The Red Army of the new Soviet state was founded in the midst of civil war. Despite the ideological nature of the new regime and the unique circumstances of the army's creation, there was considerable basis for the apolitical organizational culture of the Tsarist army to be passed on to the Red Army. Moreover, the combination of growing state strength and robust organizational control mechanisms severely constricted the possibility of military intervention. Structure and culture, in terms of the two-step model of opportunity and motive set out in Chapter 1, combined to make a military coup extremely unlikely.

This chapter examines the post-Lenin succession and the Great Purges of the military under Stalin (see Table 4.1). In both of these cases the military did not become involved in sovereign power issues. The Great Purges receive the most extended treatment both because of their theoretical and intrinsic interest (why did the officer corps not do more to protect itself?) and because of new sources available from Soviet archives. There were definite corporate interest motives for military intervention in 1937–1938, but a combination of organizational culture and structural obstacles prevented any potential military coup. Before turning to these cases, however, I briefly discuss the origins of the Soviet army and the building of the Soviet state, in order to understand the organizational and political context in which officers' decisions were made.

A NEW SOVIET ARMY?

Was the Soviet military an army “of a new type,” as the Bolshevik regime claimed? In fact there were significant continuities from the old Imperial army, in terms of both personnel and organizational culture.