Sergei Melgunov's The Red Terror

[MundoRojo]

Warning: (Probable sexual?) Violence and gore. What do comrades here think of this book? it was written by this Right SR emigre historian of the Revolution and Civil War. I haven't read all of it, but parts, and I'm getting the impression that Chekists really did function as pigs with constant over the top mass murders, torturing and extortion in many situations where it made no sense. The only criticism I've encountered of the work yet was a neglible comment by Jon Smele (in his bibliography on the russian revolution) on its "inaccuracy" and "outdatedness", yet it still remains an "account of Bolshevik atrocities". So, since this is likely to have some resemblence to reality, what do comrades here think of this book, and the actions of the Bolsheviks?

You can find a pdf of this book on libgen. I skipped the translator's preface, so I can't really advise what to warn here of, and there are graphic pictures of supposed victims.

[Illegalitarian]

Not sure I'd trust the word of a Right SR member on the accuracy of what was and wasn't done by the Bolsheviks. Sounds kind of shady

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

Melgunov wasn't even a member of the (right-) Eser party; he was a Popular Socialist, a member of a rightward split from the Esers close to Kerensky's Trudoviks. As a whiteguard, he had an obvious interest in portraying the Bolsheviks negatively, and his methodology was, ah, sloppy at best, given how much it relied on his personal notebooks chronicling rumours of executions etc. (Not that he could have had access to more reliable statistics, of course, but it does make his claims suspect.) To make matters worse he himself was arrested and - released. Such is life.

[Rafiq]

What I find truly remarkable about the inherently pathological tall tales of horror about the Bolsehviks, even up to World War two, is how accurately they confirm the famous quote from Hegel: The gaze that sees evil all around it is itself evil. Any idiot with a semblance of an understanding of how the Bolsheivks approached death was that, for the most part, they were initially softies who detested murder of all sorts. Lenin had initially remarked that they wanted to do everything they could to not resort to the terror of the french revolution, and it was so painfully true! I cannot remember the name, but I remember the Bolsheviks, before the terror having released one of the most ruthless white generals even though his counter-revolutionary activities were well known. Even Serge, who would go on to say that the terror was a blunder, admitted that he should have been shot on the spot. Speaking of whom, Serge would later recall: Once in Kharkov I dined with Dzerzhinsky and K. Radek. Dz. told the story that during the Red Terror he would sometimes use a subterfuge which consisted in publishing executions that hadn’t taken place. This produced the needed effect and lives were saved. Dz said: ‘Our Chekists had a bit of the saint and the assassin...’ Radek abruptly asked him: ‘And you? What do you think you are? Saint or bandit?’ Dz. became pale, his lips tightened, he rose from the table and he left.

https://www.marxists.org/archive/serge/1944/notebooks.htm

The Bolsheviks were largely traumatized, both systemically and personally, on the measures that they had to take to protect the revolution. That is the "horror" these reactionaries like to talk about. The only thing close to what they have accused the Soviet government during this period were acts of brutality carried out by the white terror, ultimately confirming the fact that these accusations were leveled against the Bolsheviks because they were, in effect, brutalities that were to be expected from self-experience. Needless to say, there were abuses among the Cheka, but they were not systemic, and the leaders often executed or severely punished Chekas who were found to have been openly engaging in abuse, even during the height of the red terror.

[Illegalitarian]

I think the crimes of the Bolsheviks are over exaggerated, but I'm not sure If it's accurate to paint them as big teddy bears, either.

A lot of these people are the same people who would later sign off on the forced resettlement of entire ethnic groups, who were behind some of the worst excesses of the period that came to be known as The Great Terror

[MundoRojo]

I see. Can anyone recommend me some better works/systematic studies on the Red Terror and early Cheka?