The loudest attempts on Joseph Stalin's life: Who tried to rid the country of the "leader of the peoples"

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

For all the time when Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin headed the country, he was assassinated several times. Counterrevolutionaries, intelligence officers from different countries, their own comrades-in-arms in the struggle for the cause of the revolution, and also the special services of Nazi Germany and Japan, the father of all peoples had plenty of enemies. According to some historians, the date of March 5, 1953 can be considered the day of the successful assassination attempt on Joseph Stalin.

1930s assassination attempts

A series of attempts on Stalin's life began in 1931, when, while walking on November 6, the White Guard Ogarev, who was waiting for Dzhugashvili on Ilyinka Street, tried to shoot him. The assassination attempt was averted, and since then Stalin has not been advised to travel around Moscow on foot.

In the first half of the 1930s, the NKVD uncovered a conspiracy of prominent military leaders under the direct leadership of Peterson and Yenukidze. The impending crime was solved at the preparatory stage, all the defendants were shot. And the materials of the case, which received the name "The Tangle Case", are still kept under the heading "Secret". In 1935, a bullet fired by the aristocrat Orlova-Pavlova passed the father of nations. The case was investigated within the framework of the same "Tangle".

Tamara Litsinskaya (Zankovskaya) confessed during interrogation in 1937: being a German spy, she tried to kill Joseph Stalin. There is evidence of this attempt in a book written by the son of Tamara Litsinskaya, Pyotr Vasilyevich Polezhaev.

Another attempt on Stalin's life is attributed to 1937. An indirect confirmation that a coup d'etat was being prepared is believed to be the discovery on May 1 of a combat revolver at Kliment Voroshilov, although he usually did not carry a real weapon with him.

In 1938, Stalin was attempted twice. In the spring, Lieutenant Danilov tried to shoot him, having entered the Kremlin under the guise of a GPU officer. The attempt was unsuccessful. And at the end of the year, Japanese intelligence organized an assassination attempt, in which they were supposed to shoot Joseph Stalin in Matsesta, while undergoing procedures. However, the Soviet intelligence officer Leo, who worked undercover in Japan, managed to warn of an impending crime, and a group of saboteurs was actually liquidated on the border of the USSR and Turkey. Several people fled.

Thanks to Leo, the terrorist attack on May 1, 1939 was also prevented, when, according to the plan of the Japanese special services, the bomb planted in the Mausoleum was supposed to go off during the May Day demonstration.

1940s assassination attempts

On November 6, 1942, S. Dmitriev, who had escaped from the Red Army, began to shoot at Anastas Mikoyan's car. According to investigators, he confused the cars, deciding that Stalin's car had driven out of the gate right before his shot. Some were inclined to see the shooter as a mental disorder. However, the assailant could not count on leniency, he was shot after 8 years in prison.

In 1943, during the Tehran conference, the German special services planned to destroy not only Stalin, but also Churchill and Roosevelt, thus beheading the enemy countries. In this case, Soviet counterintelligence worked brilliantly to prevent the assassination attempt.

The Germans also developed plans to blow up Stalin's car. The main plan assumed that the prisoner of war Pyotr Tavrin would shoot at the car of the USSR leader with a special projectile capable of penetrating armor. If for some reason it would have been impossible to make a shot, the second plan came to replace, according to which the detonation had to be carried out with the help of a magnetic remotely controlled mine. In this case, not a single plan found its embodiment thanks to the competent actions of the Soviet counterintelligence.

A successful assassination attempt or a fatal accident?

On March 1, 1953, as you know, Joseph Stalin suffered a stroke. And it just so happened that the first person of the state lay alone for several hours in a row. Which actually meant certain death.

Not a single person during this time even tried to help him, call a doctor and bring Stalin back to consciousness. Only almost a day later, the Stalins invited doctors who diagnosed the leader with a stroke to see Joseph. Stalin died on March 5, and his sudden death caused a lot of rumors and misinterpretations, up to the discussion of the causes of death as a result of a criminal conspiracy, and between those closest to the leader.

During the reign of Joseph Stalin, there were other strange cases that could be called attempts. However, Joseph Stalin himself considered them a falsification organized by Beria. The latter, according to Stalin, could stage dangerous situations in order to increase his own importance in the eyes of the country's first leader.

There have been moments in the history of each state when experienced saboteurs, political oppositionists, or lonely psychos tried to assassinate the leader. Sometimes they succeeded, but more often such attempts were prevented by the special services or ended in failure due to poor preparation and reliable security. But the names of these people have gone down in history forever. Now they are called "General Secretary" and their actions are not so unambiguously assessed - many sincerely lament that these assassination attempts were unsuccessful.