The Great Purge, also known as the Great Terror, marks a time period during the late 1930’s of extreme persecution and oppression in the Soviet Union. Kulaks (welthypeasents), Nepmen (people who engaged in private enterprise during the New Economic Policy of the 1920’s), clergymen, former oppositionists were all involved in persecutions after previous purges under Stalin’s control. Imprisonments and executions is what characterized the Great Purge, not only executions of usual suspects but communist leaders and party members, Red Army members, and great numbers in the Intelligentsia. The Great Purge established a new type of terror, which the boundaries of those who were oppressed were nonexistent. The secret police of the Soviet, brought one under suspicion of the NKVD, ( The People’s Commissariat of International Affairs), with any stain on record, including minor association with a perceived enemies. Charged with treason, wrecking, espionage, and more, were the people of the so-called enemies. There were strong anti-assists attitudes and persecutions against those that were bullied, who developed their own “cults of personality”, and used state funds inappropriately. The assassination of Sergei Kirov began the Great Purge. He was murdered by Leonid Nikolayev, who was suspected to have been ordered by Stalin. Kirov was a faithful communist, though he had a certain popularity in the party that threatened Stalin’s consolidation of power. Three important, widely publicized show trials triggered Kirov’s death. The trials were of former prominent Bolsheviks in Moscow, and ultimately encouraged the climate of terror during the Great Purge. The party began purging itself of desirables as a way of tension, and rapidly mounted suspicion. Since then it has been determined that Denunciations of enemies was encouraged, and surveillance tightened. During this time of oppression, hundreds of people were executed or died in a Gulag. In the summer of 1938, Nikolai Yezhov was announced head of the NKVD. As the excess of the Purge was being realized and coming to an end, but many in a Gulag were not released until the end of Stalin's leadership.