Discussion of the decisions and instructions of the VKP(b) Central Committee plenum began at a citywide gathering of writers, on 2–5 April of this year. This discussion raised the level of political activism for writers and led to the development of genuine criticism and self-criticism, something we have never had to a sufficient extent in the Union of Soviet Writers.

The writers harshly and rightly criticized their own union and its leadership for a lack of political concern, an absence in many cases of class vigilance, and for organizational muddle-headedness, which in the final analysis has helped class enemies penetrate literature and be active among writers.

The writers spoke with special harshness about the subversive activity in the literature of Averbakh and his accomplice Kirshon and others.

In connection with this, as well as with the statement by Comrade Yudin, the Party group of the SSP board subjected the activities of Kirshon, as Averbakh's closest comrade-in-arms, to a thorough examination.

At a gathering of Moscow playwrights lasting several days that began immediately after the Party group's session, the exposure of the Averbakh group unfolded even more. Only now has the subversive wrecking activity of this Averbakh group become fully evident to the Union of Soviet Writers.

After the TsK VKP(b) decision to restructure the literary organizations, Averbakh and people of like mind applied all their efforts to sabotaging this decision's implementation. With this goal in mind, as is now evident from the confessions of Kirshon, Bruno Yasensky, and Korabelnikov, as well as the confirmations of Fadeev, Bela Illes, and others, the Averbakh group has for a long time been holding its illegal, factional, anti-Party meetings in the apartments of Averbakh, Kirshon, and, subsequently, Yagoda.

At these illegal, anti-Soviet gatherings, means and methods of fighting the Party line in literature were worked out. Thus, Averbakh essentially forced a group of writers (including Fadeev, B. Illes, Sholokhov, and others) to write a letter to the TsK VKP(b) on their disagreement with the decision to eliminate RAPP.

There it was agreed, at Averbakh's initiative, to call A. M. Gorky to the defense of RAPP, i.e., against the TsK VKP(b) decision. Subsequently the group reached an agreement and unleashed wrecking work to bring A. M. Gorky into conflict with the Party group of the Union of Soviet Writers and the non-Party writers into conflict with the Communists. Relying on the support of Yagoda, who became their own man in A. M. Gorky's home, and having surrounded A. M. Gorky with “their own men,” also with the help of P. Kriuchkov, the Averbakh group managed to get some unaffiliated workers to break away from the Communists and to make Gorky, who was receiving one-sided information daily, very unfavorably inclined toward the Party group and the Communist writers. This found its expression in A. M. Gorky's articles entitled “Literary Amusements” [Literaturnye zabavy], whose point was aimed mainly at the Communist writers (Fadeev, Panfyorov, Gladkov, Vishnevsky, and others). As we know, his “Literary Amusements” ceased publication after the Pravda editors published an open letter from F. Panfyorov to A. M. Gorky.

The Averbakh group's audacity reached the point where at the group's gatherings there was vile compromising of Comrade L. M. Kaganovich, as was brought out at a session of the Party group.

The Averbakh group exploited the NKVD—its funds and connections—to create its own center parallel to the Union of Soviet Writers. It concentrated its activities in the editorial offices on the publication of its book about the White Sea—Baltic Canal, and later on the Bolshevo Commune. In the process, there was also pressure on non-Party workers from several former NKVD workers (Yagoda and his retinue).

After Averbakh was sent to the Urals to work, Kirshon took charge of the group's efforts aimed at returning Averbakh to literature. They tried to bring Averbakh to the writers' congress as a delegate. Rumors were sown among the writers about how Averbakh would be back any day. Gorky kept getting asked to make efforts on behalf of Averbakh's return. Averbakh was proposed for a job in the editorial offices of People of the Second Five-Year Plan [Liudi vtoroi piatiletki].

Until the day of Averbakh's arrest, Kirshon defended him as an “honest Bolshevik and Party man.” He was echoed by Bruno Yasensky and others.

The composition of the Averbakh group attracts the most serious attention:

All these facts characterize the true face of the Averbakh group and its activities—the most subversive wrecking.

Only now, Comrade Stalin, in connection with the full exposure of this hostile gang that has been so active in literature, will the TsK VKP(b) decision of 23 April 1932 be implemented in full.

During discussion of the decisions of the TsK VKP(b) Plenum, the activities of the literary-artistic journals and publishers, which are functioning extremely unsatisfactorily, were subjected to harsh and justified criticism.

Comrade Stalin, I beg of you to receive a group of Communist writers (Vishnevsky, Fadeev, Panfyorov, Lakhuti, and others) in the very near future.