Finally, let us note that KGB chiefs were dependent on the power constellation at the top, and were doubtless tempted to support a preferred leader against some other figure. Thus, the KGB unquestionably played a role in the ousting of Khrushchev in 1964, as surmised by the well-informed R. G. Pikhoia. According to him, the ease with which the plot proceeded must have had something to do with Khrushchev’s tense relations with the security services. After Beria’s arrest in 1953, his deputy, S. N. Kruglov, had become head of the MVD, and many had interpreted this as a sign that Stalinist methods were on the way back – especially since various military industrial branches that had just been removed from the MVD were being restored to them. In fact, these ominous signs were generated by a partial and temporary short-circuit in the top leadership, and the purge of Beria’s old accomplices continued. At the end of August 1953 the head of the MVD reported that the mopping-up operation in regional directorates was over (certain officials were condemned to death or lengthy prison sentences). Taxed with all the ‘pogroms’ of the 1930s, the MVD’s influence was on the wane, while the future KGB’s star was rising.
A year later, an MVD was created for the Russian republic, which had not possessed one since 1930, when an all-Union Internal Affairs Ministry based in Moscow was deemed sufficient. This presaged further changes. In 1956, Kruglov was replaced at the top of the MVD by Dudorov, head of the Central Committee’s construction department. In 1956–7, many MVD cadres were dismissed as a logical prelude to the abolition on 13 January 1962 of the MVD of the USSR, whose functions were turned over to its republican namesakes. In Russia, even its name changed: it became MOOP (Ministry for Public Order). But the reader need not worry: it soon reverted to its old name, for in an authoritarian state such powerful traditions are not so readily blotted out.[2]
The KGB’s so-called ‘political’ functions were defined by its statute, approved by the Central Committee Presidium on 9 January 1959. It was a ‘political organ’ responsible for defending the system from internal and external enemies. With Shelepin’s appointment in 1958, a further thinning out of its ranks was conducted, extending the measures that had been taken since Khrushchev’s arrival in power. In January 1963, Shelepin was promoted to the Politburo and replaced at the head of the KGB by Semichastny (an old Komsomol comrade). That same year, Semichastny reported that 46,000 officers had been dismissed (half of them before 1959), and that more than 90 per cent of the generals and officers in military counter-intelligence had been transferred to civilian jobs ‘in the course of the last four years’ (he probably meant 1959–63). New agents arrived with party and Komsomol references. On the other hand, many former KGB operatives were redeployed to work in the party, soviets, or in the Prosecutor’s offices. Shelepin and Semichastny’s KGB, strengthened by party cadres who were supposed to rekindle its ideological fervour, once again regarded itself as an ‘armed detachment of the party’ (Stalin’s formula), and not necessarily as pro-Khrushchev. But many of the old cadres who survived must have been upset by the dismissal of tens of thousands of agents, the reduction in their salaries, and the elimination of several perks (free medicine, privileges for length of service).
The KGB could not but inherit a sinister reputation from the Stalinist NKVD. In the USSR and throughout the world, it ‘enjoyed’ the image of the repressive agency of a regime whose foundations largely rested on repression (it is enough to refer to the list of its duties). In reality, however, its activities in this sphere did not have much in common with those of the MVD during the Stalinist period. We now possess data on the number of arrests and types of sentence meted out to opponents in the broad sense. Not unlike the trend observed in other spheres, they were now on another scale, even though it should be specified that the level of repression was determined by the leadership decisions, not exclusively by the KGB. Horrified and fascinated by the absurdity of Stalin’s repression, and amply supplied with data about it, Western opinion readily accepted the idea that it continued on the same scale and with the same means after his demise. In fact, however, the two periods are not comparable – if only because the secret police, however powerful, had lost the outrageous power to judge and punish their victims themselves. Their cases now had to go to court. As for KGB investigations, as with the Cheka at the beginning of the NEP, they had to be registered with the Prosecutor General or local prosecutors. Their results had to be communicated to the special department of the Prosecutor’s Office that oversaw such investigations (the same applied at local level). The available evidence, albeit still scanty, indicates that these procedures were observed – although we may assume that the opening of the archives will disclose shortcomings in this supervision. Predictably, respect for procedures depended on the relative weight of conservative and reformist currents in the leadership. Moreover, the outcome of strictly political cases and trials, directly handled by the Politburo in accordance with the regime’s interests, was a foregone conclusion: judges and prosecutors would simply act out a scenario decided elsewhere, and the professed guarantees were cast aside. Since persons accused of political crimes, notably the dissidents, no longer faced the death penalty, national and international public opinion could play a role. Debate within the regime and considerations of high politics would not infrequently introduce some important correctives. In the case of less high-profile individual and group oppositional activity, legal proceedings followed their normal course. We now possess a great deal of information about the number of such cases and the sentences handed down, appealed, reduced or dismissed.
OPPONENTS AND CRITICS
We shall start with the information supplied by the KGB to the government about anti-Soviet political activities. The KGB leadership was concerned about what it perceived as a growing mood of opposition in the country.[3] In the first half of 1962, it amounted to nothing less than an ‘explosion of popular discontent with Khrushchev’s policies’ (this is Pikhoja’s conclusion, not the KGB’s own assessment). In this period, the number of anonymous anti-Soviet leaflets and letters in circulation was twice as high as in the first six months of 1961: 7,705 leaflets, produced by 2,522 authors, were seized. In the first six months of 1962, sixty anti-Soviet groups – invariably composed of only a few individuals – had been uncovered, compared with forty-seven for the whole of the previous year. After a lengthy interval, leaflets lauding the ‘anti-party group’ (Molotov, Kaganovich and Malenkov), which had been disbanded in 1957, began to appear. The chekists managed to identify 1,039 authors of 6,726 anti-Soviet documents: among them were to be found 364 workers, 192 employees, 210 students or secondary-school pupils, 105 pensioners and 60 kolkhoz members. More than 40 per cent of these authors had a secondary-school education; 47 per cent were younger than thirty; and some were party and military veterans. We leave it to readers to decide what conclusions to draw from these statistics. But other, more dramatic events were to jolt the Central Committee and KGB.
2
My sources here are R. G. Pikhoia,
3
As reported by Pikhoia,