People and procedures: toward a history of the investigations of Nazi crimes in the USSR

The Extraordinary State Commission was created on November 2, 1942 by decree of the Praesidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. It fulfilled its representational function during the war, and in the postwar years faithfully kept the topic of war crimes sealed off from Soviet society. The documentary materials it created and collected have turned out to be the latest Russian mass grave. While excavating it, historians will face the task of distinguishing 'ours' from 'others' and executioners from victims