SSP

From Wikislippy

Soviet secret police

Function

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheka

The Cheka was established on December 20 [O.S. December 7] 1917, by a decision of the Sovnarkom. It was subordinated to the Sovnarkom and its functions were, "to liquidate counter-revolution and sabotage, to hand over counter-revolutionaries and saboteurs to the revolutionary tribunals, and to apply such measures of repression as 'confiscation, deprivation of ration cards, publication of lists of enemies of the people etc."

The agency performed mass arrests, imprisonments, and executions of "enemies of the people". In this, the Cheka said that they targeted "class enemies" such as the bourgeoisie, members of the clergy, and political opponents of the new regime.

Leaders

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheka

• Cheka (Abbreviation of Vecheka, itself an acronym for "All-Russian Extraordinary Committee to Combat Counter-Revolution and Sabotage") (Russian SFSR)
  • Felix Dzerzhinsky 1917 - 1918
  • Yakov Peters 1918
  • Felix Dzerzhinsky 1918 - 1922

February 6, 1922: Cheka became GPU, a section of the NKVD of the Russian SFSR.

• NKVD - "People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs"
  • GPU - State Political Directorate
    • Felix Dzerzhinsky 1922 - 1923

November 15, 1923: GPU was reorganized into OGPU under the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR.

• OGPU - "Joint State Political Directorate" or "All-Union State Political Board"
  • Felix Dzerzhinsky 1923 - July 1926
  • Vyacheslav Menzhinsky July 1926 - May 1934

July 10, 1934: OGPU became GUGB of the NKVD of the USSR; NKVD of the Russian SFSR ceased to exist.

• NKVD + GUGB - "Main Directorate for State Security" (Both GUGB and NKVD were headed by the same person.)
  • Genrikh Yagoda 1934 - 1936
  • Nikolai Yezhov 1936 - 1938
  • Lavrenty Beria 1938 - 1945

February 3, 1941: The GUGB of the NKVD was briefly separated out into the NKGB, then merged back in, and then in 1943 separated out again.

• NKGB - "People's Commissariat for State Security"
  • Vsevolod Nikolayevich Merkulov February 3, 1941 - July 20, 1941 (NKGB folded back into NKVD)
  • Vsevolod Nikolayevich Merkulov April 14, 1943 - 1946 (NKGB reseparated from NKVD)

March 18, 1946: All People's Commissariates were renamed to Ministries.

• MGB - "Ministry for State Security"
  • Viktor Semionovich Abakumov 1946 - 1951
  • Semion Denisovich Ignatiyev 1951 - 1953
  • The East German secret police, the Stasi, took their name from this iteration.

• KI - "Committee of Information"
  • Peter Fedotov MGB
  • Fedor Kuznetsov GRU
  • Yakov Malik Foreign Ministry

May 30, 1947: Official decision with the expressed purpose of "upgrading coordination of different intelligence services and concentrating their efforts on major directions". In the summer of 1948 the military personnel in KI were returned to the Soviet military to reconstitute a foreign military intelligence arm of the GRU. KI sections dealing with the new East Bloc and Soviet emigres were returned to the MGB in late 1948. In 1951 the KI returned to the MGB.

March 5, 1953: MVD and MGB are merged into the MVD by Lavrenty Beria.

• MVD - "Ministry of Internal Affairs"
  • Lavrenty Beria March, 1953 - June, 1953
  • Sergey Nikiforovich Kruglov June, 1953 - March, 1954

March 13, 1954: Newly independent force became the KGB, as Beria was purged and the MVD divested itself again of the functions of secret policing. After renamings and tumults, the KGB remained stable until 1991.

• KGB - Committee for State Security
  • Ivan Serov (March 13 1954 - December 8 1958)
  • Aleksandr Shelepin (December 25 1958 - November 13 1961)
  • Vladimir Yefimovich Semichastny (November 13 1961 - May 18 1967)
  • Yuri Andropov (May 18 1967 - May 26 1982)
  • Vitaly Fedorchuk (May 26 1982 - December 17 1982)
  • Viktor Chebrikov (December 17 1982 - October 1 1988)
  • Vladimir Kryuchkov (October 1 1988 - August 22 1991)
  • Leonid Shebarshin (August 22 1991 - August 23 1991, acting)
  • Vadim Bakatin (August 23 1991 - October 22 1991)

After the State Emergency Committee failed to overthrow Gorbachev and Yeltsin took over, General Vadim Bakatin was given instructions to dissolve the KGB.

In Russia today, KGB functions are performed by the SVR (Foreign Intelligence Service) and the FSB (Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation). The GRU, Main Intelligence Directorate, continues to operate as well.