THE PURGE IN RUSSIA

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23499, 13 May 1938, Page 16

THE PURGE IN RUSSIA

Stalin’s purge has now roped in all the old Bolsheviks,” Lenin’s friends and helpers, men whom Lenin—a very shrewd judge of character —trusted far more than he ever trusted Stalin, against whose promotion to the post of General Secretary of the Communist Party he indeed left a strongly worded note of advice, notes the Yorkshire Post. Only two alternatives remain. Either we must suppose that for the past 15 years or more nearly every leading Bolshevik—including ambassadors, generals, editors, industrial executives and even the chief, Yagoda, of Stalin’s own secret police -—have been consistently conspiring to wreck the Russian regime with the aid of foreign spies. Or v/e must conclude that Stalin, a terrified dictator, is engaged in an utterly ruthless campaign to exterminate every conceivable challenge to his ov/n autocratic power. In either case, the outlook for the unfortunate people of Russia appears to be equally grim.