THE SOVIET HISTORIOGRAPHY AND THE QUESTION OF KAZAKHSTAN’S HISTORY

THE QUESTION OF KAZAKHSTAN’S HISTORY 39
PROSECUTION OF BEKMAKHANOV: TRUTHS AND PROOFS
Prof. Dr. Arailym Musagalieva *
In post-war period, the Soviet regime executed almost all the leaders
of Alash Orda, victims of the Stalinist repressions. That made
it impossible for them to take an active political, cultural, and social
role that they should have played. There were only two important
survivors from the Alash Orda movement. The first, Alimkhan Ermekov,
spent much of his life in Soviet concentration camps, and the second,
Mukhtar Auezov, the Soviet authorities suppressed during the 1940s
and 1950s. These Kazakh leaders were accused by the authorities of
adhering to the “Alash ideas”, which fit under the concept of “being
nationalists”. Acknowledging the accusations, in his memoirs Ermekov
wrote: “We, who spent a little time in ‘Alash’, faced almost every kind
of slander. In any case of disorder in a random place in Kazakhstan,
for example when starving people in Qaraqum, Mangyshtau, Shubarta,
Bakhty or in Baqanas rioted, or when people of Jetisu migrated
to China, or when in a village a farm animal that belonged to the
Kolkhoz gets stolen, even when someone gets married to more than
one women, or when something eccentric was written in a newspaper
or journal, they blamed us for all of those.” 46
In the midst of this repressive era, the authorities persecuted
many other Kazakh intellectuals, often accusing them of “supporting
the Alash ideas in newspapers and journals”. The mere accusation
meant persecution and it was the most effective means to purge the
Kazakh intelligentsia. Clearly, attaching the label of “nationalist” to
an Alash member initiated the purge in a way that exterminated so
many educated Kazakhs. The idea of Alash, which spread all around the
Kazakh Steppe, was considered sufficient justification for Bolsheviks
to target a random Kazakh.
“The Great Terror” gained a new face in 1940s and 1950s, unlike
during the era before and during the Second World War, court trials
emerged. “Pairs” and “Triads” were abolished and at the same time
the various State Defense Committee resolutions lost the power;
politically prosecuted people were first accused in public meetings
before being put on trial. Whereas in earlier episodes when different
means to suppress were used, the accused was libeled in the press
* L. N. Gumilev Eurasian National University
46 Oskembaiev. K., A. A. Ermekov’tin Kogamdık-Sayasi jane Agartuşılık Kızmeti (1891-1970),
Karagandy, MBBKBA and KDİ, 2003, pp. 277, 199.