The structure of the kgb of the ussr. The last chairman of the KGB of the USSR KGB was created

Cheka (1917-1922)

The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission (VChK) was created on December 7, 1917 as an organ of the "dictatorship of the proletariat." The main task of the commission was the fight against counter-revolution and sabotage. The body also performed the functions of intelligence, counterintelligence and political investigation. Since 1921, the tasks of the Cheka included the elimination of homelessness and neglect among children.

The people called the commission "Chekistka", and its employees - "Chekists". Head of the first Soviet state security agency Felix Dzerzhinsky. The building of the former mayor of Petrograd, located at Gorokhovaya, 2, was assigned to the new structure.

In February 1918, Cheka employees were given the right to shoot criminals on the spot without trial or investigation in accordance with the decree "The Fatherland is in Danger!"

The highest measure was allowed to be applied against "enemy agents, speculators, thugs, hooligans, counter-revolutionary agitators, German spies", and later "all persons involved in White Guard organizations, conspiracies and mutinies."

The end of the civil war and the recession of the wave of peasant uprisings made the continued existence of the expanded repressive apparatus, whose activities had practically no legal restrictions, meaningless. Therefore, by 1921, the party faced the question of reforming the organization.

OGPU (1923-1934)

On February 6, 1922, the Cheka was finally abolished, and its powers were transferred to the State Political Administration, which later received the name of the United (OGPU). As Lenin emphasized: "... the abolition of the Cheka and the creation of the GPU does not simply mean a change in the name of the bodies, but consists in changing the nature of the entire activity of the body during the period of peaceful state building in a new situation ...".

The main task of the new body was the same struggle against counter-revolution in any of its manifestations. The OGPU was subordinate to the special units of the troops necessary to suppress public unrest and combat banditry.

In addition, the department was entrusted with the following functions:

• protection of railways and waterways;


• the fight against smuggling and border crossing by Soviet citizens);


• fulfillment of special orders of the Presidium of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars.

On May 9, 1924, the powers of the OGPU were significantly expanded. The police and the criminal investigation department began to subordinate to the department. This is how the process of merging the state security bodies with the internal affairs bodies began.

NKVD (1934-1943)

On July 10, 1934, the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs of the USSR (NKVD) was formed. The People's Commissariat was all-Union, and the OGPU was included in it in the form of a structural unit called the Main Directorate of State Security (GUGB). The fundamental innovation was that the judicial collegium of the OGPU was abolished: the new department was not supposed to have judicial functions. The new People's Commissariat headed Heinrich Yagoda.

On March 28, 1937, Yagoda was arrested by the NKVD, during a search of his house, according to the protocol, photographs of a pornographic nature, Trotskyist literature and a rubber dildo were found. Due to the "anti-state" activities of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b), Yagoda was expelled from the party. The new head of the NKVD was appointed Nikolay Yezhov.

In 1937, the "troikas" of the NKVD appeared. A commission of three people in absentia passed thousands of sentences to "enemies of the people", based on the materials of the authorities, and sometimes just from lists. The peculiarity of this process was the absence of protocols and the minimum number of documents on the basis of which a decision was made on the guilt of the defendant. The verdict of the "troika" was not subject to appeal.

During the year of work, the "troikas" convicted 767 397 people, of which 386 798 people were sentenced to death. The victims most often were kulaks - wealthy peasants who did not want to voluntarily give their property to the collective farm.

April 10, 1939 Yezhov was arrested in his office Georgy Malenkov. Subsequently, the former head of the NKVD admitted to being homosexual and preparing a coup d'etat. The third People's Commissar of Internal Affairs was Lavrenty Beria.

NKGB - MGB (1943-1954)

On February 3, 1941, the NKVD was divided into two people's commissariats - the People's Commissariat of State Security (NKGB) and the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD).

This was done in order to improve the intelligence and operational work of the state security agencies and to distribute the increased volume of work of the NKVD of the USSR.

The NKGB was entrusted with the following tasks:

• conducting intelligence work abroad;


• the fight against subversive, espionage, terrorist activities of foreign intelligence services within the USSR;


• operational development and liquidation of the remnants of anti-Soviet parties and counter-revolutionary formations among various strata of the population of the USSR, in the system of industry, transport, communications, agriculture;


• protection of party and government leaders.

The NKVD was entrusted with the task of ensuring state security. Military and prison subdivisions, militia, fire brigade remained under the jurisdiction of this department.

On July 4, 1941, in connection with the outbreak of the war, it was decided to unite the NKGB and the NKVD into one department in order to reduce the bureaucracy.

In 1946, all the people's commissariats were renamed into ministries, respectively, the NKGB became the USSR Ministry of State Security. At the same time, he became the Minister of State Security Victor Abakumov... With his arrival, the transfer of the functions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs to the jurisdiction of the Ministry of State Security began. In 1947-1952, internal troops, militia, border troops and other units were transferred to the department (camp and construction departments, fire brigade, escort troops, courier communications remained in the Ministry of Internal Affairs).

After death Stalin in 1953 Nikita Khrushchev displaced Beria and organized a campaign against the illegal repression of the NKVD. Subsequently, several thousand unjustly convicted were rehabilitated.

KGB (1954-1991)

On March 13, 1954, the State Security Committee (KGB) was created by separating departments, services and departments from the MGB that were related to issues of ensuring state security. Compared to its predecessors, the new body had a lower status: it was not a ministry within the government, but a committee under the government. The chairman of the KGB was a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU, but he was not a member of the supreme body of power - the Politburo. This was explained by the fact that the party elite wanted to protect themselves from the emergence of a new Beria - a person capable of removing her from power for the sake of implementing their own political projects.

The area of ​​responsibility of the new body included: foreign intelligence, counterintelligence, operational-search activities, guarding the state border of the USSR, protecting the leaders of the CPSU and the government, organizing and maintaining government communications, as well as combating nationalism, dissent, crime and anti-Soviet activities.

In the 1970s, the KGB stepped up its fight against dissent and the dissident movement. However, the actions of the department have become more sophisticated and disguised. Such means of psychological pressure as surveillance, public condemnation, undermining professional careers, preventive conversations, forced travel abroad, forced confinement in psychiatric clinics, political trials, libel, lies and incriminating evidence, various provocations and intimidation were actively used. At the same time, there were also lists of "restricted to travel abroad" - those who were denied travel abroad.

A new "invention" of the special services was the so-called "link for the 101st kilometer": politically unreliable citizens were evicted outside Moscow and St. Petersburg. During this period, the KGB was closely scrutinized by representatives of the creative intelligentsia - workers of literature, art and science - who, due to their social status and international authority, could cause the most extensive damage to the reputation of the Soviet state and the Communist Party.

In the 90s, changes in society and the system of state administration of the USSR, caused by the processes of perestroika and glasnost, led to the need to revise the foundations and principles of the activities of state security agencies.

From 1954 to 1958, the leadership of the KGB was carried out I. A. Serov.

1958 to 1961 - A. N. Shelepin.

1961 to 1967 - V.E.Semichastny.

1967 to 1982 - Yu. V. Andropov.

May to December 1982 - V.V. Fedorchuk.

1982 to 1988 - V. M. Chebrikov.

August to November 1991 - V.V.Bakatin.

December 3, 1991 President of the USSR Mikhail Gorbachev signed the law "On the reorganization of state security agencies." On the basis of the document, the KGB of the USSR was abolished and for a transitional period on its basis the Inter-Republican Security Service and the Central Intelligence Service of the USSR (now the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation) were created.

FSB

After the abolition of the KGB, the process of creating new state security bodies took about three years. During this time, the departments of the disbanded committee moved from one department to another.

December 21, 1993 Boris Yeltsin signed a decree establishing the Federal Counterintelligence Service of the Russian Federation (FSK). Director of the new body from December 1993 to March 1994 was Nikolay Golushko, and from March 1994 to June 1995 this post was held by Sergey Stepashin.

In general, the activities of the FSB bodies are carried out in the following main areas:

• counterintelligence activities;


• the fight against terrorism;


• protection of the constitutional order;


• the fight against especially dangerous forms of crime;


• intelligence activities;


• border activities;


• ensuring information security; fight against corruption.

The FSB was headed by:

in 1995-1996 M. I. Barsukov;

in 1996-1998 ND Kovalev;

in 1998-1999 V.V. Putin;

in 1999-2008 N.P. Patrushev;

from May 2008 - A. V. Bortnikov.

The State Security Committee, undoubtedly, rightfully belonged to the number of the strongest and most powerful intelligence services in the world.

Creation of the KGB of the USSR

The political decision to separate the structures of the state security bodies from the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs into an autonomous department was made in February 1954 on the basis of a note by the Minister of Internal Affairs S.N. Kruglov to the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee.
This note, in particular, stated:
“The existing organizational structure of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs and its bodies is cumbersome and unable to ensure the proper level of intelligence-operative work in the light of the tasks set for Soviet intelligence by the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Soviet Government.
In order to create the necessary conditions for improving intelligence and counterintelligence work, we consider it expedient to separate from the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs operational-KGB departments and departments and, on their basis, create a Committee for State Security Affairs under the USSR Council of Ministers. " 3
Thus, the KGB, having become a committee under the Council of Ministers of the USSR, was, as a union-republican ministry, the central body of state administration in the field of ensuring the state security of the Soviet Union. Such a significant decrease in the state and legal status in comparison with the Ministry of State Security that existed since 1946 was mainly due to the distrust and suspicion of Khrushchev and other then leaders of the country in relation to the state security agencies and their leaders. The last circumstances affected both the situation within the KGB of the USSR and the fate of the USSR as a whole.

Tasks of the KGB of the USSR

According to the decision of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU, the State Security Committee under the Council of Ministers of the USSR was entrusted with the following tasks:
a) conducting intelligence work in capitalist countries;
b) the fight against espionage, sabotage, terrorist and other subversive activities of foreign intelligence services within the USSR;
c) the fight against hostile activities of various kinds of anti-Soviet elements within the USSR;
d) counterintelligence work in the Soviet Army and the Navy;
e) organization of encryption and decryption business in the country;
f) protection of the leaders of the party and government.
The tasks of one of the most important directions of the KGB's activities - foreign intelligence, were specified in the decision of the Central Committee of the CPSU of June 30, 1954 "On measures to strengthen the intelligence work of state security agencies abroad."
It demanded that all efforts be directed to organizing work in the leading Western countries of the United States and
Great Britain, which were the old geopolitical rival of Russia, as well as in "the countries they used to fight against the Soviet Union - primarily West Germany, France, Austria, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan and Japan." 3

The leadership of the KGB of the USSR

Colonel-General Ivan Aleksandrovich Serov, who had previously been Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs, was appointed the first chairman of the KGB by the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of March 13, 1954.
His deputies were K.F. Lunev (first deputy), I.T. Savchenko, P.I. Grigoriev, V.A. Lukshin, P.I. Ivashutin.
It was during Serov's time as chairman of the KGB under the Council of Ministers of the USSR that the revision of previously opened criminal cases on "counter-revolutionary crimes" began, and the purge and reduction of the number of state security agencies, as well as the announcement of NS. Khrushchev on February 25, 1956 to the delegates of the XX Congress of the CPSU a special report on the personality cult of I.V. Stalin and its consequences, and many other important events in the history of the USSR.
Later, the Chairmen of the KGB of the USSR were:

	Shelepin, Alexander Nikolaevich (1958 - 1961);
	Semichastny, Vladimir Efimovich (1961 - 1967);
	Andropov, Yuri Vladimirovich (1967 - 1982);
	Fedorchuk, Vitaly Vasilievich (May - December 1982);
	Chebrikov, Viktor Mikhailovich (1982 - 1988);
	Kryuchkov, Vladimir Alexandrovich (1988 - August 1991);
	Bakatin, Vadim Viktorovich (August - December 1991).

The structure of the KGB of the USSR

By order of the chairman of the KGB under the Council of Ministers of the USSR dated March 18, 1954, the structure of the Committee was determined, in which, apart from auxiliary and support units, were formed:
- First Main Directorate (PGU, intelligence abroad - head A.S. Panyushkin);
- Second Main Directorate (VSU, counterintelligence - P.V. Fedotov);
- the Third Main Directorate (military counterintelligence - D.S. Leonov);
- the Fourth Directorate (fight against the anti-Soviet underground, nationalist formations and hostile elements - F.P. Kharitonov);
- Fifth Directorate (counterintelligence work at especially important facilities - PI Ivashutin);
- Sixth Directorate (counterintelligence work in transport - MI Egorov);
- Seventh department (external surveillance - G.P. Dobrynin);
- Eighth Main Directorate (encryption and decryption - V.A.Lukshin);
- Ninth Directorate (protection of party and government leaders - V.I. Ustinov);
- The Tenth Directorate (Office of the Commandant of the Moscow Kremlin - A.Ya. Vedenin);
- Investigative Department.
On September 27, 1954, the KGB organized the Department of the troops of the government "VCh" communications.
On April 2, 1957, the Main Directorate of the Border Troops was formed in the KGB.

Educational institutions of the KGB of the USSR

- Higher School of the KGB of the USSR named after F.E. Dzerzhinsky
Higher School of the KGB of the USSR as a special higher educational institution with a three-year term of study
students under the program of law schools of the country was formed in accordance with the decree of the Council of Ministers of the USSR dated July 15, 1952, and in April 1954, the first 189 graduates received diplomas from the new university, and 37 of them graduated with honors.
In 1954, the number of variable students of the Graduate School was set at 600 staff units. Applicants who had at least three years of service in the state security bodies, who met the requirements for admission to the country's universities, were sent to study.
On August 2, 1962, the Higher School of the KGB of the USSR was named after F.E.Dzerzhinsky.
- The Red Banner Institute named after Yu.V. Andropov of the KGB of the USSR. He was subordinate to the First Main Directorate (foreign intelligence) until October 1991.
- Leningrad Higher School of the KGB named after S. M. Kirov (1946-1994).
- In the KGB system there were 4 Higher Frontier Schools (in Babushkin in Moscow, in the city of Golitsino in the Moscow region, in Tashkent and in Alma-Ata).
- Leningrad Higher Naval Frontier School (1957 - 1960).
- Kaliningrad Higher Border Command School (1957 - 1960)
- Institute of Foreign Languages ​​of the KGB of the USSR.

Abolition of the KGB of the USSR

On August 26, 1991, at a session of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, M.S. Gorbachev states:
“We need to reorganize the KGB. In my decree appointing Comrade Bakatin as chairman of this Committee, there is an unpublished clause 2 instructing him to immediately submit proposals on the reorganization of the entire state security system. " 3
By the decree of the President of the USSR M.S. Gorbachev on August 28, 1991, the State Commission was formed to investigate the activities of state security agencies, headed by Deputy of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR S.V. Stepashin. And on November 28, 1991, it was transformed into the State Commission for the Reorganization of State Security Bodies.
Based on the information of the Chairman of the KGB Bakatin, the State Council decides on the formation of three independent departments on the basis of the USSR State Security Committee:
- Central Intelligence Service (CSR);
- Inter-republican security service (IBS);
- Committee for the Protection of the State Border of the USSR.
By a decree of the State Council of the USSR of October 22, 1991, the KGB of the USSR was abolished.

Based on materials from open sources, in the entire history of the State Security Committee of the USSR from 1954 to 1991, 40 traitors were identified and exposed in its ranks from among the officers, including:
- in foreign intelligence - 27,
- in the territorial counterintelligence bodies - 9,
- in military counterintelligence - 2,
- in the 8th Main Directorate - 1,
- in the 16th Directorate - 1.

Sources of information:

1. Shevyakin "KGB against the USSR. 17 moments of treason"
2. Atamanenko "KGB - CIA. Who is stronger?"
3. Khlobustov "KGB of the USSR 1954 - 1991. Secrets of the death of the Great Power"

On Monday, Kommersant, citing sources in the security forces, announced the impending reform, which involves the creation of an MGB based on the FSB, FSO and SVR. At the same time, the MGB, according to the publication, may be able to take into its proceedings the most resonant cases or monitor investigations carried out by other special services. As conceived by the developers of the reform, the newspaper claims, the creation of the Ministry of State Security would allow for more effective management of the power structures and help fight corruption in these departments.

Later press secretary of the President of Russia Dmitry Peskov did not confirm the information about the creation of the MGB on the basis of the FSB, FSO and SVR. “No, I can’t,” a Kremlin spokesman replied to a request from journalists to confirm the data. Federal news agency offers its readers a short excursion into the history of the issue.

VChK

Soviet special services began with the famous VChK- The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission, "Chekistka", therefore, employees of the special services are still sometimes called Chekists.

The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage under the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR was established in December 1917 as an organ of the "dictatorship of the proletariat" to combat counter-revolution. The Cheka was headed by one of the closest associates Lenin - Felix Dzerzhinsky.

After the end of the Civil War, the abolition of the so-called "war communism" and the transition to the "new economic policy" ( NEP), The Cheka was reorganized into the GPU (State Political Administration), and then - after the formation of the USSR - all republican GPUs became part of the OGPU (United State Political Administration).

NKVD

In the early 1930s, the OGPU was reorganized into the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs of the USSR ( NKVD)... The NKVD of the USSR was established in 1934 as the central body for the fight against crime, maintaining public order and ensuring state security.

The mass repressions of the 1930s are associated with the activities of the NKVD. Many of the repressed - both those who were shot and those sentenced to imprisonment or who ended up in the Gulag - were convicted out of court by special troikas of the NKVD. In addition, the NKVD troops carried out deportations based on ethnicity. Many employees of the NKVD, including those from the top leadership of this body, themselves became victims of repression.

During Great Patriotic War border and internal troops of the NKVD were used to protect the territory and search for deserters, and also directly participated in hostilities. After death Stalin hundreds of thousands of illegally repressed were rehabilitated.

MGB

For the first time, the People's Commissariat (Ministry) of State Security of the USSR was formed shortly before the Great Patriotic War - on February 3, 1941 - by dividing the NKVD of the USSR into two People's Commissariats: the NKGB of the USSR and the NKVD of the USSR. However, at the beginning of the war, these departments were again merged into a single body - the NKVD of the USSR.

In 1946, people's commissariats of all levels were transformed into ministries of the same name - so the NKVD of the USSR turned into the MGB of the USSR.

In May 1946, the head of "Smersh" became the Minister of State Security Victor Abakumov... Under Abakumov, the transfer of functions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs to the MGB began. In 1947-1952, internal troops, militia, border troops and other units were transferred from the Ministry of Internal Affairs to the Ministry of State Security.

However, Avakumov did not find the reorganization of his brainchild - on July 12, 1951, he was arrested and accused of high treason, and after Stalin's death he was shot.

On the day of Stalin's death, March 5, 1953, at a joint meeting of the Central Committee of the CPSU, the Council of Ministers of the USSR and the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, a decision was made to unite the MGB and the Ministry of Internal Affairs into a single Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR under the leadership of Lawrence Beria, who, however, did not hold this post for long and was also shot.

Subsequently, in the spring of 1954, the state security organs were withdrawn from the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs and the State Security Committee under the USSR Council of Ministers (KGB) was formed.

The KGB

The State Security Committee of the CCCP existed from 1954 to 1991. Its main functions were foreign intelligence, counterintelligence, guarding the state border and leaders of the party and state, organizing and maintaining government communications, as well as combating nationalism, dissent, crime and anti-Soviet activities.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the state security bodies underwent several reorganizations, of which the Ministry of Security of the Russian Federation was organized for a short time.

FSB

And in December 1993 the President of Russia Boris Yeltsin signed a decree on the abolition of the Ministry of Security of the Russian Federation and the creation of the Federal Counterintelligence Service of the Russian Federation (FGC of Russia), which was then transformed into the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation ( FSB of Russia).

The FSB, along with the SVR, FSVNG, FSO, SFS, FSTEK and the Service of Special Objects under the President, belongs to the special services. The FSB has the right to conduct a preliminary investigation and inquiry, operational search and intelligence activities. The director of the FSB since 2008 has been Alexander Bortnikov, who reports directly to the President of the Russian Federation.

In 1917, Vladimir Lenin created the Cheka from the remnants of the tsarist secret police. This new organization, which would eventually become the KGB, performed a wide range of tasks, including intelligence, counterintelligence, and isolating the Soviet Union from Western goods, news, and ideas. In 1991, the USSR collapsed, which led to the fragmentation of the Committee into many organizations, the largest of which is the FSB.

The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission (VChK) was created on December 7, 1917 as an organ of the "dictatorship of the proletariat." The main task of the commission was the fight against counter-revolution and sabotage. The body also performed the functions of intelligence, counterintelligence and political investigation. Since 1921, the tasks of the Cheka included the elimination of homelessness and neglect among children.

Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR Vladimir Lenin called the Cheka "a devastating weapon against countless conspiracies, countless attempts on Soviet power by people who were infinitely stronger than us."
The people called the commission "Chekistka", and its employees - "Chekists". Felix Dzerzhinsky became the head of the first Soviet state security body. The building of the former mayor of Petrograd, located at Gorokhovaya, 2, was assigned to the new structure.

In February 1918, Cheka employees were given the right to shoot criminals on the spot without trial or investigation in accordance with the decree "The Fatherland is in Danger!"

The highest measure was allowed to be applied against "enemy agents, speculators, thugs, hooligans, counter-revolutionary agitators, German spies", and later "all persons involved in White Guard organizations, conspiracies and mutinies."

The end of the civil war and the recession of the wave of peasant uprisings made the continued existence of the expanded repressive apparatus, whose activities had practically no legal restrictions, meaningless. Therefore, by 1921, the party faced the question of reforming the organization.

On February 6, 1922, the Cheka was finally abolished, and its powers were transferred to the State Political Administration, which later received the name of the United (OGPU). As Lenin emphasized: "... the abolition of the Cheka and the creation of the GPU does not simply mean a change in the name of the bodies, but consists in changing the nature of the entire activity of the body during the period of peaceful state building in a new situation ...".

The chairman of the department until July 20, 1926 was Felix Dzerzhinsky, after his death, this post was taken by the former People's Commissar of Finance Vyacheslav Menzhinsky.
The main task of the new body was the same struggle against counter-revolution in any of its manifestations. The OGPU was subordinate to the special units of the troops necessary to suppress public unrest and combat banditry.

In addition, the department was entrusted with the following functions:

Protection of railways and waterways;
- fight against smuggling and border crossing by Soviet citizens);
- fulfillment of special orders of the Presidium of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars.

On May 9, 1924, the powers of the OGPU were significantly expanded. The police and the criminal investigation department began to subordinate to the department. This is how the process of merging the state security bodies with the internal affairs bodies began.

On July 10, 1934, the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs of the USSR (NKVD) was formed. The People's Commissariat was all-Union, and the OGPU was included in it in the form of a structural unit called the Main Directorate of State Security (GUGB). The fundamental innovation was that the judicial collegium of the OGPU was abolished: the new department was not supposed to have judicial functions. The new People's Commissariat was headed by Genrikh Yagoda.

The NKVD was responsible for political investigations and the right to pass sentences out of court, the penal system, foreign intelligence, border troops, and counterintelligence in the army. In 1935, traffic regulation (GAI) was also attributed to the functions of the NKVD, and in 1937 NKVD departments for transport, including sea and river ports, were created.

On March 28, 1937, Yagoda was arrested by the NKVD, during a search of his house, according to the protocol, photographs of a pornographic nature, Trotskyist literature and a rubber dildo were found. Due to the "anti-state" activities of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b), Yagoda was expelled from the party. Nikolai Yezhov was appointed the new head of the NKVD.

In 1937, the "troikas" of the NKVD appeared. A commission of three people in absentia passed thousands of sentences to "enemies of the people", based on the materials of the authorities, and sometimes just from lists. The peculiarity of this process was the absence of protocols and the minimum number of documents on the basis of which a decision was made on the guilt of the defendant. The verdict of the "troika" was not subject to appeal.

During the year of work, the "troikas" convicted 767 397 people, of which 386 798 people were sentenced to death. The victims most often were kulaks - wealthy peasants who did not want to voluntarily give their property to the collective farm.

On April 10, 1939, Yezhov was arrested in the office of Georgy Malenkov. Subsequently, the former head of the NKVD admitted to being homosexual and preparing a coup d'etat. Lavrenty Beria became the third People's Commissar of Internal Affairs.

On February 3, 1941, the NKVD was divided into two people's commissariats - the People's Commissariat of State Security (NKGB) and the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD).

This was done in order to improve the intelligence and operational work of the state security agencies and to distribute the increased volume of work of the NKVD of the USSR.

The NKGB was entrusted with the following tasks:

Conducting intelligence work abroad;
- the fight against subversive, espionage, terrorist activities of foreign intelligence services within the USSR;
- operational development and liquidation of the remnants of anti-Soviet parties and counter-revolutionary -
- formations among various strata of the population of the USSR, in the system of industry, transport, communications, agriculture;
- protection of the leaders of the party and government.

The NKVD was entrusted with the task of ensuring state security. Military and prison subdivisions, militia, fire brigade remained under the jurisdiction of this department.

On July 4, 1941, in connection with the outbreak of the war, it was decided to unite the NKGB and the NKVD into one department in order to reduce the bureaucracy.

The re-creation of the NKGB of the USSR took place in April 1943. The main task of the committee was reconnaissance and sabotage activities in the rear of the German troops. As we moved westward, the importance of work in the countries of Eastern Europe, where the NKGB was engaged in the “liquidation of anti-Soviet elements”, increased.

In 1946, all the people's commissariats were renamed into ministries, respectively, the NKGB became the USSR Ministry of State Security. At the same time, Viktor Abakumov became the Minister of State Security. With his arrival, the transfer of the functions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs to the jurisdiction of the Ministry of State Security began. In 1947-1952, the department was transferred to internal troops, militia, border troops and other units (the Ministry of Internal Affairs retained camp and construction departments, fire brigade, escort troops, courier communications).

After Stalin's death in 1953, Nikita Khrushchev deposed Beria and organized a campaign against the illegal repression of the NKVD. Subsequently, several thousand unjustly convicted were rehabilitated.

On March 13, 1954, the State Security Committee (KGB) was created by separating departments, services and departments from the MGB that were related to issues of ensuring state security. Compared to its predecessors, the new body had a lower status: it was not a ministry within the government, but a committee under the government. The chairman of the KGB was a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU, but he was not a member of the supreme body of power - the Politburo. This was explained by the fact that the party elite wanted to protect themselves from the emergence of a new Beria - a person capable of removing her from power for the sake of implementing their own political projects.

The area of ​​responsibility of the new body included: foreign intelligence, counterintelligence, operational-search activities, guarding the state border of the USSR, protecting the leaders of the CPSU and the government, organizing and maintaining government communications, as well as combating nationalism, dissent, crime and anti-Soviet activities.

Almost immediately after its formation, the KGB carried out a large-scale staff reduction in connection with the beginning of the process of de-Stalinization of society and the state. From 1953 to 1955, the state security organs were reduced by 52%.

In the 1970s, the KGB stepped up its fight against dissent and the dissident movement. However, the actions of the department have become more sophisticated and disguised. Such means of psychological pressure as surveillance, public condemnation, undermining professional careers, preventive conversations, forced travel abroad, forced confinement in psychiatric clinics, political trials, libel, lies and incriminating evidence, various provocations and intimidation were actively used. At the same time, there were also lists of "restricted to travel abroad" - those who were denied travel abroad.

A new "invention" of the special services was the so-called "link for the 101st kilometer": politically unreliable citizens were evicted outside Moscow and St. Petersburg. During this period, the KGB was closely scrutinized by representatives of the creative intelligentsia - workers of literature, art and science - who, by their social status and international authority, could cause the most extensive damage to the reputation of the Soviet state and the Communist Party.

On December 3, 1991, the President of the USSR Mikhail Gorbachev signed the law "On the reorganization of the state security organs." On the basis of the document, the KGB of the USSR was abolished and for a transitional period on its basis the Inter-Republican Security Service and the Central Intelligence Service of the USSR (now the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation) were created.

After the abolition of the KGB, the process of creating new state security bodies took about three years. During this time, the departments of the disbanded committee moved from one department to another.

On December 21, 1993, Boris Yeltsin signed a decree establishing the Federal Counterintelligence Service of the Russian Federation (FSK). From December 1993 to March 1994, the director of the new body was Nikolai Golushko, and from March 1994 to June 1995, this post was held by Sergei Stepashin.

Currently, the FSB cooperates with 142 special services, law enforcement agencies and border structures of 86 states. The offices of official representatives of the Service are functioning in 45 countries.

In general, the activities of the FSB bodies are carried out in the following main areas:

Counterintelligence activities;
- the fight against terrorism;
- protection of the constitutional order;
- fight against especially dangerous forms of crime;
- intelligence activities;
- border activities;
- ensuring information security; fight against corruption.

The FSB was headed by:
in 1995-1996 M. I. Barsukov;
in 1996-1998 N. D. Kovalev;
in 1998-1999 V. V. Putin;
in 1999-2008 N.P. Patrushev;
since May 2008 - A.V. Bortnikov.

The structure of the FSB of Russia:
- Office of the National Anti-Terrorism Committee;
- Counterintelligence Service;
- Service for the protection of the constitutional order and the fight against terrorism;
- Economic Security Service;
- Service of operational information and international relations;
- Service of organizational and personnel work;
- Service of support of activities;
- Border Service;
- Scientific and technical service;
- Control Service;
- Investigation Department;
- Centers, management;
- directorates (departments) of the FSB of Russia for individual regions and constituent entities of the Russian Federation (territorial security bodies);
- border directorates (departments, detachments) of the FSB of Russia (border authorities);
- other directorates (departments) of the FSB of Russia exercising certain powers of this body or ensuring the activities of the FSB bodies (other security bodies);
- aviation, railway, road transport units, special training centers, special purpose units, enterprises, educational institutions, research, expert, forensic, military medical and military construction units, sanatoriums and other institutions and units designed to provide activities of the federal security service.

And anti-Soviet activities. Also, the task of the KGB was to provide the Central Committee of the CPSU (until May 16, 1991) and the highest bodies of state power and administration of the USSR with information affecting the state security and defense of the country, the socio-economic situation in the Soviet Union and issues of foreign policy and foreign economic activity of the Soviet state and communist party.

The system of the KGB of the USSR included fourteen republican committees of state security on the territory of the republics of the USSR; local bodies of state security in autonomous republics, territories, regions, individual cities and regions, military districts, formations and units of the army, navy and internal troops, in transport; border troops; government communications troops; military counterintelligence bodies; educational institutions and research institutions; as well as the so-called "first departments" of Soviet institutions, organizations and enterprises.

Over the years, the KGB had different official names and status in the system of central government bodies:

At present, in addition to its basic meaning, the abbreviation "KGB" and its derivatives are often used in colloquial speech to denote any special services of the USSR, RSFSR, and the Russian Federation.

History

Formation of the KGB

The initiative to separate the "operational-KGB directorates and departments" into an independent department is attributed to the Minister of Internal Affairs Sergei Kruglov, who on February 4, 1954 submitted an official note with a corresponding proposal to the Central Committee of the CPSU. Kruglov's proposals were discussed at a meeting of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU on February 8, 1954 and fully approved, with the exception that from the name proposed by the minister - "Committee for State Security under the Council of Ministers of the USSR" - "on business" was removed. A month later, on March 13, 1954, the State Security Committee under the Council of Ministers of the USSR... The new committee included departments, services and departments allocated from the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs that dealt with issues of ensuring state security. The former First Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR, Colonel-General I. A. Serov was appointed chairman of the committee.

It is noteworthy that the KGB was formed not as a central body of state administration, which were its predecessors - the Ministry of State Security and the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR - but only in the status of a department under the Government of the USSR. According to some historians, the reason for the lowering of the status of the KGB in the hierarchy of government bodies was the desire of the party and Soviet elite of the country to deprive the state security organs of independence, completely subordinating their activities to the apparatus of the communist party. Nevertheless, the KGB chairmen were appointed not by orders of the chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers, as was customary for the heads of departments under the country's government, but by decrees of the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet, as was done for ministers and chairmen of state committees.

1950s

Almost immediately after its formation, the KGB underwent a major structural reorganization and a reduction in the number of employees in connection with the beginning after the death of I.V. Stalin by the process of de-Stalinization of society and the state. From declassified documents of the State Archives of the Russian Federation, it became known that in the 1950s the number of KGB personnel was reduced by more than 50 percent compared to 1954. More than 3.5 thousand city and regional offices were abolished, some operational and investigative divisions were combined, investigative departments and departments in operational divisions were liquidated and merged into single investigative offices. The structure of special departments and bodies of the KGB in transport was significantly simplified. In 1955, more than 7.5 thousand employees were additionally laid off, while about 8 thousand KGB officers were transferred to the position of civil servants.

The KGB continued the practice of its predecessors - Bureau No. 1 of the USSR Ministry of State Security for sabotage work abroad under the leadership of P. A. Sudoplatov and Bureau No. 2 for the implementation of special assignments on the territory of the USSR under the leadership of V. A. Drozdov - in the field of the so-called " active action", Which meant acts of individual terror on the territory of the country and abroad against persons who were qualified by party bodies and Soviet special services as" the most active and vicious enemies of the Soviet Union from among the leaders of capitalist countries, especially dangerous foreign intelligence officers, leaders of anti-Soviet emigrant organizations and traitors to the Motherland ". Carrying out such operations was entrusted to the First Main Directorate of the KGB. So, in October 1959, the leader of the Ukrainian nationalists, Stepan Bandera, was killed in Munich by a KGB agent Bogdan Stashinsky. The same fate befell another leader of the OUN - L. Rebet.

1960s

In December 1961, at the initiative of the first secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, NS Khrushchev, A. N. Shelepin was transferred to party work as secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. The leadership of the KGB was taken over by V. Ye. Semichastny, Shelepin's former colleague from the Central Committee of the Komsomol. Semichastny continued the policy of his predecessor on the structural reorganization of the KGB. The 4th, 5th and 6th departments of the KGB were merged into the main department of internal security and counterintelligence (2nd main department). Under the wing of the 7th directorate, which was responsible for the protection of the diplomatic corps and external observation, the corresponding functional units of the 2nd main directorate were transferred. 3rd main office was demoted to management status. Corresponding structural changes have taken place in the KGB bodies of the union and autonomous republics, in the territories and regions. In 1967, the offices of representatives in cities and districts were reorganized into city and district departments and departments of the KGB-KGB-OKGB.As a result of the reduction of numerous structural links, the apparatus of the State Security Committee became more operational, while the creation in 1967 at the initiative of the new chairman The KGB of Yu. V. Andropov of the fifth department for the fight against dissidents made the KGB more prepared to fight the opponents of the Soviet system in the next two decades.

1970-1980s

Fight against dissidents in the USSR

The socio-economic processes of the period of "developed socialism" and changes in the foreign policy of the USSR, which took place in the country, had a significant impact on the activities of the KGB in the 1970s and 1980s. During this period, the KGB focused its efforts on combating nationalism and anti-Soviet manifestations at home and abroad. Domestically, the state security agencies have stepped up the fight against dissent and the dissident movement; however, the actions of physical violence, deportations and imprisonment have become more sophisticated and disguised. The use of means of psychological pressure on dissidents has increased, including surveillance, pressure using public opinion, undermining professional careers, preventive conversations, deportation from the USSR, forced confinement to psychiatric clinics, political trials, libel, lies and incriminating evidence, various provocations and intimidation. A ban on the residence of politically unreliable citizens in the capital cities of the country was practiced - the so-called "link for the 101st kilometer". During this period, the KGB closely watched, first of all, representatives of the creative intelligentsia - workers of literature, art and science - who, due to their social status and international authority, could cause the most widespread damage to the reputation of the Soviet state and the Communist Party.

The activity of the KGB in the persecution of the Soviet writer, Nobel laureate in literature A.I.Solzhenitsin is indicative. In the late 1960s - early 1970s, a special unit was created in the KGB - the 9th department of the Fifth Directorate of the KGB - which was engaged exclusively in the operational development of the dissident writer. In August 1971, the KGB made an attempt to physically eliminate Solzhenitsyn - during a trip to Novocherkassk, he was secretly injected with an unknown poisonous substance; the writer survived, but after that he was seriously ill for a long time. In the summer of 1973, KGB officers detained one of the writer's assistants, E. Voronyanskaya, and during interrogation forced her to reveal the location of one copy of the manuscript of Solzhenitsyn's work, The Gulag Archipelago. Returning home, the woman hanged herself. Upon learning of what had happened, Solzhenitsyn ordered the publication of The Archipelago in the West. A powerful propaganda campaign was launched in the Soviet press, accusing the writer of slandering the Soviet state and social system. Attempts by the KGB, through Solzhenitsyn's ex-wife, to persuade the writer to refuse to publish the Archipelago abroad in exchange for a promise of assistance in the official publication in the USSR of his novel Cancer Ward were unsuccessful, and the first volume of the work was published in Paris in December 1973. In January 1974, Solzhenitsyn was arrested, accused of treason, stripped of his Soviet citizenship and expelled from the USSR. The initiator of the deportation of the writer was Andropov, whose opinion became decisive when choosing a measure of "suppressing anti-Soviet activities" by Solzhenitsyn at a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU. After the expulsion of the writer from the country, the KGB and Andropov personally continued the campaign of discrediting Solzhenitsin and, as Andropov put it, "exposing the active use of such renegades by the reactionary circles of the West in ideological sabotage against the countries of the socialist community."

Prominent scientists have been the target of many years of persecution by the KGB. For example, the Soviet physicist, three times Hero of Socialist Labor, dissident and human rights activist, Nobel Peace Prize laureate A.D. Sakharov was under the supervision of the KGB since the 1960s, was subjected to searches and numerous insults in the press. In 1980, on charges of anti-Soviet activities, Sakharov was arrested and sent into exile without trial in the city of Gorky, where he spent 7 years under house arrest under the control of KGB officers. In 1978, the KGB undertook an attempt, on charges of anti-Soviet activity, to initiate a criminal case against the Soviet philosopher, sociologist and writer A.A. USSR ”, this measure of restraint was considered inappropriate. Alternatively, in a memorandum to the Central Committee of the CPSU, the KGB leadership recommended that Zinoviev and his family be allowed to travel abroad and that his entry into the USSR be closed.

To control the USSR's implementation of the Helsinki agreements on human rights observance, in 1976 a group of Soviet dissidents formed the Moscow Helsinki Group (MHG), the first leader of which was the Soviet physicist, corresponding member of the Academy of Sciences of the Armenian SSR Yu. F. Orlov. Since its inception, the MHG has been subject to constant persecution and pressure from the KGB and other law enforcement agencies of the Soviet state. The members of the group were threatened, forced to emigrate, forced to stop their human rights activities. Since February 1977, activists Yu. F. Orlov, A. Ginzburg, A. Sharansky and M. Landa began to be arrested. In the case of Sharansky, the KGB received authorization from the CPSU Central Committee to prepare and publish a number of propaganda articles, as well as to write and transmit to US President J. Carter a personal letter from the defendant's father-in-law denying the fact of Sharansky's marriage and "exposing" his immoral appearance. Under pressure from the KGB in 1976-1977, MHG members L. Alekseeva, P. Grigorenko and V. Rubin were forced to emigrate. In the period from 1976 to 1982, eight members of the group were arrested and sentenced to various terms of imprisonment or exile (in total - 60 years in camps and 40 years in exile), six more were forced to emigrate from the USSR and deprived of their citizenship. In the fall of 1982, amid increasing repressions, the three remaining members of the group were forced to announce the termination of the MHG. The Moscow Helsinki Group was able to resume its activities only in 1989, at the height of Gorbachev's perestroika.

Struggle against Zionism

In the summer of 1970, a group of Soviet refuseniks attempted to hijack a passenger plane in order to emigrate from the USSR. By the KGB, the protesters were arrested and brought to trial on charges of treason (attempted escape by illegally crossing the state border), attempted embezzlement on an especially large scale (hijacking an airplane) and anti-Soviet agitation.

Regularly, with the permission of the Central Committee of the CPSU, the state security agencies took measures to confiscate correspondence, parcels and material assistance sent from abroad to individuals or organizations that the KGB qualified as "hostile." For example, every year the KGB confiscated parcels with matzah sent by Jewish communities from abroad to Soviet Jews for the Passover holiday.

On the initiative of the Propaganda Department of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the KGB of the USSR in 1983, the Anti-Zionist Committee of the Soviet public was created in the USSR, which, under the leadership of the secretariat of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the state security agencies, was engaged in propaganda and publishing activities.

"Ideological operations" of the KGB

A special place in the arsenal of means of the KGB's struggle against ideology and its carriers hostile to the Soviet system was occupied by the preparation and formation of public opinion through the press, cinema, theater, television and radio. In 1978, a special prize of the KGB of the USSR was established in the field of literature and art, which was awarded to writers and actors whose works realized the ideological intentions of the leadership of the state security bodies or covered the activities of the committee staff in accordance with the official point of view of the leadership of the KGB and the Central Committee of the CPSU. Thanks to this policy, films such as Seventeen Moments of Spring, Omega Variant, The Shield and the Sword have appeared.

According to some researchers, the KGB recruited individual figures of culture, literature and science in the USSR and abroad to carry out targeted actions called "ideological operations." So these researchers suggest that in the 1970s, the state security agencies recruited a Soviet American historian, Doctor of Historical Sciences N.N. Yakovlev to write a number of books commissioned by the KGB - in particular, "August 1, 1914" "- claiming serious scientific research in the field of history on the basis of materials provided to the writer by the head of the 5th department of the KGB, General FD Bobkov. Many of these materials were fabricated. Yakovlev's books published in millions of copies set out the position of the ideological and punitive institutions of the USSR, American intelligence and Soviet dissidents were presented in a negative light, who were portrayed as "renegades", "enemies of the people", "two-faced, immoral types acting at the direction of the Western special services." Thus, the writer A. I. Solzhenitsyn was presented as a "loyal servant of the CIA" and "ideologue of fascism", human rights activist V. K. Bukovsky - "a hardened criminal", etc. Similar literature in collaboration with the 5th KGB Directorate was published by the authors of Reshetovskoy, N. Vitkevich. T.Rzezach.

The sphere of carrying out "ideological operations" of the KGB was not limited to the borders of the Soviet Union. In the second half of the 1970s, the KGB, together with the Cuban secret service of the DGI, carried out a long-term operation "Toucan" aimed at discrediting the government of Augusto Pinochet in Chile. During the operation, dozens of articles were published in the Western media (in particular, in the American newspaper New York Times), negatively covering the persecution of political opponents by the Pinochet regime and whitewashing the situation with respect to human rights in Cuba. The publications used documents provided by the KGB. In India, where the KGB was the largest station outside the USSR in the 1970s and 1980s, the Soviet special services "fed" ten newspapers and one news agency. L. V. Shebarshin, a resident of the KGB in India, who later became the head of the First Main Directorate of the KGB, wrote in his memoirs: “The hand of the CIA was also felt in the publications of some Indian newspapers. We paid with the same coin, of course. " The committee spent over ten million US dollars to support Indira Gandhi's party and anti-American propaganda in India. To convince the Indian government of US intrigues, the KGB fabricated forgeries under the guise of CIA documents. According to the reports of the Soviet residency in India, in 1972, for publication in the Indian press, KGB financed about four thousand articles pleasing to the Soviet state security bodies; in 1975, that figure rose to five thousand.

Developing countries

In the context of the intensification of the political, military and ideological confrontation between the superpowers in the 1970s and 80s, the KGB made active efforts to expand the sphere of influence of the Soviet Union in the Third World countries - in Latin America, Africa, Central and Southeast Asia.

Europe and North America

In 1978, Bulgarian writer and dissident Georgi Markov was killed in London by the Bulgarian special services. The physical elimination of the Bulgarian dissident was carried out with the help of an umbrella prick, which contained tiny granules of ricin, a poison made in the 12th KGB laboratory and provided to Bulgarian colleagues for the operation.

The official date of the abolition of the USSR State Security Committee is December 3, 1991 - the date of the signing by the President of the USSR M.S.Gorbachev of the USSR Law No. 124-N "On the Reorganization of State Security Bodies", on the basis of which the liquidation of the KGB as a government body was legalized. At the same time, the republican and local security agencies that were part of the KGB system of the USSR passed into the exclusive jurisdiction of the sovereign republics within the USSR.

Legal basis of activity and subordination

Unlike other government bodies of the USSR, the State Security Committee was party-state institution - according to its legal status, the KGB was a government body and, at the same time, was directly subordinate to the highest bodies of the Communist Party - the Central Committee of the CPSU and its Politburo. The latter was enshrined in, which, from a legal point of view, led to the "fusion of the CPSU and the state security organs" and made the KGB "the armed force of the party, physically and politically guarding the power of the CPSU, which allowed the party to exercise effective and tough control over society."

Unlike its central body, which was ordered to regularly report on its activities to the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Government of the USSR, republican and local state security bodies were not accountable to anyone except the KGB itself and the relevant party bodies in the field.

In addition to the implementation of functions traditional for the special services (in particular, the protection of the state border, foreign intelligence and counterintelligence activities, the fight against terrorism, etc.), the USSR State Security Committee had the right, under the supervision of the prosecutor's office, to conduct an investigation into cases of state crimes, but it could, without authorization the prosecutor to carry out searches, arrests and arrests of persons exposed or suspected of activities directed against the Soviet system and the Communist Party.

An attempt to take the State Security Committee out of the control of the Communist Party and completely subordinate its activities to the organs of state power and administration was undertaken in the last year of the existence of the Soviet Union. On May 16, 1991, the USSR Law "On State Security Bodies in the USSR" was adopted, according to which control over the activities of the KGB of the USSR began to be carried out by the country's supreme legislative body, the head of state and the Soviet government, while the republican state security bodies of the republics became accountable to the supreme bodies state power and administration of the respective republics, as well as the KGB of the USSR itself.

"The legal basis for the activities of state security agencies is the Constitution of the USSR, the constitutions of the republics, this Law and other legislative acts of the USSR and republics, acts of the President of the USSR, decisions and orders of the Cabinet of Ministers of the USSR and the governments of the republics, as well as the acts of the State Security Committee issued in accordance with them. USSR and state security bodies of the republics.
Employees of state security agencies in their official activities are guided by the requirements of the laws and are not bound by decisions of political parties and mass social movements pursuing political goals. "

Art. 7, paragraph 16 of the USSR Law "On the State Security Bodies in the USSR"

At the same time, the police functions were retained for the state security bodies - they were allowed to conduct inquiries and preliminary investigations in cases of crimes, the investigation of which was attributed by law to the jurisdiction of the state security bodies; to carry out, without the sanction of the prosecutor, control of postal items and wiretapping of telephone conversations; to carry out arrests and to keep in custody persons detained by the state security bodies on suspicion of committing crimes without the authorization of the prosecutor.

Resolution of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of May 16, 1991 No. 2160-1 "On the Enactment of the USSR Law" On State Security Bodies in the USSR "also provided for the development and approval of a new regulation on the USSR State Security Committee before January 1, 1992, replacing the 1959 regulation However, the new document was not approved - on December 3, 1991, the KGB of the USSR was abolished.

The relationship between the KGB and the KPSS

Despite the fact that formally the State Security Committee was endowed with the rights of a Union-Republican ministry and carried out its activities under the auspices of the Council of Ministers of the USSR - first as a department under the government, and then as a central body of state administration - the actual leadership of the KGB was carried out by the highest bodies of the Communist Party The Soviet Union, represented by the Secretariat of the CPSU Central Committee and the Politburo. From the moment of its formation until May 16, 1991 - six months before the abolition - the KGB was actually taken out of the control of the Soviet government. Certain aspects of the KGB's activities - in particular, the subordination of the party, the fight against dissent, exemption from adherence to certain norms of criminal procedure law - endowed the specialized units of the KGB with the characteristic features of the secret police.

Party control

• determined the status of the state security bodies and carried out the regulation of their activities;
• determined the main tasks of the state security bodies and specific directions of their activities;
• established the general structure of the state security organs;
• formulated goals, identified subjects and prescribed methods of dealing with them, based on the current political situation, which entailed "large-scale repressive measures";
• approved the organizational structure and staffing of the state security bodies, controlling structural changes and changes in the staffing at all levels - from the main directorates of the central apparatus to the district departments of the KGB;
• approved or approved the main internal regulations of the state security bodies - orders, decisions of the board, regulations and instructions;
• formed the leadership of the state security bodies, in particular, the approval of the chairman of the KGB and his deputies, as well as the leading officials of the state security bodies included in the nomenclature of the Central Committee of the CPSU or local party bodies;
• determined the personnel policy of the security agencies;
• received reports on the activities of the state security bodies as a whole and on its individual structures and areas of activity, while reporting was mandatory and periodic (for a month, a year, a five-year period);
• controlled specific measures or complexes of measures of the state security bodies and authorized the most important of them on a wide range of issues.

The Central Committee of the CPSU had the right to prohibit the publication of orders of the chairman of the KGB, which touched upon important, from the point of view of the party's leadership, issues of agent-operational and investigative work, which contradicted Articles 10, 12 and 13 of 1955, which provided for prosecutorial control over the compliance of regulations. issued by departments, the Constitution and laws of the USSR, union and autonomous republics, decisions of the union and republican governments.

As part of the law enforcement activities of the KGB, the security agencies were prohibited from collecting incriminating materials on representatives of the party, Soviet and trade union nomenklatura, which took out of the control of law enforcement agencies those who had administrative, controlling and economic powers, and laid the foundation for the emergence of organized crime in their midst.

The functions of the state security bodies invariably included the protection and maintenance of the top leaders of the party (including during their vacation), ensuring the security of major party events (congresses, plenums, meetings), providing the highest party bodies with technical means and encryption. For this, there were special units in the structures of the KGB, whose work and equipment were paid from the state, and not from the party budget. According to the regulations on the KGB, he was also entrusted with the protection of the leaders of the Soviet government. At the same time, an analysis of the KGB orders shows a tendency towards the transfer of security and service functions in relation to the state structures proper to the jurisdiction of the internal affairs bodies, which is evidence that the protection and maintenance of party leaders and facilities were a priority for the KGB. In a number of orders for security and maintenance measures, only party leaders are mentioned. In particular, the KGB was entrusted with ensuring the security and services of members of the Politburo, candidates for members of the Politburo and secretaries of the CPSU Central Committee, as well as, in accordance with the decisions of the CPSU Central Committee, statesmen and political leaders of foreign countries during their stay in the USSR. For example, the KGB provided security and services to B. Karmal, who permanently resided in Moscow, after his dismissal in 1986 from the post of General Secretary of the Central Committee of the People's Democratic Party of Afghanistan.

HR Integration

The selection of people to work in the security organs and in the educational institutions of the KGB - the so-called "party recruits" from among ordinary communists, workers of the party apparatus, Komsomol and Soviet bodies - were carried out systematically under the close supervision of the Central Committee of the CPSU. The most important areas of the KGB's activities were strengthened, as a rule, by party functionaries - instructors of departments of the Central Committee of republican communist parties, heads and deputy heads of departments of regional committees, secretaries of city and district party committees. Party bodies at various levels constantly carried out personnel inspections of the KGB apparatus and educational institutions, the results of which were confirmed by decisions of the KGB leadership. But the opposite was not uncommon - the promotion of KGB personnel to leading positions in party bodies. So, for example, the former chairman of the KGB of Azerbaijan GA Aliyev became the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Azerbaijan, in Latvia the head of the republican KGB B.K. Pugo became the head of the republican communist party, not to mention the chairman of the KGB of the USSR Yu.V. Andropov, who became Secretary in 1982 and then General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. Personnel transfers were practiced with repeated transfers from party work to the KGB and vice versa. For example, in April 1968, P.P. Laptev, an assistant in the department of the Central Committee of the CPSU for relations with the communist and workers' parties of the socialist countries, was sent to work in the KGB, where he immediately received the rank of colonel. Heading the KGB secretariat in -1979, Laptev rose to the rank of general. In 1979, he again went to work in the Central Committee of the CPSU, becoming an assistant to a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of Andropov. From 1984 to 1984 he was Assistant Secretary, then General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU, and then returned to work in the KGB. In June Laptev was appointed first deputy, and in May 1991 - head of the General Department of the Central Committee of the CPSU.

The leading employees of the state security bodies were included in the nomenclature of the Central Committee of the CPSU and local party bodies, and their appointment and transfer from one position to another was carried out by decision of the relevant party body. So, the candidacy of the chairman of the KGB was first approved by the Central Committee of the CPSU and only after that the chairman was appointed to the post by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, while the appointment of deputy chairmen was carried out by the Council of Ministers of the USSR only after the approval of the candidate to the Central Committee of the CPSU.

There was also a combination of posts in the party and in the KGB: the chairmen of the KGB of the USSR Andropov, Chebrikov, Kryuchkov were at various times members of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU. The heads of the territorial bodies of the KGB, as a rule, were members, or candidate members, of the bureaus of the corresponding regional committees, regional committees and the Central Committee of the republics' communist parties. The same was practiced at the level of city committees and district committees, in the bureaus of which representatives of the state security agencies were almost always included. In the administrative departments of the party committees, there were subdivisions in charge of the state security organs. Often these units were staffed with KGB cadres, who, during their work in the party apparatus, continued to be listed in the service of the KGB, being in the so-called "active reserve". For example, in 1989, the sector of state security problems of the State Legal Department of the Central Committee of the CPSU (reorganized in 1988 from the sector of state security bodies of the Department of Administrative Bodies and existed under a new name until August 1991) was headed by the chairman of the KGB of Azerbaijan, Major General I.I.Gorelovsky. Gorelovsky, who was in party work, was nevertheless introduced by the KGB leadership to the next rank of lieutenant general in the summer of 1990.

Information exchange

For the leadership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, the state security organs were the main source of information that allowed them to control the structures of government and manipulate public opinion, while the leaders and rank-and-file employees of the state security agencies saw in the face of the CPSU, at least until the end of the 1980s, “ cornerstone "of the Soviet system and its guiding and guiding force.

In addition to the so-called "posed" questions requiring the decision or consent of the Central Committee of the CPSU, from the state security bodies to the party bodies there was regular information of both an overview and a specific nature. Summaries on the operational situation in the country, summaries on the state of affairs on the border and in the border zones of the USSR, political summaries, summaries of the international situation, reviews of the foreign press, television and radio broadcasting, summaries of public reviews about certain events or activities of the Communist Party and the Soviet government, and other information came to the party organs at different intervals and, in different periods of the KGB's activity, in a different assortment depending on the current needs of the party apparatus and its leadership. In addition to reports, the Central Committee and local party organs received information regarding specific events and people. This information could be routine, intended for information, or urgent, requiring urgent decisions on the part of party leaders. It is significant that the state security agencies sent both processed and unprocessed, operatively obtained illustrative information to the Central Committee - materials of perlustration, secret seizures of documents, wiretapping of premises and telephone conversations, intelligence reports. For example, in 1957, from the KGB to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, there were memos for Academician L. D. Landau, including materials of wiretapping and reports of agents; in 1987 - records of a conversation between Academician A. D. Sakharov and American scientists D. Stone and F. von Hippel. In this regard, the KGB was the successor of the practice of the state security agencies that preceded it: the state archives preserved records of the domestic conversations of generals Gordov and Rybalchenko sent to Stalin by the Soviet special services in 1947. In the course of its activities, the KGB continued to use special information units created in the first period of the OGPU's work and whose activities continued to be regulated by the provisions approved by F.E.Dzerzhinsky.

The Central Committee of the CPSU constantly monitored the information work in the state security bodies and demanded the accuracy and objectivity of the materials sent to the party bodies, as evidenced by numerous resolutions of the Central Committee of the CPSU and orders of the KGB.

Military-political bodies in the KGB troops

Governing bodies

KGB Chairman

The activities of the State Security Committee were directed by its chairman.

Since the KGB was originally endowed with the rights of a ministry, the appointment of its chairman was carried out not by the government, but by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on the proposal of the chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR. The same procedure for appointing the head of the KGB continued after the KGB acquired the status of a state committee in July 1978. At the same time, neither the Supreme Soviet, nor the government of the USSR, within which the State Security Committee operated, had no real opportunity to influence the personnel issues of the KGB. Before the appointment of the chairman of the KGB, his candidacy was subject to mandatory approval by the Central Committee of the CPSU, under the direct control of which was the State Security Committee. All the chairmen of the KGB (with the exception of V.V. Fedorchuk, who held this position for about seven months), by virtue of their membership in the Central Committee of the CPSU, belonged to the nomenclature of the supreme body of the Communist Party and their appointment, transfer from one position to another or removal from office could be produced only by decision of the Central Committee of the CPSU. The same procedure was applied to the deputy chairmen of the KGB, who could be appointed and removed from office by the Council of Ministers of the USSR only on condition of obtaining permission from the Central Committee of the CPSU.

• Serov, Ivan Alexandrovich (1954-1958)
• Shelepin, Alexander Nikolaevich (1958-1961)
• Semichastny, Vladimir Efimovich (1961-1967)
• Andropov, Yuri Vladimirovich (1967-1982)
• Chebrikov, Viktor Mikhailovich (1982-1988)
• Kryuchkov, Vladimir Alexandrovich (1988-1991)

Structural divisions of the KGB