The 14th All-Union Communist Party Conference
Late April, 1925. Stalin's study.
Boris Bazhanov, personal secretary and aide to the General Secretary, stood before the desk with a file open in his hands and read the report without the slightest deviation from protocol.
"According to the letter from Comrade Mikoyan, Comrade Yakov Iosifovich arrived in Leningrad last week. He also passed the interview for the Red Army Military-Political School by unanimous vote and was admitted at the head of his class, and—"
"Bazhanov."
Stalin cut him off.
"Yes, Comrade General Secretary!"
"What day is it today?"
"The twenty-sixth of April!"
"The twenty-sixth of April... And tomorrow's schedule?"
"Comrade General Secretary's schedule for the twenty-seventh of April is as follows: ahead of the 14th All-Union Communist Party Conference, a meeting with Ivan Tovstukha, Head of the Secret Department of the Central Committee, who has completed his research on the thesis of Socialism in One Country, after which— ah!"
Bazhanov froze mid-sentence. He hurriedly set the file down on the desk and dropped to the floor.
"I-I'm sorry, Comrade Stalin! With the All-Union Communist Party Conference — a matter of such importance — right before us, I went and talked about Comrade Stalin's son! I have committed a mortal offense!"
"Reporting on my son's whereabouts is a mortal offense now, is it? Heh heh..."
Stalin offered a kindly smile, but Bazhanov knew better. At this moment, Stalin was furious that he had not received the report he actually wanted — and every secretary who had failed to read his mood had been packed off on a "business trip" to Siberia.
"Th-that concludes the account of Comrade Yakov Dzhugashvili's activities. Next is the report on the Socialism in One Country thesis!"
"Good. Now you're getting it. That's the one. Hahaha!"
Stalin laughed heartily and flicked his hand. Bazhanov knew perfectly well what that gesture meant.
"I'll report back shortly, Comrade Stalin!"
Bazhanov scooped up the armful of files he had brought and hurried out of the study — completely forgetting, on his way out, the one folder he had set down on the desk.
The door shut with a dull click. Stalin picked up the file Bazhanov had left behind.
A match hissed. The pipe was lit again, and Stalin began to read the report on Yakov's activities.
Yakov Iosifovich is a very different boy from the one I remember.
He speaks less now, and there is a new depth in the way he looks at people.
I cannot say what changed him, but Comrade Yakov is no longer the frightened child he once was.
— A. Mikoyan
Reading Mikoyan's brief assessment, Stalin's brow furrowed.
"He's changed..."
He tapped his pipe against the ashtray. Stalin knew all too well that Yakov had transformed overnight. In the end, the changed Yakov had satisfied him. But that was a separate matter. Stalin had no intention of quietly letting go a son who had defied an order from the General Secretary. Sending Yakov Dzhugashvili to the Red Army Military-Political School instead of the Leningrad Polytechnic Institute had been born of precisely that impulse.
"Kato."
The transformation of a son he had not seen in a full fifteen years.
"Yakov takes after you. He is far too tender by nature. But in the Union, a man like that cannot survive for long. So..."
Stalin closed his eyes quietly as he read that change, and he prayed.
Then he pulled Bazhanov's report from the file and placed it in a secret drawer. Inside that drawer lay a single letter, written by someone.
A knock at the door.
"Lev Mekhlis, Comrade General Secretary."
At the voice of his subordinate from beyond the door, Stalin snapped back to himself.
"Come in."
Mekhlis opened the door and stepped into the office. In his hands was another stack of documents awaiting approval.
The moment Mekhlis entered the General Secretary's study, his eyes caught Bazhanov's file, tossed carelessly across the desk.
"...I'll deal with Bazhanov myself."
Mekhlis said it in a low voice.
"Leave it, my friend."
Stalin smiled and waved him off.
"Comrade Bazhanov is a sharp, quick-witted fellow in his own right. Let him be."
"Understood, Comrade General Secretary."
Mekhlis bowed his head evenly.
"...In that case, I'll handle Comrade Mikoyan's letter — including the report on Comrade Yakov Iosifovich — at my own discretion."
"Hahaha! Yes. That's my First Aide for you! I'm not that damned old Brusilov. Do I need a report on every last thing the boy does?"
Mekhlis did not answer. He simply bowed his head. The General Secretary, as Mekhlis had come to understand him, was a rather inscrutable superior — a man who never stated his true opinion directly to those beneath him. The senior aides who had failed to grasp his meaning at once had been swept aside like refuse tumbling from a winter sky, and Lev Mekhlis had barely escaped that fate himself to stand here before Stalin.
And the real meaning behind Stalin's words this time was this: I will demand a report on the boy's activities without warning, so always have one ready.
"Next is the report from Leningrad."
Mekhlis flipped through the file tucked under his arm and continued.
"Comrade Brusilov, who had intended to go to Czechoslovakia for convalescence, has changed his destination to Leningrad. Deputy Commander Shaposhnikov has accepted the proposal. Comrade Messing's resignation as branch chief has been accepted. Comrade Yagoda has taken over as branch chief. Comrade Mikoyan has begun making contact with the deputies of the Leningrad Soviet..."
As Stalin absorbed the contents of the report Mekhlis recited, he simultaneously reviewed the dispatches that had arrived from the First Secretaries of the Ukrainian SSR, the Byelorussian SSR, and the Transcaucasian SFSR. His two hands moved swiftly across the documents. His eyes read the papers; his ears took in Mekhlis's briefing. Inside his mind, no fewer than four separate streams of information were sorted into their respective compartments.
This had been routine ever since Stalin assumed the post of General Secretary. He firmly believed that he alone could govern the Union — and he was the superhuman who actually did it.
"...That is all."
"Finished? Good. Then let's change venues. Bring me every item on the agenda for tomorrow's Party Conference."
"E-every item... Understood, Comrade General Secretary!"
Mekhlis clicked his tongue inwardly. The agenda items that would come up over the three days of the Conference were limited in number.
I. Cooperatives
II. The Agricultural Tax
III. The Metals Industry
IV. Results Report of the Comintern Executive Committee Regarding Party Policy
V. The Line on Socialism in One Country
The categories themselves were few. But the theses and supporting materials attached to each item were stacked as tall as a man. And Stalin had ordered him to fetch them for the express purpose of reading every last page.
He's going to read the entire Conference draft in a single night...? Comrade General Secretary really isn't... human.
Mekhlis shook his head inwardly and stepped outside.
A short while later, Stalin's secretarial staff gathered up the relevant documents in armfuls and moved with him to the Kremlin's private cinema. Stalin was the man who had taken Lenin's words — Of all the arts, the most important for us is the cinema — more seriously than anyone. Whenever something important lay ahead, or whenever he needed to concentrate, he would always put on a film and work through approval documents or read reports by its light.
A match hissed. Calmly lighting his pipe, Stalin read through the Conference theses. He sat in that one seat for a full fifteen hours and mastered every document.
And at last, the morning of April 27th arrived — the day the 14th All-Union Communist Party Conference would convene.
April 27th, 1925. The Bolshoi Theatre.
Convened to resolve major political and economic questions in advance of the All-Union Communist Party Congress, the Conference was attended by one hundred seventy-eight delegates and three hundred ninety-two non-voting Party members.
The man who announced the opening was one of Lenin's oldest comrades, a pillar of the Troika, and Chairman of the Moscow City Soviet: Lev Kamenev.
"First, a moment of silence in memory of the departed."
Some six hundred Communist Party members bowed their heads as one, mourning the communists who had died that year.
Next, it was Felix Dzerzhinsky's turn to present, on Stalin's behalf, the theses on Socialism in One Country and the Three-Year Plan for the construction of new metalworks.
However—
Kamenev had abruptly changed the order of thesis presentations.
A thunder of applause erupted.
"Waaaaah!!!"
"Hurrah for the Comintern!!!"
The delegation from Leningrad rose as one, clapping and cheering. Dzerzhinsky, who had been announced in advance as the presenter, made no effort to hide his dismay, and the men of Stalin's faction around him began exchanging glances, watching the General Secretary's face.
Kamenev... Don't tell me even you meant to betray me...?
From a distance, Stalin looked at Kamenev and Zinoviev and muttered under his breath, swallowing his rage. This Conference would end in a decision against Stalin's faction. Having already reached that conclusion, he ground his teeth and glared at Zinoviev.
Damn you... Zinoviev, you bastard...!
He could not yet overcome their power. But the Party Congress in December would be a different matter. Stalin vowed that he would punish the Troika for this betrayal.