27 February 1937 year
People's Commissar of Communications of the USSR arrested in Moscow Alexey Rykov and a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) Nikolai Bukharin — "senior Bolsheviks," Lenin's comrades. The final liquidation of the "old Leninist guard" and the peak of the Great Terror.
We can only have two parties: one in the Kremlin, the other in prison.
(Nikolai Bukharin)
Immediately after the Bolshevik victory in 1917, Rykov briefly headed the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs. After Lenin's death, he headed the Council of People's Commissars and even appeared on the cover of Time magazine.
Bukharin was Lenin's closest associate, editor of Pravda and Izvestia, and one of the authors of the 1936 USSR Constitution. He addressed Stalin informally, drew friendly caricatures of him, and Stalin affectionately called him "little Bukharin."
Bukharin and Rykov were seasoned revolutionaries, having survived several exiles and arrests, and emigrated during the Tsarist era. Both helped Stalin deal with their main rivals— Trotsky, Kamenev и Zinoviev.
Both fell out of favor in the late 1920s, when they diverged from Stalin over their views on the country's future development. They advocated the continuation of the New Economic Policy (NEP), gradual industrialization, and support for the peasantry. They opposed forced collectivization, repression, and the violent "great turning point."
Bukharin proposed equating the "kulaks" with other village residents. He called Stalin's approach "adventuristic," and the leader himself a "petty Eastern despot."
These views [of Bukharin and his group] are incompatible with the party line
(Stalin, Plenum of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks), April 1929)
In 1937, Bukharin and Rykov became the main defendants in the trial of the "Anti-Soviet Right-Trotskyist Bloc" (Bukharin was arrested right there in the Kremlin). They were accused of treason, espionage, sabotage, terrorism, wrecking, undermining the military power of the USSR, and provoking a military attack by foreign powers on the USSR.
They were also accused of murder. Kirov и Gorky, assassination attempts on Lenin and Stalin. As well as the most outrageous acts of sabotage—including coal mine explosions and train accidents.
Stalin suggested "not taking the case to court, but sending it to the NKVD." Under torture, both Bukharin and Rykov incriminated themselves and confessed.
I plead guilty to treason against the socialist homeland, to organizing kulak uprisings, and to preparing terrorist acts. The enormity of my crimes is immeasurable.
(from Bukharin's last words)
In a letter to Stalin, Bukharin denied all accusations and asked to be given the opportunity to commit suicide.
I beg you in advance, I implore you by everything you hold dear, to replace the execution with me drinking poison in my cell. Let me spend my last seconds the way I want. Have mercy!
(from Bukharin's letter to Stalin)
Rykov, however, admitted his mistakes, repented, and asked for clemency. According to witnesses, after the beating, he said he "fell into despair."
I want those who have not yet been exposed and disarmed to do so immediately and openly. Help the government expose and eliminate the remnants of the counterrevolutionary organization's tail.
(from Rykov's last words)
On March 13, 1938, both were sentenced to death and executed on March 15.
The third person on the execution list was the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs. Henry Berry - He was the only one who was never rehabilitated after Stalin's death.
According to one version, Bukharin and Yagoda were forced to watch the execution of the remaining convicts and were executed last.
The so-called NKVD organs are a degenerate organization of unprincipled, corrupt, well-off officials who, to please Stalin's morbid suspicion, in pursuit of medals and glory, commit their vile deeds, incidentally, not realizing that they are simultaneously destroying themselves - history does not tolerate witnesses to dirty deeds!
(from Bukharin's "Testament" before his execution, 1938)