The Great Terror p.

258
Show trials getting rid of old Bolsheviks
Stalin used Kirovs murder to justify the Great Terror; that there were evidence
of a widespread conspiracy against the Soviet state and its leaders
Convinced the public that enemies were everywhere and needed to be rooted
out
Extensive purge of the Leningrad party, where Kirov was based
Leningrad centre was uncovered, plotting terrorists acts against the Soviet
state
Thousands and more were accused of being Trotskyites and involved in the
plot of murdering Kirov
Kamenev and Zinoviev were put into prison even though there was no direct
evidence linking them to the plot
Stalin tries to umask the old olsheviks
Zinoviev and Kamenev pulled out of prison and put on trial in public, they
were accused of spying for foreign powers
The trial was in puublic to convey sense of danger, intimidation, and feeling
that enemies and spies were everyone to the public
These executions are important because it is the first time people who
belonged to the Central Committee were executed
Another trial took place afterwards in which Karl Radek, a Trotskyite, was the
defendant, he confessed and was found guilty later
Bukharin, Rykov, Yagoda, and other old Bolsheviks were also executed
Why did they confess
The show trials were ridiculous and a grotesque sham; its charges were
ludicrous, and yet majority of the public believed the defendents to be guilty
Worn down by torture and interrogation
Agreed to confess as part of a deal in which their families would be spared
This is especially true for Bukharin, who wrote a last loving testatment to his
wife
The Yezhovshchina
Nicolai Yezhov replaced Yagoda as head of NKVD (secret police) after the
first great trial
Yezhov was about to initiated a period of terror called Yezhovshchina