Talk:Doctors' plot

Untitled
I have nothing against the Poles but why is this link relevant here: Polish minority in Soviet Union? --Humus sapiens|Talk 23:27, 4 May 2004 (UTC)

Pasted discussion from my talk page
Link to Polish minority shows that Stalin intended to do with Jews in 1953 the same what he actually has done with Poles 20 years before. What can make you possibly to add a new article History of anti-Polonism. As far as I am concerned Poles earned bitter enemies the moment they become a nation. First chronic writer Thietmar clearly suffered from anti-Polonism. Any association with your History of Anti-Semitism? Cautious 22:14, 23 May 2004 (UTC)


 * Go ahead, create it if you feel it deserves to be in an encyclopedia. I am against ANY persecutions based on ethnic/religious grounds. Regarding the Doctors' plot, there was nothing specific about Poles there, correct? --Humus sapiens|Talk 22:39, 23 May 2004 (UTC)

I see that any discussion with you must be done open text: I think your concept of Roman anti-Semitism is equaly non-sense to concept of Thietmar anti-Polonism. More over, Stalin alleged anti-Semitism is also non-sense. Jews, Poles and Russians served the monster, the only difference was that Jews had a chance to serve Stalin for 20 years more then Poles. (I hope you understand, that the people Stalin intended to be victims of the purges were involved in the Stalin crimes before. Of course, Stalin punished always family members and members of ethnic groups, who were mostly innocent) If there is no link to Poland in Doctor's plot it must have been mistake. In 1953 Poland was ruled by the group of mostly Jewish communists. The plan was to replace them with ethnic Polish communists and make Stalin liberator of Poland again. Jewish communists resorted to play with liberal communism on condition nobody would be punished for Stalin-time crimes. This should be clearly linked with Doctor's plot. Cautious 22:57, 23 May 2004 (UTC)


 * Fascinating conspiracy theory. If you so insist, name some Poles linked to the Doc's plot. --Humus sapiens|Talk 00:47, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People's_Republic_of_Poland

"The Polish Communists were divided into two informal factions, named "Natolin" and "Pulawy" after governmental building (Palace of Natolin near Warsaw) and Pulawska street in Warsaw where they had their meetings. Natolin consisted previously of ethnic Poles of peasant origin and had a nationalist tendency of a peculiar Communist sort. Pulawy included Jewish Communists as well as old communist intelligentsia and after 1956 was more liberal." (...) "Gomulka returned to the Party leadership in October 1956, after some tough bargaining with Khrushchev, who came to Warsaw to oversee the transfer of power. Hardline Stalinists such as Berman were removed from power, but almost no-one was put on trial for the crimes of the Bierut period. The Pulawy faction argued that mass trials of Stalin era criminals, most of them of Jewish origins, would incite animosity against Jews. Rokossovski and other Soviet advisors were sent home, and Polish Communism took on a more independent orientation. But Gomulka knew that the Soviets would never allow Poland to leave the Soviet orbit, because of its strategic position between the Soviet Union and Germany. He agreed that Soviet troops could remain in Poland, and that no overt anti-Soviet outbursts would be allowed. In this way Poland avoided the risk of the kind of Soviet armed intervention that crushed the revolution in Hungary in the same month. " http://www.columbia.edu/cu/sipa/REGIONAL/ECE/gluchowski.pdf (Go and see what Berman said May 5, 1956 about Popov actions in 1953!) The classical book was "Chamy i Zydy" by Witold Jedlicki Cautious 07:58, 24 May 2004 (UTC)


 * Sorry, maybe I'll have more time to read it later. So far I don't see any relation to the subject. Do you have a solid answer to my question above, other than Stalin didn't like the Jews, but he also didn't like the Poles? --Humus sapiens|Talk 09:04, 24 May 2004 (UTC)
 * Read the pdf, you will find a plenty of relations. Do you think, that Doctor's plot was supposed to limit itself to SU? Do you think, when Stalin planned the Doctor's plot? My guess, 1945. To answer your question: Stalin worked with Polish communists 26-38, 12 years. Stalin worked with Jewish communists 26-53, 27 years. Do you still claim that Stalin didn't like them? He liked them when it suite his cause. Cautious 09:21, 24 May 2004 (UTC)

Anything more specific than "read the pdf"? Your conspiracy theories were proven wrong far too many times. I'm going to move this discussion to the talk:DP page. Objections? --Humus sapiens|Talk 17:53, 24 May 2004 (UTC)
 * 1) Stalin was in the business way before 1926.
 * 2) he killed whomever he wanted to before 1941. Same with population transfer. I suspect you don't realize the amount of power he had.
 * 3) there is plenty of evidence of A-S in his private life.
 * 4) if he planned it all in 45, why did he vote for the establishment of the State of Israel two years later?

Mistranslation
"Every Jew is a nationalist and potential agent of the American intelligence"

- Stalin did not actually say this. This is a mistranslation, and should read "Every Zionist is a nationalist, etc." --Charm Quark 21:28, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * You are wrong: here's a proof . I do remember I used some Russian language source, will try to recall which one. &larr;Humus sapiens&larr;ну? 22:20, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * You both are wrong. Stalin used the expression "evrei-natsionalisty" - "Jewish nationalists". The main difference is that he did not claim that every Jew is a nationalist.--85.140.130.68 20:24, 8 April 2006 (UTC)

Removed this clause from first paragraph

 * "and the State of Israel allying with the West"

This has no relevance to the situation of 1948 -- in the late 1940's, the Soviet Union strongly supported the coming into existence of Israel (in order to diminish British influence in the mideast, rather than out of any sympathy with Jewish aspirations, it's true), and the Soviet-Arab aligment didn't really exist until a few years into the 1950's. Similarly, Israel couldn't be said to have "allied with the West" in any very meaningful sense until the mid-50's or so (in the late 1940's, Israel actually got most of its heavy arms from Czechoslovakia!). AnonMoos 13:19, 26 March 2006 (UTC)


 * Let's make this chronological: the USSR supported the establishment of Israel and the Soviet WW2 weapons were supplied via Czechoslovakia (to dodge the embargo). By the end of 1948, the USSR switched sides and aligned with the Arabs against Israel. I wasn't there but I remember reading Paul Johnson and others (including post-Soviet historians) about this. ←Humus sapiens ну? 01:21, 27 March 2006 (UTC)


 * "Switch sides" would probably be too dramatic if you're confining yourself to 1948. It seems to me that Stalin was pretty much flailing around trying to do whatever would most diminish British influence, but he wasn't yet entirely sure what that was (and perhaps hadn't yet fully grasped that the US was now the main opponent).  I don't think there was a real steady Soviet-Arab alliance until the period of the Bandung Conference, the wrangling over the sponsorship of the Aswan dam, the run-up to the Suez crisis, the ruckus over the Baghdad Pact, etc. AnonMoos 12:52, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Similarity with earlier trial
There was a large doctors' component in the 1938 phoney trial in Moscow. The 1938 trial was the last one in Moscow before 1953. Stalin regarded the 1938 trial as a success. He probably wanted to duplicate this success. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.74.1.27 (talk • contribs)


 * Please see WP:OR and WP:RS. I find the statement above dubious. E.g. The 1938 trial was the last one in Moscow before 1953 doesn't seem to be true (there were show trials, secret tribunals, etc). BTW, all Stalinist trials were successful, and the cases where the accused asked for death sentence were not uncommon. Oh, and the DP never got to the trial phase. ←Humus sapiens ну? 08:53, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
 * There was a medical component in the Slansky trial, mentioned in the main article.

Possible deaths
One or two doctors were not released after Stalin's death as they seem to have died under torture.
 * See the article on Yakov Etinger. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.129.103.141 (talk) 08:55, 24 September 2007 (UTC)


 * Good source ? Biophys (talk) 06:41, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Spelling
Timashuk's name is sometimes spelled Timashchuk.

A "Kruschev" appears in the text. Is this a mistake?
 * Yes, surely, I fixed it and thanks for pointing that out. Herostratus (talk) 02:08, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Semitism and Zionism
This campaing in the article is called "anti-semitic", however, it is not true, it is "anti-zionist", which is different. I'm changing the references. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 190.174.91.153 (talk) 18:21, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

"Jewish communists, such as the legendary founder of the Cheka, Felix Dzerzhinsky" Since when Dzierżyński is considered a Jew? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 188.127.29.194 (talk) 15:55, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Jews and the purges
"the major landmarks of Soviet state anti-semitism were the massive purged of the 1930s" and "toward the end fo the war the party's anti-Semitic policy became more intense" It is not right to think that Jews were singled out in Stalin's purges; Lots of other nationalities can make the same claim. Many of the old Bolsheviks were Jews, so you think they were purged because they were Jewish and not because they were political rivals? This is the author's view and it should be attributed to him.

"Stalin had said to him: `Purge the ministry of Jews’ " "Absurdly denying any anti-semitism on the part of Stalin, Molotov held that this purge was designed to bring more ethnic Russians into top positions" All of your sources for this also state that it was a move in foreign policy for better relations with Nazi Germany. The title of the source you quote from even proves this... Look at the article on Litvinov. So the reason should stay since it shows that it was likely a political decision and not just primitive anti-Semetism.


 * -YMB29 (talk) 15:58, 5 March 2009 (UTC)

Flow
The article does not flow well at all.

Can we do something to make it a little more readable? No.

Sagi Nahor (talk) 13:30, 15 June 2010 (UTC)

Neutrality
Many of the articles linked to are far less emphatic (polemic?). 68.49.23.150 (talk) 02:30, 2 June 2012 (UTC)

Planned deportation of Jews
I can't check all sources here, but let's WP:AGF. Do I understand correctly the following:
 * 1) There is a clear majority view that deportations of Jews to Siberia were actually planned, as reflected in the article in Encyclopedia Britannica. I checked a couple of books (by Figes and Radzinsky), and indeed, they did tell about the planned deportation as something generally established, with references to other sources.
 * 2) Several big labor camps were indeed (as a fact) built in Siberia, but remained unused after the death of Stalin (Radzinsky tells about this too).
 * 3) There is a minoriry opinion represented by Russian historian Gennady Kostyrchenko that deportations were not planned (this is clearly a minority opinion because I do not see others modern historians telling the same).
 * 4) Here is the argument by Kostyrchenko: there is no any paper/archive evidence of the planned deportations. Others do not consider this a serious argument because: (a) other similar operations (e.g Caucasus) were conducted based on oral orders from Stalin, and the paper work appeared only later; (b) KGB archives are closed and a lot of documents are destroyed.

Did I miss something really important? My very best wishes (talk) 13:25, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Read the new source I added. The full text is available online.
 * It looks to me that most serious historians don't support the idea that the deportation was planned. Is Radzinsky even a historian? -YMB29 (talk) 22:15, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
 * So, you tell that there is also a book by Zhores Medvedev who tells that plan did not exist because: (a) there are no supporting documents from archives (same point as one made by Kostrychenko), (b) it would be difficult to arrest so many Jews in Moscow; (c) Soviet people would not support such arrests; and (d) the arrest would be damaging for Soviet economy and culture.

(Russian text: Таких документов в архивах никто никогда не находил. Массовая депортация евреев даже только из Москвы была невозможна по чисто практическим причинам. В Москве в 1953 году проживало около 400 тысяч евреев, большинство которых было полностью ассимилировано в советском обществе. Для них родным был именно русский язык. Для большей части советских евреев в 1953 году был характерен советский, а не израильский патриотизм. Психология «советского», а не узко этнического сознания была в послевоенный период особенно сильна. Общественное сознание народа не было подготовлено к столь грандиозной «Этнической чистке». Массовая депортация евреев, будь она осуществлена, вызвала бы сильное разрушительное действие на большое число важных сфер жизни общества, прежде всего на систему здравоохранения, просвещения и образования, на науку, культуру, книгоиздательство, прессу и множество других.)

Of course one could make the points (b-d) about any campaign of arrests that was actually conducted by Stalin (so probably that's why other researchers do not take them seriously). Thanks, I got it. My very best wishes (talk) 03:09, 26 April 2013 (UTC)


 * I don't know about other campaigns, but most researchers don't take theories that are based on just rumor seriously... -YMB29 (talk) 16:13, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Two English language books I checked (one by Russian historian and another by British historian) and apparently Encyclopedia Britannica did not describe this as something based on rumors, but rather as an established historical fact; and even camps in Siberia were actually built. Two Russian authors you mentioned happened to disagree. This is understandable. My very best wishes (talk) 20:58, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
 * They don't just disagree; they explain that there is no evidence for the deportation. I am not sure what the sources you mentioned say, but historical facts are based on actual evidence. -YMB29 (talk) 05:07, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Comrads, stop. At Stalin was founded JEWISH AUTONOMOUS OBLAST (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Autonomous_Oblast). What anti-semitism you talking about!? Stalin supported jew and gave them autonomous territory. (Sorry for my english, i'm from Russia and bad speak) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 176.59.34.128 (talk) 15:36, 10 June 2018 (UTC)

The way this article presents the alleged planned deportation of Jews, the doctors' plot is merely the tip of the iceberg and the plan to deport the Soviet Union's entire Jewish population to remote parts of the country and then to systematically exterminate them surely must be the main subject. I would suggest that the planned deportation of Jews should be the title of an article, of which the doctors' plot is a mere detail.--Exjerusalemite (talk) 16:40, 20 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Actually, you can have both. Bith subjects are large and notable enough. - Altenmann >talk 05:05, 21 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, doesn't look like there is such an article, or at least this article doesn't have a link to it. Which makes this whole theory look questionable. If you want this theory to sound believable, there has to be an article devoted to it. Imagine that the Holocaust was just a section in the Kristallnacht article, rather than an article in its own right...--Exjerusalemite (talk) 05:03, 26 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Well, the operational words in my answer are "you can". The theory does exist, but no documents, only various memoirs. That's what our article says. And your comparison is incorrect: holocaust was not a thery. - Altenmann >talk 05:44, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

P.S. Please keep in mind that wikipedia talk pages are not internet forums (see WP:NOT). They are to discuss improvements of our articles basing on information found in reputable sources. If you do not have specific suggestions on what to add/delete/change, then please look for internet forums which discuss the issue. - Altenmann >talk 06:16, 26 December 2018 (UTC)

The explosion in Tel-Aviv as a provocation by the Soviet Union itself
At http://www.sovsekretno.ru/articles/id/3151/ there is an article by Vladimir Voronov that states that on 3/Feb/1953 the writer Ilya Erenburg has sent a letter to Stalin in which he refers to the project of "The letter to Pravda", which he should sign with other prominent Jews. In that letter he condemns the explosion, which did not even occur by then!!!

That and other clues may directly lead to understanding that the explosion in the Soviet embassy was part of the bigger plot by the Soviet Union itself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Sirovsky (talk • contribs) 21:36, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Brezhnev
User:Zhanghao1987 is wanting to include the following sentences at the end of the "Khrushchev's statements" section:
 * in 1971，Stalin got some high praises by Brezhnev. But Mikhail Gorbachev denounced Stalin again in the late 1980s.

and there are three refs for this. Grammar aside (that's easily fixable), I think this is kind of getting off track from the proper scope of this article. It may belong somewhere but not here in this article. Not wishing to edit war over this, I invite the editor to here state his case for including these sentences in the article. Herostratus (talk) 13:28, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Catalyst?
First paragraph: The doctors' plot was to be the catalyst of Stalin's campaigns against Soviet Jews Shouldn't this be 'climax'? Stalin hardly needed a catalyst for any of his actions. 194.39.218.10 (talk) 11:10, 21 June 2013 (UTC)

Articles like this are the reason why many people don't treat Wikipedia as a serious source of information
I hope you will not think of me as of an anti-Semite if I say that I personally don't like how Jews try to gain credits on the tragedies in their history, how they claim that their sufferings were more important that those of other nations (who cares of Soviet, Poles, Chinese etc citizens (most of whom were civilians) who died during the Second World War, except themselves?) and how they try to find anti-Semitism in any tragic event where a single Jewish surname was mentioned.

So, about this article. It's basically a single version of the plot, possibly original content, which doesn't have hard proofs, described as if it actually were that way. It's not encyclopedic at all, this article should be completely rewritten with other versions mentioned, and generally with some try to explain what really happened. It has a fair share of mistakes (if not direct lie) too, consider this:

>The Kremlin doctors were arrested, but they were all Russian. To keep the conspiracy as Zionist, Ryumin and Semyon Ignatyev, who had succeeded Abakumov as head of the MGB, had the Jewish doctors Etinger supposedly specified also arrested;

You can easily check that Etinger was arrested years before those Kremlin doctors, it was basically vice versa. So, what kind of anti-Semitic plot it is when you firstly arrest a Jew and then, not a few other Jewish doctors which were quite common in Soviet Russia, but a bunch of Russians? IMO the more plausible version it's Stalin was preparing yet another series of repressions vs some people in his entourage, possibly even vs Beria. He already did the same trick when he executed Yagoda, who supposedly used two doctors to kill Gorky. There are other versions too.

Also you probably didn't read that Russian comment in the thread, that person explained that this supposed mass deportation of Jews would be nearly economically impossible, and disregard what you may think of Stalin he, unlike Pol Pot etc communist leaders, didn't do things which could actually ruin the economics of the country, Soviet Union became a super power after all. 217.118.64.53 (talk) 08:19, 13 June 2014 (UTC)

Citing Zhukov
I has a very distinct recollection that this historian was discussed in talk page. I see not. Maybe it was elsewhere. Anyway, my two objections to removal this ref. Therefore please lets review the disputed text piecewise. - üser:Altenmann >t 03:24, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Ref removal left some text unreferenced.
 * I don't see how POV of the author influence the plain coverage of plain facts.
 * I agree that his deductions may be removed without harm.


 * Zhukov was described as an obvious antisemitic writer, for example here. According to the publication, Zhukov "borrowed" his ideas from Andrey Dikiy. Most statements were actually sourced to other publications, so there is no need to use Zhukov in most cases. I think that paragraph that starts from "According to Russian historian Yuri Zhukov..." should be removed because the meaning of the text is completely unclear. "According to Russian historian Yuri Zhukov, neither Malenkov nor Beria needed the plot to have an anti-Semitic character, but the secretary of ideology, N. Mikhailov, did not specify to newspapers and magazines what exactly was expected of them or pursued his own interests, and, after the initial Pravda article, the media emphasized Jewish names and a Zionist conspiracy. Mikhailov and the heads of agitprop had to soon intervene." What does it mean??? My very best wishes (talk) 04:10, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
 * That's what I wrote: we don't need his opinions. So no problemo to delete this piece. But the fact "of 9 there were 6 Jews" must be verified if ref removed. And so on. - üser:Altenmann >t 05:21, 11 June 2016 (UTC)
 * Agree. My very best wishes (talk) 13:25, 11 June 2016 (UTC)

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Consistent capitalisation
The article text writes its title variously "Doctors' Plot", "doctors' plot", and "Doctors' plot". I don't have an opinion as to which we should use, but we should be consistent. -- Finlay McWalter··–·Talk 15:53, 29 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Stick to the article title. - Altenmann >talk 05:07, 21 December 2018 (UTC)

Censoring
The opinions of significant academics of soviet history like Ian Grey and Zhores Medvedev and the lesser known albeit notable Brent and Noumov are hardly poor sources, in fact they are excellent sources. They are so excellent that Medvedev, Brent and Noumov are cited all thoughout the article. However by cheer coincidence (sarcasm) one editor only wants to remove the parts of the article that is sourced to them in which the view that Stalin fabricated the plot is challenged.

There is clearly scholarly debate on this topic and that shouldn't be censored.95.153.48.2 (talk) 13:22, 11 January 2019 (UTC)

NPOV
is making controversial changes without having discussed them. Pinging. --Jamez42 (talk) 19:53, 27 February 2019 (UTC)

NPOV
Jamez42 not all of it is changing words, most of it is source information and nothing else. What is wrong with those additions?110.74.199.28 (talk) 19:55, 27 February 2019 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion: Participate in the deletion discussion at the. —Community Tech bot (talk) 07:11, 30 June 2021 (UTC)
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Counterfactual and conjectural statement about WW3
I saw a quote saying that the doctor's plot was going to happen as a prelude to a purge taking place before a hypothetical third world war, and the source is a Russian popular historian. Why is his conjecture in the first 5 paragraphs? I am planning on removing it. Jpegthebitmap (talk) 23:56, 29 January 2023 (UTC)

Yakov Etinger Death date inconsistent
This page says March 2, but https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yakov_Gilyarievich_Etinger says March 8 24.193.182.39 (talk) 23:15, 12 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks for noticing this. The article on Etinger was wrong. Source in Russian doesn't say March 8. He died on March 2. I've already fixed it in that article.--Brandonobaza (talk) 01:28, 14 June 2023 (UTC)