History A-level Edexcel - Russia 1917-91: from Lenin to Yeltsin - Theme 3:3b

Names of the secret police (1917-81)

Cheka

GPU

NKVD

KGB

Main heads of the secret police

Felix Dzerzhinsky (1917-34)

Genrikh Yagoda (1934-36)

Nikolai Yezhov (1936-38)

Lavrentiy Beria (1938-53)

Yuri Andropov (1967-82)

Attacks on government opponents (1917-28)

- based on French Revolution, Lenin wanted less severe version

- Lenin thought political terror was temporary measure until revolution was secure

The Cheka

- Lenin's first secret police

- established Dec 1917

- targeted counter-revolutionaries

- Felix Dzerzhinsky head (1917-26)

Role of the Cheka (1917-21)

- during civil war, role was to protect communist rule in areas held by communists (not defend and enlarge territory)

- Cheka attacked capitalist and socialist enemies of communists

- did not enforce laws/ bound by laws

- helped red army requisition grain in War communism

- closed opposition propaganda and dealt with opponents of party

- used violence against communist enemies

- supported red army's attack on Kronstadt

- ran concentration camps to house enemies

- stopped private trading

Role of GPU (formerly Cheka) - 1922 onwards

- 1922 - Lenin ordered Dzerzhinsky to monitor press

- kept former tsarist officers under surveillance

- supervised deportation of professors/engineers

- kept public opinion under close scrutiny

- had power to intercept post

- reported moral problems

- policed semi-capitalist marketplace established by NEP (Nepmen, women, youth, priests)

Lenin's political trials

- 1922, Dzerzhinsky organised trial of socialist revolutionary leaders (accused of treason and sabotage) - all defendants sentenced to death

The NKVD under Genrikh Yagoda

- appointed head in July 1934

- responsible for leading hunt for enemies after Kirov's death

- proved to be disappointment as Stalin expected more and was not to scale

- collaborated with Stalin in Great Terror to turn NKVD against communists

Terror under Nikolai Yezhov

- Stalin had put forward doctrine of sharpening class struggle - justified terror

- Stalin set targets for arrests, executions, deportations

- 1937 - NKVD purged (many agents were loyal to party/Stalin's opponents and ideologically opposed to mass terror)

- new NKVD agents recruited

- introduced 'conveyor belt system' to quicken process of getting victims to confess

- yezhovshchina - terror attacked all aspects of life

- at local level, workers and peasants organised own show trials

Consequences of the terror

- terror removed everyone from government who fought in Civil War/ worked with Lenin

- Stalin replaced these officials with own supporters

- economic problems- factory managers+economic planners deported/executed so little expertise to run economy - affected 3rd FYP

- Yagoda and Yezhov killed

The NKVD under Beria (1938-53)

- Yezhov arrested in April 1939

- Beria felt indiscriminate attacks inefficient and waste of manpower

- oversaw murder of Trotsky in Mexico in 1940

- made Gulag profitable (food rations improved to increase productivity)

- responsible for policing ethnic minorities

- 1942, organised mass deportation of Kalmyks as Stalin feared they would welcome German invasian

- 1944, ordered deportation of Chechens to Siberia

- 1945 - interrogated soviet prisoners of war

- Leningrad Affair (1949)

- The Doctors' Plot (1952/53)

The NKVD under Beria - the Leningrad Affair (1949)

- purge against Leningrad party officials as Stalin claimed they acted independently

- 200 arrested and forced to confess crimes

- Beria's rivals based there

The NKVD under Beria - the Doctors' Plot (1952/53)

- Stalin's medical staff arrested for trying to poison Stalin

- many of the doctors purged were jewish/jewish name so anti-semitic attack

- Stalin died before doctors were executed and they were released after his death

KGB under Khrushchev

- KGB low profile

- jobs no longer led to positions of power within government

KGB under Andropov - aims

- suppress dissidents (minority who refused to conform to soviet expectations)

- strategy was to achieve maximum control through minimum violence

- expose+prosecute corruption

KGB under Andropov - methods of suppression of dissidents and increasing discipline

- 1968 - KGB order issued to increase surveillance of and action against dissidents

- artist trials 1964-66 (outcry from other nations who demanded artistic freedom so more subtle methods used henceforth)

- KGB agents not allowed to accept gifts

- KGB agents had to declare financial assets

- KGB agents sacked if they broke law

- KGB agents promoted based on success of dealing with dissidents

- Directorate V branch established in 1967 to deal with dissidents

KGB under Andropov - emigration policy

- high profile dissidents with international reputation allowed to emigrate

- Jews, who had campaigned since 1948 to go to Israel, given exit visas (justified by referring to demographics and how jews were more likely to be dissidents)

KGB under Andropov - repressive psychiatry

- less well known dissidents could be sent to psychiatric institutions for compulsory treatments

- policy endorsed in secret resolution in 1969

- Benefit over prison: less overt, psychiatric records private so government could hide repression, 'treatment' could carry on indefinitely, medicine could be prescribed to keep patients quiet

- rumours reached west in 1970s

KGB under Andropov - changing emphasis from repression to prevention

- this was done as: he believed Stalin's repression was ineffective and growing party belief that socialism incompatible with widespread repression

- Nov 1972 - issuing official warning policy adopted

- if warnings didn't work, dissidents could be sacked/demoted, sent to psychiatric institutions, exiled, imprisoned

- show trials used e.g. 1972 trials of Pyotr Yakir and Viktor Krasin

- KGB could use violence to intimidate dissidents e.g. Bulldozer Exhibition 1974

KGB under Andropov - Sakharov

- had advocated human rights

- regarded as father of hydrogen bomb

- from 1962 had become critical of damage from nuclear tests

- in 1964 led campaign to expel Lysenko from Soviet Academy of Sciences

- 1968, circulated essay arguing SU should respect human rights, produced in samizdat

- well respected in west and SU so KGB reluctant to prosecute so restricted his right to travel, reduced his salary and given warning

- Sakharov gave full report of his intimidation to New York Times

- case so well known by 1968 that he could not be arrested so KGB orchestrated press campaign against him

- published 'My country and the world' in 1975 and received Nobel Peace Prize

- sent into internal exile

KGB under Andropov - Solzhensitsyn

- Solzhenitsyn was Russian nationalists and devoted member of Russian Orthodox Church

- became famous for novels describing horrors of gulags published in west

- received Nobel literature prize

- Western fame meant he could not be imprisoned so forced into exile in America in 1973

The Helsinki Agreement (1975)

- committed countries across Europe, including Russia, to respect human rights

- dissidents used this to show treatment was in breach of agreement which embarrassed government

KGB under Andropov - Law and order campaign (1979)

- caused by increased problems (economic slowdown, poor harvests, Afghanistan war, Brezhnev's failed negotiations with USA, growing corruption and non+conformity) and prospect of 1980 Moscow Olympics

- anti-social behaviour attacked e.g. drunkenness and hooliganism

KGB under Andropov - monitoring of popular discontent (1982-85)

- KGB agents posed as westerners and initiated anti-gov conversations with citizens

- used phone tapping and intercepting mail

KGB under Andropov - popular discontent and social malaise

- increasing discontent as soviet citizens were anxious about progression of living standards, dissatisfied with quality+availability of food and consumer goods, insufficient industry promotion opportunities, resented privileges and corruption of party members+managers

- serious as since 1964 soviet rule based on 'social contract'

- increased social malaise lead to alcoholism, poor labour discipline, black market, military service avoidance, western goods demand, sympathy for Polish strikes, increased Church attendance, falling birth rate

KGB under Andropov - dealing with discontent (1982-85)

- anti-corruption - investigated senior party officials and managers using soviet resources to make themselves rich

- anti-alcohol campaign - workers sacked for drunkenness/fined for machinery+products damaged if they were drunk at work

- operation trawl - KGB officers arrested people who were drunk/absent from work

Comparing the role of the secret police

- Cheka secured communist rule e.g. Red Terror

- NKVD under Yezhov implemented Great Terror

- NKVD under Beria expanded gulag system which increased forced labour

- Under Andropov, KGB suppression of dissidents

- after Stalin, role in social control declined