"Spies and Wreckers"

No. 1 bogie of the Soviet Union is exiled Leon Trotsky. No. 2 is "espionage." carried out by "agents of Germany and Japan" who. according to Russia's official press, "swarm the country." In yet another effort to stamp out these twin enemies, the Kremlin last week was full of the bustle of spring cleaning.

Executions-- In Svobodny, a small Siberian town near the Manchukuan frontier. 44 Russian men and women were lined up before firing squads, shot dead. Not until after eleven days did news reach Moscow and the world. The Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the U. S. S. R. had found all guilty of spying, of plotting railway wrecks in Siberian military areas "on orders of the Japanese Secret Service."

At Tiflis, few miles from the birthplace of Stalin, in the Georgian Socialist Soviet Republic, at least 20 more "spies and wreckers" were "completely destroyed" last week for aiming "at the establishment of an independent republic under the protection of a certain capitalistic power." Among those shot was Budu Mdivani, once reported to be a brother of the Marrying Mdivanis (score: Pola Negri, Mary McCormic, Louise Astor van Alen, Barbara Hutton) but disowned as such by curly-haired Prince David Mdivani (Mae Murray). During last January's treason trial Budu Mdivani's name was mentioned in connection with a conspiracy to overthrow Communism by helping Germany and Japan defeat Russia in a war.

In the North Caucasus region, preparations were afoot last week for yet another treason trial of railway chiefs and others, charged with causing 17 train wrecks in January alone. Many of the accused have already confessed, including one Burstein, head of the Mineralnye Vody traffic department. Pravda, official news-organ of the Communist Party, urged the Soviet to make its enemies "pay with gallons of blood for every drop of workers' blood they shed."

Trade Unions-- After a three-week session of the Central Trade Union Council, Director Zharikov of the Bureau of Foreign Workers, Director Kotov, lately chief of the Social Insurance Bureau, Assistant Director Antoshkin of the Scientific Research Institute and Comrade Miliutan, editor of a trade union magazine--all four of them prominent trade union officials--were arrested on charges of "malfeasance, Trotskyism and sabotage." The Council further charged the trade unions as a whole with neglecting their main duty, the social welfare of the worker--supervising sanatoriums, sick benefits, old age benefits.* A Stalin-inspired ultimatum thundered that the trade unions must be overhauled, converted into thoroughgoing "Schools of Communism."

The Army. Ordered established in all military districts were war councils of three, similar to those set up in the infancy of the Russian Revolution when a Red Army was being licked into shape by ex-Tsarist officers who had to be watched closely for signs of treachery. Stalin thus aimed last week at uncovering incipient Trotskyism or other heresies in his hitherto potent military commanders, who in future must get their orders countersigned by at least one other council member (probably a civilian) mainly interested in the welfare of the Communist Party.

This shakeup followed the demotion week before of Mikhail Nikolaivich Tukhachevsky, youngest and most brilliant of the Soviet's five field marshals. For some reason not officially explained he was stripped of his office--Vice Commissar for Defense--and sidetracked to a comparatively insignificant Volga military district immune from foreign invasion, with headquarters at Kuibishev. All that Russians knew was that he had been "mentioned with suspicion" by the prosecuting GPU during last January's trial of "Trotskyites. " He was entirely absolved, but it was expected in Moscow that "something might happen to him" because sudden misfortunes had befallen others similarly "mentioned." Foreign newshawks in Moscow thought that last week's army reorganization solved the problem of Tukhachevsky's demotion--Tukhachevsky was known to favor a small mobile army commanded by 100% professional officers. He may have been obstreperously opposed to civilians helping to rule the military roost.

*In Russia, trade unions do not call strikes or agitate for higher wages for workers since the State regulates these and the workers are supposed to be the State.

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