The special mission of Semyon Ignatyev in Buryat-Mongolia (1937-1943)

In the autumn of 1937, the leadership of the Buryat-Mongolian ASSR, headed by M. Erbanov, was repressed, and the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) sent S. D. Ignatyev to the Buryat-Mongolian Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks), assigning him a special mission of purging” the republic from “nationalist infection” and “enemies of the people”. However, in the Buryat-Mongolian ASSR, S. D. Ignatyev did not become a mere tool of the “repression mechanism”. He chose his own course to lead the republic out of the moral-political crisis. Moreover, he succeeded in protecting the Buryat people and culture from being labeled as “Pan-Mongolism” and nationalism. Ignatyev mobilized the republic's economy for defense needs during the war, and he promoted and trained a generation of leaders of Buryat-Mongolia, who continued his work in the future.