Great Purge Stalin Voroshilov Kaganovich Zhdanov Molotov

The Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the Soviet Union (

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

: Военная коллегия Верховного суда СССР, ''Voennaya kollegiya Verkhovnogo suda SSSR'') was created in 1924 by the

Supreme Court of the Soviet Union The Supreme Court of the Soviet Union (russian: Верховный Суд СССР) was the highest court of the Soviet Union during its existence. The Supreme Court of the USSR included a Military Collegium and other elements which were not typic ...

as a court for the higher military and political personnel of the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, after ...

and

Fleet Fleet may refer to: Vehicles *Fishing fleet *Naval fleet *Fleet vehicles, a pool of motor vehicles *Fleet Aircraft, the aircraft manufacturing company Places Canada *Fleet, Alberta, Canada, a hamlet England * The Fleet Lagoon, at Chesil Beach, ...

. In addition it was an immediate supervisor of

military tribunal Military justice (also military law) is the legal system (bodies of law and procedure) that governs the conduct of the active-duty personnel of the armed forces of a country. In some nation-states, civil law and military law are distinct bodie ...

s and the supreme authority of military

appeal In law, an appeal is the process in which cases are reviewed by a higher authority, where parties request a formal change to an official decision. Appeals function both as a process for error correction as well as a process of clarifying and ...

s. During 1926–1948 the Chairman of the Collegium was

Vasiliy Ulrikh Vasiliy Vasilievich Ulrikh (russian: Василий Васильевич Ульрих, 13 July 1889 – 7 May 1951) was a senior judge of the Soviet Union during most of the regime of Joseph Stalin. Ulrikh served as the presiding judge at man ...

. The role of the Military Collegium drastically changed after June 1934, when it was assigned the duty to consider cases that fell under

Article 58 Article 58 of the Russian SFSR Penal Code was put in force on 25 February 1927 to arrest those suspected of counter-revolutionary activities. It was revised several times. In particular, its Article 58-1 was updated by the listed sub-articles and ...

, counter-revolutionary activity. During the

Great Purge The Great Purge or the Great Terror (russian: Большой террор), also known as the Year of '37 (russian: 37-й год, translit=Tridtsat sedmoi god, label=none) and the Yezhovshchina ('period of Nikolay Yezhov, Yezhov'), was General ...

of 1937–1938 the Military Collegium tried relatively prominent figures, usually based on the lists approved personally by

Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secreta ...

, the majority of Article 58 cases having been processed extrajudicially by

NKVD troika NKVD troika or Special troika (russian: особая тройка, osobaya troyka), in Soviet history, were the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD which would later be the beginning of the KGB) made up of three officials who issued ...

s. In particular, the Military Collegium conducted the major Soviet

show trial A show trial is a public trial in which the judicial authorities have already determined the guilt or innocence of the defendant. The actual trial has as its only goal the presentation of both the accusation and the verdict to the public so th ...

s. The Collegium was also involved in a subsequent trial of Polish General

Leopold Okulicki General Leopold Okulicki (noms de guerre ''Kobra'', ''Niedźwiadek''; 1898 – 1946) was a general of the Polish Army and the last commander of the anti-Nazi underground Home Army during World War II. He was arrested after the war by the Sovi ...

, the last commander of the Polish

Home Army The Home Army ( pl, Armia Krajowa, abbreviated AK; ) was the dominant resistance movement in German-occupied Poland during World War II. The Home Army was formed in February 1942 from the earlier Związek Walki Zbrojnej (Armed Resistance) esta ...

, and

Jan Stanisław Jankowski Jan Stanisław Jankowski (6 May 1882 – 13 March 1953; noms de guerre ''Doktor'', ''Jan'', ''Klonowski'', ''Sobolewski'', ''Soból'') was a Polish politician, an important figure in the Polish civil resistance during World War II and a ...

, Government Delegate for Poland.

Chairmen

* 1923–1926:

Valentin Trifonov Valentin Andreyevich Trifonov (Russian: Валентин Андреевич Трифонов; 8 September 1888 – 15 March 1938) was a Bolshevik activist, Soviet politician and one of the leaders of Cossack revolutionary forces who played a m ...

* 1926–1948:

* 1948–1957: Aleksandr Cheptsov * 1957–1964: V. V. Borisoglebskiy * 1964–1971: N.F. Chistyakov

References

Government of the Soviet Union Law enforcement in the Soviet Union Great Purge Trial of the Sixteen (Great Purge) Military of the Soviet Union 1924 establishments in the Soviet Union Defunct courts Courts and tribunals established in 1924 {{Soviet-stub

Chairmen

See also

References