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136-636: The main components of the 9K714 system were: The operational life of the Oka was limited and controversial. The Soviet military asserted that the Oka had a maximum range of 250 miles (400 km). American experts, however, estimated it had a greater range. In 1987, Mikhail Gorbachev proposed to George Shultz that he would unilaterally remove all Okas, if it would prevent the United States from building up its own short-range nuclear forces in Europe, despite

272-618: A communal apartment . In 1961, Gorbachev pursued a second degree, in agricultural production; he took a correspondence course from the local Stavropol Agricultural Institute, receiving his diploma in 1967. His wife had also pursued a second degree, attaining a PhD in sociology in 1967 from the Moscow State Pedagogical University ; while in Stavropol she too joined the Communist Party. Stalin

408-599: A party Congress . Members of the Central Committee were given a predetermined list of candidates for the Politburo (having only one candidate for each seat); for this reason, the election of the Politburo was usually passed unanimously. The more power the CPSU General Secretary had, the stronger the chance was that the Politburo membership were passed without serious dissent. Article 25 of

544-634: A "radical restructuring" of foreign policy. A major issue facing his leadership was Soviet involvement in the Afghan Civil War, which had then been going on for over five years. Over the course of the war, the Soviet Army took heavy casualties and there was much opposition to Soviet involvement among both the public and military. On becoming leader, Gorbachev saw withdrawal from the war as a key priority. In October 1985, he met with Afghan Marxist leader Babrak Karmal , urging him to acknowledge

680-652: A candidate member to a full member of the Politburo ( 25th term ), the highest decision-making authority in the Communist Party. At the time, he was the Politburo's youngest member. After Brezhnev's death in November 1982, Andropov succeeded him as General Secretary of the Communist Party , the de facto leader in the Soviet Union. Gorbachev was enthusiastic about the appointment. However, although Gorbachev hoped that Andropov would introduce liberalizing reforms,

816-428: A complex series of reforms to restructure society and the economy. He was concerned by the country's low productivity, poor work ethic, and inferior quality goods; like several economists, he feared this would lead to the country becoming a second-rate power. The first stage of Gorbachev's perestroika was uskoreniye ("acceleration"), a term he used regularly in the first two years of his leadership. The Soviet Union

952-680: A distinction; his final paper had been on the advantages of "socialist democracy" (the Soviet political system) over "bourgeois democracy" ( liberal democracy ). He was subsequently assigned to the Soviet Procurator 's office, which was then focusing on the rehabilitation of the innocent victims of Stalin's purges, but found that they had no work for him. He was then offered a place on an MSU graduate course specializing in kolkhoz law, but declined. He had wanted to remain in Moscow, where Raisa

1088-517: A dormitory in the Sokolniki District . He and other rural students felt at odds with their Muscovite counterparts, but he soon came to fit in. Fellow students recall him working especially hard, often late into the night. He gained a reputation as a mediator during disputes and was also known for being outspoken in class, although he would reveal some of his views only privately; for instance, he confided in some students his opposition to

1224-467: A failure. The purpose of reform was to prop up the centrally planned economy —not to transition to market socialism . Speaking in late summer 1985 to the secretaries for economic affairs of the central committees of the East European communist parties, Gorbachev said: "Many of you see the solution to your problems in resorting to market mechanisms in place of direct planning. Some of you look at

1360-832: A guide from the French Communist Party . He was surprised by how openly West Europeans offered their opinions and criticized their political leaders, something absent from the Soviet Union, where most people did not feel safe speaking so openly. He later related that for him and his wife, these visits "shook our a priori belief in the superiority of socialist over bourgeois democracy". Gorbachev had remained close to his parents; after his father became terminally ill in 1974, Gorbachev traveled to be with him in Privolnoe shortly before his death. His daughter, Irina, married fellow student Anatoly Virgansky in April 1978. In 1977,

1496-426: A high honour to be a member of the highly advanced, genuinely revolutionary Communist Party of Bolsheviks. I promise to be faithful to the great cause of Lenin and Stalin, to devote my entire life to the party's struggle for Communism. — Gorbachev's letter requesting membership of the Communist Party, 1950 In June 1950, Gorbachev became a candidate member of the Communist Party. He also applied to study at

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1632-484: A hut of their own could be built. The Soviet Union was a one-party state governed by the Communist Party , and during Gorbachev's childhood was under the leadership of Joseph Stalin . Stalin had initiated a project of mass rural collectivization which, in keeping with his Marxist–Leninist ideas, he believed would help convert the country into a socialist society . Gorbachev's maternal grandfather joined

1768-465: A largely ceremonial role with little influence, and moved his own ally, Eduard Shevardnadze , to Gromyko's former post in charge of foreign policy. Other allies whom he saw promoted were Yakovlev, Anatoly Lukyanov , and Vadim Medvedev. Another of those promoted by Gorbachev was Boris Yeltsin , who was made a Secretary of the Central Committee ( 26th term ) in July 1985. Most of these appointees were from

1904-620: A measure, proposing instead of handing them over to the courts. Molotov and Kliment Voroshilov , supported a compromise brokered by Stalin, which handed over Bukharin and Rykov to the NKVD . Despite this opposition, Stalin and his closest associates began purging officials nationwide. In May 1937, Jānis Rudzutaks became the first Politburo member to be purged. In 1938, four other Politburo members were purged; Chubar, who personally telephoned Stalin crying trying to assure his innocence, Kosior, who confessed for anti-socialist crimes after his daughter

2040-472: A necessary measure to ensure perestroika by alerting the Soviet populace to the nature of the country's problems in the hope that they would support his efforts to fix them. Particularly popular among the Soviet intelligentsia , who became key Gorbachev supporters, glasnost boosted his domestic popularity but alarmed many Communist Party hardliners. For many Soviet citizens, this newfound level of freedom of speech and press—and its accompanying revelations about

2176-614: A new generation of well-educated officials who had been frustrated during the Brezhnev era. In his first year, 14 of the 23 heads of department in the Secretariat were replaced. Doing so, Gorbachev secured dominance in the Politburo within a year, faster than either Stalin, Khrushchev, or Brezhnev had achieved. Gorbachev recurrently employed the term perestroika , first used publicly in March 1984. He saw perestroika as encompassing

2312-552: A noted factionalist before the Bolshevik seizure of power, supported the promotion of people he had previously clashed with on important issues to the Politburo; Trotsky and Lenin had had several years of violent polemics between them, while Grigori Zinoviev and Lev Kamenev both opposed the Central Committee resolution that initiated the October Revolution. From 1917 to the mid-1920s, congresses were held annually,

2448-616: A one-man dictatorship within the party, Lenin countered, stating that he, like any other, could only implement policies by persuading the party. This happened on several occasions, such as in 1917 when he threatened to leave the party if it did not go along with the October Revolution , when he persuaded the party to sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk , or with the introduction of the New Economic Policy (NEP). Lenin,

2584-521: A period of political liberalization in the Marxist–Leninist country. Although Gorbachev later stated that he had had private concerns about the invasion, he publicly supported it. In September 1969 he was part of a Soviet delegation sent to Czechoslovakia, where he found the Czechoslovak people largely unwelcoming to them. That year, the Soviet authorities ordered him to punish Fagim B. Sadygov,

2720-406: A philosophy professor of the Stavropol agricultural institute whose ideas were regarded as critical of Soviet agricultural policy; Gorbachev ensured that Sadykov was fired from teaching but ignored calls for him to face tougher punishment. Gorbachev later related that he was "deeply affected" by the incident; "my conscience tormented me" for overseeing Sadykov's persecution. In April 1970, Yefremov

2856-530: A plan to close GUM and open some kind of cabinet of curiosities there." After everyone sat down, he asks: "Well, has the GUM issue been resolved?" Everyone, including Suslov, nodded their heads. The problem was closed once and for all without discussion. To be elected to the Politburo, a member had to serve on the Central Committee . The Central Committee formally elected the Politburo in the aftermath of

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2992-507: A reformer and changemaker. However, as the Soviet Union collapsed as a result of these reforms, so did his approval rating; contemporary Russians often deride him for weakening Russia's global influence and precipitating an economic collapse in the country . Mikhail Gorbachev also ran unsuccessfully in 1996 which, despite neoliberal reforms in Russia at the time, showed mass unpopularity with the results of his administration and possibly regret in

3128-659: A wide range of awards, including the Nobel Peace Prize , in the West he is praised for his role in ending the Cold War, introducing new political and economic freedoms in the Soviet Union, and tolerating both the fall of Marxist–Leninist administrations in eastern and central Europe and the German reunification . Gorbachev has a complicated legacy in Russia. While in power, he had net positive approval ratings, being viewed as

3264-552: Is a system in which higher bodies are responsible to lower bodies and where every member is subordinate to party decisions). The nature of democratic centralism had changed by 1929, and freedom of expression , which had been previously tolerated within the party, was replaced with monolithic unity. This was achieved with Stalin's defeat of rival factions such as the Left Opposition and the Right Opposition . It

3400-472: Is approved,' said Brezhnev after a few more moments of silence. Makarov put his hand on my shoulder, whispering, 'Okay, Arkady, that's it. You can go.'" Nevertheless, there were times where the General Secretary would override all the other members by making his opinion clear and implying that dissent would not be tolerated. Mikhail Smirtyukov , recalled one such Politburo meeting. While Brezhnev

3536-623: Is generally believed that under Stalin the Politburo's powers were reduced compared to the General Secretary . Stalin defeated the Left Opposition led by Trotsky by allying himself with the rightists within the Politburo; Nikolai Bukharin , Aleksey Rykov , and Mikhail Tomsky . After defeating the Left Opposition, Stalin began attacking the rightists (referred to as the Right Opposition) through his supporters in

3672-588: The Canadian Parliament . There, he met and befriended the Soviet ambassador, Aleksandr Yakovlev , who later became a key political ally. In February 1984, Andropov died; on his deathbed he indicated his desire that Gorbachev succeed him. Many in the Central Committee nevertheless thought the 53-year-old Gorbachev was too young and inexperienced. Instead, Konstantin Chernenko —a longstanding Brezhnev ally—was appointed general secretary, but he too

3808-686: The Komsomol youth organization and, after Stalin's death, became a keen proponent of the de-Stalinization reforms of Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev . He was appointed the First Party Secretary of the Stavropol Regional Committee in 1970, overseeing the construction of the Great Stavropol Canal . In 1978, he returned to Moscow to become a Secretary of the party's Central Committee ; he joined

3944-549: The Komsomol , the Soviet political youth organization, becoming leader of his local group and then being elected to the Komsomol committee for the district. From primary school he moved to the high school in Molotovskoye ; he stayed there during the week while walking the 19 km (12 mi) home during weekends. As well as being a member of the school's drama society, he organized sporting and social activities and led

4080-568: The October Revolution , with only seven members (Lenin, Leon Trotsky , Grigory Zinoviev , Lev Kamenev , Joseph Stalin , Grigori Sokolnikov , and Andrei Bubnov ), but this precursor did not outlast the event; the Central Committee continued with the political functions. However, due to practical reasons, usually fewer than half of the members attended the regular Central Committee meetings during this time, even though they decided all key questions. The 8th Party Congress in 1919 formalized this reality and re-established what would later on become

4216-512: The People's Commissar for Heavy Industry , refused to acknowledge Stalin's projected economic growth targets, claiming that the majority in the Politburo supported his position. Sergey Kirov , who had turned down an offer to take Stalin's place as General Secretary before the 17th Congress, opposed many of Stalin's repressive policies, and tried throughout 1934 to moderate them. Several scholars have viewed Ordzhonikidze's and Kirov's outspokenness as

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4352-603: The Twenty-Seventh Party Congress in February, Yeltsin called for more far-reaching reforms than Gorbachev was initiating and criticized the party leadership, although he did not cite Gorbachev by name, claiming that a new cult of personality was forming. Gorbachev then opened the floor to responses, after which attendees publicly criticized Yeltsin for several hours. After this, Gorbachev also criticized Yeltsin, claiming that he cared only for himself and

4488-803: The USSR . It was founded in October 1917, and refounded in March 1919, at the 8th Congress of the Bolshevik Party . It was known as the Presidium from 1952 to 1966. The Politburo's authority was significantly undermined during the August coup and subsequently ended three months later upon its dissolution in 1991. On 18 August 1917, the top Bolshevik leader, Vladimir Lenin , set up a political bureau—known first as Narrow Composition , and after 23 October 1917, as Political Bureau —specifically to direct

4624-416: The armed forces into neighbouring Afghanistan to support its Soviet-aligned government against Islamist insurgents ; Gorbachev privately thought it a mistake. At times he openly supported the government position; in October 1980 he for instance endorsed Soviet calls for Poland's Marxist–Leninist government to crack down on growing internal dissent in that country . That same month, he was promoted from

4760-401: The population censuses , during these years the Soviet Union had a composition of between 51% (in 1989 ) and 58% (in 1939 ) Russian, between 15% (in 1989) and 21% (in 1926 ) Ukrainian, between 1.2% (in 1926) and 1.4% (in 1989) Georgian, and between 0.5% (in 1989) and 1.8% (in 1926) Jewish. In general, in the first half of the Politburo's existence, there was a higher ethnic representation than

4896-505: The 1960s onwards the majority of new members had workers' backgrounds, as expected. What is strange, however, is that from 1975 to 1981, a sudden increase of people of peasant background took place. When looking at first profession, the majority of members had worked as workers, but the majority of them had attended higher education later in their life (the majority of them choosing engineering ). 43 percent of Politburo members attained higher education credentials during their life, while in

5032-458: The 1985 Red Square holiday celebrations, and encouraged frank and open discussions at Politburo meetings. To the West, Gorbachev was seen as a more moderate and less threatening Soviet leader; some Western commentators however believed this an act to lull Western governments into a false sense of security. His wife was his closest adviser, and took on the unofficial role of a " first lady " by appearing with him on foreign trips; her public visibility

5168-699: The Central Committee plenum in February 1937, Stalin, Molotov, Zhdanov and Nikolai Yezhov began accusing leading officials of anti-socialist behavior, but they met opposition. Pavel Postyshev , a Politburo candidate member and First Secretary of the Ukrainian Communist Branch , in response to them accusing a member of the Ukrainian Central Committee of being anti-socialist said; "I don't believe it." When Yezhov proposed killing Bukharin and Rykov, Postyshev along with Stanislav Kosior and Grigory Petrovsky , opposed such

5304-520: The Central Committee treated Politburo replenishment as the responsibility of the Politburo itself. Politburo members usually picked successors who were around the same age, the result being the establishment of the gerontocracy of the Brezhnev Era . While the age steadily crept up during Khrushchev's leadership, members were replaced; for instance, 70 percent of the members elected to the Politburo in 1956 lost their seats in 1961. In contrast, all

5440-403: The Central Committee was convened at least once a month and the Politburo met once a week. With Joseph Stalin 's consolidation of power , the frequency of formal meetings declined. By the mid-1930s, the Central Committee met only once a month, and the Politburo convened at most once every third week. The Politburo was established, and worked within the framework of democratic centralism (that

5576-489: The Central Committee, upon elections. These amendments were removed from the party Charter under Leonid Brezhnev , and Article 25 now stated; "In the election of all party organs, from the primary party organization to the Central Committee of the CPSU, the principle of systematic replacement of personnel and the continuity of leadership is to be observed." The Brezhnev period saw, in complete contrast to Khrushchev's amendment,

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5712-438: The Communist Party and helped form the village's first kolkhoz (collective farm) in 1929, becoming its chair. This farm was 19 kilometres (12 mi) outside Privolnoye village and when he was three years old, Gorbachev left his parental home and moved into the kolkhoz with his maternal grandparents. The country was then experiencing the famine of 1930–1933 , in which two of Gorbachev's paternal uncles and an aunt died. This

5848-536: The KGB. In his new position, Gorbachev often worked twelve to sixteen hour days. He and his wife socialized little, but liked to visit Moscow's theaters and museums. In 1978, Gorbachev was appointed to the Central Committee's Secretariat for Agriculture ( 25th term ), replacing his old patron Kulakov, who had died of a heart attack. Gorbachev concentrated his attentions on agriculture: the harvests of 1979, 1980, and 1981 were all poor, due largely to weather conditions, and

5984-675: The Leningrad City Committee and member of the Secretariat, and Robert Eikhe , the First Secretary of the Siberian and West-Siberian District Committee, were elected Politburo candidate members. 1936 signaled the beginning of the Great Purge , a nationwide purge of what Stalin deemed as anti-socialist elements. The first victims of the purge were members and leaders of economic organizations. Not everyone in

6120-633: The North Caucasus; he holidayed with the head of the KGB , Yuri Andropov , who was favorable towards him and who became an important patron. Gorbachev also developed good relationships with senior figures including the Soviet prime minister, Alexei Kosygin , and the longstanding senior party member Mikhail Suslov . The government considered Gorbachev sufficiently reliable that he was sent as part of Soviet delegations to Western Europe; he made five trips there between 1970 and 1977. In September 1971 he

6256-648: The OTR-23 Oka was also reported to be able to deliver chemical munitions. Mikhail Gorbachev Former General Secretary of the CPSU Former President of the Soviet Union Secretariate (1985–1991) Presidency (1990–1991) Foreign policy Post-leadership [REDACTED] Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev (2 March 1931 – 30 August 2022) was a Soviet and Russian politician and statesman who served as

6392-580: The Politburo (as well as the Central Committee) had to step down at each election to the Politburo, and that no members could be elected for more than three terms. The initiator of these changes, Khrushchev, the CPSU General Secretary, had served in the Politburo for 22 years. Instead of stepping down, Khrushchev made a rule which stated that members "who enjoyed great authority and possessed exceptional ability" could serve more than three terms, if they received more than 75 percent approval votes from

6528-455: The Politburo agreed with the purges, or the scope of them. Ordzhonikidze ridiculed the purge, and tried to save officials working in the People's Commissariat for Heavy Industry. Stalin expected that Ordzhonikidze would support the purges, at least officially, but instead he wrote a speech condemning them. On 18 February 1937, Ordzhonikidze was found dead in his house, having killed himself. At

6664-516: The Politburo from its establishment in 1919. This is not surprising, since the three most populous republics within the Soviet Union were ethnic Slavic; Byelorussia , Ukraine and Russia . From 1919 until 1991, 89 members of the Politburo were Russians (which makes up 68 percent). In distant second were Ukrainians, who had 11 members in the Politburo, making up 8 percent. In third place are both ethnic Jews and Georgians, who had 4 members respectively, making up 3 percent. For comparison, according to

6800-503: The Politburo members elected in 1966 were reelected in 1971. Even more worrisome, 12 out of 19 members elected in 1966 were reelected in 1981. By the time of Brezhnev's death in 1982, the median age of the politburo was 70. This age development was finally put to a halt under Gorbachev. From 1985 onwards, the age of Politburo members steadily declined. Fifty-nine percent of Politburo members (both candidate and full) were of rural origins, while 41 percent were urban. The first members of

6936-430: The Politburo were predominantly from urban areas. For instance, on the 9th Politburo, two out of eight (Trotsky and Mikhail Kalinin ) were born in rural areas. From the 1930s onwards, the majority of Politburo members had a father who worked either as a peasant or as a worker. This is strange, considering that one would assume a rise in representation of the intelligentsia as the Soviet Union became more advanced. From

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7072-440: The Politburo's existence. Serving in the Politburo was a part-time function, and members served concurrently in either the party, state, trade union , security or military administrations (or all of them concurrently). Until the 1950s, most members served in state positions, but this changed at the 20th Congress (held in 1956) when 47% percent of Politburo members served in the central party apparatus while another 47% served in

7208-585: The Politburo, Secretariat, and Orgburo. During this period, the office of the General Secretary became paramount. The Politburo, which was nominally responsible to the Central Committee and the Party Congress, became responsible to the General Secretary. The General Secretary, the formal head of the Secretariat and the Orgburo, "came to exercise enormous weight in decision-making." The Secretariat and Orgburo were responsible for personnel appointments in

7344-470: The Politburo, the Central Committee, and the Control Commission. Stalin and his companion supported an undemocratic interpretation of Lenin's What Is to Be Done? . Throughout the late-1920s, Politburo member Lazar Kaganovich (a Stalin ally), wrote and campaigned for a party organisational by-law which reduced intra-party democracy in favour of hierarchy and centralism . With the defeat of

7480-406: The Politburo; Elena Stasova , Yekaterina Furtseva , Alexandra Biryukova and Galina Semenova . Furtseva, Biryukova and Semenova reached the Politburo under the leadership of reformist party leaders; Nikita Khrushchev and Mikhail Gorbachev . The average age of the Politburo was 39 in 1919, and the Politburo continued to age more-or-less consistently until 1985. The reason for this being that

7616-490: The Soviet Union the " evil empire ". Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union The Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , abbreviated Politbureau CC CPSS or simply Politbureau , was the highest political body of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and de facto a collective presidency of

7752-432: The Soviet economy, namely from decreasing tax collections from declining alcohol sales, resulting in losses of up to US$ 100 billion between 1985 and 1990. Another serious problem was the strain on the Soviet healthcare system, as uneducated Soviet citizens had resorted to drinking rubbing alcohol, nail polish remover or cologne as dangerous substitutes, resulting in a rise in poisoning cases. Gorbachev later considered

7888-550: The Soviet jurisprudential norm that a confession proved guilt, noting that confessions could have been forced. During his studies, an antisemitic campaign spread through the Soviet Union, culminating in the Doctors' plot ; Gorbachev publicly defended Volodya Liberman, a Jewish student who was accused of disloyalty to the country by one of his fellows. At MSU, Gorbachev became the Komsomol head of his entering class, and then Komsomol's deputy secretary for agitation and propaganda at

8024-581: The Soviet legislature, a largely honorific position. In June he traveled to Italy as a Soviet representative for the funeral of Italian Communist Party leader Enrico Berlinguer , and in September to Sofia , Bulgaria to attend celebrations of the fortieth anniversary of its liberation from the Nazis by the Red Army. In December, he visited Britain at the request of its prime minister Margaret Thatcher ; she

8160-692: The Soviets informed the US of their covert transfer of at least 120 missiles to the Warsaw Pact states of Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, and East Germany during the time of negotiation of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty . Evidence indicates that the missiles were transferred with conventional warheads only, although equipment to load Soviet nuclear warheads was apparently retained. In addition to these warheads,

8296-714: The Stavropol City Party Organization ("Gorkom"). By 1968 he was increasingly frustrated with his job—in large part because Khrushchev's reforms were stalling or being reversed—and he contemplated leaving politics to work in academia. However, in August 1968, he was named Second Secretary of the Stavropol Kraikom, making him the deputy of First Secretary Leonid Yefremov and the second most senior figure in Stavropol Krai. In 1969, he

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8432-469: The Struggle for Temperance was formed to promote sobriety; it had over 14 million members within three years.Anti-alcohol propaganda was distributed, mostly by way of billboards extolling the virtues of a sober workforce. As a result, crime rates fell and life expectancy grew slightly between 1986 and 1987. However, bootleg liquor production rose considerably, and the reform imposed large costs on

8568-572: The Supreme Soviet appointed Gorbachev to chair the Standing Commission on Youth Affairs due to his experience with mobilizing young people in Komsomol. In November 1978, Gorbachev was appointed a Secretary of the Central Committee. His appointment had been approved unanimously by the Central Committee's members. To fill this position, Gorbachev and his wife moved to Moscow, where they were initially given an old dacha outside

8704-426: The United States; he was appalled at the prospect of nuclear war , was aware that the Soviet Union was unlikely to win the arms race and thought that the continued focus on high military spending was detrimental to his desire for domestic reform. US president Ronald Reagan publicly appeared to not want a de-escalation of tensions, having scrapped détente and arms controls, initiating a military build-up, and calling

8840-408: The annual speech marking the birthday of the Soviet founder Vladimir Lenin ; this required him re-reading many of Lenin's later writings, in which the latter had called for reform in the context of the New Economic Policy of the 1920s, and encouraged Gorbachev's own conviction that reform was needed. In May 1983, Gorbachev was sent to Canada, where he met Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and spoke to

8976-507: The area and tried to improve the lives of their inhabitants; he established a discussion circle in Gorkaya Balka village to help its peasant residents gain social contacts. Mikhail Gorbachev and his wife Raisa initially rented a small room in Stavropol, taking daily evening walks around the city and on weekends hiking in the countryside. In January 1957, Raisa gave birth to a daughter, Irina, and in 1958 they moved into two rooms in

9112-417: The area around Chernobyl. Taubman noted that the disaster marked "a turning point for Gorbachev and the Soviet regime". Several days after it occurred, he gave a televised report to the nation. He cited the disaster as evidence for what he regarded as widespread problems in Soviet society, such as shoddy workmanship and workplace inertia. Gorbachev later described the incident as one which made him appreciate

9248-455: The authorities. Gorbachev became close friends with Zdeněk Mlynář , a Czechoslovak student who later became a primary ideologist of the 1968 Prague Spring . Mlynář recalled that the duo remained committed Marxist–Leninists despite their growing concerns about the Stalinist system. After Stalin died in March 1953, Gorbachev and Mlynář joined the crowds massing to see Stalin's body lying in state. At MSU, Gorbachev met Raisa Titarenko , who

9384-417: The backs of one's rivals. In practice, Soviet Leninism's democratic centralism often followed a style of unanimous consent rather than majority vote . This style of consensus decision-making had roots not only in the era of the Great Terror , also known as the Yezhovshchina, but also in Brezhnev's carefully cultivated culture of collective decision-making. Shevchenko said, "While the Politburo considered

9520-516: The campaign to have been an error, and it was terminated in October 1988. After it ended, it took several years for production to return to previous levels, after which alcohol consumption soared in Russia between 1990 and 1993. In the second year of his leadership, Gorbachev began speaking of glasnost , or "openness". According to Doder and Branson, this meant "greater openness and candour in government affairs and for an interplay of different and sometimes conflicting views in political debates, in

9656-498: The city. They then moved to another, at Sosnovka , before finally being allocated a newly built brick house. He was also given an apartment inside the city, but gave that to his daughter and son-in-law; Irina had begun work at Moscow's Second Medical Institute . As part of the Moscow political elite, Gorbachev and his wife now had access to better medical care and to specialized shops; they were also given cooks, servants, bodyguards, and secretaries, although many of these were spies for

9792-783: The collapse of the USSR. Gorbachev was born on 2 March 1931 in the village of Privolnoye , then in the North Caucasus Krai of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic , Soviet Union . At the time, Privolnoye was divided almost evenly between ethnic Russians and ethnic Ukrainians. Gorbachev's paternal family were ethnic Russians and had moved to the region from Voronezh several generations before; his maternal family were of ethnic Ukrainian heritage and had migrated from Chernihiv . His parents named him Viktor at birth, but at

9928-564: The combined meetings of the Central Committee and the Control Commission into the party's " parliament ". The combined meetings of these two would hold the Politburo responsible, while at the same time guard the Politburo from factionalism . Admitting that organizational barriers may be inadequate to safeguard the party from one-man dictatorship, Lenin recognized the importance of individuals. His testament tried to solve this crisis by reducing both Stalin's and Leon Trotsky 's powers. Although some of his contemporaries accused Lenin of creating

10064-405: The country had to import increasing quantities of grain. He had growing concerns about the country's agricultural management system, coming to regard it as overly centralized and requiring more bottom-up decision making; he raised these points at his first speech at a Central Committee Plenum, given in July 1978. He began to have concerns about other policies too. In December 1979, the Soviets sent

10200-516: The country's past—was uncomfortable. Some in the party thought Gorbachev was not going far enough in his reforms; a prominent liberal critic was Yeltsin. He had risen rapidly since 1985, attaining the role of party secretary in Moscow. Like many members of the government, Gorbachev was skeptical of Yeltsin, believing that he engaged in too much self-promotion. Yeltsin was also critical of Gorbachev, regarding him as patronizing. In early 1986, Yeltsin began sniping at Gorbachev in Politburo meetings. At

10336-538: The coup's wake, the Soviet Union dissolved against Gorbachev's wishes. After resigning from the presidency, he launched the Gorbachev Foundation , became a vocal critic of Russian presidents Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin , and campaigned for Russia's social-democratic movement. Gorbachev is considered one of the most significant figures of the second half of the 20th century. The recipient of

10472-636: The early 1990s. He was the only Soviet leader born after the country's foundation. Gorbachev was born in Privolnoye , Russian SFSR , to a poor peasant family of Russian and Ukrainian heritage. Growing up under the rule of Joseph Stalin in his youth, he operated combine harvesters on a collective farm before joining the Communist Party , which then governed the Soviet Union as a one-party state . Studying at Moscow State University , he married fellow student Raisa Titarenko in 1953 and received his law degree in 1955. Moving to Stavropol , he worked for

10608-420: The eighth leader of the Soviet Union. Few in the government imagined that he would be as radical a reformer as he proved. Although he was not a well-known figure to the Soviet public, there was widespread relief that the new leader was not elderly and ailing. Gorbachev's first public appearance as leader was at Chernenko's Red Square funeral, held on 14 March. Two months after being elected, he left Moscow for

10744-424: The elected Congress of People's Deputies undermined the one-party state. When various Warsaw Pact countries abandoned Marxist–Leninist governance in 1989 , he declined to intervene militarily. Growing nationalist sentiment within constituent republics threatened to break up the Soviet Union, leading the hardliners within the Communist Party to launch an unsuccessful coup against Gorbachev in August 1991. In

10880-496: The evolution of the Soviet political system after his death. Others, such as Leonard Schapiro , argue that the system itself evolved from an inner-party democratic system to a monolithic one in 1921, with the establishment of the Control Commission , the ban on factions and the power of the Central Committee to expel members they deemed unqualified. These rules were implemented to strengthen party discipline. However,

11016-444: The existence of the USSR. While nominally subordinate to the Central Committee and the Party Congress, in practice the Politburo was the true center of power in the CPSU, and its decisions de facto had the force of law. Arkady Shevchenko , like many Soviet technical experts, once attended the part of a Politburo meeting that touched on his area of expertise, and he often prepared his boss Andrei Gromyko for meetings. He described

11152-490: The fact that the Soviet military was in favor of the Oka. Shultz however lacked the authority to act on the suggestion. Gorbachev included the Oka in the class of systems to be discontinued as part of the INF Treaty as a gesture of goodwill, even though Soviet assertions of its maximum range did not put it outside the specifications of the treaty. There was diplomatic controversy over this weapons system in April 1990, when

11288-419: The first time, traveling to Leningrad , where he spoke to assembled crowds. In June he traveled to Ukraine, in July to Belarus, and in September to Tyumen Oblast , urging party members in these areas to take more responsibility for fixing local problems. Gorbachev's leadership style differed from that of his predecessors. He would stop to talk to civilians on the street, forbade the display of his portrait at

11424-445: The governing Politburo ( 25th term ) as a non-voting member in 1979 and a voting member in 1980. Three years after the death of Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev —following the brief tenures of Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko —in 1985, the Politburo elected Gorbachev as general secretary, the de facto leader. Although committed to preserving the Soviet state and its Marxist–Leninist ideals, Gorbachev believed significant reform

11560-548: The greatest continuity in the Politburo in its history. Article 25 of the Charter remained unchanged under the successive leadership of Yuri Andropov , Konstantin Chernenko and Mikhail Gorbachev . Between 1919 and 1990, 42 members who served as candidate members were not promoted to full member status of the Politburo. Similarly, 32 full members of the Politburo never served as candidate members. Six members who had served as full members were demoted to candidate status during

11696-459: The harvest; the money earned allowed him to pay for a wedding. On 25 September 1953 he and Raisa registered their marriage at Sokolniki Registry Office and in October moved in together at the Lenin Hills dormitory. Raisa discovered that she was pregnant and although the couple wanted to keep the child she fell ill and required a life-saving abortion. In June 1955, Gorbachev graduated with

11832-547: The insistence of his mother—a devout Orthodox Christian —he had a secret baptism , where his grandfather christened him Mikhail. His relationship with his father, Sergey Andreyevich Gorbachev, was close; his mother, Maria Panteleyevna Gorbacheva (née Gopkalo), was colder and punitive. His parents were poor, and lived as peasants. They had married as teenagers in 1928, and in keeping with local tradition had initially resided in Sergey's father's house, an adobe -walled hut, before

11968-463: The item for which I was responsible, I sat with Kuznetsov , Kornienko , and [Vasily] Makarov, behind Gromyko at the long table in the Kremlin. Brezhnev asked whether all members of the Politburo had received the draft U.S.-Soviet documents in time and if they had studied them. Most of the members nodded silent assent. 'Can I assume that the draft is approved?' Brezhnev asked. No one spoke. 'The draft

12104-422: The lack of widespread public support for his government and pursue a power sharing agreement with the opposition. That month, the Politburo approved Gorbachev's decision to withdraw combat troops from Afghanistan, although the last troops did not leave until February 1989. Gorbachev had inherited a renewed period of high tension in the Cold War. He believed strongly in the need to sharply improve relations with

12240-578: The last leader of the Soviet Union from 1985 to the country's dissolution in 1991. He served as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 and additionally as head of state beginning in 1988, as Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet from 1988 to 1989, Chairman of the Supreme Soviet from 1989 to 1990 and the president of the Soviet Union from 1990 to 1991. Ideologically, Gorbachev initially adhered to Marxism–Leninism but moved towards social democracy by

12376-407: The latter carried out only personnel shifts rather than structural change. Gorbachev became Andropov's closest ally in the Politburo; with Andropov's encouragement, Gorbachev sometimes chaired Politburo meetings. Andropov encouraged Gorbachev to expand into policy areas other than agriculture, preparing him for future higher office. In April 1983, in a sign of growing ascendancy, Gorbachev delivered

12512-613: The law school of Moscow State University (MSU), then the most prestigious university in the country. They accepted him without asking for an exam, likely because of his worker-peasant origins and his possession of the Order of the Red Banner of Labour. His choice of law was unusual; it was not a well-regarded subject in Soviet society at that time. At age 19, he traveled by train to Moscow, the first time he had left his home region. In Moscow, Gorbachev resided with fellow MSU students at

12648-624: The law school. One of his first Komsomol assignments in Moscow was to monitor the election polling in Presnensky District to ensure the government's desire for near-total turnout; Gorbachev found that most of those who voted did so "out of fear". In 1952, he was appointed a full member of the Communist Party. As a party and Komsomol member, he was tasked with monitoring fellow students for potential subversion; some of his fellow students said that he did so only minimally and that they trusted him to keep confidential information secret from

12784-524: The market as a lifesaver for your economies. But, comrades, you should not think about lifesavers but about the ship, and the ship is socialism." Gorbachev's perestroika also entailed attempts to move away from technocratic management of the economy by increasingly involving the labor force in industrial production. He was of the view that once freed from the strong control of central planners, state-owned enterprises would act as market agents . Gorbachev and other Soviet leaders did not anticipate opposition to

12920-586: The military sector had had representatives in the Politburo since the 8th Politburo (in 1919). Defense ministers who had served in the Politburo are Leon Trotsky , Mikhail Frunze , Kliment Voroshilov , Nikolai Bulganin , Georgy Zhukov and Dmitry Ustinov among others. Similarly, several leading Politburo officials had participated in either the Russian Revolution , the Russian Civil War or World War II . Ethnic Slavs dominated

13056-430: The next general secretary; as a longstanding party member, Gromyko's recommendation carried great weight among the Central Committee. Gorbachev expected much opposition to his nomination as general secretary, but ultimately the rest of the Politburo supported him. Shortly after Chernenko's death, the Politburo unanimously elected Gorbachev as his successor; they wanted him rather than another elderly leader. He thus became

13192-468: The other factions, these interpretations became party law. To strengthen the system of centralised decision-making, Stalin appointed his allies to high offices outside the Politburo. For instance, Vyacheslav Molotov succeeded Rykov as Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars in 1930, to reduce the chance of another independent locus of centralised power forming form which could threaten Stalin and

13328-453: The party Charter, said little to nothing on the actual relationship between the Politburo and the Central Committee. Until 1961, Article 25 stated (with several changes) that the Central Committee "forms" or "organizes" the Politburo. It was not until 1961, under Nikita Khrushchev , that the party Charter was amended; stating that the Politburo was appointed through "secret elections". The amended party Charter stated that at least one-third of

13464-562: The party continued under Lenin and the early post-Lenin years to try to establish democratic procedures within the party. For instance, by 1929, leading party members began criticizing the party apparatus, represented by the Secretariat headed by Stalin, of having too much control over personnel decisions. Lenin addressed such questions in 1923, in his articles "How We Should Reorganize the Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate" and "Better Fewer but Better". In these, Lenin wrote of his plan to turn

13600-696: The perestroika reforms; according to their interpretation of Marxism, they believed that in a socialist society like the Soviet Union there would not be "antagonistic contradictions". However, there would come to be a public perception in the country that many bureaucrats were paying lip service to the reforms while trying to undermine them. He also initiated the concept of gospriyomka (state acceptance of production) during his time as leader, which represented quality control. In April 1986, he introduced an agrarian reform which linked salaries to output and allowed collective farms to sell 30% of their produce directly to shops or co-operatives rather than giving it all to

13736-603: The perversions of Stalin. He helped spread Khrushchev's anti-Stalinist message in Stavropol, but encountered many who continued to regard Stalin as a hero or who praised the Stalinist purges as just. Gorbachev rose steadily through the ranks of the local administration. The authorities regarded him as politically reliable, and he would flatter his superiors, for instance gaining favor with prominent local politician Fyodor Kulakov . With an ability to outmanoeuvre rivals, some colleagues resented his success. In September 1956, he

13872-849: The position. As head of the Stavropol region, he automatically became a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union ( 24th term ) in 1971. According to biographer Zhores Medvedev , Gorbachev "had now joined the Party's super-elite". As regional leader, Gorbachev initially attributed economic and other failures to "the inefficiency and incompetence of cadres, flaws in management structure or gaps in legislation", but eventually concluded that they were caused by an excessive centralization of decision making in Moscow. He began reading translations of restricted texts by Western Marxist authors such as Antonio Gramsci , Louis Aragon , Roger Garaudy , and Giuseppe Boffa , and came under their influence. Gorbachev's main task as regional leader

14008-671: The press, and in Soviet culture". Encouraging reformers into prominent media positions, he brought in Sergei Zalygin as head of Novy Mir magazine and Yegor Yakovlev as editor-in-chief of Moscow News . He made the historian Yury Afanasyev dean of the State Historical Archive Faculty, from where Afansiev could press for the opening of secret archives and the reassessment of Soviet history. Prominent dissidents like Andrei Sakharov were freed from internal exile or prison. Gorbachev saw glasnost as

14144-591: The regional Komsomol, in which position he went out of his way to appoint women as city and district leaders. In 1961, Gorbachev played host to the Italian delegation for the World Youth Festival in Moscow; that October, he also attended the 22nd Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union . In January 1963, Gorbachev was promoted to personnel chief for the regional party's agricultural committee, and in September 1966 became First Secretary of

14280-542: The republican-level. Security officials had historically had a low-profile on the Politburo. From 1953 until 1973, no officials representing the security sector served in the Politburo as full members; the last two being Lavrentiy Beria and Nikolay Ignatov . This tradition was put to an end with the elevation of Yuri Andropov , the KGB Chairman, to full membership (having served as a candidate member since 1967). Alexander Shelepin had served as KGB Chairman, but

14416-407: The rise of a moderate Stalinist faction with the party. On 1 December 1934, Kirov was shot dead – whether he was the victim of a lone assailant or killed on Stalin's orders remains unknown. Not long after, on 21 January 1935, Valerian Kuybyshev died of natural causes, and a month later, Anastas Mikoyan and Vlas Chubar were elected Politburo full members. Andrei Zhdanov , the First Secretary of

14552-516: The scale of incompetence and cover-ups in the Soviet Union. From April to the end of the year, Gorbachev became increasingly open in his criticism of the Soviet system, including food production, state bureaucracy, the military draft, and the large size of the prison population. In a May 1985 speech given to the Soviet Foreign Ministry —the first time a Soviet leader had directly addressed his country's diplomats—Gorbachev spoke of

14688-460: The school's morning exercise class. Over the course of five consecutive summers from 1946 onward he returned home to assist his father in operating a combine harvester, during which they sometimes worked 20-hour days. In 1948, they harvested over 8,000 centners of grain, a feat for which Sergey was awarded the Order of Lenin and his son the Order of the Red Banner of Labour . I would consider it

14824-421: The second half. It was not until the 28th Politburo that every republic had a representative at the Politburo. The Politburo never tried to fix the ethnic imbalance within the Politburo. Instead, the Soviet Union at the central level was mostly ruled by Russians. Despite the ideological rhetoric about equality between the sexes, the Politburo came to be composed largely of men. Only four women ever served in

14960-757: The secret police , an account that influenced the young boy. Following on from the outbreak of the Second World War in 1939, in June 1941 the German Army invaded the Soviet Union. German forces occupied Privolnoye for four and a half months in 1942. Gorbachev's father had joined the Red Army and fought on the frontlines; he was wrongly declared dead during the conflict and fought in the Battle of Kursk before returning to his family, injured. After Germany

15096-429: The state administration. From the 20th Congress until the 28th Congress , the share of Politburo members serving in the central party apparatus increased, while those serving in the state administration declined. The majority of Politburo members had leading central posts; the highest share of republican officials serving in the Politburo came at the 22nd Congress (held in 1961) when 50 percent of members held offices at

15232-412: The state for distribution. In a September 1986 speech, he embraced the idea of reintroducing market economics to the country alongside limited private enterprise, citing Lenin's New Economic Policy as a precedent; he nevertheless stressed that he did not regard this as a return to capitalism . In the Soviet Union, alcohol consumption had risen steadily between 1950 and 1985. By the 1980s, drunkenness

15368-482: The true center of political power in the Soviet Union . It ordered the Central Committee to appoint a five-member Politburo to decide on questions too urgent to await full Central Committee deliberation. The original members of the Politburo were Lenin , Trotsky , Stalin , Kamenev , and Nikolai Krestinsky . The Soviet system was based upon the system conceived by Lenin , often referred to as Leninism . Certain historians and political scientists credit Lenin for

15504-451: The whole party, and so were used as a machine by Stalin and his allies to promote like-minded individuals. Molotov and Kaganovich played a key role in strengthening the role of the Secretariat and the Orgburo in Party affairs. The 17th Politburo was elected at the 1st Plenary Session of the 17th Central Committee , in the aftermath of the 17th Congress . Outwardly, the Politburo remained united, but on 4 February Grigory Ordzhonikidze ,

15640-463: The working style of the Politburo's weekly meeting during the Brezhnev era as "quiet, orderly, and methodical. Although an agenda is prepared, there is no quorum call or other form of parliamentary procedure ." Shevchenko's memoir makes it clear that the tense political struggle that could often occur among Politburo members usually did not take place openly during its meetings, but rather behind

15776-486: Was "politically illiterate". Yeltsin then resigned both as Moscow party secretary and as a member of the Politburo. From this point, tensions between the two men developed into a mutual hatred. In April 1986 the Chernobyl disaster occurred. In the immediate aftermath, officials fed Gorbachev incorrect information to downplay the incident. As the scale of the disaster became apparent, 336,000 people were evacuated from

15912-497: Was a breach of standard practice and generated resentment. His other close aides were Georgy Shakhnazarov and Anatoly Chernyaev . Gorbachev was aware that the Politburo could remove him from office, and that he could not pursue more radical reform without a majority of supporters in the Politburo. He sought to remove several older members from the Politburo, encouraging Grigory Romanov , Nikolai Tikhonov , and Viktor Grishin into retirement. He promoted Gromyko to head of state,

16048-670: Was a major social problem and Andropov had planned a major campaign to limit alcohol consumption, but died before the plan was put into action. Encouraged by his wife, Gorbachev—who believed the campaign would improve health and work efficiency—oversaw its implementation. Alcohol production was reduced by around 40%, the legal drinking age rose from 18 to 21, alcohol prices were increased, stores were banned from selling it before 2 pm, and tougher penalties were introduced for workplace or public drunkenness and home production of alcohol. The program also recommended that drinking scenes be censored from old movies. The All-Union Voluntary Society for

16184-443: Was aware that he was a potential reformer and wanted to meet him. At the end of the visit, Thatcher said: "I like Mr. Gorbachev. We can do business together". He felt that the visit helped to erode Andrei Gromyko 's dominance of Soviet foreign policy while at the same time sending a signal to the United States government that he wanted to improve Soviet–US relations . On 10 March 1985, Chernenko died. Gromyko proposed Gorbachev as

16320-414: Was behind the United States in many areas of production, but Gorbachev claimed that it would accelerate industrial output to match that of the US by 2000. The Five Year Plan of 1985–1990 was targeted to expand machine building by 50 to 100%. To boost agricultural productivity, he merged five ministries and a state committee into a single entity, Agroprom, although by late 1986 he acknowledged this merger as

16456-534: Was defeated, Gorbachev's parents had their second son, Aleksandr, in 1947; he and Mikhail would be their only children. The village school was closed during much of the war but re-opened in autumn 1944. Gorbachev did not want to return but when he did he excelled academically. He read voraciously, moving from the Western novels of Thomas Mayne Reid to the works of Vissarion Belinsky , Alexander Pushkin , Nikolai Gogol , and Mikhail Lermontov . In 1946, he joined

16592-598: Was elected as a deputy to the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union and made a member of its Standing Commission for the Protection of the Environment. Cleared for travel to Eastern Bloc countries, in 1966 he was part of a delegation which visited East Germany , and in 1969 and 1974 visited Bulgaria . In August 1968 the Soviet Union led an invasion of Czechoslovakia to put an end to the Prague Spring,

16728-613: Was elected to the Politburo through his work in the Komsomol , while Eduard Shevardnadze , who had served as the Georgian Minister of Internal Affairs until 1972, became a candidate member of the Politburo through his work as First Secretary of the Georgian Communist Party . Similarly in 1973, the Minister of Defense Andrei Grechko was appointed to the Politburo. However, unlike the security sector,

16864-486: Was enrolled in a PhD program, but instead gained employment in Stavropol ; Raisa abandoned her studies to join him there. In August 1955, Gorbachev started work at the Stavropol regional procurator's office, but disliked the job and used his contacts to get a transfer to work for Komsomol, becoming deputy director of Komsomol's agitation and propaganda department for that region. In this position, he visited villages in

17000-552: Was followed by the Great Purge , in which individuals accused of being " enemies of the people ", including those sympathetic to rival interpretations of Marxism like Trotskyism , were arrested and interned in labor camps, if not executed. Both of Gorbachev's grandfathers were arrested (his maternal in 1934 and his paternal in 1937) and spent time in Gulag labor camps before being released. After his December 1938 release, Gorbachev's maternal grandfather discussed having been tortured by

17136-506: Was in very poor health. Chernenko was often too sick to chair Politburo meetings, with Gorbachev stepping in last minute. Gorbachev continued to cultivate allies both in the Kremlin and beyond, and also gave the main speech at a conference on Soviet ideology, where he angered party hardliners by implying that the country required reform. In April 1984, Gorbachev was appointed chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee of

17272-613: Was necessary for its survival. He withdrew troops from the Soviet–Afghan War and embarked on summits with United States president Ronald Reagan to limit nuclear weapons and end the Cold War . Domestically, his policy of glasnost ("openness") allowed for enhanced freedom of speech and press , while his perestroika ("restructuring") sought to decentralize economic decision-making to improve its efficiency. Ultimately, Gorbachev's democratization measures and formation of

17408-543: Was on vacation, Mikhail Suslov , who hated the idea that in front of the Lenin Mausoleum in Red Square there was a department store (GUM), attempted to turn GUM into an exhibition hall and museum showcasing Soviet and Communist history. After the decision was drawn up, Brezhnev was immediately reported. When he returned from vacation, before the first meeting of the Politburo he said: "Some idiot here invented

17544-536: Was part of a delegation that traveled to Italy, where they met with representatives of the Italian Communist Party ; Gorbachev loved Italian culture but was struck by the poverty and inequality he saw in the country. In 1972, he visited Belgium and the Netherlands, and in 1973 West Germany . Gorbachev and his wife visited France in 1976 and 1977, on the latter occasion touring the country with

17680-564: Was promoted First Secretary of the Stavropol city's Komsomol, placing him in charge of it; in April 1958 he was made deputy head of the Komsomol for the entire region. At this point he was given better accommodation: a two-room flat with its own private kitchen, toilet, and bathroom. In Stavropol, he formed a discussion club for youths, and helped mobilize local young people to take part in Khrushchev's agricultural and development campaigns. In March 1961, Gorbachev became First Secretary of

17816-403: Was promoted to a higher position in Moscow and Gorbachev succeeded him as the First Secretary of the Stavropol kraikom. This granted Gorbachev significant power over the Stavropol region. He had been personally vetted for the position by senior Kremlin leaders and was informed of their decision by the Soviet leader, Leonid Brezhnev . Aged 39, he was considerably younger than his predecessors in

17952-400: Was raped in front of him, Postyshev and Eikhe. Petrovsky in contrast, was rather lucky, instead of being purged he was not reelected to the Politburo at the 18th Congress . The purging of Rudzutaks, Eikhe, and Kosior testified to Stalin's growing power; the Politburo were not even notified of the decision. Postyshev was purged because "of too much zeal in persecuting people." The Politburo

18088-525: Was studying in the university's philosophy department. She was engaged to another man, but after that engagement fell apart, she began a relationship with Gorbachev; together they went to bookstores, museums, and art exhibits. In early 1953, he took an internship at the procurator's office in Molotovskoye district, but he was angered by the incompetence and arrogance of those working there. That summer, he returned to Privolnoye to work with his father on

18224-571: Was the highest organ of the party when the party Congress and the Central Committee were not in session. The Politburo, along with the Secretariat and the Organizational Bureau (Orgburo) until 1952, was one of three permanent bodies of the party. The General Secretary , the party leader, served as ex officio chairman of the Politburo (however, no formal rule stipulated such activity). 28 politburos were elected throughout

18360-700: Was to raise agricultural production levels, a task hampered by severe droughts in 1975 and 1976. He oversaw the expansion of irrigation systems through construction of the Great Stavropol Canal . For overseeing a record grain harvest in Ipatovsky district, in March 1972 he was awarded the Order of the October Revolution by Brezhnev in a Moscow ceremony. Gorbachev always sought to maintain Brezhnev's trust; as regional leader, he repeatedly praised Brezhnev in his speeches, for instance referring to him as "the outstanding statesman of our time". Gorbachev and his wife holidayed in Moscow, Leningrad, Uzbekistan, and resorts in

18496-480: Was ultimately succeeded as Soviet leader by Nikita Khrushchev , who denounced Stalin and his cult of personality in a speech given in February 1956 , after which he launched a de-Stalinization process throughout Soviet society. Later biographer William Taubman suggested that Gorbachev "embodied" the "reformist spirit" of the Khrushchev era. Gorbachev was among those who saw themselves as "genuine Marxists" or "genuine Leninists" in contrast to what they regarded as

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