On 11–12 June 1937, one of the most devastating political purges in military history unfolded in the Soviet Union. Eight of the Red Army’s most prominent commanders — Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky, Iona Yakir, Ieronim Uborevich, Robert Eideman, August Kork, Vitovt Putna, Boris Feldman, and Vitaly Primakov — were arrested, tortured by the NKVD, and accused of plotting with Nazi Germany to overthrow Joseph Stalin.

After a secret trial that lasted only a few hours, all eight generals were sentenced to death and executed by shooting shortly after midnight on 12 June 1937.

Their executions marked the beginning of Stalin’s massive purge of the Red Army leadership. Tens of thousands of officers were dismissed, imprisoned, or killed, crippling Soviet military command just years before Nazi Germany launched Operation Barbarossa in 1941.

Only decades later were the generals officially rehabilitated, when Soviet authorities admitted that the charges had been fabricated and their confessions extracted under torture.