Contents

Article
Footnotes
Footnotes about people
Miscellaneous footnotes
Sources for footnotes

Among the victims of this band of inhuman beasts were Comrades A. A. Zhdanov ^p1 and A. S. Shcherbakov ^p2. The criminals confessed that, taking advantage of the illness of Comrade Zhdanov, they intentionally concealed a myocardial infarction, prescribed inadvisable treatments for this serious illness and thus killed Comrade Zhdanov. Killer doctors, by incorrect use of very powerful medicines and prescription of harmful regimens, shortened the life of Comrade Shcherbakov, leading to his death.

In the first place, the criminals tried to undermine the health of the Soviet military leadership cadres, to remove them from the power structure and thereby weaken the defense of the country.¹ The arrest of the criminals disrupted these nefarious plans, preventing the accomplishment of their monstrous goals.

Whom did these monsters serve? Who directed the criminal, terrorist, and harmful activity of these vicious traitors to the Motherland? What goal did they want to achieve by the murders of leading figures of the Soviet government?

It has been determined that all participants of the terrorist group of doctors were in the service of foreign intelligence; having sold their bodies and souls, they appeared as hirelings, paid agents.

The majority of the participants of the terrorist group -- Vovsi^p3, B. Kogan^p4, Feldman^p5, Grinshtein^p6, Etinger^p7 and others -- were bought by American intelligence. They were recruited by an branch-office of American intelligence -- the international Jewish bourgeois-nationalist organization called "Joint"². The filthy face of this Zionist spy organization, covering up their vicious actions under the mask of kindness, is now completely revealed.

Relying upon a group of corrupt Jewish bourgeois nationalists, the professional spies and terrorists of "Joint," through assignments from and under the direction of American intelligence, extended their subversive activity even into the territory of the Soviet Union. As the prisoner Vovsi revealed under investigation, he received directives "about the extermination of leadership cadres of the USSR," from the USA. These instructions were handed to him, in the name of the spying-terrorist "Joint" organization, through Dr. Shimeliovich^p8 and the well-known Jewish bourgeois nationalist Mikhoels^p9.

Unmasking the gang of poisoner-doctors struck a blow against the international Jewish Zionist organization. Now all can see what sort of philanthropists and "friends of peace" hid beneath the sign-board of "Joint."

Other participants in the terrorist group (Vinogradov^p10, M. Kogan^p11, Egorov^p12) were discovered, as has been presently determined, to have been long-time agents of English intelligence, serving it for many years, carrying out its most criminal and sordid tasks. The bigwigs of the USA and their English junior partners know that to achieve domination over other nations by peaceful means is impossible. Feverishly preparing for a new world war, they energetically send spies inside the USSR and the people's democratic countries: they attempt to accomplish what the Hitlerites could not do -- to create in the USSR their own subversive "fifth column." It is enough to recall the undisguised and cynical appropriation by the American government of $100,000,000 for subversive terror and espionage activity in countries belonging to the socialist camp, not to mention that, for this purpose, hundreds of millions of dollars, both American and British, will be spent in secret.

The Soviet people should not for a minute forget about the need to heighten their vigilance in all ways possible, to be alert for all schemes of war-mongers and their agents, to constantly strengthen the Armed Forces and the intelligence organs of our government.

Comrade Stalin has repeatedly warned, that our successes have their dark side ³, that they cause among many of our workers a spirit of placidity and complacency. Such moods are far from being overcome. We still have many complacent people. It is exactly this absentmindedness of our people that becomes the fertile soil for this vile sabotage.

In the USSR, we are ruled indivisibly by socialist relations. In the Great Patriotic War, the Soviet people won a victory which is unprecedented in history. In a surprisingly short period of time, the difficult consequences of war have been liquidated. In all areas of economic and cultural construction, we have successes. From these facts, certain people have drawn the conclusion that now the dangers of wrecking, sabotage, and espionage have disappeared, that the bosses of the capitalist world will give up their attempts to conduct subversive activities against the USSR.

But only Right-Opportunists can think and judge this way, people standing for an anti-Marxist view of the "fading" of the class struggle. They do not or cannot understand that these successes lead not to the exhaustion, but to the sharpening of the struggle, that the more successful is our forward progress, the more fierce will be the struggle of the enemies of the people, doomed to destruction, brought to despair.

So the immortal Lenin teaches, so does Comrade Stalin teach.

"In our revolution," Lenin points out, "more than in any other, the law was proven that the strength of the revolution, the strength of its pressure, energy, determination, and celebration of its victory will increase, along with this, the strength of opposition from the bourgeoisie."

Unmasking the opportunistic theory of the "fading" class struggle due to the degree of our success, Comrade Stalin warned:

This is not merely a rotten theory, but also a dangerous theory, because it lulls our people to sleep, leads them into a trap, while it gives the class enemy a chance to recover for war against the Soviet power."⁴

In the USSR the exploiting classes were broken up and liquidated a long time ago, but still there remain vestiges of bourgeois ideology, vestiges of the morals and psychology of private ownership; there remain holders of bourgeois opinions and bourgeois morals, living people, secret enemies of our people. Exactly these hidden enemies, being supported by the imperialistic world, will be harmful in the future.

All this obliges the Soviet people in every possible way to strengthen their revolutionary vigilance: to keep a sharp eye out for enemy plots. Just this fact that a group of filthy degenerates from the "men of science" were, over the course of some time, able to work with impunity, reveals how some of our Soviet organs and leaders lost their vigilance, having been infected with carelessness.

The organs of state security did not reveal soon enough the saboteur and terrorist organization among the doctors. In this, these organs should have been especially watchful, since history already knows examples⁵ when, under the mask of doctors, vicious killers and traitors to the Motherland were active, such as "Doctors" Levin^p13 and Pletnev^p14, who on assignment of enemies of the Soviet Union killed the great Russian author A. M. Gorki^p15 by means of deliberately erroneous treatments, as well as important figures of the Soviet government such as V. V. Kuibyshev ^p16 and V. R. Menzhinsky^p17.

Nor did the leaders of the Ministry of Public Health turn out to be up to the task. They overlooked terrorist wrecking activity of the vile degenerates, who had sold out to the enemies of the Soviet Union.

Exposing the gang of poisoner-doctors struck a shattering blow to the Anglo-American war mongers. Their agents were captured and neutralized. Again the true face of the slaveholding cannibals of the USA and England appears before the whole world.

The Soviet people with anger and indignation denounce the criminal band of killers and their foreign bosses. As for the despicable hirelings, serving for dollars and sterling, the people crush them, as loathsome reptiles. As for the instigators of these murderous mercenaries, this they can be sure of: that retribution will not forget about them and will find out the devious road that leads to them, in order to speak its weighty word.

All this is true, of course. But it is also true that, apart from these enemies, we still have another enemy: the lack of vigilance of our people. One may not doubt that, as long as we are absent-minded, there will be sabotage. Consequently, in order to liquidate sabotage, it is necessary to purge lack of vigilance from our ranks.

Footnotes

People (numbers follow "p")
Editorial policy on "people"s footnotes:
For doctors, I tried to scrape up what information I could from Vaksberg, Rapoport, and Conquest. All of the doctors mentioned here had been among the best in their profession, and some were responsible for treating national leaders. For other, better-known people (eg Gorky, Zhdanov), I figured a one-line footnote was enough to make clear who was being talked about.

Note p1 -- Zhdanov, Andrej Aleksandrovich (1896-1948)
Member of Poliburo, 1939-1948
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Note p2 -- Shcherbakov, Aleksandr Sergeevich (1901-1945)
Candidate Member of Poliburo, 1941-1945
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Note p3 -- Vovsi, Miron
Doctor who had treated leaders at Kremlin Hospital ; had a clinic at Botkin Hospital
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Note p4 -- Kogan, Boris
Doctor who had treated leaders at Kremlin Hospital
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Note p5 -- Fel'dman, A.I.
Doctor
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Note p6 -- Grinshtejn (Grinstein), Alexander
Doctor (neuropathologist)
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Note p7 -- E^tinger (Etinger), Yakov
Doctor (headed a clinic at First Gradskaya Hospital)
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Note p8 -- Shimeliovich, (may be Shchimeliovich) Boris
Doctor (chief physician at Botkin Hospital). Executed 12 Aug 1952 during repression of Jewish Antifascist Committee (JAC)⁶
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Note p9 -- Mixoe^ls, (Mikhoels) Solomon Mixajlovich (1890-1948)
Internationally respected actor and director, notably in classical Jewish plays. During WW II, was chairman of Jewish Antifascist Committee (JAC)⁶. Killed by NKVD in staged auto accident. Given an honorable state funeral; this news release was one of the first public indications of disfavor.
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Note p10 -- Vinogradov, Vladimir
Comrade Stalin's personal physician.
In 1952, VV diagnosed Comrade Stalin to be at risk of a stroke [he eventually turned out to be correct], and was foolhardy enough to recommend "Complete rest, freedom from all work." Comrade Stalin, seeing a conspiracy to remove Him from power, furiously demanded Vinogradov's arrest: "Leg irons! Put him in leg irons!" [A. Vaksberg, p. 242].
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Note p11 -- Kogan, Mixail Borisovich (1901?-1952?)
Doctor, brother of Boris Kogan. According to some accounts he was arrested and died under interrogation in 1952 , but Ya. Rapoport says he had died naturally (of cancer) several years earlier.
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Note p12 -- Egorov, Mixail
Doctor
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Note p13 -- Levin, L. (1870?-1938?-
Distinguished doctor. According to 1938 Bukharin show trial, was recruited by NKVD chief Yagoda (a traitor working for Opposition) as poisoner.
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Note p14 -- Pletnëv, D. (1872?-1939??)
Distinguished doctor. According to 1938 Bukharin show trial, was recruited by NKVD chief Yagoda (a traitor working for Opposition) as poisoner.
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Note p15 -- Gor'kij, Maksim (given name: Peshkov, Aleksej Maksimovich) (1868-1936)
World-renowned author, playwright, and social activist.
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Note p16 -- Kujbyshev (Kuibyshev), Valerian Vladimirovich (1888-1935)
Member of Central Committee since 1922. An independent and popular Stalinist, he may have died just in time to avoid accusations of Trotskyism.
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Note p17 -- Menzhinskij, Vyacheslav Rudol'fovich (1874-1934)
Head of OGPU (secret police) 1926-1934.
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Misc. Notes

Note 1 -- Medical malpractice against military leaders
Writer Boris Andreyevich Pil'nyak (1894-1937) had written a fictional piece "Tale of the Unextinguished Moon" ("Povest' Nepogashennoj Luny"), widely understood as a "roman a clef" accusing Comrade Stalin of arranging military hero Mikhail Vasil'evich Frunze's death (1925) under a controversial medical operation. In 1937, the supreme measure of social defense was imposed on Pil'nyak, convicted of spying for Japan. The idea of medical skulduggery, however, continued to have resonance even among those who rejected Pil'nyak's outrageous slander.
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Note 2 --"Joint"
This is deliberately vague. The single, untranslated English word in the original would frighten less-educated Russian-language readers with its alien sound. It apparently refers to the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC), a leading philanthropic organization of American Jews for overseas aid, but why wasn't it spelled out?
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Note 3 -- "dark side"
Comrade Stalin discussed this theme at length in Part 4 of
About Shortcomings in Party Work and Measures for the Liquidation of Trotskyite and Other Double-Dealers (Report and Final Words at the Plenary Session of the Central Committee [CC] of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) [ACP(b)], 3-5 March 1937).
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Note 4 -- Quote is from
I.V. Stalin, About Shortcomings in Party Work and Measures for the Liquidation of Trotskyite and Other Double-Dealers, section 5.
If you can read Russian, you can jump direct to the original quote
If not, you can use the table of contents to point yourself to section 5.
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Note 5 -- History already knows examples
Levin and Pletnev were among the defendants in the 1938 Bukharin show trial. For the official Soviet version, see
Report of the Court Proceedings in the Case of the Anti-Soviet "Bloc of Rights and Trotskyites", Moscow, 1938.
For a counterrevolutionary version, see
Robert Conquest, The Great Terror: A Reassessment, Oxford University Press, New York and London, 1990; pp. 375-390.
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Note 6 -- Jewish Antifascist Committee (JAC)
In August 1941, Comrade Stalin tentatively authorized a "Jewish Anti-Hitler Committee" to mobilize international Jewish aid for the Soviet war effort against Nazi Germany. It finally emerged in April 1942 as the "Jewish Antifascist Committee," of Soviet Jews only, under close government control. With the end of the war (1945), however, Soviet Jewish celebrities were no longer needed to extract money from wealthy American donors, and Comrade Stalin came to distrust JAC's foreign connections, especially after Israel's independence in 1948. Comrade Stalin's first prominent JAC victim was Mikhoels (too internationally prominent to be condemned publicly). JAC itself was disbanded in Nov 1948, while Jews were quietly being fired as "rootless cosmopolitans" from responsible jobs. Many former JAC members were arrested and tortured, in preparation for a show trial that was aborted by Comrade Stalin's death.
"The USSR is one of the few states in the world where a display of national hatred is persecuted by law. There has never been nor can there be a case of someone in the USSR becoming an object of persecution because of his national origins."
--Comrade Stalin, in an answer to an American named Barnes, 20 March 1933. [printed in last volume of "Collected Works"]
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Some sources used for footnotes

Yakov Rapoport, The Doctors' Plot of 1953 (translated by N.A. Perova and R.S. Bobrova), Harvard University Press, Cambridge MA, 1991.
Dr. Rapoport had been arrested as one of the "killer doctors" on 3 Feb 1953. His book is partly a personal account, but mostly a broader study.

Arkady Vaksberg, Stalin Against the Jews (translated by Antonina W. Bouis), Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1994.
Book covers Stalin's entire career. Final chapters cover the murder of Solomon Mikhoels (ch. 8), the destruction of the JAC (ch. 9), and the Doctors' Plot (ch. 10).
Mr. Vaksberg has written other counterrevolutionary accounts of the Stalin years, eg a biography of "Stalin's Prosecutor," Andrei Ya. Vyshinsky.

(for info about "killer-doctors" Levin and Pletnev in 1938 Bukharin trial only)
Robert R. Conquest, The Great Terror: A Reassessment, Oxford University Press, New York and Oxford, 1990.

Dzhin Bronskaya i Vladimir Chuguev, Kto Est' Kto v Rossii i Byvshem SSSR, Terra, Moskva, 1994.

Announcement in "Pravda," 4 April 1953 (after Comrade Stalin's death), that the "Doctor's Plot" case has been dismissed.
vrach-ub-cancel.html"
A return of sanity? Or were the traitors Khrushchov and Beriya covering their tracks?