The Doctor's Plot was not something created by Stalin or carried out by him. In fact...it was an attempt to undermine him...and probably what killed him.
The story of the Doctor's Plot started in 1948 when Dr Lydia Timashuk accused Dr Yakov Ettinger of wrongdoing in the examination of Zhdanov. She said she took an ECG of Zhdanov which showed the serious nature of his condition, but that Etinger had dissmissed it as a lesser condition and had ordered her to rewrite her report, leaving out any mention of his real condition. She send many such letters to State Security Minister V. S. Abakumov. She herself never accused Etinger and Zhdanov's other doctors of any conspiracy...but that they had made the wrong diagnoses and had forced her to rewrite her report.
Abakumov send a letter to Stalin telling him about her accusations. Etinger the Younger, Etinger's son wrote a book called "The Doctor's Plot" In it he says:
"On the desk of the State Security Minister V. S. Abakumov.
On that same day he sent a top-secret memorandum to Stalin: To Comrade Stalin, 1. V., I am sending you a statement by Dr. L. F.Timashuk, head of the electrocardiography laboratory, about the condition of Comrade Zhdanov. As is evident from Dr. Timashuk's statement, she insists that Comrade Zhdanov had a myocardial infarction in the area of the anterior wall of the left ventricle and of the intra ventricular septum. Head of the Kremlin medical department Egorov and Academician Vinogradov suggested that she alter the diagnosis omitting any mention of myocardial infarction.
Enclosed: Statement by Comrade Timashuk and the ECG of Comrade Zhdanov."
Iakov Etinger "The Doctors' Plot@; p. 115-7
Stalin did not believe the accusations and ignored them. Svetlana Stalin wrote about it:
My father's housekeeper told me not long ago that my father was extremely distressed at the turn events took... She was waiting on table as usual, when my father remarked that he did not believe the doctors were "dishonest" and that the only evidence against them, after all were the Areports@ of Dr. Timashuk."
Alliyeuva S; ibid; p.215.
The case was ignored until 1952. During this time Timashuk kept sending letters to the CC and various members of the Security services. She met with Kuznetsov. Shortly after the case was reopened and Etinger was arrested for questioning.
There is nothing to indicate that Stalin reopened the case or that he was involved in ANY part of this investigation. It was entirely independent of him.
Etinger was questioned by Abakumov. Abakumov's conclusion was that Etinger was a Jewish nationalist and anti-Soviet (from recorded conversations)...but that he was not part of any conspiracy or that any such conspiracy existed. Abakumov's conclusion was that nothing wrong had been done.
While in the Leningrad prison in a solitary cell, Etinger suddenly died of "unknown" reasons.
This is where things took the wrong turn...and this is where the anti-Stalin conspiritors tried to push foreward their anti-Jewish policies. It was Riumin, another high ranking member of State Security that started making accusations against Abakumov. He made accusations that Abakumov had prevented the interrogationg of Etinger by his men...that he somehow had covered up the fact that Etinger was guilty and that somehow Abakumov was responsible for the death of Etinger in order to prevent him from revealing the conspiracy.
Abakumov was arrested on July 12 1951 and put under investigation because of these accusations.
Again it is important to point out that Stalin had nothing to do with it. In fact Abakumov send a letter to Stalin asking him that he personally get involved in his case.
"Riumin"s statement about my alleged hint to Etinger that he should refuse to testify regarding terrorism is all wrong. There was nothing of the kind and could never be. Had we had any concrete facts to act upon we would have skinned him alive in order not to miss a case like that."
3 days later Stalin asked to see the information on Abakumov's investigation himself.
It was at this time that Riumin got Col. M. Likhachev, former deputy head of the USSR State Security Ministry, to testify that Etinger had indeed confessed to criminal wrong-doing...but that Abakumov had covered it up. This was a trumped up charge...created by Riumin and the other revisionists...but nonetheless it played heavily against Agakumov. Etinger himself was dead...so there was no way to verify it and now there was a lot of testimony against Abakumov.
At this point the State Security was put in charge of Abakumov's case...and Riumin was in a perfect position to affect the investigation as he wanted. With the trumped up accusations by Likhachev...the "sudden" death of Etinger...Abakumov's fate was sealed. He was found guilty of criminal wrong doing in the "Leningrad Affair" was it was called.
What was Stalin's role in this?? As far as I can see...none. Stalin got involved only when Abakumov asked him to personally overview his case...but this was negated by the fact that just days later Riumin was able to fabricate some very dameging charges against him. Stalin either did not do anything becasue he couldn't...or becasue he too was fooled by Riumin's "evidence" and therefore decided not to take any part in it.
After the Abakumov affair...Riumin was able to get Etinger found guilty of terrorist activity and therefore all the other doctors that were invalved by Timashuk become targets and were arrested.
Riumin was made Deputy Minister of State Security from where he could affect the investigations at his will. By November 1952 the Doctor's Plot had already been put into move. Stalin died in March 1953.
But again...this had nothing to do with Stalin. Stalin was not involved in such matters at any point of the investigations, arrests or sentancing...excpet as an observer. There is no evidence that Stalin was involved in the Doctor's Plot at all...nor the Abakumov affair.
In fact...the evidence suggests that Riumin and other revisionists at high positions were putting forth their own agenda to undermine Stalin in order to gain power for themselves. Some would go as far as to say that they did it in order to kill Stalin...that his death was due to the fact that he was denied medical attention...and that this was the plan of the revisionists.
Following Stalin's death, Beria took up the fight against the revisionists (Beria's intentions being dubious to me at least...I consider him to have been a much bigger revisionist that even Khruschiev)...and Beria got most of the doctors arrested freed and got Riumin arrested for fabricating evidence against the doctors. By this time...Khruschiev, Mikoyan and others had already set their sights against Beria.
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Stalin was not an anti-Semite. Some in the intelligentsia however were anti-Semitic. Some such as Philosopher Dmitrii Chesnokov started making anti-semitic propaganda...and there were others. They were opposed by most of the intelligentsia...I guess this really shows the character of the Soviet Union. It was not a monolithic dictatorship by Stalin where whatever he said was the law and the only law of the land. In fact...Stalin had little to do with what happened. There were many contradictory views among the Soviet intelligentisa and government on various issues. Unfortunately...by the late 40s and 1950s...the revisionsist which would later rule the USSR...were gaining more and more influence and making their voice hear more and more. People like Dimitri Chesnokov published a letter where he called for the Jews to be deported. He was harshly put down by people like Ilya Erenburg.
My belief...that I have had for a long time...is that WW2 really did defeat the USSR. WW2 halted socialist construction and fatally weakened the Soviet political system through years of inactivity and harsh repression druing war time. When they came out of WW2...they never again regained the momentum...and revisionsits were able to come into power and undermine Stalin and undermine socialist development.
For that I accuse Stalin of not being vigilent enough...
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism, since it is the merger of state and corporate power."-- Benito Mussolini
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