The Metro-Vickers Affair was an international crisis precipitated by the arrest of six British subjects who were employees of Metropolitan-Vickers, and their public trial in 1933 by the authorities in the Soviet Union on charges of "wrecking" and espionage.
The show trial garnered international press coverage, generated broad public criticism over alleged violations of legal process, and resulted in the conviction and ultimate deportation of the defendants, following extensive diplomatic pressure.
[3] On 7 January 1933, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin made a speech on the first Five-Year Plan, but concluded with an ominous warning against counter-revolutionary elements which he claimed were still working to bring about the downfall of the Soviet state: "Thrown out of their groove, and scattered over the whole face of the USSR, these 'has-beens'[4] have wormed their way into our plants and factories, into our government offices and trading organizations, into our railway and transport enterprises... What did they carry with them into these places?
[8] "What had occurred, she would not and probably dared not say," Monkhouse later recalled, adding that he felt sure that threats had been used to cause her to henceforth "act as an agent of the OGPU" and assist in the effort to "frame up" a case against her employer and his associates.
Some five hours of close investigation followed, headed by the deputy chief of the Economic Department of the OGPU, who presented Monkhouse with search and arrest warrants.
[15] Monkhouse asserted that no physical torture, hypnotism, or drugs were used on him but that the interrogation was conducted for many hours on end, running without interruption from breakfast time until 2 am.
[15] Monkhouse denied repeatedly that he was a British intelligence agent but later asserted that he had been overcome by exhaustion towards the end of the process and consented to write a statement.
Almost every phrase which [the interrogator] dictated I disputed, altered, and finally wrote in a form which I thought would satisfy him and yet not harm my employers’ high reputation.
[17] After a second lengthy day of interrogation the interview was abruptly cut short and Monkhouse was released under orders not to leave the city, apparently at the behest of OGPU chief Vyacheslav Menzhinsky.
[21] The indictment noted that a panel of 6 "expert engineers" had studied the matter in association with the office of the Prosecutor General of the RSFSR Andrey Vyshinsky and had concluded that in all the cases of breakdowns investigated there was either criminal negligence or deliberate wrecking on the part of a number of persons in the technical personnel serving these stations.
"[23] MacDonald's interrogation transcript, introduced as part of the indictment, additionally indicated that the instruction to collect such material on "the political and economic situation of the USSR" had come in the summer of 1929 from his boss, L.C.
[25] Soviet authorities were anxious to counter anticipated objections that the pre-trial statements by Gussev and MacDonald had been obtained under duress, with procurator Andrey Vyshinsky publishing an interview on the politically sensitive prospective case in Izvestiia on March 23 asserting that "no kind of pressure was brought to bear on the accused" and that "only enemies who are striving to impair our relations with other states would spread such absurd rumors about alleged deviations from the established rules of procedure..."[26] No death sentences were handed out as a result of the April 1933 Metro-Vickers trial, with two of those indicted to stand trial not receiving punishment of any kind.
[28] In the view of the most recent study of the affair, by Nipissing University history professor Gordon W. Morrell, the comparatively mild sentences may have resulted from indecision within the Soviet government as to the severity of the alleged wrecking activity and the efficacy of draconian punishment in a case so closely impacting Soviet-British relations.
[27] All of these public spectacles seem to have been intended to send a political message, it is argued, that "older technical specialists from the old regime were not to be trusted and that [Communist] party members and Soviet citizens must be increasingly vigilant against enemies.