The Recriminalization of Homosexuality under Stalin: New Sources, New Answers

GENRIKH IAGODA’S NOTE: WHAT THE FULL TEXT REVEALS

On September 15, 1933, five days after Iur’s article regarding Marinus van der Lubbe appeared on the front page of Izvestiia, Iagoda sent a three-page note to Stalin. In 1993, a few passages from the note were published in a Russian academic journal.[69] However, the full report has never been examined by historians, as it was believed to be kept in the Presidential Archive, which is closed to the public and scholars. My discovery of this text, declassified in 1998 and housed in the Russian State Archive of Contemporary History (RGANI), enables a more nuanced reassessment of the recriminalization of homosexuality.[70] Dan Healey has claimed that Iagoda was the first to propose legal measures against homosexual men.[71] However, the full text of the report makes it clear that this was not the case. So, why was the text written? What was its primary purpose?

Iagoda’s note was addressed directly to Stalin (FIGURE 3). It starts routinely: “Based on secretservice materials on the existence of a pederastic formation in Moscow and Leningrad, the OGPU has conducted arrests. Subsequently, an investigation has revealed that the formation consisted of actors, white-collar workers, and separate asocial elements from the workers. The leadership group consists of nobles and former White officers.”[72] Citing the testimonies of the arrested men, Iagoda mentioned the existence of twelve “pederast salons” in Leningrad and another ten in Moscow. He briefly alludes to the events that allegedly unfolded in the “salons”: “There were organized systematic drinking parties (p'ianka), orgies, collective sleepovers, and other forms of depravity; they used to take drugs and dress in women’s attire.”[73] Iagoda emphasizes the “malign influence” that Moscow and Leningrad homosexuals exerted on the youth. According to him, these men were not merely a bad example. Through psychological manipulation and alcohol, they were “morally depraved” and were “introducing [the youth] to pederasty.”

The next section of the note focuses on the “treacherous nature” of homosexuals. Iagoda informs Stalin of the alleged liaisons between these men and officials from German, Finnish, and Norwegian diplomatic missions. The German Embassy was indeed mentioned during interrogations by two individuals. One man who was a hairdresser had clients there.[74] The other was Vladimir Aleksandrov, who was the only person among nearly 200 detainees who spoke in detail about his alleged “contacts” with German Embassy employees, whom he described as “pederasts.”[75] He also briefly mentioned that one of his friends, a Soviet “pederast,” had contacts in the Italian and Austrian embassies. The nature of Soviet homosexual men’s connections with foreign embassies was not explored further in the testimonies. According to Iagoda, however, the mere existence of such contacts—whether real or fabricated—was enough to create opportunities for espionage. Notably, Aleksandrov was the only one to receive a suspended sentence and was released. Interestingly, Iagoda did not appear to be thorough in compiling his report: the Norwegian and Finnish Embassies, which he included, were not mentioned at all in the interrogations related to the Leningrad affair.

Iagoda then falsely asserts that 74 of the 130 men arrested so far had “origins in the privileged classes,” followed by a list of names of the “active members of the organization.” Of the twelve individuals Iagoda mentioned, seven were from Leningrad and five from Moscow. Despite Iagoda’s emphasis on the “leaders” of the communities coming from noble families, the OGPU records in the Leningrad case clearly contradict this claim. The place of birth and social status of the arrested individuals show that very few were from noble families; most came from peasant or proletarian backgrounds. Iagoda concluded his report with a standard phrase that is important for understanding the purpose behind his presentation: “Further investigation is ongoing.” As was often the case, Stalin’s response to the affair was prominently reflected on the first page of the document: “To Comrade Kaganovich. These scoundrels must receive exemplary punishment, and a corresponding guiding decree must be introduced in our legislation.”[76]

Figure 3. The first page of Genrikh Iagoda’s note to Stalin. The inscription in Stalin’s hand reads: “These scoundrels must receive exemplary punishment.” Source: RGANI, f. 3, op. 57, d. 37, l. 19.

In a timely manner, Iagoda successfully “uncovered” a potentially dangerous conspiracy (one of many), but this particular case was especially relevant to the goals the USSR was pursuing on the international stage at the time. Iagoda functioned as an exemplary high-ranking cog in the Stalinist state. He not only crafted the plot in alignment with the Soviet Union’s international agenda but also skillfully exposed and handled it. Moreover, he had a personal motivation to distinguish himself in Stalin’s eyes. Although Iagoda’s position as the acting head of the OGPU in 1933 seemed solid, he did not hold the position officially. He was the second deputy head of the OGPU while the terminally ill Viacheslav Menzhinskii officially remained in charge of the agency until his death in May 1934.[77]

The powerful position of the first deputy head had stayed vacant since Ivan Akulov, Iagoda’s rival, was discharged in 1932.[78]

The public campaign surrounding the Reichstag fire and van der Lubbe appears to have been leveraged by Iagoda not only as a pretext to address the growing visibility of homosexuality in Moscow and Leningrad, which had become a concern for the OGPU, but also as a strategic move to gain Stalin’s favor and strengthen his position as the de facto head of the USSR’s most powerful security agency. Notably, Iagoda’s note makes no mention of van der Lubbe. One might argue that asserting a direct causal link between the campaign against van der Lubbe and the repression of homosexuals in 1933—culminating in the new law—would require more explicit evidence than is currently available. However, the very omission of van der Lubbe in the note may in fact support this interpretation. Iagoda was not responding to a direct order from above, but rather he acted on his own initiative. In doing so, he framed the operation as part of a routine crackdown on “counterrevolutionaries,” thereby avoiding the appearance of interfering in foreign policy matters outside his mandate. It is evident that the campaigns against van der Lubbe and against homosexuals in Moscow and Leningrad unfolded in parallel, and this simultaneity is unlikely to have been coincidental.

The full text of Iagoda’s note helps clarify another important issue. In his work, Dan Healey highlights a discrepancy between Iagoda’s note, which was unavailable to him in full at the time, and the subsequent shift in the rhetoric surrounding the recriminalization of homosexuality. In the report, Iagoda expresses concern regarding espionage: “establishing networks of salons, centers, dens, groups, and other organized formations of pederasts, with the eventual transformation of these organizations into outright espionage cells.”[79] Healey questions why later authorities make no mention of espionage in the paperwork related to the recriminalization of homosexuality and the drafting of the anti-homosexuality article.[80] This discrepancy can be explained by the differing approaches to homosexuality taken by the OGPU and Iagoda, on the one hand, and Stalin, on the other—as well as by the fact that Iagoda, in sending his report to Stalin, did not intend to propose new legislation. While the OGPU and Iagoda framed homosexuality as part of counterrevolutionary group activity concentrated in Moscow and Leningrad, Stalin advocated for a separate law aimed at addressing homosexual relations more systematically and uniformly across the broader population.[81] Initially, for Iagoda and the secret police, homosexuals were a troubling community that stood out in the poorly controlled urban landscape of Moscow and Leningrad at the time. In Iagoda’s view, “the core group,” which “seduced” and actively implicated the “innocent,” was seen as the main threat to public welfare and, of course, the source of espionage—a widely circulated accusation during Stalin’s rule. Stalin’s remark on Iagoda’s note “to introduce a new guideline to the legislation” suggests a different and more expansive approach, implying that sporadic waves of secret prosecution were a one-shot measure.

The association between Soviet homosexuals and fascism disappears from official documents availible to scholars after the 1930s and leaves no trace in later sources.[82] With the onset of World War II, the Soviet press revived the association between fascism and homosexuality while conspicuously avoiding any mention of homosexuality within the Soviet context.[83]