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blotting out the memory of Lenin and Trotsky, the real creators of the
Red Army, and of Tukachevsky, who modernized and motorized it. But
since she mentions Frunze's death, why doesn't Mrs. Strong also mention
the peculiar circumstances in which it took place. As for Voroshilov, why
has Stalin relieved him of his command? Mrs. Strong, who knows every·
thing, misses many such opportunities to demonstrate her knowledge.
Neither she nor Mr. Duranty nor Mr. Davies are any more enlighten·
ing on the Moscow Trials. In all three books one finds very little new
either as information or argument. And the few new departures ventured
by these authors cannot withstand the slightest scrutiny.
Mr. Davies, for example, is particularly anxious to exculpate Stalin
personally: "Moreover, generally speaking, in diplomatic circles here
responsibility for these executions, in a strictly personal sense, is not
attributed to Stalin." (Which is important evidence about ... diplomatic
circles.) But Mr. Duranty writes:
In Moscow after the trial I was told that Ordjonikidze, the
late Commissar of Heavy Industry, one of Stalin's oldest and
nearest friends, went to Stalin to beg Piatakov's life. "I need
him," he said, "the country needs him. I know that he is guilty
of treason, but nevertheless he's the brains in our heavy industry.
Surely, what he has done for us can be balanced against what he
has done against us." "No," said Stalin. "But I need him,"
Ordjonikidze insisted, "and what's more, I will answer for him
personally." "No," said Stalin. "He must die."
Whether this story is true or not, everybody except Mr. Davies and
his "diplomatic circles" knows that Stalin decides everything. Mr. Davies
present-day ignorance is all the more inexpliiable in vjew of the fact that
Mr. Duranty, to whom he pays his respects several times in his book, was
one of his chief sources of information while he was in Russia.
Mr. Davies' book has at least this to be said for it: in his innocence,
the author sheds some light on one aspect of the Trials. We are told that
at the time of the Radek Trial, Mr. Davies personally saved the life of a
certain Vladimir Romm, former Tass correspondent in Washington, who,
like all the rest, had confessed to all sorts of imaginary crimes. This inter–
vention he made at the request of Mr. Arthur Krock of the
N. Y. Times,
acting in the name of "all members of the Washington newspaper corps"
to guarantee the perfect Soviet loyalty of Romm. Despite the overwhelm·
ing guilt indicated by Romm's confession, the intervention was successful.
Naive, ignorant and ... diplomatic as Mr. Davies is, he cannot even
pretend to believe that Molotov made the decision. It was Stalin, and
Stalin alone, who could make it. That is to say, Stalin refused Ordjoni–
kidze's plea for Piatakov (and, in fact, had Ordjonidze himself "liqui–
dated," something Messers Davies and Duranty forget to mention). But
he
spared Romm at Mr. Davies' request, so as not to provoke the members
of
~he
Washington newspaper corps, whom at the time he had his own
reasons for cultivating. Where is the justice in all this?
