Written: Written between January 26 and 31, 1922
Published:
First published in 1965 in Collected Works, Fifth (Russian) Ed., Vol. 54.
Printed from a typewritten text of I. S. Unschlicht’s reminiscences.
Source:
Lenin
Collected Works,
Progress Publishers,
1976,
Moscow,
Volume 45,
page 454b.
Translated: Yuri Sdobnikov
Transcription\Markup:
R. Cymbala
Public Domain:
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Publicity for revolutionary tribunals should not be a rule; their panels should be augmented by “your” men, and their ties (of all sorts) with the All-Russia Cheka strengthened; the force and speed of their reprisals should be intensified and the C.C.’s attention to this increased. The slightest increase in banditry, etc., should entail martial law and shootings on the spot. The C.P.C. will be able to pass this swiftly, if you look sharp, and it could be done by phone.
Also have a talk with Stalin, and if you consider it necessary, show Him this letter.[1]
[1] This is in reply to a letter from I. S. Unschlicht, Deputy Chairman of the All-Russia Cheka, of January 26, 1922, in which he stood up for the new draft statute of the All-Russia Cheka, worked out by its Collegium, and insisted that it should retain its punitive functions. The letter is quoted in his reminiscences of Lenin, He sets out the beginning of the letter as follows: “Lenin did not agree with my arguments and sent me a reply saying that my proposals could and should be realised not my way but through a C.C. commission draft.... Lenin ended his letter by noting that on the basis of the decisions taken by a Politbureau commission ‘an increase in the speed and force of reprisals can and must be achieved’” (Voprosy istorii KPSS, 1965, No. 4, p. 97). See also this volume, Document 522.
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