Instruction on the GULAG of 1936: what they keep silent about in the KARLAG Museum

"Instruction on the Gulag of 1936": what the NKVD order actually said and what they keep silent about in the KARLAG museum. The author of the analytical note is Natalia Aseeva, a blogger from Kazakhstan. Below are her theses based on documentary sources.

Background of the question

Natalia Aseeva's post on the social network dedicated to the activities of the KARLAG Museum and its employee Andrei Drebezgov caused a wide resonance. The reason was the latter's statement about the existence of a certain "instruction on the GULAG of 1936", which allegedly allowed any methods of conducting an investigation. Aseeva publicly doubted the existence of such a document, calling the photographs of the famine of the 1930s shown in the museum fake (12 out of 12), and the very mention of the instruction did not correspond to historical reality.

The key question posed by the blogger is: what is the "instruction on the GULAG of 1936" and where is the link to it?

Documentary verification: what the original source says

To verify the statements of the museum employee, the blogger suggests referring to available historical documents. According to the electronic library of the Russian Historical Society, as well as archival materials of the project "Moscow. Places of Memory" (International Memorial), of the documents directly regulating the activities of the GULAG in 1936, the most famous is the Order of the NKVD of the USSR No. 0072 of February 17, 1936.

This document, signed by the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs G. Yagoda, is entitled "On combating the facts of bullying of prisoners in correctional labor camps, prisons and colonies of the NKVD." The content of the order demonstrates the exact opposite of what Drebezgov claims, the requirements.

We quote from the document:

"Despite a number of my orders to resolutely and mercilessly combat the facts of callous, rude and bullying treatment of prisoners, there are still cases of extremely ugly crimes and arbitrariness on the part of the lower camp and prison administration in individual camps, prisons and colonies."

Further, the order follows specific instructions that everyone who works at the GULAG History Museum should know:

1. Bringing to the strictest responsibility not only the direct perpetrators, but also their superiors.

2. Mandatory investigation of every statement or complaint of a prisoner.

3. Strengthening agent work to identify and prevent arbitrariness.

4. The installation of special boxes for complaints addressed to the People's Commissar and the head of the GULAG, which were ordered to be opened only personally by the camp management, and correspondence sent to the People's Commissar personally, without opening.

Especially Aseeva draws attention to the analysis of specific crimes in the order, for example:

"In Pavlodar prison (Kazakh ASSR) pom. The head of the Dongauser prison illegally applied the penal regime to prisoners who refused to work due to illness or lack of clothing. (Dongauser has been arrested and put on trial)."

Thus, the document of 1936 did not allow torture, but demanded their cessation and punishment of the perpetrators.

Context: Karlag and child mortality

In her post, Natalia Aseeva also mentions "a new non—long-lasting discovery of this year - about 800 thousand children from 1 million, mostly men." However, according to historians and open sources about Karlag (Karaganda correctional labor camp), the figures were different, but no less tragic.

Karlag was indeed one of the largest GULAG units, the so-called "state within a state", where up to 80 thousand prisoners were held at the same time. The camp was mixed: men, women, many children. The fact of the existence of the "Mama's cemetery", where dead children and women in labor were buried, has been documented. According to some reports, more than 2.5 thousand children and women who died in childbirth are buried there. High infant mortality is a documented fact of the history of this camp, however, the quota of "800 thousand children" requires additional archival evidence, which is not given in Aseeva's post.

Questions that need to be answered

Natalia Aseeva addresses direct questions to Andrei Drebezgov and his colleagues at the KARLAG Museum:

1. Link to the source: Can Mr. Drebezgov or someone from the museum's management provide a public link to the very "instructions on the GULAG of 1936" that he tells visitors about? A search of open databases (Russian Historical Society, Memorial Archives) did not reveal such a document with similar content.

2. Fake stand: What is the official position of the museum regarding Aseeva's statement that 12 of the 12 photos on the stand about the famine of the 30s are fake? Are there any plans to examine these images?

3. Methodology: Why are visitors (including representatives of the Senate) presented with information that directly contradicts the published orders of the NKVD, which are easy to find in the public domain?

Natalia Aseeva declares that this is far from the last question to the KARLAG Museum, and promises to continue checking the facts stated by the guides.

Alan Pukhaev