Dāvids Beika (Russian: Давид Самуилович Бейка; 30 August 1885 – 6 February 1946) was a Latvian

Marxist Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflic ...

revolutionary and political activist, publicist and

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

intelligence officer.

Biography

Beika was born in to a peasant family and worked as a teacher. He joined the

Russian Social Democratic Labour Party The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party (RSDWP) or the Russian Social Democratic Party (RSDP), was a socialist political party founded in 1898 in Minsk, Russian Empire. The ...

in 1903 and the Latvian Social Democratic Party in 1905. He was an active participant in the

Russian Revolution of 1905 The Russian Revolution of 1905, also known as the First Russian Revolution, was a revolution in the Russian Empire which began on 22 January 1905 and led to the establishment of a constitutional monarchy under the Russian Constitution of 1906, t ...

and after the defeat of the revolution he emigrated to the United States where he became a leading figure of the Latvian Social Democratic Organization in America. Beika returned to Russia after the

February Revolution The February Revolution (), known in Soviet historiography as the February Bourgeois Democratic Revolution and sometimes as the March Revolution or February Coup was the first of Russian Revolution, two revolutions which took place in Russia ...

and to Latvia after the

October Revolution The October Revolution, also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution (in Historiography in the Soviet Union, Soviet historiography), October coup, Bolshevik coup, or Bolshevik revolution, was the second of Russian Revolution, two r ...

and became a leader of the

Latvian Socialist Soviet Republic The Latvian Socialist Soviet Republic (, LSPR) was a short-lived socialist republic formed during the Latvian War of Independence. It was proclaimed on 17 December 1918 with the political, economic, and military backing of Vladimir Lenin and ...

where he was appointed Commissar of Industry. After the fall of the Soviet republic he went back to what was now Soviet Russia and became the head of the economic council of Pskov. He was a member of the Central Committee of the

Communist Party of Latvia The Communist Party of Latvia (, LKP) was a political party in Latvia. History Latvian Social-Democracy prior to 1919 The party was founded at a congress in June 1904. Initially the party was known as the Latvian Social Democratic Workers' Party ...

and was a delegate of the second and third congresses of the Communist International and was elected a member of its

Executive Committee A committee or commission is a body of one or more persons subordinate to a deliberative assembly or other form of organization. A committee may not itself be considered to be a form of assembly or a decision-making body. Usually, an assembly o ...

and then head of the International Liaison Department of the Comintern in 1920. From January 1922 he worked in the Smolensk province and in 1924, he was appointed executive secretary of the Smolensk Provincial Committee of the All-Union Communist Party(b). Later he worked as the secretary of the Arkhangelsk Provincial Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (b). From 1928 he was in economic work and was a representative of member of the Collegium of the People's Commissariat of Heavy Industry of the USSR. During the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

he was a military commissar in the

International Brigades The International Brigades () were soldiers recruited and organized by the Communist International to assist the Popular Front (Spain), Popular Front government of the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War. The International Bri ...

from 1936 to 1937 and then from 1937 to 1938 he was Comintern officer in the United States. Beika was recalled to Moscow, and on 20 April 1938 he was arrested by the

NKVD The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (, ), abbreviated as NKVD (; ), was the interior ministry and secret police of the Soviet Union from 1934 to 1946. The agency was formed to succeed the Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU) se ...

on charges of participating in an anti-Soviet nationalist terrorist organization, and on 22 April 1939, by the verdict of the

Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the Soviet Union The Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the Soviet Union () was created in 1924 by the Supreme Court of the Soviet Union as a court for the higher military and political personnel of the Red Army and Fleet. In addition it was an immedia ...

, he was sentenced to twenty years in a forced labor camp. On 6 February 1946 he died in the Ustvymlag of the

Komi Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic The Komi Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (; ), abbreviated as Komi ASSR (Komi and ), was an autonomous republic of the Russian SFSR within the Soviet Union, established in 1936 as successor of Komi-Zyryan Autonomous Oblast. In 1991, it b ...

. On 22 February 1956 he was posthumously rehabilitated. Dāvids Beika was also an author of poems and memoirs.

Biography

References

Further reading