The Gulag at War: Stalin’s Forced Labour System in the Light of the Archives

205 Pages·1996·19.92 MB·English

by  Edwin Bacon (auth.)

THE GULAG AT WAR
STUDIES IN SOVIET HISTORY AND SOCIETY
General Editors: R. W. Davies, Emeritus Professor of Soviet Economic Studies, and
E. A. Rees, Lecturer in Soviet History, both at the Centre for Russian and East
European Studies, University of Birmingham
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The Gulag at War
Stalin's Forced Labour System
in the Light of the Archives
Edwin Bacon
--
in association with the
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN
MACMillAN
© Edwin Thomas Bacon 1994, 1996
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Published by
MACMILLAN PRESS LTD
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS
and London
Companies and representatives
throughout the world
First edition 1994
Reprinted (with alterations) 1996
ISBN 978-0-333-67510-6 ISBN 978-1-349-14275-0 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-349-14275-0
A catalogue record for this book is available
from the British Library.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 I
05 04 03 02 01 00 99 98 97 96
Contents
List of Tables vii
Preface to the 1996 Reprint ix
Preface xii
Acknowledgements xiii
Abbreviations XIV
Glossary XV
Introduction
Gulag Studies 6
2 New Revelations 23
3 Origins and Development 42
4 Gulag Administration 64
5 Forced Labour Establishments 82
6 How Many Prisoners? 101
7 Labour Use and Production 123
8 Life in the Gulag at War 145
Appendix A: Additional Tables 163
Appendix B: Administrative Structure of the Gulag
during the War Years 171
Notes and References 172
Index 189
v
List of Tables
1.1 Estimates of the Gulag population around the outbreak
of war lO
2.1 Number of prisoners in Gulag corrective labour camps
and colonies (on 1 January each year) 24
2.2 The Gulag camps: inflow and outflow 1934-47 28
2.3 Population of the Gulag labour settlements
(on I January each year) 30
5.1 Camp formation and dissolution, June 1941 to July 1944 87
5.2 Evacuation of NKVD prisons by January 1942 91
5.3 Camps, colonies, and camp subdivisions, 1944-4j 91
5.4 Population of NKVD Special Camps (Verification and
Filtration Camps), January 1945 95
5.5 Gulag camps existing throughout the war 99
6.1 Soviet citizens of German nationality in Gulag camps,
31 December 1942 108
6.2 Arrests under state procuracy and NKVD directive
no. 221, June 1941 to April 1942 109
6.3 Prisoner movement devoted to intra-Gulag transfers,
1942 (%) 113
6.4 Turnover ratio in the Gulag camps, 1942 113
6.5 Distribution of prisoners added to the Gulag camp
system, 1942 (%) 114
6.6 Sources of prisoners entering the Gulag camps,
1942 (% of those entering) 116
6.7 Destinations of prisoners leaving the Gulag camps,
1942 (% of those leaving) 116
6.8 Forced labour in the Soviet Union, 1942--45 (millions,
annual average) 121
7.1 Distribution of Soviet workforce, 1942--45 (millions,
annual average) 125
7.2 Gulag camp workforce not working, October 1941 to
January 1942 (%) 128
7.3 Physical classification of prisoners in Gulag camps,
1 Jam,ary 1942 (%) 130
vii
viii List of Tables
7.4 Gulag camp workforce in productive labour,
November 1941 to January 1942 (%) 131
7.5 Gulag workforce engaged in productive labour, by
administration, 1942-44 (fourth quarter each year, %) 132
7.6 Gulag agricultural production, 1941 and 1944
(thousands of tons) 139
7.7 Livestock on Gulag agriculturai establishments, 1941,
1943-45 (thousands) 140
7.8 NKVD output of selected raw materials and products,
1941-44 144
8.1 Indicators of medical care in Gulag camps and colonies,
1941, 1943 and 1944 (on 1 January) 149
8.2 Mortality rates in Gulag camps and colonies, 1941-44
(% of annual average population) 149
8.3 Female Gulag prisoners, 1941-45 (% of total) 151
8.4 Gulag population by age, 1940 and 1943 (%) 151
8.5 Nationality of prisoners in the Gulag camps, 1941-45,
1 January (% of total) 153
8.6 Offences of which Gulag inmates and personnel were
convicted within the camps, June 1941 to June 1944 157
A.l Camps of the Main Administration of Railway
Construction (GULZhDS), 1942-44 163
A.2 Camps of the Main Administration for Camps of
Industrial Construction (Glavpromstroi), 1942-44 164
A.3 Camps of the Main Administration for Camps of the
Mining and Metallurgical Industry (GULGMP), 1942-44 165
A.4 Camps of the Administration for Camps of the
Timber Industry (ULLP), 1942-44 165
A.5 Camps of the Dal'stroi; Osobstroi; Main Administration
of Road Construction (GUShosDor), 1942-44 166
A.6 Camps of the Administration of Corrective Labour
Colonies (upravlenie ispravitel'no-trudovykh kolonii -
UITK), 1942-44 166
A.7 Gulag camps inflow, 1934-47 167
A.8 Gulag camps outflow, 1934-47 167
A.9 Intra-Gulag camp transfers, 1934-47 168
A.10 Gulag camps inflow and outflow, 1942 168
A.ll Labour-use of Gulag camp workforce by managerial
administration, 1940-44 (%) 169
A.l2 Gulag prisoners contracted out to other People's
Commissariats (Narodnyi kommissariat- NK), 1943-44 170
Preface to the 1996 Reprint
The preface to the hardback edition of The Gulag at War set out in brief
the work's raison d'etre. At the end of the Soviet period the archives of
the Stalinist forced labour system opened up to a greater degree than ever
before. Given the level of secrecy previously surrounding the Gulag, and
the debate which flourished in the absence of official material, even a
limited opening of the archives was significant. The Gulag at War drew its
original material from the 'in-house' accounts of the Secret Police
concerning, in particular, the role and organisation of the labour camps
during the Second World War.
The preface then set out the advantages and limits of the archival
material. First, the process of new historical revelation could be carried
forward. Second, however, the over-optimistic hopes of some scholars that
most matters of dispute would somehow be settled was unrealistic. It is to
these two issues that the preface to the 1996 reprint addresses itself further.
Since the first edition, the opportunity has presented itself to combine
two avenues of research which had previously been pursued almost
separately - forced labour and war losses. Through the preparation of a
conference paper1, it became apparent that the figures were now available
to state clearly that, during the Second World War, the Gulag incarcerated
significantly more Soviet citizens than did the enemy. Whereas around
five and three-quarter million Soviet prisoners of war fell into German
hands, 2 well over seven million individuals served time in Soviet forced
labour establishments between 1941 and 1945.
According to the Gulag archives, 4.7 million individuals were at some
point in a Gulag camp or colony between June 1941 and June 1944,3 with
at least a further 350 000 added by the War's end.4 In addition there were
at least a million, and perhaps double that, in Gulag Labour Settlements
over the same period,5 and half a million coming straight from Nazi
control into Verification and Filtration Camps. 6 These totals do not
include those in NKVD prisons nor those sentenced to forced labour
without deprivation of liberty. To put this in context, the Soviet Union
suffered huge losses during the same years. Military losses alone
amounted to some 8.7 million, according to the findings of a Soviet
General Staff Commission announced in 1990.7
In a time of great externally-afflicted hardship and an economically
detrimental labour shortage, the Soviet authorities maintained a forced
ix
X Preface to the 1996 Reprint
labour network which in toto imprisoned more Soviet citizens than did the
enemy. The new material presented here brings to light this fact and
examines the rationale with which the Soviet authorities justified the
maintenance of such a system to themselves. Which brings us to the
second point identified above - the limitations of the new revelations.
A critic of The Gulag at War argued that it failed to treat the archival
materials presented with sufficient scepticism. 8 Of course, scepticism is
not easy to quantify, and, in devoting much space to exposing the
undercounting of many glasnost' -era archive-based articles, these pages
are by no means unquestioning with regard to the official Soviet accounts.
Therein though is the point. As well as using archival data to increase our
knowledge of events per se, the information used here 'presents the
official perception of the camp network' .9 The way the Soviet authorities
perceived and justified the evil of the Gulag system is inherently
interesting. Furthermore, if the devil is in the detail, then this work's
survey of the administrative structures of the vast forced labour system is
likewise of value in revealing the official, almost bureaucratic, conception
of the system which is evident in archival material. The very limitations of
the archival material are of import. In itself it does not do justice to the
labour-camp experience. It does, however, stand alongside other material
to increase our knowledge of the brutal phenomenon which was Stalin's
Gulag.
EDWIN BACON
Birmingham, January 1996
1. E. T. Bacon 'The Contribution of the GULAG during the Second World War', Annual
Conference of the Centre for Russian and East European Studies, University of
Birmingham. Cumberland Lodge, Windsor, 23-25 June 1995.
2. John Barber and Mark Harrison The Soviet Home Front (Longman, 1991) p. 41.
3. GARF f. 9414 op. 1 d. 68 1.8.
4. V. N. Zemskov, 'Arkhipelag: glazami pisatelya i statistika', Argumenty i fakty 45 ( 1989)
pp. 6-7.
5. There were 930 221 on these settlements in January 1941 (seep. 30). If they experienced
the same turnover rate as camps and colonies during the war, then 2.4 million individuals
passed through them. However, their nature and war-use suggests that the turnover of
inmates was far slower than in the general camp network.
6. Table 6.8, p. 122. There may be an element of double-counting if this figure is simply
added to the number in the camps and colonies during the war, as of course many of the
returnees passed through Verification and Filtration Camps into the Gulag proper.
However, it seems that around half of these camps' inmates went back into the armed
forces, rather than into the Gulag (p. 94).