One of Vavilov's former pupils, a peasant horticulturalist named Trofim Denisovich Lysenko, followed Jean-Baptiste Lamarck’s theory that organisms could acquire traits in their lifetimes from their environments. These qualities would then be passed down to the next generation. There was no need for genetic engineering or seed banks, which, Lysenko argued, represented a waste of time and resources: one simply had to train plants to meet one’s goals, a theory he named vernalization.
Lysenko's outlier theory resonated with the country's leader, Joseph Stalin. He liked the idea that plants, like workers, could be transformed by an act of political will. Stalin also liked that, unlike Vavilov, Lysenko came from peasant stock, and that his theories did not rely on academic laboratory work. Lysenko promised Stalin that he could meet the demand for improved crop varieties within three years, seven fewer than Vavilov estimated his work required to produce results.
Stalin's policies had induced famine and he needed quick solutions. So when, at a 1935 conference, Lysenko delivered a speech in which he vilified the scientific elite and promised quick-fix solutions to the problems of Soviet food production and distribution, his message was welcomed. Vavilov followed Lysenko's work closely but suspected that he had manipulated the results of his experiments to support his ideas. But since he was supported by Stalin, Lysenko sailed past Vavilov, who was his former teacher, through the ranks of the Soviet hierarchy.
Vavilov had begun to experience powerful opposition in the late twenties itself because of Stalin's attacks on the intellectual elite. Lysenko’s arrival on the scene increased the attacks. The seed bank was increasingly viewed as a wasteful drain on the state without tangible benefit. Vavilov’s expeditions began to be viewed as little more than expensive luxury tourist trips that cost millions.
It was Vavilov, however, whose reputation prevailed internationally. His expeditions were covered by Western journalists, and, on his travels, he befriended dignitaries and world leaders. In Stalinist Russia, to be acclaimed by so many international writers and intellectuals could soon become a problem. Vavilov suspected that his close ties to Western science had brought him under the surveillance of the Soviet security services.
Science in Stalinist Russia seemed deeply politicized. He faced criticism for hiring staff to work at the seed bank regardless of their social background and Party affiliation. In October 1937, Pravda published an editorial that claimed “[Vavilov’s] expeditions have absorbed huge amounts of people’s money. We must declare that practical value of the collection did not justify the expenses.” Stalin began to imprison intellectuals on charges of being "enemies of the state,” banishing them to labor camps to be “reeducated” in accordance with Communist principles.
Vavilov wondered for how long he could lead the Plant Institute in such an oppressive climate. He continued his work with great determination, maintaining that discipline, not politics, should inform research and scientific collaboration. At a March 1939 staff meeting he said: “We shall go to the pyre. We shall burn. But we shall not retreat from our convictions.”
Nevertheless, the past twelve months had been trying. International fame and status had pushed Vavilov unwillingly into the shadow world of Stalin-era politics. Stress had started affecting his health. The doorman noticed how he became short of breath whenever he climbed the building’s staircase. He had become increasingly prone to fits of rage, which burned out quickly, leaving him feeling awkward and embarrassed because it was not like him. The jealousy of his peers had affected his health and led him on several occasions to attempt to resign from his position as director of the seed bank.
On August 6 1940, he was out collecting samples on a mountainside near Ukraine with some colleagues. A black car pulled up with three shady looking characters who tell him that he was needed on urgent business in Moscow. He got into the car and left with them. But it' was a ruse because these were members of the NKVD, the precursor to the KGB, and they arrest him. He was never seen again in public.
Some months later, to everybody's surprise, Hitler broke off the nonaggression pact that he had signed with Stalin and invaded Russia. Before this, for the first part of the Second World War, the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany were allied. Stalin had received a lot of warnings from his various spies that Hitler will break the pact but for whatever reason, he had chosen not to believe them.