The Gulag Archipelago

by Alexander Solzhenitsyn

  And the reason why, gentlemen, comrades, and brothers, is that the proper time was allowed to slip by! You ought to have got hold of yourselves and remembered who you were back when Struzhinsky burned himself alive in his Vyatka cell, and even be- fore that, when you were declared "counterrevolutionaries."

  And so you allow the thieves to take your overcoat and paw through your jacket and snatch your twenty rubles from where it was sewn in, and your bag has already been tossed up above and checked out, and everything your sentimental wife collected for your long trip after you were sentenced stays up there, and they've thrown the bag back down to you with . . . your tooth- brush.

  Although not everyone submitted just like that, 99 percent did in the thirties and forties.

  [I have heard of a few cases in which three seasoned, young, and healthy men stood up against the thieves—not to defend justice in general, but to protect, not those who were being plundered right next to them, but themselves only. In other words: armed neutrality.]

  And how could that be? Men, officers, soldiers, front-line soldiers!

  To strike out boldly, a person has to be ready for that battle, waiting for it, and has to understand its purpose. All these condi- tions were absent here. A person wholly unfamiliar with the thieves'—the blatnoi—milieu didn't anticipate this battle and, most importantly, failed totally to understand its vital necessity. Up to this point he had assumed (incorrectly) that his only enemies were the bluecaps. He needed still more education to arrive at the understanding that the tattooed chests were merely the rear ends of the bluecaps. This was the revelation the bluecaps never utter aloud: "You today, me tomorrow." The new prisoner wanted to consider himself a political—in other words, on the side of the people—while the state was against the people. And at that point he was unexpectedly assaulted from behind and both sides by quick-fingered devils of some kind, and all the categories got mixed up, and clarity was shattered into fragments. (And it would take a long time for the prisoner to put two and two together and figure out that this horde of devils were hand in glove with the jailers.)

  To strike out boldly, a person has to feel that his rear is de- fended, that he has support on both his flanks, that there is solid earth beneath his feet. All these conditions were absent for the Article 58's. Having passed through the meat grinder of political interrogation, the human being was physically crushed in body: he had been starved, he hadn't slept, he had frozen in punishment cells, he had lain there a beaten man. But it wasn't only his body. His soul was crushed too. Over and over he had been told and had had demonstrated to him that his views, and his conduct in life, and his relationships with people had all been wrong because they had brought him to ruin. All that was left in that scrunched- up wad the engine room of the law had spewed out into the prisoner transport was a greed for life, and no understanding whatever. To crush him once and for all and to cut him off from all others once and for all—that was the function of interrogation under Article 58. The convicted prisoner had to learn that his worst guilt out in freedom had been his attempt somehow to get together or unite with others by any route but the Party organizer, the trade-union organizer, or the administration. In prison this fear went so far as to become fear of all kinds of collective action: two voices uttering the same complaint or two prisoners signing a complaint on one piece of paper. Gun-shy now and for a good long time to come of any and every kind of collaboration or unification, the pseudo politicals were not prepared to unite even against the thieves. Nor would they even think of bringing along a weapon—a knife or a bludgeon—for the Stolypin car or the transit prison. In the first place, why have one? And against whom? In the second place, if you did use it, then, considering the aggravating circumstance of your malevolent Article 58, you might be shot when you were retried. In the third place, even before that, your punishment for having a knife when they searched you would be very different from the thief's. For him to have a knife was mere misbehavior, tradition, he didn't know any better. But for you to have one was "terrorism."

  Finally, many of the people imprisoned under Article 58 were peaceful people (very often elderly, too, and often ill), and they had gotten along all their lives with words and without resorting to fisticuffs, and they weren't any more prepared for them now than they had been before.

  Nor had the thieves ever been put through the same kind of interrogation. Their entire interrogation had consisted of two sessions, an easy trial, and an easy sentence, and they wouldn't have to serve it out. They would be released ahead of time: either they would be amnestied or else they would simply escape.

  [V. I. Ivanov (now from Ukhta) got Article 162 (thievery) nine times and Article 82 (escape) five times, for a total of thirty-seven years in prison— and he "served out" five to six years for all of them.]

  Even during interrogation, no one ever deprived a thief of his legitimate parcels—consisting of abundant packages from the loot kept by his underworld comrades who were still on the loose. He never grew thin, was never weak for a single day, and in transit he ate at the expense of the innocent nonthieves, whom he called, in his own jargon, the frayera—"frayers," or "innocents," or "suckers."

  ["Prayer" is a blatnoi—underworld—word meaning nonthief—in other words, not a Chelovek ("Human being," with a capital letter). Well, even more simply: the frayera were all nonthief, nonunderworld mankind.]

  Not only did the articles of the Code dealing with thieves and bandits not oppress the thief; he was, in fact, proud of his con- victions under them. And he was supported in this pride by all the chiefs in blue shoulder boards and blue piping. "Oh, that's nothing. Even though you're a bandit and a murderer, you are not a traitor of the Motherland, you are one of our own people; you will reform." There was no Section Eleven—for organization— in the thieves' articles in the Code. Organization was not for- bidden the thieves. And why should it be? Let it help develop in them the feelings of collectivism that people in our society need so badly. And disarming them was just a game. They weren't punished for having a weapon. Their thieves' law was respected ("They can't be anything but what they are"). And a new murder in the cell would not increase a murderer's sentence, but instead would bring him new laurels.

  And all that went very deep indeed. In works of the last cen- tury, the lumpenproletariat was criticized for little more than a certain lack of discipline, for fickleness of mood. And Stalin was always partial to the thieves—after all, who robbed the banks for him? Back in 1901 his comrades in the Party and in prison ac- cused him of using common criminals against his political enemies. From the twenties on, the obliging term "social ally" came to be widely used. That was Makarenko's contention too: these could be reformed. According to Makarenko, the origin of crime lay solely in the "counterrevolutionary underground." (Those were the ones who couldn't be reformed—engineers, priests, SR's, Mensheviks.)

  And why shouldn't they steal, if there was no one to put a stop to it? Three or four brazen thieves working hand in glove could lord it over several dozen frightened and cowed pseudo politicals.

  With the approval of the administration. On the basis of the Progressive Doctrine.

  But even if they didn't drive off the thieves with their fists, why didn't the victims at least make complaints? After all, every sound could be heard in the corridor, and a convoy guard was marching slowly back and forth right out there.

  Yes, that is a question! Every sound and every complaining cry can be heard, and the convoy just keeps marching back and forth—why doesn't he interfere? Just a yard away from him, in the half-dark cave of the compartment, they are plundering a human being—why doesn't the soldier of the government police interfere?

  For the very same reason: he, too, has been indoctrinated. Even more than that: after many years of favoring thieves, the convoy has itself slipped in their direction. The convoy has itself become a thief.

  From the middle of the thirties until the middle of the forties, during that ten-year period of the thieves' most f
lagrant debauches and most intense oppression of the politicals, no one at all can recall a case in which a convoy guard intervened in the plunder- ing of a political in a cell, in a railroad car, or in a Black Maria. But they will tell you of innumerable cases in which the convoy accepted stolen goods from the thieves and, in return, bought them vodka, snacks (sweeter than the rations, too), and smokes. The examples are so numerous as to be typical.

  The convoy sergeant, after all, hasn't anything either: he has his gun, his greatcoat roll, his mess tin, his soldier's ration. It would be cruel to require him to escort an enemy of the people in an expensive overcoat or chrome-leather boots or with a swag of luxurious city articles—and to reconcile himself to that in- equality. Was not taking these things just one additional form of the class struggle, after all? And what other norms were there?

  In 1945-1946, when prisoners streamed in not just from any- where but from Europe, and wore and had in their bags unheard- of European articles, even the convoy officers could not restrain themselves. Their service had kept them from the front, but at the end of the war it also kept them from the harvest of booty—and, I ask you, was that just?

  And so, in these circumstances, the convoy guard systemati- cally mixed the thieves and the politicals in each compartment of their Stolypin, not through lack of space for them elsewhere and not through haste, but out of greed. And the thieves did not let them down: they stripped the beavers of everything, and then those possessions migrated into the suitcases of the convoy.

  [A beaver in the blatnoi—underworld—jargon was any rich zek who had "trash"—meaning good clothes—and "bacilli"—meaning fats, sugar, and other goodies.]

  But what could be done if the beavers had been loaded into the Stolypin cars, and the train was moving, and there simply weren't any thieves at all—they simply hadn't put any aboard? What if they weren't being shipped out on prisoner transports that day, even from one of the stations along the way? This could and did happen—several such cases are known.

  In 1947 they were transporting from Moscow to the Vladimir Central Prison a group of foreigners who had opulent possessions —as could be seen the very first time their suitcases were opened. At that point, the convoy itself began a systematic confiscation of their belongings right there in the railroad car. So that nothing should be missed, the prisoners were forced to undress down to their bare skin and to sit on the floor of the car near the toilet while their things were examined and taken away. But the convoy guard failed to take into account that they were taking these prisoners not to a camp but to a genuine prison. On their arrival there, I. A. Korneyev handed in a written complaint, describing exactly what had happened. They found the particular unit of convoy guards and searched them. Some of the things were recovered and returned to their owners, who also received com- pensation in money for those that weren't recovered. They say that the convoy guards got from ten to fifteen years. However, this is something that cannot be checked, and anyway they would have been convicted under an ordinary nonpolitical article of the Code, and they wouldn't have had to spend a long time in prison.

  However, that was an exceptional case, and if he had managed to restrain his greed in time, the chief of the convoy would have realized that it was better not to get involved in it. And here is another, less complicated case, which probably means that it happened often. In August, 1945, in the Moscow-Novosibirsk Stolypin car (in which A. Susi was being transported), it turned out that there weren't any thieves. And the trip was a long one, and the Stolypins just crawled along at that time. Without hurry- ing in the least, all in good time, the convoy chief declared a search—one prisoner at a time in the corridor with his things. Those summoned were made to undress in accordance with prison rules, but that wasn't why the search was being conducted, for each prisoner who had been searched was, in fact, put right back into his own crowded compartment, and any knife, anything for- bidden, could simply have been passed from hand to hand. The real purpose of the search was to examine their personal articles —the clothes they were wearing and whatever was in their bags. And right there, beside the bags, not in the least bored by the whole protracted search, the chief of the convoy guard, an officer, stood with a haughty poker face, with his assistant, a sergeant, beside him. Sinful greed kept trying to pop out, but the officer kept it hidden under a pretended indifference. It was the same situation as an old rake looking over little girls but embarrassed by the presence of outsiders—yes, and by that of the girls too— and not knowing exactly how to proceed. How badly he needed just a few thieves! But there were no thieves in the transport.

  There were no thieves aboard, but there were individuals among the prisoners who had already been infected by the thief-laden atmosphere of the prison. After all, the example of thieves is instructive and calls forth imitations: it demonstrates that there is an easy way to live in prison. Two recent officers were in one of the compartments—Sanin (from the navy) and Merezhkov. They were both 58's, but their attitudes had already changed. Sanin, with Merezhkov's support, proclaimed himself the monitor of the compartment and, through a convoy guard, requested a meeting with their chief. (He had fathomed that haughtiness and its need of a pimp!) This was unheard of, but Sanin was sum- moned, and they had a chat somewhere. Following Sanin's ex- ample, someone in the second compartment also asked for a meeting. And that person was similarly received.

  And the next morning they issued not twenty ounces of bread —the prisoner-transport ration at the time—but no more than nine ounces.

  They gave out the ration, and a quiet murmur began. A mur- mur, but in fear of any "collective action," these politicals did not speak up. In the event, only one among them loudly asked the guard distributing the bread: "Citizen chief! How much does this ration weigh?"

  "The correct weight," he was told.

  "I demand a reweighing; otherwise I will not accept it!" the dissatisfied prisoner declared loudly.

  The whole car fell silent. Many waited before beginning to eat their ration; expecting that theirs, too, would be reweighed. And at that moment, in all his spotlessness, the officer appeared. Everyone fell silent, which made his words all the weightier and all the more irresistible.

  "Which one here spoke out against the Soviet government?"

  All hearts stopped beating. (People will protest that this is a universal approach, that even out in freedom every little chief declares himself to be the Soviet government, and just try to argue with him about it. But for those who are panicky, who have just been sentenced for anti-Soviet propaganda, the threat is more frightening.)

  "Who was starting a mutiny over the bread ration?" the officer demanded.

  "Citizen lieutenant, I only wanted . . ." The guilty rebel was already trying to explain it all away.

  "Aha, you're the bastard? You're the one who doesn't like the Soviet government?"

  (And why rebel? Why argue? Wasn't it really easier to eat that little underweight ration, to suffer it in silence? And now he had fallen right in it!)

  "You stinking shit! You counterrevolutionary! You ought to be hanged, and you have the nerve to demand that the bread ration be re weighed! You rat—the Soviet government gives you food and drink, and you have the brass to be dissatisfied? Do you know what you're going to get for that?"

  Orders to the guard: "Take him out!" The lock rattles. "Come on out, you! Hands behind your back!" They bring out the un- fortunate.

  "Now who else is dissatisfied? Who else wants his bread ration reweighed?"

  (And it's not as if you could prove anything anyway. It's not as if they'd take your word against the lieutenant's if you were to complain somewhere that there were only nine ounces instead of twenty.)

  It's quite enough to show a well-beaten dog the whip. All the rest turned out to be satisfied, and that was how the penalty ration was confirmed for all the days of the long journey. And they began to withhold the sugar too. The convoy had appropriated it.

  (And this took place during the summer of o
ur two great vic- tories—over Germany and Japan—victories which embellish the history of our Fatherland and which our grandsons and great- grandsons will learn about in school.)

  The prisoners went hungry for a day and then a second day, by which time several of them began to get a bit wiser, and Sanin said to his compartment: "Look, fellows: If we go on this way, we're lost. Come on now, all of you who have some good stuff with you, let me have it, and I'll trade it for something to eat." With great self-assurance he accepted some articles and turned down others. (Not all the prisoners were willing to let their things go—and, you see, no one forced them to either.) And then he and Merezhkov asked to be allowed to leave the compartment, and, strangely enough, the convoy let them out. Taking the things, they went off toward the compartment of the convoy guard, and they returned from there with sliced loaves of bread and with makhorka. These very loaves constituted the eleven ounces miss- ing from the daily rations. Now, however, they were not dis- tributed on an equal basis but went only to those who had handed over their belongings.

  And that was quite fair: after all, they had all admitted they were satisfied with the reduced bread ration. It was also fair be- cause the belongings were, after all, worth something, and it was right that they should be paid for. And it was also fair in the long view because those things were simply too good for camp and were destined anyway to be taken away or stolen there.

  The makhorka had belonged to the guard. The soldiers shared their precious makhorka with the prisoners. And that was fair, too, since they had eaten the prisoners' bread and drunk up their sugar, which was too good for enemies anyway. And, last, it was only fair, too, that Sanin and Merezhkov took the largest share for themselves even though they'd contributed nothing—because without them all this would not have been arranged.

  And so they sat crammed in there, in the semidarkness, and some of them chewed on their neighbors' chunks of bread and their neighbors sat there and watched them. The guard permitted smoking only on a collective basis, every two hours—and the whole car was as filled with smoke as if there'd been a fire. Those who at first had clung to their things now regretted that they hadn't given them to Sanin and asked him to take them, but Sanin said he'd only take them later on.