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Nikolai Getman. Moving out.
Nikolai Getman. Nikolai Getman (Николай Гетман Микола Ґетьман an artist was born in 1917 in Kharkiv, Ukraine, and died at his home in Orel, Moving out. [1]

The Gulag was the government agency that administered the penal labor camps of the Soviet Union. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 "Gulag" is the Russian acronym for The Chief Administration of Corrective Labor Camps and Colonies — Главное Управление Исправительно-Трудовых Лагерей и колоний, Glavnoye Upravleniye Ispravitel'no-Trudovykh Lagerey i koloniy — of the NKVD. Acronyms, initialisms, and alphabetisms are Abbreviations that are formed using the initial components in a phrase or name The NKVD ( НКВД, ru Народный Комиссариат Внутренних Дел ''Narodnyy Komissariat Vnutrennikh Del'') or People's Commissariat Eventually, by metonymy, the usage of "Gulag" began generally denoting the entire penal labor system in the USSR, then any such penal system. In Rhetoric, metonymy (mɨˈtɒnɨmi is the use of a word for a concept or object associated with the concept/object originally denoted by the word In Russian, Gulag is pronounced: (Russian: ГУЛАГ, listen (help·info))

Gulag: A History, by Anne Applebaum, explains:

“ It was the branch of the State Security that operated the penal system of forced labour camps and associated detention and transit camps and prisons. Russian ( transliteration:,) is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages Gulag A History, also published as Gulag A History of the Soviet Camps, written by Anne Applebaum and published by Doubleday, won Anne Elizabeth Applebaum (born 25 July 1964 is a journalist and Pulitzer Prize -winning Author who has The NKVD ( НКВД, ru Народный Комиссариат Внутренних Дел ''Narodnyy Komissariat Vnutrennikh Del'') or People's Commissariat A labor camp is a simplified detention facility where inmates are engaged in Penal labor. While these camps housed criminals of all types, the Gulag system has become primarily known as a place for political prisoners and as a mechanism for repressing political opposition to the Soviet state. A political prisoner is someone held in Prison or otherwise detained perhaps under House arrest, for his or her involvement in political activity The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 Though it imprisoned millions, the name became familiar in the West only with the publication of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's 1973 The Gulag Archipelago, which likened the scattered camps to a chain of islands. Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn ( Алекса́ндр Иса́евич Солжени́цын) (December 11 1918 – August 3 2008 was a Russian Novelist The Gulag Archipelago ( Архипелаг ГУЛАГ) is a book by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn based on the Soviet forced labor and concentration camp system ”

There were at least 476 separate camp complexes, each comprising hundreds, even thousands of camps. [2] There may have been an estimated 7 million prisoners in these camps at a given time (although the documents show significantly lower numbers); possibly some 10 per cent died yearly. [3][4] Probably the worst of the camp complexes were the three built north of the Arctic Circle at Kolyma, Norilsk, and Vorkuta. This is an article about the region commonly known as Kolyma For river it is named after see Kolyma River The Kolyma (pronounced koh-lee-MAH Norilsk (Нори́льск is a major city in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia. Vorkuta (Воркута́ Вӧркута Vörkuta; Nenets for Place teems with bears) is a Coal Mining town in the [5][6]

More than 18 million people passed through the Gulag from 1929 to 1953, with further millions being deported and exiled to remote areas of the USSR. Population transfer in the Soviet Union may be classified into the following broad categories deportations of " Anti-Soviet " categories of population often classified [7][8][9]

Most Gulag inmates were not political prisoners, although the political prisoner population always was significant. [10] People could be imprisoned in a Gulag camp for crimes such as unexcused absences from work, petty theft, or anti-government jokes. [11] About half of the political prisoners were sent to Gulag prison camps without trial; per official data, there were more than 2. By administrative means (В административном порядке "V administrativnom poryadke" was an expression in use in the Soviet Union applied to 6 million imprisonment sentences in cases investigated by the secret police, 1921-1953. [12]

Entering Gulag (a leaf from Eufrosinia Kersnovskaya's notebook)
Entering Gulag (a leaf from Eufrosinia Kersnovskaya's notebook)

Contents

Modern usage and other terminology

Although Gulag originally was the name of a government agency, the acronym acquired the qualities of a noun, denoting: the Soviet system of prison-based, unfree labor — including specific labor, punishment, criminal, political, and transit camps for men, women, and children. Eufrosinia Antonovna Kersnovskaya (Евфросиния Антоновна Керсновская January 8, 1908 &mdash March 8, 1994) A prison, penitentiary, or correctional facility is a place in which individuals are physically confined or interned and usually deprived of a range of Unfree labour is a generic or collective term for those work relations especially in modern or early modern history in which people are employed against their will Thus, "Gulag" means the repressive Soviet "meat-grinder" procedural system and its consequences — arrests, interrogations, transport (in unheated rail road cattle cars), forced labor, familial separation, exile, and early death, [7] while other authors use gulag as denoting all the prisons and internment camps in Soviet history (1917–1991) with the plural gulags. Exile means to be away from one's home (ie city state or country while either being explicitly refused permission to return and/or being threatened by prison or death upon return The term's contemporary usage is notably unrelated to the USSR, such as in the expression "North Korea's Gulag"[13]. North Korea is the commonly used short form name for the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (or DPRK) a State located in East Asia,

The word "Gulag" was not often used in Russian — either officially or colloquially; the predominant terms were the camps (лагеря, lagerya) and the zone (зона, zona), always singular — for the labor camp system and for the individual camps. The official term, "corrective labor camp", was suggested for official politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union use in the session of July 27, 1929, replacing concentration camp, then the common usage. Politburo, short for Political Bureau, Russian Politicheskoye Buro, is the executive organization for a number of Political parties, most notably Internment is the imprisonment or confinement of people commonly in large groups without trial

History

Early Soviet period

Soviet poster of the 1920s: The GPU strikes the counter-revolutionary saboteur on the head
Soviet poster of the 1920s: The GPU strikes the counter-revolutionary saboteur on the head

From 1918, camp-type detention facilities were set up, as a reformed analogy of the earlier system of penal labor (katorgas), operated in Siberia in Imperial Russia. Penal labour or penal servitude is a form of Unfree labour. The term may refer to two different notions labour as a form of punishment and labour as a form of occupation Katorga (ка́торга from medieval Greek: katergon κάτεργον Galley) was the precursor to the Gulag system Siberia (Сиби́рь Sibir) is the name given to the vast region constituting almost all of Northern Asia and for the most part currently serving The Russian Empire ( Pre-reform Russian: Pоссійская Имперія Modern Russian: Российская Империя translit: Rossiyskaya The two main types were "Vechecka Special-purpose Camps" (особые лагеря ВЧК, osobiye lagerya VČK) and forced labor camps (лагеря принудительных работ, lagerya prinuditel'nikh rabot). The Cheka ( ЧК - чрезвычайная комиссия Chrezvychaynaya Komissiya,) was the first of a succession of Soviet State security A labor camp is a simplified detention facility where inmates are engaged in Penal labor. They were installed for various categories of people deemed dangerous for the state: for common criminals, for prisoners of the Russian Civil War, for officials accused of corruption, sabotage and embezzlement, various political enemies and dissidents, as well as former aristocrats, businessmen and large land owners. The Russian Civil War (1917–1923 was a multi-party war that occurred within the former Russian Empire after the Russian provisional government collapsed These camps, however, were not on the same scale as those in the Stalin era. In 1928 there were 30,000 prisoners in camps, and the authorities were opposed to compelling them to work. In 1927 the official in charge of prison administration wrote that: “The exploitation of prison labour, the system of squeezing ‘golden sweat’ from them, the organisation of production in places of confinement, which while profitable from a commercial point of view is fundamentally lacking in corrective significance – these are entirely inadmissible in Soviet places of confinement. ”[14]

Convict labour system expansion under Stalin

Prisoner labour at the construction of Belomorkanal, 1931–33
Prisoner labour at the construction of Belomorkanal, 1931–33

The legal base and the guidance for the creation of the system of "corrective labor camps" (Russian: исправительно-трудовые лагеря, Ispravitel'no-trudovye lagerya), the backbone of what is commonly referred to as the "Gulag", was a secret decree of Sovnarkom of July 11, 1929 about the use of penal labor (see its wikisource reference) that duplicated the corresponding appendix to the minutes of Politburo meeting of June 27, 1929. Joseph Stalin ( ნამდვილი გვარი ჯუღაშვილი|Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili; March 5 1953 was General Secretary of the Communist Party The White Sea-Baltic Sea Canal (Belomorsko-Baltiyskiy Kanal BBK) is a Ship canal that joins the White Sea and the Baltic Sea near Russian ( transliteration:,) is the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages Council of Ministers of the USSR (Совет Министров СССР tr Events 911 - Signing of the Treaty of Saint-Clair-sur-Epte between Charles the Simple and Rollo of Normandy. Year 1929 ( MCMXXIX) was a Common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Penal labour or penal servitude is a form of Unfree labour. The term may refer to two different notions labour as a form of punishment and labour as a form of occupation Politburo, short for Political Bureau, Russian Politicheskoye Buro, is the executive organization for a number of Political parties, most notably Events 1358 - Republic of Dubrovnik is founded 1709 - Peter the Great defeats Charles XII of Sweden Year 1929 ( MCMXXIX) was a Common year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar.

As an all-Union institution and a main administration with the OGPU (the Soviet secret police), the GULAG was officially established on April 25, 1930 as the "ULAG" by the OGPU order 130/63 in accordance with the Sovnarkom order 22 p. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 The State Political Directorate was the Secret police of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic ( RSFSR) and the Soviet Union from 1922 until Secret police (sometimes political police) are a Police agency which operates in Secrecy to maintain National security against internal Events 1607 - Eighty Years' War: The Dutch fleet destroys the anchored Spanish fleet at Gibraltar. Year 1930 ( MCMXXX) was a Common year starting on Wednesday (link will display 1930 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. 248 dated April 7, 1930, and was renamed into GULAG in November. Events 529 - First draft of Corpus Juris Civilis (a fundamental work in Jurisprudence) is issued by Eastern Roman Emperor

In the early 1930s a drastic tightening of Soviet penal policy caused a significant growth of the prison camp population. During the period of the Great Purge (1937–38) mass arrests caused another upsurge in inmate numbers. Great Purge (Большая чистка transliterated Bolshaya chistka) was a series of campaigns of Political repression and Persecution During these years hundreds of thousands of individuals were arrested and sentenced to long prison terms on the grounds of one of the multiple passages of the notorious Article 58 of the Criminal Codes of the Union republics, which defined punishment for various forms of "counterrevolutionary activities. Article 58 of the Russian SFSR Penal Code was put in force on February 25, 1927 to arrest those suspected of counter-revolutionary activities "

Under NKVD Order № 00447 tens of thousands of GULAG inmates who were accused of "continuing anti-Soviet activity in imprisonment" were executed in 1937-38. NKVD Order № 00447 by July 30, 1937 О репрессировании бывших кулаков уголовников и других антисоветских

The hypothesis that economic considerations were responsible for mass arrests during the period of Stalinism has been refuted on the grounds of former Soviet archives that have become accessible since the 1990s, although some archival sources also tend to support an economic hypothesis. [15][16] In any case the development of the camp system followed economic lines. The growth of the camp system coincided with the peak of the Soviet industrialization campaign. is a process of social and economic change whereby a human group is transformed from a Pre-industrial society into an industrial one Most of the camps established to accommodate the masses of incoming prisoners were assigned distinct economic tasks. These included the exploitation of natural resources and the colonization of remote areas as well as the realization of enormous infrastructural facilities and industrial construction projects.

In 1931–32 the Gulag had approximately 200,000 prisoners in the camps; in 1935 — approximately 800,000 in camps and 300,000 in colonies (annual averages), and in 1939 — about 1. 3 millions in camps and 350,000 in colonies. [17] (all data about the numbers of prisoners here and below are taken from formerly secret documents produced by the NKVD). The NKVD ( НКВД, ru Народный Комиссариат Внутренних Дел ''Narodnyy Komissariat Vnutrennikh Del'') or People's Commissariat

GULAG during World War II

After the Soviet invasion of Poland following the corresponding German invasion that marked the start of World War II in 1939, the Soviet Union annexed eastern parts (so-called "Kresy") of the Second Polish Republic. The 1939 Soviet invasion of Poland was a military operation that started without a formal declaration of war on 17 September 1939 during the early stages of World War II, sixteen The Invasion of Poland (1939 precipitated World War II. It was carried out by Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small German-allied World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 The term Kresy, meaning Outskirts or Borderlands, was first used to define the Polish eastern frontier The Second Polish Republic or interwar Poland is the Republic of Poland between World War I and World War II. In 1940 the Soviet Union annexed Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Bessarabia and Bukovina. Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia ( Eesti or Eesti Vabariik) is a Country in Northern Europe in the Baltic region Latvia ( Latvija officially the Republic of Latvia (Latvijas Republika is a Country in Northern Europe in the Baltic region. Lithuania, officially the Republic of Lithuania (Lietuvos Respublika is a Country in Eastern often referred to as Northern Europe or in the Bessarabia ( Basarabia in Romanian, Бесарабія in Ukrainian, Бессарабия in Russian, Бесарабия in Bulgarian Bukovina (Bucovina Буковина/ Bukovyna; German and Polish: Bukowina; see also other languages) is a historical region on the Hundreds of thousands of Polish citizens[18][19] and inhabitants of the other annexed lands, regardless of their ethnic origin, were arrested and sent to the GULAG camps. However, according to the official data, the total number of sentences for political crimes in USSR in 1939-41 was only 211,106. [12]

During the Great Patriotic War, Gulag populations declined sharply, as a consequence of the mass releases of hundreds of thousands of prisoners who were conscripted and sent directly to the front lines and a steep rise in mortality in 1942–43. The term Great Patriotic War (Великая Отечественная война Velikaya Otechestvennaya Vojna) is used in Russia and some other 516,841 prisoners died in prison camps in 1941-43. [20]

In 1943, the term "katorga works" (каторжные работы) was reintroduced. They were initially intended for Nazi collaborators, but then other categories of political prisoners (for example, members of deported peoples who fled from exile) were also sentenced to "katorga works". During World War II Nazi Germany occupied all or parts of the following countries Poland, Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg, Population transfer in the Soviet Union may be classified into the following broad categories deportations of " Anti-Soviet " categories of population often classified Prisoners sentenced to "katorga works" were sent to Gulag prison camps with the most harsh regime and many of them perished. [20]

GULAG after WWII

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn gives his re-enactment of a search to which the inmates were subjected - this picture was not taken in a prison camp.
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn gives his re-enactment of a search to which the inmates were subjected - this picture was not taken in a prison camp. Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn ( Алекса́ндр Иса́евич Солжени́цын) (December 11 1918 – August 3 2008 was a Russian Novelist

After World War II the number of inmates in prison camps and colonies again rose sharply, reaching approximately 2. 5 million people by the early 1950s (about 1. 7 million of whom were in camps).

When the war ended in May 1945, as many as two million former Russian citizens were forcefully repatriated (against their will) into the USSR.[21] On 11 February 1945, at the conclusion of the Yalta Conference, the United States and United Kingdom signed a Repatriation Agreement with the Soviet Union. Operation Keelhaul was a program carried out in Austria by British and American forces in May and June 1945 that decided the fate of up The Yalta Conference, sometimes called the Crimea Conference and Codenamed the Argonaut Conference, was the wartime meeting from 4 February The United States of America —commonly referred to as the The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located [22] One interpretation of this agreement resulted in the forcible repatriation of all Soviets. British and U.S. civilian authorities ordered their military forces in Europe to deport to the Soviet Union up to two million former residents of the Soviet Union, including persons who had left Russia and established different citizenship years before. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK or Britain,is a Sovereign state located The United States of America —commonly referred to as the The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 The forced repatriation operations took place from 1945-1947. [23]

Soviet POWs on their return to the Soviet Union were often treated as traitors (see Order No. 270). In Law, treason is the Crime that covers some of the more serious acts of disloyalty to one's sovereign or Nation. Order No 270, dated August 16, 1941, was issued by Joseph Stalin acting as People's Commissar of Defense [24][25][26] According to some sources, over 1. 5 million surviving Red Army soldiers imprisoned by the Germans were sent to the Gulag. The Red Army ( Russian: Рабоче-Крестьянская Красная Армия R aboche- K rest'yanskaya K rasnaya A rmiya [27][28][29]

For years after World War II, a significant minority of the inmates were Ukrainians, Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians from lands newly incorporated into the Soviet Union, as well as Finns, Poles, Romanians and others. Ukrainians (Українці Ukrayintsi,) are an East Slavic Ethnic group primarily living in Ukraine, or more broadly— Citizens Lithuanians are the Baltic Ethnic group native to Lithuania, where they number a little over 3 million Latvians or Letts (latvieši the indigenous Baltic people of Latvia, occasionally refer to themselves by the ancient name of Latvji, which Estonians ( Estonian: eestlased, previously maarahvas) are a Finnic people closely related to the Finns and inhabiting primarily the country The terms Finns and Finnish people ( Finnish: suomalaiset, Swedish: finländare) are used in English to The Polish people, or Poles, (Polacy) are a Western Slavic Ethnic group of Central Europe, living predominantly in Poland. Romania ( dated: Rumania, Roumania POWs, in contrast, were kept in a separate camp system (see POW labor in the Soviet Union), which was managed by GUPVI, a separate main administration with the NKVD/MVD. Systematic POW labor in the Soviet Union is associated primarily with the outcomes of the World War II and covers the period of 1939-1956 The Main Administration for Affairs of Prisoners of War and Internees (Главное управление по делам военнопленных и интернированных НКВД/МВД The NKVD ( НКВД, ru Народный Комиссариат Внутренних Дел ''Narodnyy Komissariat Vnutrennikh Del'') or People's Commissariat

Yet the major reason for the post-war increase in the number of prisoners was the tightening of legislation on property offences in summer 1947 (at this time there was a famine in some parts of the Soviet Union, claiming about 1 million lives), which resulted in hundreds of thousands of convictions to lengthy prison terms, sometimes on the basis of cases of petty theft or embezzlement. At the beginning of 1953 the total number of prisoners in prison camps was more than 2. 4 million of which more than 465 thousand were political prisoners. [20]

The state continued to maintain the extensive camp system for a while after Stalin's death in March 1953, although the period saw the grip of the camp authorities weaken and a number of conflicts and uprisings occur (see Bitch Wars; Kengir uprising). The Bitch Wars or Suka Wars (Сучьи войны or in singular Сучья война occurred within the Soviet labor camp system between 1945 The Kengir uprising was a prisoner uprising that took place in the Soviet Prison labor camp Kengir in May and June 1954

The amnesty in March 1953 was limited to non-political prisoners and for political prisoners sentenced to not more than 5 years, therefore mostly those convicted for common crimes were then freed. Amnesty (from the Greek amnestia, oblivion is a legislative or executive act by which a state restores those who may have been guilty of an offense against it to The release of political prisoners started in 1954 and became widespread, and also coupled with mass rehabilitations, after Nikita Khrushchev's denunciation of Stalinism in his Secret Speech at the 20th Congress of the CPSU in February 1956. Rehabilitation (реабилитация in the context of Soviet or Russian topics is often a linguistic False cognate used to translate the Russian Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (April 17 1894 – September 11 1971 served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 following Stalinism is the political regime named after Joseph Stalin, leader of the Soviet Union from 1929–1953 On the Personality Cult and its Consequences (О культе личности и его последствиях commonly known as the Secret Speech or the

By the end of the 1950s, virtually all "corrective labor camps" were dissolved. Colonies, however, continued to exist. Officially the GULAG was liquidated by the MVD order 20 of January 25, 1960. Events 41 - After a night of negotiation Claudius is accepted as Roman Emperor by the Senate Year 1960 ( MCMLX) was a Leap year starting on Friday (link will display full calendar of the Gregorian calendar.

Altogether, according to some recent estimates on the basis of archival documents, between 28 and 50 million people had been prisoners in camps and colonies throughout the period of Stalinism at one point or another.

Conditions

Gulag prisoner mortality rates from 1934 to 1953
Gulag prisoner mortality rates from 1934 to 1953

Living and working conditions in the camps varied significantly across time and place, depending, among other things, on the impact of broader events (World War II, countrywide famines and shortages, waves of terror, sudden influx or release of large numbers of prisoners). Mortality rate is a measure of the number of Deaths (in general or due to a specific cause in some population scaled to the size of that population per unit time World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including However, to one degree or another, the large majority of prisoners at most times faced meagre food rations, inadequate clothing, overcrowding, poorly insulated housing; poor hygiene, and insufficient or inadequate health care. The overwhelming majority of prisoners were compelled to perform harsh physical labor. In most periods and economic branches, the degree of mechanization of work processes was significantly lower than in the civilian industry: tools were often primitive and machinery, if existent, short in supply. Officially established work hours were in most periods longer and days off were fewer than for civilian workers. Often official work time regulations were extended by local camp administrators.

In general, the central administrative bodies showed a discernible interest in maintaining the labor force of prisoners in a condition allowing the fulfillment of construction and production plans handed down from above. Besides a wide array of punishments for prisoners refusing to work (which, in practice, were sometimes applied to prisoners that were too enfeebled to meet production quota), they instituted a number of positive incentives intended to boost productivity. These included monetary bonuses (since the early 1930s) and wage payments (from 1950 onwards), cuts of sentences on an individual basis, general early release schemes for norm fulfillment and overfulfillment (until 1939, again in selected camps from 1946 onwards), preferential treatment and privileges for the most productive workers (shock workers or Stakhanovites in Soviet parlance). Udarnik (Ударник is a Russian term for a superproductive worker in the Soviet Union. In Soviet history and iconography a Stakhanovite (стахановец follows the example of Aleksei Grigorievich Stakhanov, employing hard work or [30]

A distinctive incentive scheme that included both coercive and motivational elements and was applied universally in all camps consisted in standardized "nourishment scales": the size of the inmates’ ration depended on the percentage of the work quota delivered. Naftaly Frenkel is credited for the introduction of this policy. Naftaly Aronovich Frenkel (Нафталий Аронович Френкель 1883–1960 was a Soviet citizen and Chekist (member of the Soviet secret police While it was effective in compelling many prisoners to make serious work efforts, for many a prisoner it had the adverse effect, accelerating the exhaustion and sometimes causing the death of persons unable to fulfill high production quota.

Immediately after the German attack on the Soviet Union in June 1941 the conditions in camps worsened drastically: quotas were increased, rations cut, and medical supplies came close to none, all of which led to a sharp increase in mortality. Operation Barbarossa ( Unternehmen Barbarossa) was the Codename for Nazi Germany 's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II The situation slowly improved in the final period and after the end of the war.

Considering the overall conditions and their influence on inmates, it is important to distinguish three major strata of Gulag inmates:

Mortality in GULAG camps in 1934-40 was 4-6 times higher than average in Russia. The estimated total number of those who died in imprisonment in 1930-1953 is 1. 76 million, about half of which occurred between 1941-1943 following the German invasion. [31][32]

Geography

Part of 'Project 503' to build a railroad from Salekhard to Igarka near Turukhansk on the Yenisey
Part of 'Project 503' to build a railroad from Salekhard to Igarka near Turukhansk on the Yenisey

In the early days of Gulag, the locations for the camps were chosen primarily for the ease of isolation of prisoners. Salekhard (Салеха́рд Nenets: Саля'харад lit Igarka (Ига́рка is an town in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia, located 163 km north of the Arctic Circle. Turukhansk (Туруха́нск is a village ( selo) in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia. Yenisei (Енисе́й is the greatest River system flowing to the Arctic Ocean, and at 5539 km (3445 mi is the fifth longest river in the world Remote monasteries in particular were frequently reused as sites for new camps. The site on the Solovetsky Islands in the White Sea is one of the earliest and also most noteworthy, taking root soon after the Revolution in 1918. The Solovetsky Islands (Солове́цкие острова́ Соловки́ are located in the Onega Bay of the White Sea, Russia. The White Sea (Бе́лое мо́ре Vienanmeri is an Inlet of the Barents Sea on the northwest coast of Russia. The colloquial name for the islands, "Solovki", entered the vernacular as a synonym for the labour camp in general. A colloquialism is an expression not used in formal speech, writing or Paralinguistics. Vernacular refers to the Native language of a country or a locality This article deals with the general meaning of the term "synonym" It was being presented to the world as an example of the new Soviet way of "re-education of class enemies" and reintegrating them through labour into the Soviet society. The term enemy of the people is a fluid designation of political or class opponents of the group using the term Initially the inmates, the significant part being Russian intelligentsia, enjoyed relative freedom (within the natural confinement of the islands). For the coffee shop company often called Intelligentsia for short see Intelligentsia Coffee & Tea. Local newspapers and magazines were edited and even some scientific research was carried out (e. g. , a local botanical garden was maintained, but unfortunately later lost completely). Eventually it turned into an ordinary Gulag camp; in fact some historians maintain that Solovki was a pilot camp of this type. See Solovki for more detail. Maxim Gorky visited the camp in 1929 and published an apology of it. Aleksey Maksimovich Peshkov ( In Алексе́й Макси́мович Пешко́в ( &ndash June 18, 1936) better known as Maxim Gorky (Максим

With the new emphasis on Gulag as the means of concentrating cheap labour, new camps were then constructed throughout the Soviet sphere of influence, wherever the economic task at hand dictated their existence (or was designed specifically to avail itself of them, such as Belomorkanal or Baikal Amur Mainline), including facilities in big cities — parts of the famous Moscow Metro and the Moscow State University new campus were built by forced labour. The White Sea-Baltic Sea Canal (Belomorsko-Baltiyskiy Kanal BBK) is a Ship canal that joins the White Sea and the Baltic Sea near The Baikal-Amur Mainline ( Russian Байкало-Амурская Магистраль Baikalo-Amurskaya Magistral’, BAM) is a Railway line The Moscow Metro (Московское метро which spans almost the entire Russian capital, is the world's second most heavily used Rapid-transit Many more projects during the rapid industrialization of the 1930s, war-time and post-war periods were fulfilled on the backs of convicts, and the activity of Gulag camps spanned a wide cross-section of Soviet industry. World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including

The majority of Gulag camps were positioned in extremely remote areas of north-eastern Siberia (the best known clusters are Sevvostlag (The North-East Camps) along Kolyma river and Norillag near Norilsk) and in the south-eastern parts of the Soviet Union, mainly in the steppes of Kazakhstan (Luglag, Steplag, Peschanlag). Sevvostlag (Северо-восточные исправительно-трудовые лагеря Севвостлаг СВИТЛ This is an article about the region commonly known as Kolyma For river it is named after see Kolyma River The Kolyma (pronounced koh-lee-MAH Norillag, Norilsk Corrective Labor Camp (Норильлаг Норильстрой Норильский ИТЛ was a Gulag Labor camp set by Norilsk Norilsk (Нори́льск is a major city in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia. In physical Geography, a steppe ( German, from степь - "a flat and arid land" степ - /stɛp/ тал - tal дала - /dɑlɑ/ pronounced Kazakhstan, also Kazakstan ( Қазақстан, Qazaqstan, qɑzɑqˈstɑn Казахстан, Kazakhstán,) officially the These were vast and sparsely inhabited regions with no roads (in fact, the construction of the roads themselves was assigned to the inmates of specialized railroad camps) or sources of food, but rich in minerals and other natural resources (such as timber). However, camps were generally spread throughout the entire Soviet Union, including the European parts of Russia, Byelorussia, and Ukraine. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR was a constitutionally Socialist state that existed in Eurasia from 1922 to 1991 Russia (Россия Rossiya) or the Russian Federation ( Rossiyskaya Federatsiya) is a transcontinental Country extending Belarus ( Belarusian Беларусь / Biełaruś is a Landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered by Russia to the north and east Ukraine (Україна Ukrayina, /ukrɑˈjinɑ/ is a country in Eastern Europe. There were also several camps located outside of the Soviet Union, in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, and Mongolia, which were under the direct control of the Gulag. Czechoslovakia may also refer to what is now the Czech Republic and Slovakia. Hungary (Magyarország 'mɔɟɔrorsaːg) officially in English the Republic of Hungary ( Magyar Köztársaság, literally Magyar (Hungarian Republic Poland (Polska officially the Republic of Poland Mongolia (mɒŋˈɡoʊliə, literally Mongol country/nation,) is a Landlocked Country in East

Not all camps were fortified; in fact some in Siberia were marked only by posts. Escape was deterred by the harsh elements, as well as tracking dogs that were assigned to each camp. While during the 1920s and 1930s native tribes often aided escapees, many of the tribes were also victimized by escaped thieves. Tantalized by large rewards as well, they began aiding authorities in the capture of Gulag inmates. Camp guards were also given stern incentive to keep their inmates in line at all costs; if a prisoner escaped under a guard's watch, the guard would often be stripped of his uniform and become a Gulag inmate himself. Further, if an escaping prisoner was shot, guards could be fined amounts that were often equivalent to one or two weeks wages.

In some cases, teams of inmates were dropped to a new territory with a limited supply of resources and left to set up a new camp or die. Sometimes it took several attempts before the next wave of colonists could survive the elements.

The area along the Indigirka river was known as the Gulag inside the Gulag. Indigirka River (Индиги́рка is a River in the Sakha Republic in Russia. In 1926, the Oimiakon (Оймякон) village in this region registered the record low temperature of −71. Oymyakon (Оймяко́н is a village ( selo) in Oymyakonsky Ulus of the Sakha Republic, Russia, located along the 2 °C (−96 °F).

Under the supervision of Lavrenty Beria who headed both NKVD and the Soviet Atom bomb program until his demise in 1953, thousands of zeks were used to mine uranium ore and prepare test facilities on Novaya Zemlya, Vaygach Island, Semipalatinsk, among other sites. Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria (ლავრენტი პავლეს ძე ბერია Lavrenti Pavles dze Beria; Russian: Лаврентий Павлович A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from Nuclear reactions either fission or a combination of fission and fusion. Uranium (jʊˈreɪniəm is a silvery-gray Metallic Chemical element in the An ore is a volume of rock containing components or Minerals in a mode of occurrence that renders it valuable for mining Novaya Zemlya (Но́вая Земля́ also spelled Novaja Zemlja, lit Vaygach Island (Вайга́ч is an Island in the Novaya Zemlya archipelago in the Arctic Sea between the Pechora Sea and the The Semipalatinsk Test Site (STS was the primary testing venue for the Soviet Union 's Nuclear weapons.

Special insititutions

Influence

Culture

The Gulag spanned nearly four decades of Soviet and East European history and affected millions of individuals. Its cultural impact was enormous.

The Gulag has become a major influence on contemporary Russian thinking, and an important part of modern Russian folklore. History The concept of folklore developed as part of the 19th century ideology of Romantic nationalism, leading to the reshaping of oral traditions to serve modern ideological Many songs by the authors-performers known as the bards, most notably Vladimir Vysotsky and Alexander Galich, neither of whom ever served time in the camps, describe life inside the Gulag and glorified the life of "Zeks". For other meanings of the word see Bard (disambiguation. The term bard (бард Vladimir Semyonovich Vysotsky (Владимир Семёнович Высоцкий Vladimir Semyonovich Vysotskyj) ( January 25 1938 &ndash July Alexander Galich (Александр Аркадьевич Га́лич (born Alexander Aronovich Ginzburg October 19, 1918 – December 15, Words and phrases which originated in the labor camps became part of the Russian/Soviet vernacular in the 1960s and 1970s.

The memoirs of Alexander Dolgun, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Varlam Shalamov and Yevgenia Ginzburg, among others, became a symbol of defiance in Soviet society. Alexander Dolgun ( September 29 1926 - August 28, 1986) was a survivor of the Soviet Gulag who wrote up his experiences in 1975 after Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn ( Алекса́ндр Иса́евич Солжени́цын) (December 11 1918 – August 3 2008 was a Russian Novelist Varlam Tikhonovich Shalamov (Варлам Тихонович Шаламов July 1, 1907 &ndash January 17, 1982) was a Russian Writer Yevgenia Ginzburg ( November 20, 1904 Communist Party]] member Ginzburg continued her successful career as educator journalist and administrator These writings, particularly those of Solzhenitsyn, harshly chastised the Soviet people for their tolerance and apathy regarding the Gulag, but at the same time provided a testament to the courage and resolve of those who were imprisoned.

Another cultural phenomenon in the Soviet Union linked with the Gulag was the forced migration of many artists and other people of culture to Siberia. This resulted in a Renaissance of sorts in places like Magadan, where, for example, the quality of theatre production was comparable to Moscow's. Magadan (Магада́н is a Port town on the Sea of Okhotsk and gateway to the Kolyma region Moscow (Москва́ romanised: Moskvá, IPA: see also other names) is the Capital and the largest city of

Literature

Many eyewitness accounts of Gulag prisoners were published before World War II.

Colonization

Soviet state documents show that among the goals of the GULAG was colonization of sparsely populated remote areas. To this end, the notion of "free settlement" was introduced. Forced settlements in the Soviet Union took several forms Though the most notorious was the Gulag Labor camp system of Penal labor, resettling of entire

When well-behaved persons had served the majority of their terms, they could be released for "free settlement" (вольное поселение, "volnoye poseleniye") outside the confinement of the camp. They were known as "free settlers" (вольнопоселенцы, "volnoposelentsy", not to be confused with the term ссыльнопоселенцы, "ssyl'noposelentsy", "exile settlers"). Forced settlements in the Soviet Union took several forms Though the most notorious was the Gulag Labor camp system of Penal labor, resettling of entire In addition, for persons who served full term, but who were denied the free choice of place of residence, it was recommended to assign them for "free settlement" and give them land in the general vicinity of the place of confinement.

This implement was also inherited from the katorga system. Katorga (ка́торга from medieval Greek: katergon κάτεργον Galley) was the precursor to the Gulag system

Life after term served

Persons who served a term in a camp or in a prison were restricted from taking a wide range of jobs. Concealment of a previous imprisonment was a triable offence. Persons who served terms as "politicals" were nuisances for "First Departments" (Первый Отдел, Pervyj Otdel, outlets of the secret police at all enterprises and institutions), because former "politicals" had to be monitored. The First Department (Первый отдел Pervyj Otdel was in charge of secrecy and political security of the workplace of every enterprise or institution of the Soviet Secret police (sometimes political police) are a Police agency which operates in Secrecy to maintain National security against internal

Many people released from camps were restricted from settling in larger cities.

Lack of prosecution

It has often been asked why there has been nothing along the lines of the Nuremberg Trials for those guilty of atrocities at the Gulag camps. The Nuremberg Trials were a series of trials most notable for the prosecution of prominent members of the political military and economic leadership of Nazi Germany after Two recent books, reviewed by Peter Rollberg in the Moscow Times[33], cast some light on this. Tomasz Kizny's Gulag: Life and Death Inside the Soviet Concentration Camps 1917-1990 details the history of the labour camps over the years while Oleg Khlevniuk's The History of the Gulag: From Collectivization to the Great Terror presents records of confidential memos, official resolutions, individual testimonies and tabulated statistics. Rollberg explains how both books contribute to our understanding of why there were no post-Communism trials. "The gulag had already killed tens of thousands of its own most ardent killers. Again and again, yesterday's judges were declared today's criminals, so that Soviet society never had to own up to its millions of state-backed murders. "

Gulag memorials

The Memorial pictured below in St Petersburg is made of a boulder from the Solovki camp — the first prison camp in the Gulag system. Saint Petersburg ( tr: Sankt-Peterburg,) is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River The Solovki prison camp and later Solovki prison (located on the Solovetsky Islands, White Sea) was part of the Soviet penal system People gather here every year on the Day of Victims of the Repression (October 30).

The Gulag Memorial.

Literature

See also

Wikisource

References

  1. ^ The Gulag Collection: Paintings of Nikolai Getman. This enormous but far from complete list enumerates sites of Soviet Forced labor camps ("corrective labor camps" This is an article about the region commonly known as Kolyma For river it is named after see Kolyma River The Kolyma (pronounced koh-lee-MAH Article 58 of the Russian SFSR Penal Code was put in force on February 25, 1927 to arrest those suspected of counter-revolutionary activities Population transfer in the Soviet Union may be classified into the following broad categories deportations of " Anti-Soviet " categories of population often classified Forced settlements in the Soviet Union took several forms Though the most notorious was the Gulag Labor camp system of Penal labor, resettling of entire Mass graves in the Soviet Union Soviet repression and terror The government "Memorial" ( Russian: Мемориал is an international historical and Civil rights society that operates in a number of post- USSR states The Kengir uprising was a prisoner uprising that took place in the Soviet Prison labor camp Kengir in May and June 1954 Norilsk uprising was a major uprising of the GULAG Labor camp Inmates in Norillag, Norilsk, Russia, in the summer of 1953 Norilsk (Нори́льск is a major city in Krasnoyarsk Krai, Russia. Mining is the extraction of valuable Minerals or other geological materials from the earth usually (but not always from an Ore body The Vietnamese Gulag is a book comparing post-war Vietnam to an archipelago of prison camps along the lines of the description of the Soviet Union in Extermination through labour (Vernichtung durch Arbeit was a Nazi German World War II principle that regulated the aims and purposes of most of their labour and Nazi Germany and the Third Reich are the common English names for Germany under the regime of Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist German Workers The Danube-Black Sea Canal (Canalul Dunăre-Marea Neagră is a Canal in Romania which runs from Cernavodă on the Danube to Agigea Katorga (ка́торга from medieval Greek: katergon κάτεργον Galley) was the precursor to the Gulag system The Russian Empire ( Pre-reform Russian: Pоссійская Имперія Modern Russian: Российская Империя translit: Rossiyskaya Laogai ( the abbreviation for Láo dòng Gǎi zào (勞動改造 which means "reform through labor" is a slogan of the Chinese criminal China ( Wade-Giles ( Mandarin) Chung¹kuo² is a cultural region, an ancient Civilization, and depending on perspective a National The End of America A Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot (ISBN 978-1933392790 is the most recent book released by author Naomi Wolf.
  2. ^ Anne Applebaum — Inside the Gulag
  3. ^ Gulag: Understanding the Magnitude of What Happened
  4. ^ The National Archives Learning Curve
  5. ^ Gulag: A History of the Soviet Camps, by Anne Applebaum
  6. ^ Gulag from InfoPlease. com
  7. ^ a b Anne Applebaum. GULAG: a history (HTML) (English). Retrieved on 2007-12-21. Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. Events 69 - The end of the Year of the four emperors: Following Galba, Otho and Vitellius, Vespasian
  8. ^ The Other Killing Machine, The New York Times.
  9. ^ Stalin's forgotten victims stuck in the gulag, Telegraph.
  10. ^ http://publicist.n1.by/articles/repressions/repressions_gulag2.html
  11. ^ Often, one finds statements that Soviet PoW landed in the Gulag after release, which is a confusion with two other types of camps. During and after World War II freed PoWs went to special "filtration" camps. World War II, or the Second World War, (often abbreviated WWII) was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including Of these, by 1944, more than 90 per cent were cleared, and about 8 per cent were arrested or condemned to penal battalions. Penal Battalions, penal companies, etc are military units consisting of convicted persons for which Military service was either the In 1944, they were sent directly to reserve military formations to be cleared by the NKVD. The NKVD ( НКВД, ru Народный Комиссариат Внутренних Дел ''Narodnyy Komissariat Vnutrennikh Del'') or People's Commissariat Further, in 1945, about 100 filtration camps were set for repatriated Ostarbeiter, PoWs, and other displaced persons, which processed more than 4,000,000 people. OST-Arbeiter (Ostarbeiter Eastern Workers was a designation for Slave workers gathered from Eastern Europe to do Forced labor in Nazi Germany A displaced person (sometimes abbreviated DP) is a person who has been forced to leave his or her native place a phenomenon known as Forced migration. By 1946, 80 per cent civilians and 20 per cent of PoWs were freed, 5 per cent of civilians, and 43 per cent of PoWs re-drafted, 10 per cent of civilians and 22 per cent of PoWs were sent to labor battalions, and 2 per cent of civilians and 15 per cent of the PoWs transferred to the NKVD, i. Labour battalions have been a form of Alternative service or Unfree labor in various countries in lieu of or resembling regular Military service. e. the Gulag. — (“Военно-исторический журнал” (“Military-Historical Magazine”), 1997, №5. page 32)
  12. ^ a b http://publicist.n1.by/articles/repressions/repressions_organy1.html
  13. ^ Antony Barnett (2004-2-1). Revealed: the gas chamber horror of North Korea's gulag (English). Guardian Unlimited. Retrieved on 2007-12-21. Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. Events 69 - The end of the Year of the four emperors: Following Galba, Otho and Vitellius, Vespasian
  14. ^ D. J. Dallin and B. I. Nicolayesky, Forced Labour in Soviet Russia, London 1948, p. 153.
  15. ^ See, e. g. , Jakobson, Michael. Origins of the GULag: The Soviet Prison Camp System 1917–34. (Lexington, KY: University Press of Kentucky, 1993), p. 88.
  16. ^ See, e. g. , Ivanova, Galina M. Labor Camp Socialism: The Gulag in the Totalitarian System. (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2000), p. 70 (and, in fact, almost all of Chapter 2).
  17. ^ Cf, e. g. , Istorija stalinskogo Gulaga: konec 1920-kh - pervaia polovina 1950-kh godov; sobranie dokumentov v 7 tomakh, ed. by V. P. Kozlov et al. , Moskva: ROSSPEN 2004, vol. 4: Naselenie GULAGa
  18. ^ Franciszek Proch, Poland's Way of the Cross, New York 1987 P. 146
  19. ^ Project In Posterum [1]
  20. ^ a b c http://publicist.n1.by/articles/repressions/repressions_gulag1.html
  21. ^ Mark Elliott. "The United States and Forced Repatriation of Soviet Citizens, 1944-47," Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 88, No. 2 (June, 1973), pp. 253-275.
  22. ^ Repatriation -- The Dark Side of World War II
  23. ^ Forced Repatriation to the Soviet Union: The Secret Betrayal
  24. ^ The warlords: Joseph Stalin
  25. ^ Remembrance (Zeithain Memorial Grove)
  26. ^ Soviet Prisoners of War: Forgotten Nazi Victims of World War II
  27. ^ Sorting Pieces of the Russian Past
  28. ^ Patriots ignore greatest brutality
  29. ^ Joseph Stalin killer file
  30. ^ Leonid Borodkin and Simon Ertz 'Forced Labour and the Need for Motivation: Wages and Bonuses in the Stalinist Camp System', Comparative Economic Studies, June 2005, Vol. 47, Iss. 2, pp. 418–436.
  31. ^ "Demographic Losses Due to Repressions", by Anatoly Vishnevsky, Director of the Center for Human Demography and Ecology, Russian Academy of Sciences, (Russian)
  32. ^ "The History of the GULAG", by Oleg V. The Russian Academy of Sciences (Российская Академия Наук Rossi'iskaya Akade'miya Nau'k, shortened to PAH RAN) consists of the National Khlevniuk
  33. ^ Prosecuting the Gulag, Moscow Times, January 21, 2005, retrieved 18 January 2007. Events 1189 - Philip II of France and Richard I of England begin to assemble troops to wage the Third Crusade. Year 2005 ( MMV) was a Common year starting on Saturday (link displays full calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Events 350 - Generallus Magnentius deposes Roman Emperor Constans and proclaims himself Emperor Year 2007 ( MMVII) was a Common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century.

External links

Events 1184 BC - Trojan War: Troy is sacked and burned according to the calculations of Eratosthenes. Year 2003 ( MMIII) was a Common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar. The Moscow News, which began publication in 1930 is Russia ’s oldest English-language publication Newspaper. Events 553 - The Second Council of Constantinople begins 1215 - Rebel Barons renounce their allegiance to King John Year 2006 ( MMVI) was a Common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. The Library of Congress is the De facto National library of the United States and the research arm of the United States Congress

Dictionary

gulag

-noun

  1. A prison camp.
  2. A generic name for the system of all Soviet prison camps.
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