In the 1930s, Stalin launched a large-scale purge campaign in the Soviet Union, a large-scale purge that can no longer be described simply as the "expansion" of the movement. In this tragic movement, countless upright people have been arrested, and countless unjust, false and wrongly decided cases have been committed.
Stalin and his two close comrades-in-arms, Molotov and Voroshilov, were undoubtedly the spiritual leaders of the movement, and together they defined the political line of the purge movement, i.e., to arrest anyone without conclusive evidence and charges, and to speculate on false accusations that could only be made by looking up at the sky. However, there are still countless people who flock to such a ridiculous political line, because it is the best way to grab political capital, such as Kaganovich.
The Jew had been Stalin's confidant as early as Lenin's time, but had long been stationed in the provinces. After the 1930s, Kaganovich returned to Moscow and gradually became Stalin's right and left hand. However, Kaganovich was less intimate with Stalin than Molotov and Voroshilov, so the Jew "tiptoed and wagged his tail in front of them, acting as a bug."
Stalin admired this, portraying Kaganovich as "a sense of class," a class symbol of uncompromisingness toward the enemy, and a model of staunch Bolsheviks. However, this does not guarantee the safety of Kaganovich's family during the Great Purge, or even the safety of Kaganovich himself. Kaganovich, then, must show the kind of "firmness" that the leader admires. And a ridiculous case closely related to Kaganovich is a good expression of his "excellent qualities".
In 1941, Kaganovich's brother, Mikhail Kaganovich, committed suicide in the toilet of Mikoyan's office. The former alternate member of the Central Organization Bureau appeared so helpless during the Great Purge that Stalin and others put him on a ridiculous charge that Mikhail was a German spy and that Hitler had sent him to infiltrate the Soviet government. It was so absurd that Hitler would send a Jew into the Soviet government? Either Hitler was mad or the Soviets were mad. Yet it was this charge that crushed Mikhail, and his brother did not defend him a word.
Kaganovich successfully passed Stalin's test of loyalty and survived the darkest period safely at the expense of his own brother. Later, almost no one mentioned Mikhail's case, and even if it was finally found to be a great injustice, Kaganovich never mentioned the tragedy, and Mikhail was forgotten by his relatives and comrades.
In front of Stalin, Kaganovich became even more aggressive and flattered, which also allowed him to remain in the ranks of Stalin's "close comrades-in-arms" for a long time, and even survived Stalin's "anti-Semitic campaign" in 1949.