trotsky's role in this matter. Even Smirnov, who stubbornly denied that he took any part in the terroristic activities of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite centre, could not help admitting that he personally had received the directions on individual terror against the leaders of the Soviet government and the C.P.S.U. in 1931 from Trotsky's son, Sedov, that these directions on terror were confirmed by Trotsky in 1932 in the instructions brought from abroad by Gaven and conveyed to Smirnov. Smirnov tried to alleviate the gravity of his own position by stating that the instruction on terror which he had received from Sedov was Sedov's personal attitude. But this is a worthless explanation. It is obvious to everyone that Sedov was no authority whatever for Smirnov. Ter-Vaganyan and Mrachkovsky corroborated this here when they said that had they thought that the direction on terror came from Sedov they would have spat upon it with supreme contempt.

The accused Ter-Vaganyan, one of the principal organizers of the united centre, confirmed that Smirnov, while abroad, really did receive from Trotsky instructions to adopt terror. Ter-Vaganyan merely veiled his evidence by substituting for the word terror the phrase: "sharp struggle against the leaders of the C.P.S.U." Later, however, he had to decipher this and to admit that these were instructions, the content of which was terrorism and terrorism alone.

Finally, you heard the witness Safonova whose confrontation with the accused has probably left a deep impression upon the memories of everyone present in this court. At this confrontation, Safonova, whose case is being taken up separately because the investigation is still continuing, fully confirmed that Smirnov received from Trotsky instructions on individual terror through Sedov in 1931, and later through Gaven.

On the basis of these facts we can take it as absolutely established that it was precisely Trotsky's instructions on terrorism that served as the basis for the development of the terroristic activities of the united centre. Trotsky's instructions to organize a united centre and to adopt terrorism were accepted by the Trotskyite underground organization. Zinoviev and Kamenev, the leaders of the Zinovievite section of the bloc,  arrived at the same idea and also accepted Trotsky's instructions as the basis of the activities of the united centre and underground organizations.

These bitter and ingrained enemies could not look calmly on the growing prosperity of our people, of our country, which had emerged onto the highroad of socialism.

The U.S.S.R. is achieving victory. The U.S.S.R. is building socialism, in the U.S.S.R. socialism is triumphant, and because of that their hatred towards the Central Committe, towards Stalin and the government to whom the country owes this victory, of whom the country is proud, grows more and more.

From their gloomy underworld Trotsky, Zinoviev and Kamenev issue the despicable call: Put out of the way, kill! The underground machinery begins to work, knives are sharpened, revolvers are loaded,bombs are charged, false documents are written and fabricated, secret connections are established with the German political police, people are sent to their posts, they engage in revolver practice, and finally they shoot and kill.

That is the main thing! The counter-revolutionaries not only dream of terror, they not only devise plans for a terroristic plot, or for terroristic attempts, they not only prepare to commit these foul crimes, they commit them, they shoot and kill!

The main thing in this trial is that they transformed their counter-revolutionary thoughts into counter-revolutionary deeds, their counter-revolutionary theory into counter-revolutionary terroristic practice; they not only talk about shooting, they shoot, shoot and kill!

That is the main thing. They killed Comrade Kirov, they were getting ready to kill Comrades Stalin, Voroshilov, Kaganovich, Orjonikidze, Zhdanov, Kossior and Postyshev. This is what we are trying these people for, these organizers of secret murder, these certified murderers.

And that is why we demand that the Court judge them as severely as our Soviet law commands, judge them as our socialist censcience demands.

Murder - this is the whole "program" of the home policy of these people.

What was their foreign policy?

Here the shades of the dead arise, here the old "Clemenceau theses" are revived, here the cloven hoof of Trotsky again becomes visible.

Trotsky's letter received by Dreitzer contained three brief points: 1) put Stalin and Voroshilov out of the way; 2) unfold work of organizing nuclei in the army; 3) in the event of war, take advantage of every setback and possible confusion to seize the leadership.

This is avowed banking on defeat.

This is the old Clemenceau thesis, but in a new version, edited by the united centre of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite terroristic bloc. 

Fritz David stated during the preliminary investigation and confirmed it in this Court (and it fully conforms with a number of historical documents, the evidence of other accused and the very nature of the task which confronted Trotsky, Zinoviev and Kamenev), that in one of his conversations with Trotsky the latter asked him: "Do you think this discontent will disappear in the event of a war between the Soviet Union and the Japanese?" (He referred to the discontent which he thought existed in our country.) "No, on the contrary," said Trotsky, "under these conditions the forces hostile to the regime will try to unite, and in that case our task will be to unite and take the lead of these discontented masses, to arm them and lead them against the ruling bureaucrats"(Vol. VIII, p. 61).

Trotsky repeated this in his letter of 1932 (evidently this is his

idée fixe)  and in a conversation with Berman-Yurin.

Berman-Yurin stated: "In connection with the international situation at that time Trotsky told me that the task of demoralizing our military forces was of particular importance, for in the event of a war against the Soviet Union large masses would be called up to the army." Trotsky and the Trotskyites together with the Zinovievites calcylated on being able to influence these masses very easly. "Trotsky said to me literally the following, " added Berman-Yurin: " 'We will defend the Soviet Union provided the Stalin leadership is overthrown' " (Vol. IV, p. 100).

Such was their program in foreign policy!

Perhaps this is all an invention? Perhaps Fritz David and Berman-Yurin just gave rein to their fantasy? Perhaps this is all a pack of lies, an invention, the irresponsible chatter of the accused who are trying to say as much as they can against the others in order to mitigate their own ultimate fate? No! This is not an invention, not fantasy! It is the truth! Who does not know that Trotsky,together with the accused Kamenev and Zinoviev now in the dock, several years ago proclaimed the "Clemenceau thesis," that they said that it was necessary, in the event of war, to wait until the enemy had got within a distance of 80 kilometers of Moscow and then to rise in arms against the Soviet government, to overthrow it. This is an historical fact. It cannot be denied. And that is why it must be admitted that the evidence given by Berman-Yurin and Fritz David in this onnection corresponds to the truth.

Such was the "foreign policy" program of these people. For this program alone our Soviet people will hang these trailors on the very first gates! And it will serve them right!

Let us now turn to the methods by which these people operated.

This, perhaps, is one of the most shameful pages in the story of their shameful criminal activities.

In conformity with the "principle" of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite underground bloc  to seize power by any means, the members of this bloc  widely practised double-dealing as their principal method in their relations with the Party and the Government. They transformed this double-dealing into a system which all the Azefs and Malinovskys, all the secret police, with all their spies, provocateurs and agents for diversive activities, might well envy.

Reingold stated that in 1933-34 Zinoviev told him in a private conversation - and Zinoviev corroborated this before the whole world at this trial - that "the principal, practical task that confronted their underground organization was to organize their terroristic work so secretly as not to compromise themselves in any way."

Perhaps this is an exaggeration? Of course not. What Reingold said conforms to the logic of things.

"The main thing during an investigation," said Zinoviev in instructing his accomplices, "is to deny all connection with the organization, arguing that terror is incompatible with the views of Bolsheviks-Marxists" (Vol. XXVII, p. 112).

Trotsky also recommended that in the event of a terroristic act being committed, they should dissociate themselves from the Trotskyite organization and take up a position analogous to that taken by the Central Committee of the Socialist-Revolutionaries toward Madam Kaplan who shot at Vladimir Ilyich (Lenin). We know what that means. We remember that after Kaplan fired her treacherous bullet at Lenin, the Central Committee of the Socialist-Revolutionaries issued a leaflet in which they categorically declared that they had nothing to do with this terroristic act. Trotsky, Zinoviev and Kamenev adopted the same tactics.

Zinoviev said: "We took the path of a carefully considered and profoundly secret plot, we regarded ourselves as Marxists, and remembering the formula 'insurrection is an art,' altered it to suit our purposes and declared that 'plotting against the Party, against Stalin, is an art.' "

The masters of this "art" are now sitting in the dock. I will not say that they are highly skilled masters. They are unskilled masters. Nevertheless, they managed to do their despicable work. What did their "art" consist of? The foremost part of their plan was by every possible means to mask their truly criminal faces.

This perhaps is one of the most striking cases in history when the word mask acquired its real meaning: these people put masks on their faces, adopted the pose of repentant sinners who had broken with the past, who had abandoned their old erring ways and mistakes which grew into crime.

It is characteristic that precisely at the time when the united Trotskyite-Zinovievite centre was intensifying its activities to the utmost, when these terroristic activities reached their highest point of development, when they were advancing to the consummation of the despicable murder of Comrade Kirov, it was precisely at that period that Zinoviev sent a letter of repentance to the Central Committee. In this letter dated May 8, 1933, that is to say, when the preparations for terroristic acts were at their height, Zinoviev not only renounced all his past mistakes, but hypocritically vowed his loyalty to socialism and to the Party.

During the very days in which he was preparing to strike a treacherous blow at the very heart of the Party, preparing a terroristic act against Comrade Stalin, this criminal who, like all those sitting in the dock at the present time, had lost every semblance of a human being, ended his letter with the following words:

"I ask you to believe that I am speaking the truth and nothing but the truth. I ask you to retore me to the ranks of the Party and to give me an opportunity of working for the common cause. I give my word as a revolutionary that I will be the most devoted member of the Party, and will do all I possibly can at least to some extent to atone for my guilt before the Party and its Central Committee."

We know now what these words were worth, we know that Zinoviev did all he possibly could to damage the Party and the work of building socialism in our country, to damage the cause of the whole international Communist movement. On June 16, 1933, he published an article in Pravda  entitled "Two Parties." He publishes an article in the Central Organ of our Party in which he does everything to prove his loyalty to the Party, roundly condemns opportunism and sings hallelujahs to the victories achieved by the Party.

This was on May 8 and June 16, that is to say, in the summer of 1933. And in that very summer of 1933, as has now been definitely established at a conference of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite centre, Zinoviev instructs Bakayev to start the practical realization of measures of terrorism.

Zinoviev was indignant with Smirnov here when the latter reproached him for telling lies. Smirnov himself did not utter a single word of truth here, but he reproached Zinoviev for telling lies. Zinoviev was offended and said that the difference between him and Smirnov was that he, Zinoviev, "had firmly decided at this last moment to speak the whole truth, whereas Smirnov had evidently taken a different decision."

Permit me, comrades judges, to warn you against this statement of Zinoviev's. Do not believe that he really speaking the whole truth here.

At the Leningrad trial on January 15-16 Zinoviev and Kamenev performed not at all badly in one of the scenes of their cunning, perifidious masquerade. While giving evidence at the trial on January 15-16, 1935, Kamenev wanted to create the impression that he was an enemy who had finally and sincerely laid down his arms and was telling all that was in his heart against the government and the Party. He then recalled some episode in which Zinoviev concealed something of what was said in a conversation with Trotsky. In a voice of pathos and "unfeigned" indignation Kamenev reproached Zinoviev for having concealed this fact, for not speaking the truth.

But at that very time Kamenev himself, and Zinoviev, tried to deceive us, to deceive the Court and the whole country by stating that they had had no connection whatever with the murder of Sergei Mironovich Kirov. Then, as now, literally in the same words that were uttered yesterday, Zinoviev and Kamenev vowed that they were speaking the whole truth. It may be said that for Kamenev and Zinoviev the trial of January 15-16, 1935, was a sort of rehearsal of the present trial, which they did not expect, perhaps, but which they did not escape any more than they could escape from fate.

I will come back to the "remarkable" evidence given at the trial in Leningrad. I mention it now only in order to warn you, and through you, through the Court, to warn the whole country, not only against Kamenev and Zinoviev, but against all other doubledealers, all other traitors whom unfortunately we still have in our ranks and who talk about their repentance, who dissociate themselves, and mask themselves, in order the better to thrust their knife into the back of the Party, of our country, of our great cause.

Not the slightest confidence must be placed in these certified and hardened deceivers!

They themselves understand that they do not deserve any confidense. While examining Zinoviev I asked him: "Are you speaking the whole truth now?" And he ansvered: "Now I am speaking the whole truth to the very end."

But what proof is there of this? How can we believe them when they have surpassed all conceptions of perfidy, cunning, deceit and treachery?

Zinoviev carried this perfidy to such lengths that after the murder of Sergei Mironovich Kirov he sent an obituary notice to Pravda.  The only thing he said here about that was: "That obituary was not published as far as I remember." And that is all.

Here is the obituary; I have it in my hand. Zinoviev dated it, if I am not mistaken, the 4th or 7th of December, most probably the 4th of December.

You, Zinoviev, gave this obituary notice on Comrade Kirov the title "The Beacon Man." How did you start the obituary notice which you intended for the press, and which, consequently, was to become public property?

"This could be observed throughout the 17 years of our revolution, at every moment when the enemy contrived to strike a blow at the Bolsheviks. . . . That is what happened when the enemy succeeded in striking a palpable blow on the battlefields of the

Civil War, that is what happened . . . " etc., etc.

And further on Zinoviev writes: "The grief of the Party is the grief of the whole people, of all peoples of the U.S.S.R. The Party's mourning is the mourning of the whole of our great country. . . . The whole people have felt the bitterness of bereavment."

It is true that the bitterness of bereavment and anger against the treacherous shot was felt by the whole country. That feeling was really shared by the whole country, young and old.

But to what extent does this concern you?

"The foul murder of Sergei Mironovich Kirov has in truth roused the whole Party, the whole of the Soviet Union." "The loss of this beloved and dear man has been felt by all as the loss of one who is nearest and dearest of all. . . ."

This is what you, the accused Zinoviev, wrote in this terrible and disgraceful article. Why did the Party lose this near and infinitely dear S. M. Kirov, accused Zinoviev? The Party lost this man who was so near and dear to us because you, the accused Zinoviev, killed him, you killed him with your own hands, your hands are stained with Kirov's blood! . . .

"Beloved son of the Party," you wrote. What insolent sacrilege!

"A son of the working class - this is what this Beacon Man was," "our dear, deep, strong. . . . One could not help believing him, one could not help loving him, one could not help being proud of him."

This is what Zinoviev wrote, exceeding all bounds of cynicism!

Such is this man. He loved him, he was proud of him, and he killed him! The miscreant, the murderer, mourns over his victim! Has anything like it ever occurred before?

What can one say, what words can one use fully to describe the utter baseness and loathesomeness of this: Sacrilege! Perfidy! Duplicity! Cunning!

It was you, Zinoviev, you who with your sacrilegious hand extinguished this beacon, and you began publicly and hypocritically to tear your hair in order to deceive the people.

Whom did you kill? You killed a magnificent Bolshevik, a passionate tribune, a man who was dangerous to you, a man who fought devotedly for Lenin's testament and against you. You killed this man in a flash of time by the bullet fired by the despicable hand of Nikolayev, and two or three days afterwards you sent an article to the Pravda  in which you wrote about the "extinguished beacon." Where shall we find the word with which to appraise this despicable trick! I can not find the words in my vocabulary!

We will now pass to Kamenev, the second pillar of the socalled Zinovievite group, this hypocrite "in an ass's skin," as he himself expressed it at the Seventeenth Congress of the Party.

I ask the Court to pay attention to the articles Kamenev published in 1933. Kamenev wrote these articles almost simultaneously with those written by Zinoviev by mutual agreement. Kamenev published an article in Pravda  in which he, like Zinoviev, renounced his past erring ways, condemned his own mistakes and said that "the man who had fought Lenin for decades became the most important figure in the opposition," etc., etc. "It is clear," wrote Kamenev in this article of May 25, 1933, "that the resistance to the policy headed by Comrade Stalin was based on the premises which made members of the Party in October 1917 come out as the opponents of the policy of Lenin." Weeping and groaning, Kamenev tried to prove that he had broken off relations with his old friends and concluded his article with an appeal to all of them to abandon all resistance which was interfering with the work of building socialism.

This was in May 1933. And in the summer of 1933, after the return of Kamenev and Zinoviev from exile, a meeeting of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite centre was held in Zinoviev's apartment for the purpose of organizing terroristic acts against the leaders of the Party and the Soviet government.

When Kamenev was asked about this here, his replies were curt. The following dialogue took place between me and him, which I will take the liberty to repeat. I asked:

"What appraisal should be given the articles and statements you wrote in 1933, in which you expressed loyalty to the Party? Deception?

"Kamenev:  'No, worse than deception.'

"Vyshinsky:  'Perfidy?'

"Kamenev:  'Worse!'

"Vyshinsky:  'Worse than deception; worse than perfidy - find the word. Treason?

"Kamenev:  'You have found the word!' "

Later on he said that he not only did this in agreement with Zinoviev, but that it was all done in fulfilment of the plan to seize power that had been drawn up beforehand, which plan was combined with the necessity of winning confidence.

There is a small detail which is of some importance for defining the moral, or, if you will, the ideological level of the accused Kamenev, for characterizing his interest at the time, for characterising some of his moral premises.

I would like to mention one of the books of Machiavelli (Vol. I). It was published in 1934 by the "Academia" Publishing House, of which Kamenev was then the head, and has a prefase by Kamenev. It is a very interesting book. It was written in the 16th century. The author wrote it for a prince in order to instruct him in the art of governing the state in accordance with his princely interests. Marchiavelli wrote: "You must know that there are two ways of contending, by law and by force: the first is proper to men; the second to beasts.

"But because many times the first is insufficient, recourse must be had to the second. A prince must possess the nature of both beast and man."

This pleased Kamenev very much, and in his short preface to this book he wrote the following interesting words: "A master of political aphorism and a brilliant dialectician. . . ." (According to Kamenev Machiavelli was a dialectician! This hardened schemer turns out to be a dialectician!) "A master of political aphorism. . . . " A fine aphorism indeed! Machiavelli wrote: to fight by means of law is characteristic of men, to fight by means of force is characteristic of the beast; pursue this bestial policy and you, says Machiavelli, will achieve your goa! And this the accused Kamenev calls being a "master of political aphorism."

Let us hear what Kamenev writes further: ". . . . A dialectician who from his observations had formed the firm opinion that all concepts of the criteria of good and evil, of the permissible and impermissible, of the lawful and criminal were relative. . . ." Evidently, according to Kamenev, this is dialectics: mixing up what is criminal with what is not criminal, the lawful with the unlawful, good with evil is a new "Marxian" in terpretation of dialecties a la Machiavelli.

"Machiavelli," wrote Kamenev in 1934, "made his treatise into an astonishingly sharp and expressive catalogue of the rules by which the ruler of his time was to be guided in order to win power, to hold it and victoriously to withstand any attacks upon it," You had a good teacher, Kamenev, but you, and you must be given credit for this, have excelled your teacher.

Futher on you write in this preface: "This is far from being the sociology of power, but from this prescription there magnificently stand out the zoological features of the struggle for power in the society of slave owners based on the rule of the rich minority over the toiling majority."

That is so. But you wanted to employ in our society the methods of struggle and the principles of struggle that were worthy of slave owners; you wanted to apply them against our society, against socialism. You write: "Thus, this secretary of the Florentine bankers and their ambassador at the Pope's Court, by accident or design, created a shell of tremendous explosive force which disturbed the minds of rulers for centuries. . . ." You, Kamenev, adopted the rules of Machiavelli, you developed them to the utmost point of unscrupulousness and immorality, you modernized them and perfected them.

I do not ask you, comrades judges, to regard this book as material evidence in this case. I am not using this book to prove that the accused are guilty of the crimes of which they are charged. I simply thought it necessary to devote a few minutes of attention to this circumstance, in order to show the ideological source from which Kamenev and Zinoviev obtained their sustenance at that time - these men who even now, at this trial try to preserve their noble pose of Marxists capable of thinking and arguing in conformity with the principles of Marxism.

Drop this clownish farce! Tear the mask from your faces once and for all! Here Kamenev calls Machiavelli's book a shell of enormous explosive force. Evidently Kamenev and Zinoviev wanted to use this shell to blow up our socialist fatherland. They miscalculated! And although Machiavelli was a puppy and a yokel compared with them, nevertheless, he was their spiritual preceptor. "Machiavellism," and Azefism served you as the source of your activities and your crimes. Now this has been exposed by Zinoviev and Kamenev themselves: murder, cunning, perfidy and masquerade were the principal, decisive methods in their criminal activities.

Yesterday, Zinoviev and Kamenev, frankly if cynically, admitted that this entered into the plan of their activities. This was testified to by Reingold, this was testified to by others of the accused, and I think that a sufficiently exhaustive characterization of this methods is contained in the materials which I have presented. Summing up this part of my speech, I can say that the Trotskyite-Zinovievite centre was organized on a terrorist basis and had its program, a very primitive and simple one, it is true, expressed in only a few words, a program which did not even need for drafting the two hours to which the accused themselves contemptuously referred. Their program of home policy was confined to murder; their program of foreign policy was confined to defeat of the U.S.S.R. in war; their method was perfidy, cunning and treason.

I now pass to the second part of my speech for the prosecution, to the practical activities of the so-called united centre and to the characterization of the role of each of the accused in this criminal conspiracy against the Soviet government.

There is not the slightest doupt that the union of the Zinovievite and Trotskyite counter-revolutionary groups which took place in the autumn of 1932 arose and grew strong on the soil and on the basis of the mutual recognition of terror as the sole and decisive method in the struggle for power - a struggle which was then the fundamental and principal task of the Trotskyites and Zinovievites.

An organization existed. An underground, conter-revolutionary, terrorist group existed. Existed and functioned. However much Smirnov may try to deny this here, he will not succeed .The facts are too strong, the facts are too numerous. We, the prosecution, have every ground for asserting that an underground, counter-revolutionary, Trotskyite-Zinovievite group existed, that this terrorist organization was created, that it was created precisely as a terrorist organization, that it developed its activities precisely as terroristic activities, that it prepared for terroristic attempts at assassination and that, to our great misfortune and horror, one of these attempts was successful. The foul murder of Sergei Mironovich Kirov on December 1, 1934, was committed by this organization. This is the most horrible of the crimes which this organization succeeded in committing.

In January 1935 we tried the Moscow centre in connection with the trial of the Leningrad centre which took place a little before that, about two weeks before, and as a result of which L. Nikolayev, Kotolynov, Rumyantsev, Sossitsky and a number of others were convicted and shot. At that time we did not yet know who were the real authors, instigators and participants in this monstrous crime. But we were on the right track. The investigation directed by the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs proceeded along the true and correct trail of exposing the real organizers of this crime, although the amount of evidence available at that time did not enable us to make a direct charge against Kamenev, Zinoviev, Evdokimov and Bakayev of organizing this murder, of guiding this murder, of committing this murder.

The verdict in the case of the so-called Moscow centre in which Kamenev, Zinoviev, Evdokimov and several others played the principal roles merely said in regard to the role they played that they had fanned the terrorist sentiments of their accomplices, that they had created the objective soil upon which this crime inevitably had to grow up and did grow up.

Being absolutely objective, the investigating and prosecuting authorities did not then charge Kamenev, Zinoviev, Evdokimov and Bakayev with directly instigating, directly organizing this murder. The indictment stated that the investigating authorities had not established their direct participation. Nevertheless, all the materials in the possession of the investigating authorities permitted them to say that these people - Kamenev, Zinoviev, Bakayev and Evdokimov - were closely connected with this crime and, as they themselves expressed it, had to bear complete moral and political responsibility for it.

In conformity with this Kamenev, Zinoviev, Evdokimov and Bakayev were given in the Moscow centre case a relatively mild sentence - only deprivation of liberty.

Kamenev, Zinoviev, Evdokimov and Bakayev did all they possibly could to misrepresent the real state of affairs, to shield the real organizers and accomplices in the crime. They tried to make it appear that they had had no hand in this sordid and despicable affair. Speaking in lofty style, they declared that the counter-revolution had chosen them as the instrument of its criminal activity. It was not they who had chosen counter-revolution as the instrument of their struggle, it was counter-revolution which had chosen them as its instrument. . . .

Zinoviev, Kamenev, Bakayev and Evdokimov did all they could to assert and prove that they could not bear more responsibility for this foul murder than moral and political responsibility; but they declared that they were fully and honestly prepared to bear this responsibility, and admitted the correctness and the justness of the charges brought against them within those limits.

During the trial on January 15-16, 1935, Zinoviev said: "There are many of us sitting in the dock, more than fifteen persons, each with a different biography. Among us there are many who have belonged to the working class movement for many years. Much of what they have done they did because they had confidence in me, and for that, of course, I must torture myself. The task that I see confronting me at this stage is to repent fully, frankly and sincerely, before the court of the working class, of what I understood to be a mistake and a crime, and to say it in such a way that it should all end, once and for all, with this group."

I have already said that this statement of Zinoviev's was a pose, a manoeuvre, a tactical move.

This is the way criminals always behave. Accused of murder and robbery, they plead guilty only to robbery. Accused of robbery, they plead guilty only to larceny. Accused of larceny, they plead guilty only to receiving stolen goods. These are the usual tricks of criminals: charged with graver crimes, they plead guilty to lesser crimes. It is a trick to wipe out the traces of the crime committed, counting on the credulity of people who still, in many cases, even in criminal cases, show some confidence in criminals.

This was the position taken up by Zinoviev. An analogous position was taken up - and this they will not deny - by Kamenev, Evdokimov and Bakayev. Caught in 1935, almost red-handed, these people admitted responsibility for the minor crime in order to evade responsibility, real responsibility, for the major crime.

Zinoviev talked about making a "frank and sincere" confession, but he did not really do that. Actually, they did all they could to shield their accomplices from the hand of Soviet justice, to leave themselves some reserves, in order at the necessary moment to use these reserves against our Party, against the leaders of our country.

This explains the whole position taken up by Zinoviev, Kamenev, Evdokimov and Bakayev at the Leningrad trial on January 15-16, 1935. "It is true," said Zinoviev, "that we are being tried on objective features." He said that he did not know many of the people who were with him in the dock at that time. Zinoviev, it would appear, did not know either Evdokimov, or Gertik, or Kamenev, or Sakhov. . . . Zinoviev said that subjectively they were "loyal" to the working class.

Zinoviev even had the effrontery to allege that he and his 15 accomplices were subjectively loyal to the working class and did not want to take the path of counter-revolution, but objectively things turned out the other way. Why did things turn out the other way? I would like the accused Zinoviev in his speech in defence to say how it happened that although he was subjectively loyal to the working class, objectively it turned out the other way. This cannot be the case; such things do not happen. If, objectively, it really turned out that way, it was only because your subjective loyalty to the revolution, accused Zinoviev, was false and rotten! What were you thinking about when you said these things? I ask you to tell us about that too, in your speech in defence.

In your fight against the Soviet government you armed yourself not only with rage but with firearms. You carried out your criminal designs in practice. You yourself spoke about duplicity, but you spoke about it in such a way as to conceal the fact that even at that moment you were continuing the policy of duplicity.

You said: "I am accustomed to feel that I am a leader; for me, personally, that played an enormous role." You said:

"I am accustomed to feel that I am a leader, and it goes without saying that I should have known everything. If I am removed from the leadership, it is either an injustice, or a misunderstanding, or for a few months. This is no justification, but I am telling you all I think, and thereby I am extracting from my body the last splinter of the crimes that are being unfolded here."

Zinoviev extracted the "last splinter" at the Leningrad trial. . . . No! He did not do that! He left that splinter, and not only that one, but several, in the body of our socialist country in order to continue to prepare for and commit the gravest crimes.

You said:

". . . I did not think otherwise: how can I be without my cirkle, without knowing everything, without being in the very heart of politics," etc.?

That was the thought that was torturing you - you thought that nothing could happen without you. . . . Your position in the past was determined by deeds, just as your present position is determined by your deeds. Approaching the question as to whether there was a centre, you said: Of course there was one up to 1929. you tried to assert that there was no centre in the subsequent years, that strictly speaking it did not function after 1929. That was deception. The old Zinovievite centre was transformed into the centre of the united Trotskyite-Zinovievite bloc.  It was reorganized, it became somewhat stronger because several groups were consolidated. In 1932 it began to develop its activities on a wider scale in 1933 it displayed particular activity, it prepared for a number of terroristic acts and in 1934 it committed one of them.

Zinoviev said, "this is not the centre that existed in 1926-27," and that he had no connection whatever with this centre. how did Zinoviev then put the question of connection with the Leningrad centre? He said that "there was a group consisting of Kotolynov, Mandelstam, Myasnikov and others." An important role was played by Kotolynov, which, Zinoviev alleges, he learned from the indictment in the case of Kirov's murder.

Zinoviev wanted to assert that he learned about one of the organizers of the Leningrad terrorist group only from the indictment!

Was that really the case? No, it was not. Zinoviev sent Bakayev to Leningrad to establish contacts with the Nikolayev-Kotolynov group and to investigate how Nikolayev, Kotolynov, Mandelstamm and others were preparing to commit the crime.

Here again we have deceit, lies, again camouflage!

"We sought rapprochement with them." Already in 1935, in spite of all the camouflage, Zinoviev had to admit that he had sought rapprochement with Kotolynov and Nikolayev, and that he found this rapprochement. Now this has been established with absolute precision.

Zinoviev related that in 1932 he met Levin, who was shot in 1935 in connection with the murder of Comrade Kirov, and added: "We did not talk about organization. Nor was there any need for this: my hints were understood, I was an authority for him and he was an authority for me; I knew that this man of the 'leaderless group' would do what we told him." This, too, contains a number of half hints and half admissions, which only subsequently, after a number of clues exposing Zinoviev had been collected, made it possible to ensure Zinoviev's full confession of his part in this crime. Now Zinoviev no longer conceals the fact which yesterday Bakayev tried very hard to minimize.

Already in January 1935, in connection with the Moscow centre case, Zinoviev admitted that Vladimir Levin was particularly intimate with Bakayev. But yesterday Bakayev tried to minimize this intimacy, to minimize it by stating that he did not go to meet Levin in Leningrad for conspirative, terroristic purposes. But these were the only purposes possible, where such an intimacy existed. All the time he tried to impress: expunge the words "for this purpose" from the evidence and the indictment. No, Bakayev, we shall not expunge those words; they cannot be expunged because you went there "for this purpose," as an expert, an expert in terrorism, and your journey was not accidental!

Why did not Zinoviev send Reingold, Pickel or even Evdokimov to Leningrad? Why did Zinoviev choose Bakayev and no other to negotiate with the Leningrad group, with the group that was to murder Comrade Kirow? I find the reply to that question in Zinoviev's evidence, and partly in that of Bakayev, at the trial on January 15-16, 1935. Zinoviev's choice fell on Bakayev because Bakayev was most closely connected with Levin, who was the representative of the Zinovievites in Leningrad, who was the leader of the Leningrad terrorist underground organization, as he himself admitted before the Military Collegium, last year. We also find confirmation of this in Zinoviev's evidence: "Bakayev knew him particularly closely, he was one of the important organizers of the anti-Party struggle in Leningrad. . . ."

Accused Zinoviev, was it only anti-Party struggle? It was an anti-Soviet struggle, a counter-revolutionary struggle, a struggle which by its very nature bore an openly counter-revolutionary, anti-state, anti-Soviet character!

Zinoviev went on to say: "I did not give him any instructions,"Well, you know this is jesuitry that can hardly be exceeded. It is like the reply of the jesuit monk who, when asked: "Did this man pass here?" answered, pointing up his sleeve: "He did not pass here " . . . .

You had no contacts with Levin, but you did have contacts with him through Bakayev. Bakayev travelled on your instructions. Consequently, when you said: "I did not give him any instructions," you lied again!

Bakayev was not the only one to carry out your instructions. All of you - both Kamenev and Zinoviev, as well as the whole of your centre, carried on negotiations with Levin, Kotolynov, Nikolayev, Rumyantsev, Sossitsky, Mandelstamm and a number of other members of this gang of Leningrad Zinovievites, which has now been broken up and destroyed. The whole of your centre checked up on the progress being made by the Leningrad gang of Zinovievites in preparing for this crime; and you waited impatiently for the time when at last that loyal son of our Party, the leader of the Leningrad Bolsheviks and fiery tribune, Sergei Mironovich Kirov, would be destroyed. And they lived to see this murder committed.

In this Court Zinoviev admitted that he was pressing to hasten murder. He was in a hurry, he clutched feverishly at people like Nikolayev and Kotolynov in order to hasten this murder. Not the least motive was the desire to forestall the Trotskyite terrorists. The Trotskyites were pressing hard.

Zinoviev admitted that Smirnov was also hurrying. They were all hurrying. The Trotskyites operated with greater determination and energy than the Zinovievites. Zinoviev knew that Trotskyite terrorists were arriving from abroad. And Zinoviev declared that it was a "matter of honour" - I am ashamed to use such a word in this connection - to carry out his criminal design sooner than the Trotskyites! Hence Zinoviev's feverish impatience. That is why he was waiting every day for the moment when that treacherous shot would at last be fired in Leningrad. All his activities were directed towards committing this foul crime as soon, as swiftly and as successfully as possible!

Such was the role played by Zinoviev, such was his conduct in this affair.

In finishing with this episode, I would like now to get a straight answer from Zinoviev to the following question: Does Zinoviev now accept only moral responsibility, or the whole criminal responsibility, full responsibility, for preparing, organizing and committing the murder of Sergei Mironovich Kirov?

Of course, Zinoviev will say "yes." He cannot say anything else He said this on the very first day of this trial when caught in the grip of the iron chain of evidence and proof.

At that same trial Kamenev took an almost similar stand. Bakayev took a similar stand. Kamenev said that he did not know of the existence of the Moscow centre. Trying to pose as a noble person, he said that in so far as the centre existed, and this was proved, he was responsible for it. . . .

The way Kamenev put it, it amounted to this: he did not know there was a centre, but if there was a centre, well then, he knew about it. But Kamenev did know of the existence of the centre; he indeed knew. This has been proved. And now this is corroborated by fresh evidence obtained in connection with the discovery of a number of new criminal gangs operating in the same direction. This evidece throws full light on this ghastly and terrible affair.

And then Kamenev tried to pose as a man who had become politcally blind. He said: I became blind - I lived to the age of 50 and did not see this centre in which, it turns out, I myself was active, in which I participarted by action and by inaction, by speech and by silence.

It sounds like some sort of spiritualism, spiritualism and black magic!

Even at that time we realized that this was simply an attempt at concealment by means of false phrases, an attempt by means of these false phrases to conceal the truth. Now all this has been finally exposed. No, Kamenev did not become blind. Kamenev very well saw and knew what he was doing. He saw perfectly well what was going on around him, because he organized what was going on around him. Kamenev did not become blind, because he acted by speech and silence. By silence when he did not say: "Don't do that," when he should have said that; and by speech when he said: "Do it," when, perhaps, some of his younger assistants warvered and turned to him as their authority, as their mentor.

Kamenev said:

"I want to say - not in my own justification, I did not remember this before but now I recall - that some time ago Zinoviev told me that Safarov had visited him and had proposed some sort of a bloc.  I said that I would not take part in any bloc  because I never believed that man. Zinoviev can confirm this. I was not opposed to talking. I talked."

With whom did he talk?

"With Tolmazov and Shatsky." Tolmazov and shatsky were active members of the Leningrad Zinovievite gang which killed Comrade Kirov.

Kamenev talked with Tolmazov and shatsky, that is to say, with two of the principal organizers of the murder of Comrade Kirov. So Kamenev agreed to these conversations and carried them on through Bakayev. But he tried to conceal this.

Arguing that he could not have any connection with terrorism, Kamenev, striking a pose, said:

"Imust say that I am not a coward by nature, but I never banked on fighting with arms. I always expected that a situation would arise in which the Central Committee would be compelled to negotiate with us, that it would move up and make room for us. . . .These dreams did not recur during the past two years, simply because I am not a dreamer and not a fantast. There were fantasts and adventurers in our midst, but I do not belong to that category."

I think that Kamenev will now define his part in this affair somewhat differently. What aim did Kamenev set himself? Did he or did he not bank on fighting with arms?

At that time he said - "No." Now, two days ago, he said - "Yes." At that time he said "no" because he knew, he saw that we were as yet not in possession of all the threads of this ghastly crime, because at that stage of the investigation all the threads had not yet been finally unravelled. At that time he said: "No." Now when everything has been disclosed, he says - "yes."

Here is a characteristic fact! It shows what a great and decisive role personal motives played in this criminal "work" of Kamenev. Kamenev thought that a time must arrive when the Central Committee would move up and make room for him. but suppose it did not move up? Suppose it did not make room for him? In that case he, Kamenev, would take measures to have room made for him.

This is the whole of Kamenev's logic and politics! Logic and politics which make it utterly impossible for us to agree that he does not belong to the category of people whom he himself described as adventurers. No. Obviously he belongs to this category, as well as to the other category - the"fantasts." There was not a little of fantasy here, but there was plenty of willingness to put this fantasy into practice, to make it real, to make it a living thing even by means of adventures, by means of a bloc  with spies, agents for diversive activities, secret police agents, murderers, and by direct murders. Kamenev agreed to this, Kamenev was prepared to do this.

Here is something else he said at the Leningrad trial: "I am speaking before the portraits of these great builders of socialism. . . ." It must be said that among these there was a portrait framed in black, the portrait of Comrade Kirov. Kamenev at the trial vowed before the portrait of Kirov, whom Kamenev had murdered!

" . . . Before the portraits of these great builders of sicialism I am a criminal if I lacked the strength to leave and to take with me those whom it was possible to take. . . ."

Lies! Again hypocrisy, cunning, perfidy and cynism!

Above I asked: Was there an organization? Was there a Trotskyite-Zinovievite terrorist centre? I answer: Yes, there was. It arose in 1932. it consisted of Kamenev, Zinoviev, Evdokimov, Bakayev, Smirnov, Ter-Vaganyan and Mrachkovsky.

This centre existed, and, what is most importaut, it was formed on the direct instructions of Trotsky, Zinoviev and Kamenev. It was formed on the direct instructions of Trotsky to adopt terror as the sole method of fighting against the leaders of the land of Soviets. It was formed on the basis of profound and strict secrecy. Yesterday we were able to observe one of the representatives of this Trotsky-Zinoviev-Kamenev school of conspiracy in the person of the accused Holtzman. In the dock we have another conspirator in the person of Smirnov. The centre existed and funktioned: it not only resorted to methods of downright perfidy, deceit and treachery but, as has now been definitely established, it organized and established secret communications with the German fascists, with whom it mated the German Trotskyites, using them in the fight against our leaders, using their connections with the German Gestapo in the persons of Tukalevsky, P. Olberg and their like.

I take it as absolutely proven by the personal evidence of literally all the accused, including that of Smirnov on this point, that this centre was organized on a terroristic basis, that the centre resorted to terroristic methods, not shrinking from the most sordid and cynical methods in its struggle. I take it as absolutely proven that this centre prepared a number of terroristic attempts in the Ukraine, in Moscow and in Leningrad. Finally, this centre prepared and committed the murder of Sergei Mironovich Kirov in Leningrad.

As I have already said, the murder of Sergei Mironovich Kirov was part of the conspirators' general plan to murder the leaders of the Soviet state and the C.P.S.U. Incidentally, this has been established by the evidence of Evdokimov. I ask the Court to take note of Evdokimov's testimony of August 10, when he said that the murder of Kirov was committed on the direct instructions of the united centre of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite bloc,  when he said that in 1934 Zinoviev gave him direct instructions to this effect. Bakayev also corroborated this. The decision to organize the murder of Kirov was adopted by Zinoviev, Kamenev, Evdokimov and Bakayev, and by Trotsky's representatives, Mrachkovsky and Ter-Vaganyan.

Evdokimov's evidence, to which I now refer, reads as follows: "For the purpose of preparing for the murder, Bakayev was sent to Leningrad at the beginning of November 1934, that is to say, some days before Nikolayev killed Kirov in the Smolny, in the city of Leningrad - to check up on the preparations for this murder. Bakayev personally met Nikolayev and on returning to Moscow informed Evdokimov, Zinoviev and Kamenev of this. The latter noted with satisfaction the successful progress of the preparations for this foul crime and began to wait for the shot. Bakayev warned Nikolayev and his accomplices that they must wait for Zinoviev's signal, that they must fire simultaneously with the shots to be fired in Moscow and Kiev."

All this has now been proved by the trial. Let the accused challenge this in their defence speeches if they dare.

After prolonged denials during the preliminary investigation Zinoviev gave the evidence which I have already mentioned. A characteristic detail. As far back as the autumn of 1932, in Zinoviev's and Kamenev's summer villa (they jointly occupied a summer villa which, incidentally, Kamenev once called the source of his misfortunes) Bakayev was instructed to prepare a terroristic act against Comrade Stalin, and Karev was instructed to prepare one against Comrade Kirov. But then the situation changed, for Karev was arrested and Kamenev and Zinoviev found themselves in exile.

Then came 1933, the year of revival of terroristic sentiments, the year of resumption of activities by the Trotskyite-Zinovievite centre. And now, Bakayev is given instructions; and thorough preparations for the murder of Comrade Kirov are begun.

Kamenev says: "I did not know these preparations proceeded in practice because it was not I, but Zinoviev who exercised practical direction in the organization of this terroristic act." Accused Kamenev, did you know that Bakayev went to Leningrad to check up on the progress of these preparations? Yes, you knew. Did you know that Bakayev, after having checked up and found that everything was going on successfully, arrived in Moscow and reported to you the progress of these preparations? you knew. How, after this, can you presume to say that you took no practical part in the murder of Kirov? Your attempt to throw all the blame on Zinoviev will not hold water.

Kamenev says "it was decided" to kill, and adds "I agreed to this decision." Is this not taking practical steps?

At the preliminary investigation Bakayev persistently denied that he had played any part in the preparations for the murder of Kirov; but he was exposed by Karev, who reminded him of a number of facts. And only then, after that, did Bakayev confess.That is why, in view of Bakayev's full confession, I refrained from examining Karev in Court.

It was the hand of Nikolayev, of Kotolynov, of his group that murdered Sergei Mironovich Kirov. But who else took part in this murder? I asked Zinoviev: When was the united centre organized? Zinoviev replied: In the summer of 1932. During what period of time did it function? Zinoviev: Practically up to 1934. . . .

I would like to deal with this question in greater detail. In 1932-33 Kamenev and Zinoviev were in exile; but the centre functioned. It is known that in 1934 Smirnov, too, was not at liberty; he was arrested in January 1933; but the centre functioned. And Zinoviev confirms that the centre functioned. I draw the conclusion that if the centre functioned it was because of the well-organized technique of communication which enabled even those who were not at liberty, Smirnov, for example, to take part in guiding the work of this centre.

I know that in his defence Smirnov will argue that he had left the centre. Smirnov will say: "I did not do anything, I was in prison." A naive assertion! Smirnov was in prison from January 1, 1933, but we know that while in prison Smirnov organized contacts with his Trotskyites, for a code was discovered by means of which Smirnov, while in prison, communicated with his companions outside. This proves that communication existed andSmirnov cannot deny this.

But even this does not settle the question because, after all, what is important for us is that Smirnov, like Zinoviev and Kamenev, is responsible for all the centre's activities and for the activities of the whole of the terrorist group which was organized, built up and functioned under his leadership when they were still at liberty. Smirnov, Zinoviev and Kamenev were the organizers of the centre; they directed the activities of their terrorists, of all these Pickels, the Dreitzers and the rest. And they must bear full responsibility for this, irrespective of whether any one of them was at liberty at the time or not. This is elementary, and I do not think it is necessary to deal with it in detail. As the leaders, they must answer for the whole of the criminal activities of the organization which they led and of all those groups which sprang up the soil they plowed.

What did the activities of the centre consist of? Zinoviev said: "Their principal activities consisted in the preparations of terroristic acts against the leaders of the Party and the Government." I asked: against whom? Zinoviev answered: against the leaders. I asked: that is to say, against Stalin, Voroshilov and Kaganovich? Was it your centre that organized the murder of Kirov? Was the murder of Sergei Mironovich Kirov organized by your centre, or by some other organization?

Zinoviev:  Yes, by our centre.

I asked: Did this centre comprise you, Kamenev, Smirnov, Mrachkovsky and Ter-Vaganyan?

Zinoviev:  Yes.

To my question: So you organized the murder of Kirov?

Zinoviev  replied: Yes.

And so it is Zinoviev, Kamenev, Smirnov, Mrachkovsky, Ter-Vaganyan and all the rest who must answer for this crime.

The most persistent in his denials is Smirnov. He pleaded guilty only to being the leader of the Trotskyite underground counter-revolutionary centre. True, he said this in a somewhat jocular way. Turning to Ter-Vaganyan, Mrachkovsky and Dreitzer, he said to them: "You want a leader? Well, take me." But you accused Smirnov, were the leader. Smirnov was the leader of the Trotskyite underground organization. It was no accident that Zinoviev and Kamenev regarded him as Trotsky's representative, as Trotsky's deputy, as the actual leader of the whole of the Trotskyite underground organization. And finally he himself confessed to this.

I do not know what Smirnov is going to say in his last plea; but I think that on the basis of the material of the preliminary investigation and of the material of the court investigation I have every ground for declaring the following: 1) the accused Smirnov has confessed that for a number of years he was the actual leader of the Trotskyite underground organization; 2) he has confessed that he was Trotsky's representative and deputy in the U.S.S.R.; 3) he has confessed that he was in Berlin in 1931 and there met Sedov; and 4) he has confessed that Sedov informed him of the terroristic tasks and gave the terroristic directions.

It is true that Smirnov denies that these were Trotsky's directions. He says that this was Sedov's "personal opinion." Nevertheless, on returning to the U.S.S.R., he considered it necessary to communicate Sedov's "personal opinion" to his companions in the unerground organization. . . .

We asked him: Where is the logic of this? If this was Sedov's personal opinion, and moreover, an opinion with which Smirnov, as he asserted, did not agree, why communicate it to the other members of the underground organization? Communicate it and not say that he did not agree with it? All his companions in the counter-revolutionary underground organization declare that he did not even hint at his disagreement with this line. Uner these circumstances, what can we regard as established? Was there a meeting with Sedov in 1931? There was. Is Sedov - the son of L. Trotsky - his closest and first assistant in all his political activities? He is. During this meeting, did Sedov talk to Smirnov? He did. Smirnov admits this. Did they talk about terror? Yes, they talked about terror. Smirnov admits this too. The question as to how Smirnov understood Sedov is after all a matter of complete indifference to the prosecution. If Smirnov understood his conversation with Sedov not as an instruction, then there was no need for him to communicate it to his colleagues in his underground group. If he communicated this conversation and did not say that he disagreed with it, it means that it was an instruction, and it could not be otherwise.

Smirnov says that he did not agree with this instruction. But if he did not agree with it he, as a sufficiently experienced underground worker, factionalist and counter-revolutionary, should have understood that it was his duty to break with this group,to leave this group. Otherwise he would not be a man engaged in politics, let alone a leader of an underground organization. Yet Smirnov was not merely a rank-and-file member of the Trotskyite group. Smirnov is not Holtzman. Holtzman is a poor edition of Smirnov; but Smirnov is not Holtzman. Smirnov is Smirnov. He is the leader. How can the leader remain a member of an underground group when he disagrees with the main line of this group? And the main line of this group was trrorism. And if he says that in 1931 hi did not accept, what Sedov said as an instruction, but took it merely as Sedov's personal opinion, in 1932, however, he received direct instructions from Trotsky through Yuri Gaven. At that time he could no longer say that this was somebody's "personal opinion," for even if it really was a "personal" position, it was the position of Trotsky!

From Sedov's personal position a straight path leads to Trotsky's position. There are no personal position! There is the Trotskyite decision, Trotsky's line of terrorism. You, Smirnov, received it in 1931 and in 1932. You also received the instructions from Dreitzer, not personally, but I am deeply convinced that you knew about it notwithstanding the fact that you were in a house of detention for political offenders.

In 1932 you received Trotsky's instruction through Gaven. Trotsky plainly said: Terror; put Stalin out of the way; kill Voroshilov; kill the leaders of the Party and the government. You, Smirnov, received this instruction. You say: I received it, but did not accept it. If you did not accept it, and if you preserved a sense of political honesty to any degree, after having heard in 1932 Trotsky's instruction sent to you through Gaven, you could not but break with the Trotskyite organization. You understand this, and that is why you say - I broke, I left. But whom did you tell that you had left? You told no one. Mrachkovsky did not know about it, Ter-Vaganyan did not know about it and even Safonova did not know about it. You did not tell anyone! No one knew!

Consequently, we have no right whatever to believe these assertions of yours. We can assert that in 1932 you received instructions on terrorism from Trotsky and you accepted them. You would not be the Smirnov you are if you remained in the Trotskyite group while disagreeing with the fundamental line of this group, while disagreeing with the line of the man who was such an authority for you as was Trotsky. We know that in your defence speech you will curse Trotsky. But no one will believe you, because in this Court you have not said, and you do not want to say, even two words of truth about your work in the terrorist centre. Even yesterday you wanted to conceal the role played by Putna. You wanted to save some reserves, who, perhaps, would not be entirely exposed. You wanted to save reserves for Trotsky, for your accursed Trotskyite underground organization!

I think that all the circumstances I have mentioned permit us to establish the following in regard to Smirnov.

First. Smirnov was a member of the united centre of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite terrorist organization. This centre was organized with his participation. Consequently, he is one of the most important organizers of the centre.

Second. He organized this centre on the basis of Trotsky's instructions which he received in 1931. He gave this centre its terroristic character and the terroristic direction of its activities.

Third. In 1932, Smirnov received a second instruction from Trotsky. This is indisputably established. All Smirnov's attempts to prove that, having received this instruction, he did not agree with it, although he remained in the ranks of the Trotskyite underground organization, are too transparent.

Comrades judges, there is one other very important circumstance. The question can be put in this way: All right, terroristic basis, disposition towards terrorism, talk about terror being the sole means - but what about the organization of practical measures for the purpose of getting together terrorist groups, for the purpose of putting terrorism into practice?

Ter-Vaganyan said that work was carried on to get together terrorist groups, but that this was preparatory work which did not go beyond the limits of preparations. But was that really the case?

Of course not. The Zinovievites followed the Trotskyites, and Smirnov in particular, who persuasively and fervently insisted on the earliest application of terror, and not terror in general, but terror against Comrades Stalin, Kirov, Voroshilov,and other of our leaders. It was Comrade Stalin and Comrade Kirov who had smashed this dishonest opposition. It is quite understandable, therefore, that Smirnov, this consistent, fully convinced and irreconcilable Trotskyite, should concentrate all his organizing abilities on preparing the assassination first of all of the leaders of the Central Committee of our Party, the leaders of our country. Smirnov kept urging Zinoviev: Let us hurry up and commit a terroristic act, let us hurry up and kill Stalin, Kirov and Voroshilov. And Zinoviev, hurrying at the heels of the Trotskyites is full of excitement and agitation fearing lest he lag behind. . . .

Smirnov urged Zinoviev to hurry up with the murder. He was in no hurry about a platform. He said: It could be drawn' up at one sitting.What did they want a platform for when they had what in their opinion was a surer means - assassination!Smirnov drew up and placed in the hands of his agents a concrete plan for the organization of terroristic acts. The murder of Comrade Kirov was carried out in fulfilment of this plan, for which Zinoviev as well as Kamenev, Smirnov, Mrachkovsky and Ter-Vaganyan must bear full responsibility before the land of Soviets, before the Soviet people, before the Soviet proletarian Court.

I consider that the guilt of Zinoviev, Kamenev, Evdokimov and Bakayev has been fully established, and that I can be relieved of the duty of en?merating the many facts, and of analysing the material of the Court investigation, which exposes them to the fullest degree. I merely want to emphasize that by the side of Zinoviev, Kamenev, Evdokimov and Bakayev should stand Smirnov, Ter-Vaganyan and Mrachkovsky. They ought to stand side by side. Together they directed their criminal activities against our government, together they murdered Kirov and, therefore, together and fully must they answer for this.

Smirnov understands this perfectly well, and that is why he adopted a position of denial. At first he denied everything: he denied the existence of a Trotskyite organization, he denied the existence of a centre, he denied his participation in the centre, he denied connection with Trotsky, he denied that he gave any secret instructions, even those which he gave in 1936, and we know that this great conspirator managed to organize the communication of criminal instructions to his adherents even while he was isolated. He denied everything - he denied the existence of the Trotskyite centre in 1931, he denied the existence of such a centre in 1932. he denied everything. The whole of this examination of May 20 consisted solely of the words: "I deny that, again I deny, I deny." That is the only thing left for him to do.

Accused Smirnov, your experience, your skill in deceit, has betrayed you. Exposed by the evidence of Safonova, Mrachkovsky and Ter-Vaganyan, you were compelled to admit that there was a centre, that you were a member of this centre. Your denials were of no avail. You denied that you had received any instructions on terrorism, but you were exposed on this matter by Gaven, and you confessed; you were exposed by Holtzman who received instructions from Trotsky to be conveyed to you personally, and only to you, instructions to the effect that it was now necessary to adopt terrorism. Holtzman, whose Trotskyite allegiance was kept a particularly profound secret, said that he had received these instructions, but did not communicate them; and you think that this can be believed. No, no one will believe this.

Holtzman adopt the same position as Smirnov - I admit everything except terrorism - because he knows that for terrorism he may have to pay with his head. Smirnov was exposed as a terrorist by Holtzman, by Mrachkovsky, by Safonova and by Dreitzer.

On July 21, you, Smirnov, gave somewhat different evidence, that is to say, at first you denied that you had received any instructions from Trotsky to organize terrorism, but here you admitted that you did received them. Your denials came to nought.

When confronted with Mrachkovsky, you continued to deny that you had received from Trotsky and conveyed to Mrachkovsky instructions to organize a terrorist group. Mrachkovsky put you to shame by saying: "Why, Ivan Nikitich, you want to get out of a sordid bloody business with a clean shirt?" I can repeat this: "Do you really think, accused Smirnov, that you will get out of this bloody business unscathed?" In reply to Mrachkovsky you said: "Invention and slander," but later you did confess to something.

You admitted that the bloc  was organized on the principle of the necessity of terrorism, and therefore you were one of the organizers of the terrorist centre. You received instructions on terror from Trotsky. On that basis you developed terroristic criminal activities. True, your arrest hindered you somewhat from taking part in the carrying out of these activities; nevertheless you did all you possibly could to help these activities.

I want to remind you that the confrontation with Safonova during the preliminary investigation, which, in the main reproduced what we saw in this Court, was very characteristic. Smirnov does not venture to deny Safonova's evidence. He invents an elastic form of lies. he knows that Safonova will not slander him, Safonova was formerly his wife, and has no personal grudge against him; therefore, he cannot plead a personal grudge. He says: "I do not remember," "evidently such a conversation may have taken place." He is asked: Was there any talk about organizing terrorism? He replies: "There was not, but there might have been." When now, masking himself, he says: "I have nothing to reply to that," he is guided by the same animal cowardice. But on August 13 he was compelled to admit that this conversation did take place in 1932, that he, Smirnov, bears full responsibility for this, and that now he does not intend to evade responsibility.

I now want to deal with Ter-Vaganyan. He, too at first, adopted a position of denial; but on August 14 he gave more truthful evidence. Summing up his testimony and his behaviour in Court we can draw several definite deductions: we may consider it established that Ter-Vaganyan was a member of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite centre, that he took an active part in organizing the centre, that he carried out the instructions of the centre on the basis of Trotsky's instructions which were received through Smirnov, and of which he learned from Smirnov. He tries to assert that actually he did nothing. But I must say beforehand that even if he "did nothing," what he did is sufficient to deserve the penalty provided for in Arts. 58⁸, 19 and 58⁸, 58¹¹ of the Criminal Code.

Moissei Lurye and Nathan Lurye. We have heard Nathan Lurye's evidence of how he arrived here and for what purpose, of the work he carried on in preparation for terroristic acts under the guidance of Moissei Lurye, of how, in fact, he was practically the successor to the group which had been gotten together here before him by Franz Weitz, the fascist agent and a trusted man of Himmler, chief of the fascist black secret service, chief of the German S. S. detachments and subsequently, chief of the German Gestapo.

You remember all their evidence, and I do not think it is necessary to deal with it in detail. It has been fully, categoriecally, and unquestionably proved that Nathan Lurye and Moissei Lurye prepared to commit terroristic acts. They must bear full responsibility for this crime!

When I spoke of the methods by which these gentlemen operated I showed, tried to show, to what depths these people had sunk, morally and politically. And perhaps one of the most striking and characteristic proofs of the depths of moral turpitude to which these people have sunk, of their lack of even those "moral" principles and rules of conduct by which even hardened criminals and gangsters are guided, is what Reingold told us about here. I refer to their plan to remove the traces of their foul crimes.

Was it an accident, comrades judges, that they, in expectation of successfully carrying out their heinous plan, intended to appoint none other than Bakayev as chairman of the O.G.P.U. - precisely Bakayev, who is known as a man filled with malicious hatred, as a resolute man, persevering and persistent, with a very strong will, strong character and stamina, who would not stop at anything to achieve the aims which he had set himself!

If some of the accused coolly planned to come to power over mountains of corpses of the best people of our Soviet land, then Bakayev was perhaps the most determined and most implacable executor of this plan! It is precisely this man that they intended to appoint as chairman of the O.G.P.U. in the event of their plot being successful.

I will not deal with the ludicrous distribution of portfolios among the conspirators and terrorists. I merely emphasize once again that none other than Bakayev was intended for the post of chairman of the O.G.P.U. Zinoviev and Kamenev did not exclude the possibility that the O.G.P.U. was in possession of the threads of the plot that they were hatching against the state, and, therefore, they considered it to be one of their most important tasks to appoint Bakayev chairman of the O.G.P.U. He was to obtain possession of all these threads and then destroy them, as well as the very people who carried out Zinoviev's and Kamenev's instructions.

Kamenev and Zinoviev do not deny the first part of this, but they deny the second part. That second part is too ghastly, and Zinoviev said it was taken from Jules Verne. But do we not know that there have been such examples in history? Do we not know certain neighbouring states in which such procedure has been applied, where participants in a plot were physically exterminated by the hand of the organizers of the plot, as was the case with Roehm and his henchmen?

Accused Zinoviev, you yourself say that it was intended to appoint Bakayev to the post of chairman of the O.G.P.U. in order to use him for the purpose of removing the traces of your crime. Why, then, do you say this is from Jules Verne? You have chosen a faulty line of defence.

This is not very important for the case; but that is not the question,that is not the point. This is one of the remarkable touches which characterize the people who aspired to the leadership of our country. It proves how fortunate we are that they were removed from this leadership in time!

Zinoviev and Kamenev call this fantastic tales from the Arabian Nights. But, by your leave, what about the murder of Zinoviev's secretary Bogdan? What is that? A tale? Zinoviev could not say anything about that; but Reingold revealed it and Pickel confirmed it.

Zinoviev recommended Bogdan to Bakayev as a suitable person to commit terroristic acts.

Reingold said it, Pickel confirmed it, but Bakayev vigorously denies it and tries to escape from it. But it is a fact which nobody can escape. Reingold and Pickel have proved that Bogdan's "suicide" was really murder. It was done by Bakayev on the instructions of the united centre! "You are hesitating to carry out the instructions of our united Trotskyite-Zinovievite centre? Kill yourself or else we will kill you." That is what Bakayev said to Bogdan, and Bogdan gave way.

This was the beginning of the execution of the plan drawn up by Zinoviev and Kamenev that was to be carried out in the event of the terroristic plot turning out successful. Zinoviev and Kamenev tried to depict Bogdan's suicide as the fate of a "victim"of our Soviet regime. But you yourselves drove Bogdan to suicide by confronting him with the dilemma: either to carry out a terroristic act or to commit suicide.

Comrades Judges, if you link up this episode with all the methods of struggle, all the other methods of "work" adopted by this criminal gang, you will easily understand the truthfulness of the evidence given by Reingold and Pickel, who in this Court again and again exposed Zinoviev, Kamenev and Evdokimov as the perpetrators of a number of grave crimes.

I now conclude, comrades judges. The last hour is approaching, the hour of reckoning for these people who have committed grave crimes against our great country. It is the last hour of reckoning for these people who took up arms against our dearest and most beloved, against the beloved leaders of our Party and our country, against Stalin, Kaganovich, Voroshilov, Orjonikidze, Zhdanov, Postyshev, Kossior and other leaders of our land of victorious, growing and flourishing, new, socialist society. A sad and shameful end awaits these people who were once in our ranks, although they were never distinguished for either staunchness or loyalty to the cause of socialism.

Just a few words more. Some of the accused tried to draw a parallel with the historical past, with the period of the Narodnaya Volya. They tried to compare some people with the heroic terrorists who in the last century entered into combat with the terrible, cunning and ruthlessly cruel enemy, the tsarist government. In speaking of Bakayev, or perhaps of Smirnov, the name of Gershuni was mentioned here. This argument does not hold water.

That was a struggle waged by a handful of self-sacrificing enthusiasts against the gendarme giant; it was a fight in the interests of the people. We Bolsheviks have always opposed terrorism, but we must pay our tribute to the sincerity and heroism of the members of the Narodnaya Volya. Gershuni was not a Bolshevik, but he, too, fought against tsarism and not against the people.

You, however, a handful of downright counter-revolutionaries, representatives of the vanguard of the international counterrevolution, you took up arms against the vanguard of the world proletarian revolution! You took up arms against the liberty and happiness of the peoples. The comparison with the period of Narodnaya Volya terrorism is shameless. Filled with respect for the memory of those who in the times of the Narodnaya Volya sincerely and honestly, although employing, it is true, their own special, but always irreproachable methods, fought against the tsarist autocracy for liberty - I emphatically reject this sacrilegious parallel. I repeat, this parallel is out of place here. Before us are criminals, dangerous, hardened, cruel and ruthless towards our people, towards our ideals, towards the leaders of our struggle, the leaders of the land of Soviets, the leaders of the toilers of the whole world!

The enemy is cunning. A cunning enemy must not be spared. The whole people rose to its feet as soon as these ghastly crimes became known. The whole people is quivering with indignation and I, as the representative of the state prosecution, join my anger, the indignant voice of the state prosecutor, to the rumbling of the voices of millions!

I want to conclude by reminding you, comrades judges, of those demands which the law makes in cases of the gravest crimes against the state. I take the liberty of reminding you that it is your duty, once you find these people, all sixteen of them, guilty of crimes against the state, to apply to them in full measure those articles of the law which have been preferred against them by the prosecution.

I demand that dogs gone mad should be shot - every one of them!

Notes:

1. Lenin, Collected Works,  Vol. XXII, p. 457, Russian edition, "Immediate Tasks of the Soviet Government." [Go Back]

2. Stalin, The Results of the First Five-Year Plan,  end of Section VII. [Go Back]