This section of the exposition begins in 1917, the year that became known in the
history of the Soviet Union as the so–called “October Revolution.”
At the time even Lenin and the other leaders of the Communist Party did not
call this a revolution but a “coup”. It was only later that this event was mythologized and imbued with total Bolshevik revolutionary zeal. In fact, there was no storm.
ing of the Winter Palace, and those scenes that were screened in cinemas and the
mass media for many decades were an outright lie. The key element of the Bolshevik
philosophy was concealed in all sorts of ways from the very outset, when the
Bolsheviks grounded all of their great plans and hopes in violence. After all, it was
extremely difficult to govern such a huge country as the Soviet Union, rocked and
torn apart by national differences. Soon–in December 1917–the Bolsheviks created the “All–Russian Extraordinary Commission to Combat Counterrevolution and
Sabotage” (VChK, or Cheka).
Panel no. 6 reveals the history of the creation of the VChK, which was headed by
Feliks Dzerzhinsky, an extraordinarily cruel and blunt individual with a great deal of
experience in conspiratorial work, who skillfully gathered likeminded
people to his circle. The panel includes photographs of Dzerzhinsky in
the company of Ukrainian Chekistsand a portrait of Vasyl Mantsev, one of
the first heads of the Ukrainian Cheka, who was sent to Ukraine from
Moscow. In Ukraine the organs of both the All–Russian Cheka and the
Ukrainian Cheka were always headed not by local cadres (the first Ukrainian–born leader of the Central
Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine [CC CPU] was appointed only in 1953) but those who were dispatched from the “Centre”–Moscow.
One of the attributes of the
activity of the Cheka and the CC CPU
in Ukraine was that from the very
beginning of their pursuits these
institutions actively discredited themselves. Their structures were comprised not only of members of the Bolshevik Party but also various types of oppor.
tunists-people seeking to adapt themselves to the circumstances. One of these
individuals, the commandant of the Kharkiv Cheka, Stepan Saienko, is shown in
one of the pictures. The caption to this photograph is based on a quotation from
a book describing Saienko’s activity during the mass executions of 1919. After carrying out all these horrific acts, this man became a factory director and was
named honourary citizen of Kharkiv. Another picture shows the female executioner Dora Yevlinska, who personally shot four hundred officers in the Cheka
headquarters in the city of Odesa. There are several other, similar, photographs–all horrifying, but genuine.
Control over Ukraine’s territory passed from one power to the next. During the
Civil War a special commission was organized to investigate the crimes of the Cheka.
The documentary materials of this commission have been preserved, as well as photographs showing that people were savagely interrogated, tortured, and killed for
political motives. Thus, methods that as a rule are attributed to the 1930s had already
been tested as early as the 1920s.
A key question that is perpetually raised is, did Lenin know about these crimes,
and to what degree was he complicit in them? Documents published in recent years
prove that Lenin was completely familiar with this state of affairs, and in certain letters he even demanded that “tougher people” be found. In the early 1920s he
ordered the Ukrainian Chekists to be “cleaned up” and to “do away with” the most
odious individuals. Thus, from the earliest years of the Soviet Union’s existence
there is clear evidence of the introduction of violence, which was the foundation of
the totalitarian Communist system.
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