КИШИНЕВСКИЙ ПОГРОМ 1903 Г. И «ТЕОРИЯ ЗАГОВОРА» (ПО ДОКУМЕНТАМ ИЗ АРХИВА В. К. ПЛЕВЕ)

Abstract

This article is devoted to the study of the reasons for Kishinev pogrom of 1903 through the prism of "conspiracy theory". In the spring of 1881, Emperor Alexander III officially formulated the “conspiracy theory” as an explanation for the Jewish pogroms for the first time. It was then about the conspiracy of "anarchists", the alleged secret intrigues of the underground party "Narodnaya Volya", which with the help of Jewish pogroms tried to ignite a revolutionary civil war in Russia. However, further investigations have not found confirmation of this version. Again, the "conspiracy theory" captured public attention after the Chisinau pogrom of 1903. But this time there was a significant inversion within the framework of this theory: now the tsarist regime was suspected of organizing a Jewish pogrom in order to suppress the revolutionary movement. Public opinion attributed the role of the inspirer and instigator in inciting the pogromists on Jews to the publisher of the anti-Semitic Newspapers "Bessarabets" and " Znamya" P. A. Krushevan, and the head of the "conspiracy" - to the Minister of internal Affairs V. K. Pleve. This picture of events was fixed in Russian historiography for a long time. Its inertia is great although the latest research of Russian and foreign historians do not find actual evidence of the theory of deliberate conspiracy to commit a pogrom in Chisinau in 1903. This article critically examines the arguments of the supporters of the "conspiracy theory" and introduces new sources from the archives of V. K. Plehve, allowing to more accurately determine the course of events and to find out the motives, goals and actions of their main participants from the camp of the guards of the tsarist regime.

Keywords

• jewish pogrom
• pale of settlement
• conspiracy theory
• p. a. krushevan
• v. k. pleve
• s. yu. witte
• nicholas ii