Write An Essay On The Gulag History

To begin with, this book educated the reader about the past. Everyone in the Soviet Union looked up to the leader, Stalin, even though he wasn’t a good leader at all. He caused many problems for the citizens including uncomfortable living conditions. This book educates the reader by showing that back then even when people were treated badly, they still had to look up to their leader even though he was the cause of all

Often situated in cold and remote regions, they housed millions of prisoners, especially in the late 1930s. Conditions were inhumane and death rates were high for the prisoners. They were still heavily used after 1945 though fell into disuse after Stalin’s death.

When World War II ended, concentration camps that the Nazis had used for imprisonment of many victims of the war and the Nazi regime, which had supposedly been abolished, were now converted by the Soviet powers. They were used for active Nazis and those who opposed the communism regime

These camps were mostly in Siberia, a land rich with resources like coal, ore and oil, but often lacking essential things like warmth and food. Stalin would often send people to the GULAGs for any reason, such as stealing a loaf of bread or failing to meet the quota of wheat on the commune, and often for higher profile cases, Stalin would send the person up for a fixed public trial as was noted by by the French ambassador in 1938 (Doc 11). According to The Great Conquest, the amount of people that were imprisoned or died at the GULAGs were numbering around 3 million (Doc 12). However, without the GULAGs Stalin would never have managed to industrialize the USSR, and the plans definitely put the USSR as one of the premier industrial powers in Europe (Doc 6). The cost on the people of the USSR was far too great to sustain however, and the GULAGs ended up killing over 2 million people (Doc

While under Joseph Stalin, the Great Terror was a time in which had caused constant fear of authority through means that were harmful. It contained the cruelest of tortures, interrogations, and the fearful abuse of human dignity. Joseph Stalin was a cruel leader who had applied vast powers of the Soviet government to control the real, and even imagined opposition to his rule (Doc. C), establishing himself as a dictator. The amount of Soviet people believed to have been killed by Stalin’s government between 1937 and 1938 are around 681,692 people. It is said that around 1,000 people were executed each day (Doc. C).

The aim of this work is to answer the question, “Can we generalize why certain people were able to survive more than others”? To survive the Gulag, many prisoners had to fight with others for food, shelter, and simple medical care. Certain prisoners went into religious and intellectual medications to preserve at least the appearance of intelligence. The survival required willpower, strength of mind, skills, mercilessness, and a lot of luck.

The Soviet Union created a system that forced prisoners to constantly fight with each other. Being imprisoned led up to despair. Many were driven to commit

prisoners would work up to 14 hours a day doing extremely hard labor, in very bad conditions, and extreme climates. Some prisoners cut down trees with hand-saws and axes. Some dug frozen ground with pickaxes. Some mined coal and copper. Prisoners barely had enough food to deal with the extreme labor they were being put through. In 20 months, prisoners of the Gulag built the White Sea-Baltic Sea Canal. Over 100,000 prisoners dug out a 141 mile long canal with just simple tools. Many prisoners died during that construction, and in the end it was too shallow to carry most ships. To the guards the prisoners had no value, they could replace them with another person. Kolyma was said to be the worst of all of Gulag. It was the coldest, and most isolated camp. Women also had to work, and suffered greatly. They would get raped by guards, camp employees, and other male prisoners. They would get "camp husbands" to protect them, and for companionship. Most pregnancies ended with the babies being taken to an orphanage.

In 1934, the greatest purge in history started in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, or the Soviet Union, upon the orders of its dictator Joseph Stalin. At first, the purge, later known as the Great Terror, targeted the upper echelons of the Communist party. Some of the greatest revolutionaries in history, including Leon Trotsky, were erased from all records. Either killed or exiled, these enemies of the state would be forgotten within years as books and photographs were ‘fixed’ by the state. Yet, this was not enough for Stalin. By the end of 1939, an estimated twenty million ordinary citizens were killed or sent to gulags, where they would eventually die. Many never committed any real crimes. It is easy to draw parallels between George

In conclusion, the conditions that many suffered when in the Gulags were unimaginable. Many say it was easier to commit suicide rather than to suffer and live each and every day in these intense labor camps. Many were starved to extreme measures and even the most hard working people were feed little to nothing at all. Sleeping conditions were nowhere near to comfortable. Over a million perished between 1923-1953 and very few made it out and even if they did the Gulags were set in remote areas so they would not make it too far from the camp and would eventually die. Unlike concentration camps, you were eventually released from the Gulags, but once you were released you were either half dead or suffered severe psychological trauma. Many were

The Soviet Union Gulag was a massive system of forced labor camps to which those who were imprisoned were sent to. People could be incarcerated in a Gulag camp or prison for crimes such as unexcused absences or late from work, petty theft or anti-government jokes. Throughout its history, about 18 million people passed through its camps and prisons. About half of the prisoners were sent to Gulag camps without trials so many times it was innocent people. Many people died of hunger, cold and hard labor, but the exact number of deaths is still unknown, it is speculated for it to be over

The individual was to be Indoctrinated into the philosophy and meaning of what the regime wanted to convey. When someone stepped out of line and spoke ill of Stalin or the government, even if it was the truth, they would be removed from society. The government did away with individuals who were troublesome to the regime. These individuals were not who the government wanted, they wanted someone who would be obedient, not free thinking and do over anything, what was needed for Stalin and the Soviet Union. More and more individuals were being sent to the gulags just because they disagreed with the regime. Individuals would get years or decades as a sentence for publishing a poem or paper. There would be false charges, confessions, and sentences just to fill the void of workers in the camps by anyone unlucky enough to be singled out (Ulam 312). Military men would go from being in service on day, to being a prisoner the next. No one was safe and everyone lived in fear that at any time, their lives could be changed and they could be sent away.

The Gulags of the Soviet Union have been compared to the concentration camps of Nazi Germany, but in reality they were worse. The Gulags were isolated prison camps peppered across Siberia. Death, torture, and disease raged within their walls, while endless work went on outside. Gulag personnel were cruel and unfeeling, using terrible punishment methods and playing senseless games that cost prisoners their lives. Political enemies of the Bolshevik party made up a significant portion of the prisoner population, with most sent to the infamous camp system Kolyma. Liberation was painfully slow, but by 1960, all of the Gulags were gone.

After World War II, the genocide of Jews by the Germans across German-occupied territory was on everyone’s minds. Although it was a horrible event in recent history, the Holocaust was not the only genocide of that period. Joseph Stalin ordered 400,000 Chechens and Ingush to be deported to Siberia and central Asia to be put into labor camps on February 23, 1944 (“Greetings from Grozny”). The genocide of the Chechen population has been a terrible event and other genocides around the world should be stopped by efforts of individuals and the United States government.

Joseph Stalin was the leader of the Soviet Union from 1922-1953, when he died. He was responsible for one of the most notable and devastating genocides, the Great Purge. His vicious reign took the lives of around 20-60 million people by his rigid and cruel treatment. Through his exploitation of the lower class and his manipulative abuse of power, Stalin created one of the worst examples of leadership in history. It takes an interesting character to be able to execute the cruelties displayed in his regime and the traits that Stalin developed into his cult of personality were likely acquired as a child and adolescent.