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Table of Contents
The Complete Maisky Diaries: Volume 1
  • 27 October 1937
  • 12 July
  • 18 July
  • 9 August
  • 30 October
  • 31 October
  • 1 November
  • 4 November
  • 5 November
  • 6 November
  • 7 November
  • 9 November
  • 10 November
  • 12 November
  • 15 November
  • 16 November
  • 17 November
  • 18 November
  • 23 November
  • 24 November
  • 25 November
  • 27 November
  • 28 November
  • 29 November
  • 1 December
  • 5 December
  • 6 December
  • 11 December
  • 13 December
  • 16 December
  • 17 December
  • 18 December
  • 19 December
  • 20 December
  • 24 December
  • 27 December
  • 31 December
  • 8 January
  • 9 January
  • 15 January
  • 18 January
  • 25 January
  • 26 January
  • 28 January
  • 1 February
  • 4 February
  • 6 February
  • 10 February
  • 12 February
  • 14 February
  • 15 February
  • 20 February
  • 21 February
  • 22 February
  • 28 February
  • 1 March (1)
  • 1 March (2)
  • 2 March
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  • 6 March
  • 7 March
  • 8 March
  • 9 March
  • 11 March
  • 12 March
  • 13 March
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  • 3 June
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  • 12 June
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  • 19 June
  • 27 June
  • 2 July
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  • 4 November
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  • 26 January
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  • 1 December
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  • 1 December
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  • 28 January
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  • 1 March
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  • PS 1 October
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  • 22 September
  • 23 September
  • 24 September
  • 25 September
  • 26 September
  • 27 September
  • 28 September
  • 29 September
  • 30 September
  • 1 October
  • 6 October
  • 11 October
  • 13 October
  • 15 October
  • 17 October
  • 19 October
  • 20 October
  • 22 October
  • 25 October
  • 26 October
  • 27 October
  • 28 October
  • 30 October
  • 31 October
  • 1 November
  • 3 November
  • 9 November
  • 15 November
  • 16 November
  • 17 November
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  • 7 December
  • 11 December
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  • 19 December
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© 2025
1 December
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By Liakhovetsky, Ivan Mikhailovich (Maisky)

The Complete Maisky Diaries: Volume 1

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1 December


Page 43

A terrible disaster! Comrade Kirov
Sergei Mironovich Kirov (Kostrikov), first secretary of the Leningrad Regional Committee of the CPSU, 1926–34, member of the party’s Politburo from 1930.
has been killed in the Smolny in Leningrad. Who killed him? With what motives? Who sent him?… As yet, I know nothing. Fleet Street is thick with rumours and alternative versions. Some say that the assassin was an engineer with a grudge against Kirov. Others (the Daily Express) suggest that Alfred Rosenberg,
Alfred Rosenberg, editor of the Nazi Party newspaper Völkischer Beobachter; minister for eastern occupied territories, 1941–44.
Hitler’s aide-de-camp, had a hand in it. I know only one thing for sure: the obituary signed by Stalin, Molotov, Voroshilov
Kliment Efremovich Voroshilov, people’s commissar for defence, 1934–40; marshal of the Soviet Union from 1935; commander-in-chief of the Soviet forces in the war against Finland, 1939–40; deputy chairman of the USSR Council of People’s Commissars, 1940–45; commander-in-chief of the north-west armies and of the Leningrad front, 1941.
and others (I caught it on the radio) states that ‘the assassin was dispatched by class enemies’.
At the 17th Congress of the CPSU, the so-called ‘Victory Congress’, Kirov delivered a fiery speech which received a tumultuous ovation – in contrast to the reception of Stalin’s rather uninspiring oratory. It has since often been suggested that the assassination was related to the political threat Kirov posed to Stalin in 1934. Earlier on, J. Haslam in The Soviet Union and the Struggle for Collective Security in Europe, 1933–39 (New York, 1984), pp. 408–9, had discharged any evidence as being ‘thin and based largely on conjecture’. More recently, Khlevniuk in Master of the House, pp. 65–8, 108–16, 128–9, has convincingly dismissed the persisting entrenched views on the basis of a thorough survey of the Russian archives. Both have further demonstrated how Stalin exploited the event to unleash the Great Terror, issuing a directive on the day of the assassination advocating harsh treatment (including the death penalty) for suspected terrorists. See also R.J. Overy, The Dictators: Hitler’s Germany and Stalin’s Russia (New York, 2004), pp. 51–3. Stalin’s complicity was vehemently denied by Molotov, who was present when Stalin received news of the assassination and personally took charge of the investigation the following day in Leningrad, interrogating the assassin, Nikolaev; see A. Resis (ed.), Molotov Remembers: Inside Kremlin politics, conversations with Felix Chuev (Chicago, 1993), pp. 218–22. Amy Knight adds no fresh evidence, though in Who Killed Kirov? The Kremlin’s greatest mystery (New York, 1999) she attributes its absence to the efforts undertaken by the Russians to block access to relevant archival sources. Recently declassified archival documents pertaining to Kirov’s death, however, confirm that Nikolaev acted on his own initiative and that his was a crime of passion, not a plot by counter-revolutionary terrorist groups, as Stalin’s baseless version would have it. It was typical of Maisky to initially take Stalin’s account at face value and endorse it, but then later, perceiving the consequences, to maintain a low profile.
We got news of the assassination at around 9 p.m. By 11.30 p.m. the Ozerskys,
Aleksandr Vladimirovich Ozersky, head of the Soviet trade mission in Great Britain, 1931–37. Recalled to Moscow, arrested and executed. Rehabilitated posthumously.
Alperovich, and Kagan had all gathered in my office. We all felt like being together, seeking sympathy in the collective and an outlet for our agitation. We talked, exchanging thoughts, suppositions and conjectures. We sent the following telegram to Moscow:
To Stalin and Molotov, Moscow. Profoundly shocked at the news of the tragic death of Comrade Kirov, who has perished at the hands of a class enemy, we mourn the heavy loss together with the whole Soviet country. The death of Comrade Kirov, who always set an example of selfless devotion to the cause of the working class and the Soviet state, will only make us – together with all workers, peasants, and public servants in the Soviet Union – close ranks ever more tightly around the Central Committee of the Party, its leader Comrade Stalin, and the Soviet government, in the name of the great struggle for the building of socialism and the creation of a classless society. On behalf of the Soviet community in London, Maisky and Ozersky.
It’s simply horrid! An entirely unexpected break in the path of development which our country has been following for the past year. The sooner I find out all the details, the easier it will be to judge the significance of this tragic event in the Smolny.
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Document Details
Document Title1 December
AuthorLiakhovetsky, Ivan Mikhailovich (Maisky)
RecipientN/A
RepositoryN/A
ID #N/A
DescriptionN/A
Date1934 Dec 1
AOC VolumeThe Complete Maisky Diaries: Volume 1
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