RED TERROR DURING THE LIQUIDATION OF THE IZHEVSK-VOTKINSK UPRISING (AUGUST - NOVEMBER 1918)

Abstract

Based on archival documents introduced into scholarly circulation for the first time, this article examines the evolution of repressive practices during the suppression of the Izhevsk-Votkinsk uprising (August - November 1918) - one of the largest armed anti-Bolshevik uprisings in the Kama region. The author aims to trace the transition from spontaneous frontline violence to an institutionalized system of extrajudicial justice established under the headquarters of the 2nd Army commanded by V. I. Shorin. The methodological framework comprises the problem- chronological and comparative-historical methods. The source base includes minutes of the Emergency Investigative Commission at the headquarters of the 2nd Army, local Cheka offices in Izhevsk and Votkinsk, orders of the Revolutionary Military Council, operational summaries, memoirs of participants, and the local press. In the first stage (August - early September 1918), Red units suffered defeats, and repressions were decentralized and improvised: unit commanders independently decided on extrajudicial executions of prisoners and the burning of villages. As the front stabilized and the Cheka was established at the headquarters of the 2nd Army (September 15, 1918), terror was centralized. After the capture of Izhevsk (November 7-8) and Votkinsk (November 12-14), a new wave of repression unfolded, carried out by local Cheka offices. An analysis of the minutes shows that during November-December 1918, 874 persons passed through the Cheka, of whom 228 (26%) were sentenced to execution, and 610 (70%) were released. Concurrently, the army’s military-revolutionary tribunal carried out disciplinary repression within the troops. The scholarly novelty of the research lies in the fact that, for the first time, the evolution of repressive practices - from frontline violence to bureaucratized extrajudicial justice - is comprehensively traced for a specific region. Unlike previous works that focused on the military history of the uprising, the author analyzes the institutionalization of terror through the creation of Cheka offices and military tribunals. The conclusions of the article indicate that the Red Terror in the Kama region became not only a means of military victory but also an instrument for the radical political restructuring (“Sovietization”) of the region. The article is addressed to historians of the Russian Civil War, specialists in the history of Bolshevik repressive policy, and regional historians of the Urals and the Kama region.