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108-745: First established in 1917 as the NKVD of the Russian SFSR , the ministry was tasked with regular police work and overseeing the country's prisons and labor camps. It was disbanded in 1930, and its functions dispersed among other agencies before being reinstated as a commissariat of the Soviet Union in 1934. During the Great Purge in 1936–1938, on Stalin's orders, the NKVD conducted mass arrests, imprisonment, torture, and executions of hundreds of thousands of Soviet citizens. The agency sent millions to

216-610: A People's Commissar. However, the NKVD apparatus was overwhelmed by duties inherited from MVD, such as the supervision of the local governments and firefighting, and the Workers' and Peasants' Militias staffed by proletarians were largely inexperienced and unqualified. Realizing that it was left with no capable security force, the Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR established (20 December [ O.S. 7 December] 1917)

324-649: A given region (e.g., the quotas for clergy, former nobles , etc., regardless of identity). The families of the repressed, including children, were also automatically repressed according to NKVD Order no. 00486 . The purges were organized in a number of waves according to decisions of the Politburo of the Communist Party . Some examples are the campaigns among engineers ( Shakhty Trial ), party and military elite plots ( Great Purge with Order 00447 ), and medical staff (" Doctors' Plot "). Gas vans were used in

432-807: A new Constitution of Russia was adopted. On 29 May 1990, at his third attempt, Boris Yeltsin was elected the chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR . The Congress of People's Deputies of the Republic adopted the Declaration of State Sovereignty of the Russian SFSR on 12 June 1990, which was the beginning of the " War of Laws ", pitting the Soviet Union against the Russian Federation and other constituent republics. On 17 March 1991, an all-Russian referendum created

540-556: A purge coinciding with Stalin's Great Purge in 1937. Sheng and the Soviets alleged a massive Trotskyist conspiracy and a "Fascist Trotskyite plot" to destroy the Soviet Union. Soviet Consul General Garegin Apresoff , General Ma Hushan , Ma Shaowu , Mahmud Sijan, the official leader of Xinjiang province, Huang Han-chang, and Hoja-Niyaz were among the 435 alleged conspirators in the plot. Xinjiang came under Soviet influence. In

648-585: A result of the October Revolution , the Russian Soviet Republic was proclaimed as a sovereign state and the world's first constitutionally socialist state guided by communist ideology . The first constitution was adopted in 1918. In 1922, the Russian SFSR signed a treaty officially creating the Soviet Union. The Russian SFSR's 1978 constitution stated that "[a] Union Republic is a sovereign [...] state that has united [...] in

756-666: A secret political police, the Cheka , led by Felix Dzerzhinsky . It gained the right to undertake quick non-judicial trials and executions if that was deemed necessary in order to "protect the Russian socialist- communist revolution." The Cheka was reorganized in 1922, as the State Political Directorate , or GPU, of the NKVD of the RSFSR. In 1922 the USSR formed, with the RSFSR as its largest member. The GPU became

864-803: A small number of ex-NKVD agents in the Baltic states were convicted of crimes against the local population. These included: The extensive system of labor exploitation in the Gulag made a notable contribution to the Soviet economy and the development of remote areas. Colonization of Siberia , the Far North , and the Far East were among the explicitly stated goals in the first laws concerning Soviet labor camps . Mining, construction works (roads, railways, canals, dams, and factories), logging, and other functions of

972-683: The All-Union Supreme Soviet (the other house, Soviet of the Union , had already lost the quorum after recall of its members by the several union republics). After the dissolution, Russia took full responsibility for all the rights and obligations of the Soviet Union under the Charter of the United Nations, including the financial obligations. As such, Russia assumed the Soviet Union's UN membership and permanent membership on

1080-521: The Azerbaijan SSR ( Azerbaijan ), Georgian SSR ( Georgia ) and Kazakh SSR ( Kazakhstan ) to the south. Roughly 70% of the area in the RSFSR consisted of broad plains , with mountainous tundra regions mainly concentrated in the east of Siberia with Central Asia and East Asia. The area is rich in mineral resources, including petroleum, natural gas, and iron ore. The Soviet government first came to power on 7 November 1917, immediately after

1188-609: The Battle of Stalingrad and the Crimean offensive . to stem desertions under Stalin's Order No. 270 and Order No. 227 decrees of 1941 and 1942, which aimed to raise troop morale through brutality and coercion. At the beginning of the war, the NKVD formed 15 rifle divisions, which grew by 1945 to 53 divisions and 28 brigades. Unlike the Waffen-SS , the NKVD did not field any armored or mechanized units. In enemy-held territories,

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1296-532: The Belovezh Accords . The document, consisting of a preamble and fourteen articles, stated that the Soviet Union no longer existed "as a subject of international law and geopolitical reality". However, based on the historical community of peoples and relations between the three states, as well as bilateral treaties, the desire for a democratic rule of law, the intention to develop their relations based on mutual recognition and respect for state sovereignty,

1404-737: The Communist Party of the Russian SFSR in the territory of Russia. On 6 November, he went further, banning the Communist Parties of the USSR and the RSFSR in the RSFSR. On 8 December 1991, at Viskuli near Brest (Belarus) , Yeltsin, Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk and Belarusian leader Stanislav Shushkevich signed the "Agreement on the Establishment of the Commonwealth of Independent States", known in media as

1512-768: The Communist Party of the Soviet Union ), the Russian SFSR was renamed the Russian Federation . The next day, after the lowering of the Soviet flag from the top of the Senate building of the Moscow Kremlin and its replacement by the Russian flag , the Soviet Union was self-dissolved by the Soviet of the Republics on 26 December, which by that time was the only functioning parliamentary chamber of

1620-660: The Constitution of the Russian SFSR . By 1918, during the Russian Civil War , several states within the former Russian Empire had seceded, reducing the size of the country even more, although some were conquered by the Bolsheviks. The Russian famine of 1921–22 , also known as Povolzhye famine, killed an estimated 5 million, primarily affecting the Volga and Ural River regions. The economic impact of

1728-607: The Democratic Russia pro-reform movement, was elected the first and only President of the RSFSR, a post that would later become the Presidency of the Russian Federation . The August 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt in Moscow with the temporary brief internment of President Mikhail Gorbachev destabilised the Soviet Union. Following these events, Gorbachev lost all his remaining power, with Yeltsin superseding him as

1836-668: The First Congress of the Soviets of the USSR approved the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR , by which Russia was united with the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic , Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic and Transcaucasian Soviet Federal Socialist Republic into a single federal state, the Soviet Union. The treaty was included in the 1924 Soviet Constitution , adopted on 31 January 1924 by

1944-650: The Gulag system of forced labor camps and, during World War II, carried out the mass deportations of hundreds of thousands of Poles, Balts, and Romanians, and millions of ethnic minorities from the Caucasus , to remote areas of the country, resulting in millions of deaths. Hundreds of thousands of NKVD personnel served in Internal Troops divisions in defensive battles alongside the Red Army , as well as in " blocking formations ," preventing retreat. The agency

2052-827: The Kazakh SSR (now Kazakhstan ) and Kirghiz Soviet Socialist Republic ( Kyrgyzstan ). The former Karakalpak Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic was transferred to the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic ( Uzbekistan ). The final name for the republic during the Soviet era was adopted by the Russian Constitution of 1937, which renamed it the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR). Just four months after Operation Barbarossa ,

2160-654: The Kuril Islands off the coast of East Asia, north of Japan , making them part of the RSFSR. The status of the southernmost Kurils, north of Hokkaido of the Japanese home islands remains in dispute with Japan and the United States following the peace treaty of 1951 ending the state of war. On 17 April 1946, the Kaliningrad Oblast – the north-eastern portion of the former Kingdom of Prussia ,

2268-531: The NKVD structure. GUGB departments (or Sections) dealt with - intelligence, internal security, counter-intelligence, protection of government and secret communications. The first chief of the GUGB was Yakov Agranov , Commissioner 1st rank of State Security and first deputy of People's Commissar of Internal Affairs. The next chief of the GUGB from April 15, 1937, to September 8, 1938, was komkor Mikhail Frinovsky , who

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2376-458: The OGPU (Joint State Political Directorate), under the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR. The NKVD of the RSFSR retained control of the militsiya and various other responsibilities. In 1934, the NKVD of the RSFSR was transformed into an all-union security force, the NKVD (which the Communist Party of the Soviet Union leaders soon came to call "the leading detachment of our party"), and

2484-788: The Red Army and personal ranks used in the Militsiya ; the rank insignia was also very distinct. Even though insignia introduced in 1937 followed the Red Army collar patch patterns, it assigned them to very different ranks for GUGB and Internal Troops /political/specialist branches, with GUGB rank placed at least one grade higher than a similar army equivalent. When GUGB and Militsiya ranks were replaced with military ranks and insignia in February 1943, Major to Sergeant ranks were aligned with Colonel to Junior Lieutenant, and Senior Major and up were replaced with various degrees of Commissioner. In 1945, General Commissioner Lavrentiy Beria received

2592-721: The Russian Orthodox Church , the Ukrainian Orthodox Church , the Roman Catholic Church , Greek Catholics , Islam , Judaism , and other religious organizations, an operation headed by Yevgeny Tuchkov . During the 1930s, the NKVD was responsible for political murders of those Stalin believed opposed him. Espionage networks headed by experienced multilingual NKVD officers such as Pavel Sudoplatov and Iskhak Akhmerov were established in nearly every major Western country, including

2700-611: The Russian Soviet Republic and the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic , and unofficially as Soviet Russia , was an independent federal socialist state from 1917 to 1922, and afterwards the largest and most populous constituent republic of the Soviet Union from 1922 to 1991, until becoming a sovereign part of the Soviet Union with priority of Russian laws over Union-level legislation in 1990 and 1991,

2808-668: The Second Congress of Soviets of the USSR . One of the early ambitious economic plans of the Soviet government was GOELRO , Russian abbreviation for "State Commission for Electrification of Russia" ( Го сударственная комиссия по эл ектрификации Ро ссии), which sought to achieve total electrification of the entire country. Soviet propaganda declared the plan was basically fulfilled by 1931. The national power output per year stood at 1.9 billion kWh in Imperial Russia in 1913, and Lenin's goal of 8.8 billion kWh

2916-617: The Spanish Civil War , the NKVD ran Section X, coordinating the Soviet intervention on behalf of the Spanish Republicans . NKVD agents acting in conjunction with the Communist Party of Spain exercised substantial control over the Republican government, using Soviet military aid to further Soviet influence. The NKVD established numerous secret prisons around Madrid, used to detain, torture, and kill hundreds of

3024-697: The Ukrainian SSR . On 8 February 1955, Malenkov was officially demoted to deputy Prime Minister. As First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, Nikita Khrushchev's authority was significantly enhanced by Malenkov's demotion. The Karelo-Finnish SSR was transferred back to the RSFSR as the Karelian ASSR in 1956. On 9 January 1957, Karachay Autonomous Oblast and Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic were restored by Khrushchev and they were transferred from

3132-581: The Wehrmacht was quickly advancing through the Russian SFSR, and was approximately 10 miles (16 km) away from Moscow. However, after the defeat in the Battle of Moscow and the Soviet winter offensive , the Germans were pushed back. In 1942, the Wehrmacht entered Stalingrad . Despite a deadly five-month battle in which the Soviets suffered over 1,100,000 casualties, they achieved victory following

3240-471: The sharashka were Sergey Korolev , head designer of the Soviet rocket program and first human space flight mission in 1961, and Andrei Tupolev , the famous airplane designer. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was also imprisoned in a sharashka and based his novel The First Circle on his experiences there. After World War II, the NKVD coordinated work on Soviet nuclear weaponry under the direction of General Pavel Sudoplatov . The scientists were not prisoners, but

3348-400: The then existing Constitution of 1978 , and were retained as such in the subsequent 1993 Constitution of Russia . At a total of about 17,125,200 km (6,612,100 sq mi), the Russian SFSR was the largest of the fifteen Soviet republics, with its southerly neighbor, the Kazakh SSR , being second. The international borders of the RSFSR touched Poland on the west; Norway and Finland on

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3456-532: The Civil War was devastating. A black market emerged in Russia, despite the threat of martial law against profiteering. The ruble collapsed, with barter increasingly replacing money as a medium of exchange and, by 1921, heavy industry output had fallen to 20% of 1913 levels. 90% of wages were paid with goods rather than money. 70% of locomotives were in need of repair , and food requisitioning, combined with

3564-532: The Congress of People's Deputies of Russia approved the renaming of the RSFSR into the Russian Federation, by making appropriate amendments to the Constitution, which entered into force since publication on 16 May 1992. The Government was known officially as the Council of People's Commissars (1917–1946) and Council of Ministers (1946–1991). The first government was headed by Vladimir Lenin as Chairman of

3672-654: The Congress. At the same time, a number of prominent members of the Left Socialist Revolutionaries had assumed positions in Lenin's government and lead commissariats in several areas. This included agriculture ( Kolegaev ), property ( Karelin ), justice ( Steinberg ), post offices and telegraphs ( Proshian ) and local government (Trutovsky). Lenin's government also instituted a number of progressive measures such as universal education , healthcare and equal rights for women . On 25 January 1918, at

3780-462: The Council of People's Commissars of the Russian SFSR and the last by Boris Yeltsin as both head of government and head of state under the title of president. The Russian SFSR was controlled by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union until the 1991 August coup , which prompted President Yeltsin to suspend the recently created Communist Party of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic . In

3888-459: The GUGB structure: By the end of 1937 the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs Nikolai Yezhov , in his order #00362 had changed the number of departments from five to twelve. After Lavrenty Beria took over Frinovsky place as a GUGB head, in 29 of September 1938, GUGB underwent another organizational change - The GUGB had a unique system of ranks, a blend of the position-rank system used in

3996-688: The GUGB- NKVD (responsible for counter-intelligence in the military) became part of the Army and Navy ( RKKA and RKKF , respectively). The GUGB was disbanded as an organization within NKVD USSR. The units that operated in GUGB were reorganized and made the core of the newly made People's Commissariat of State Security or NKGB . Following the outbreak of World War II , the NKVD and NKGB were reunited, not as GUGB but as totally separate directorates. On July 20, 1941, Army and Airforce counter-intelligence

4104-434: The Georgian SSR back to the Russian SFSR . In 1964, Nikita Khrushchev was removed from his position of power and replaced with Leonid Brezhnev . Under his rule, the Russian SFSR and the rest of the Soviet Union went through a mass era of stagnation . Even after Brezhnev's death in 1982, the era did not end until Mikhail Gorbachev took power in March 1985 and introduced liberal reforms in Soviet society. On 12 April 1978,

4212-555: The German Gestapo . In March 1940, representatives of the NKVD and the Gestapo met for a week in Zakopane to coordinate the pacification of Poland. The Soviet Union allegedly deported hundreds of German and Austrian Communists to Nazi territories as unwanted foreigners. According to the work of Wilhelm Mensing , no evidence that which suggests that the Soviets specifically targeted German and Austrian Communists or others who perceived themselves as "anti-fascists" for deportations to Nazi Germany. Furthermore, many NKVD units later fought

4320-476: The NKVD carried out numerous missions of sabotage. After the fall of Kiev , NKVD agents set fire to the Nazi headquarters and various other targets, eventually burning down much of the city center. Similar actions took place across the occupied Byelorussia and Ukraine . The NKVD (later the KGB ) carried out mass arrests, deportations, and executions. The targets included both collaborators with Germany and members of non-communist resistance movements such as

4428-449: The NKVD's enemies, first focusing on Spanish Nationalists and Spanish Catholics , then after late 1938 increasingly anarchists and Trotskyists as objects of persecution. In 1937, Andrés Nin , the secretary of the Trotskyist POUM , and his colleagues were tortured and killed in an NKVD prison in Alcalá de Henares. Before the German invasion, to accomplish its own goals, the NKVD was prepared to cooperate even with such organizations as

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4536-441: The NKVD. The military CI was also upgraded from a department to a directorate and put in the NKVD organization as the Directorate of Special Departments , or UOO NKVD USSR. The NKVMF, however, did not return to the NKVD until January 11, 1942. It returned to NKVD control on January 11, 1942, as UOO 9th Department controlled by P. Gladkov. In April 1943, Directorate of Special Departments was transformed into SMERSH and transferred to

4644-487: The OGPU was incorporated into the NKVD as the Main Directorate for State Security (GUGB); the separate NKVD of the RSFSR was not resurrected until 1946 (as the MVD of the RSFSR). As a result, the NKVD also took over control of all detention facilities (including the forced labor camps, known as the gulag ), as well as the regular police. At various times, the NKVD had the following Chief Directorates, abbreviated as ""ГУ"ГУ"—Главное управление, Glavnoye upravleniye . Until

4752-439: The People's Defense and Commissariates. At the same time, the NKVD was reduced in size and duties again by converting the GUGB to an independent unit named the NKGB. In 1946, all Soviet commissariats were renamed "ministries." Accordingly, the Peoples Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD) of the USSR became the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), while the NKGB was renamed the Ministry of State Security (MGB). In 1953, after

4860-516: The Polish Home Army and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army , which were trying to separate from the Soviet Union, among others. The NKVD also executed tens of thousands of Polish political prisoners in 1940–1941, including at the Katyń massacre . On November 26, 2010, the State Duma issued a declaration acknowledging Stalin's responsibility for the Katyn massacre and the execution of intellectual leaders and 22,000 Polish POWs by Stalin's NKVD. The declaration stated that archival material "not only unveils

4968-434: The RSFSR became an integral part of the economy of the USSR. The economic program of the RSFSR (NEP) was continued in all union republics. The Gosplan (State General Planning Commission) of the RSFSR, which replaced GOELRO, was reorganized into the Gosplan of the USSR. His early task was to develop a unified national economic plan based on the electrification plan and to oversee the overall implementation of this plan. Unlike

5076-715: The Russian February Revolution of 1917, the Provisional Government dissolved the Tsarist police and set up the People's Militias . The subsequent Russian October Revolution of 1917 saw a seizure of state power led by Lenin and the Bolsheviks , who established a new Bolshevik regime, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR). The Provisional Government's Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), formerly under Georgy Lvov (from March 1917) and then under Nikolai Avksentiev (from 6 August [ O.S. 24 July] 1917) and Alexei Niketan (from 8 October [ O.S. 25 September] 1917), turned into NKVD (People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs) under

5184-402: The Security Council , nuclear stockpile and the control over the armed forces; Soviet embassies abroad became Russian embassies. The 1978 constitution of the Russian SFSR was amended several times to reflect the transition to democracy, private property and market economy. The new Russian constitution , coming into effect on 25 December 1993 after a constitutional crisis , completely abolished

5292-471: The Soviet Union during the Great Purge in the cities of Moscow , Ivanovo , and Omsk A number of mass operations of the NKVD related to persecution of entire ethnic categories. For example, the Polish Operation of the NKVD in 1937–1938 resulted in the execution of 111,091 Poles. Whole populations of certain ethnicities were forcibly resettled . Foreigners living in the Soviet Union were given particular attention. When disillusioned American citizens in

5400-475: The Soviet Union thronged the gates of the U.S. embassy in Moscow to plead for new U.S. passports to leave the USSR (their original U.S. passports had been taken for 'registration' purposes years before), none were issued. Instead, the NKVD promptly arrested the Americans, who were all taken to Lubyanka Prison and later shot. American factory workers at the Soviet Ford GAZ plant, suspected by Stalin of being 'poisoned' by Western influences, were dragged off with

5508-406: The Soviet Union § Violence and terror and Bibliography of Stalinism and the Soviet Union § Terror, famine and the Gulag 55°45′38″N 37°37′41″E  /  55.7606°N 37.6281°E  / 55.7606; 37.6281 Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic ( Russian SFSR or RSFSR ), previously known as

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5616-502: The Soviet form of government and replaced it with a semi-presidential system . Under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) and Leon Trotsky (1879–1940), the Bolshevik communists established the Soviet state on 7 November [ O.S. 25 October] 1917. This happened immediately after the October Revolution toppled the interim Russian Provisional Government (most recently led by opposing democratic socialist Alexander Kerensky (1881–1970)) which had governed

5724-421: The Soviet state (" enemies of the people "), untold multitudes of people were sent to GULAG camps, and hundreds of thousands were executed by the NKVD. Formally, most of these people were convicted by NKVD troikas ("triplets") – special courts martial . Evidence standards were very low: a tip-off by an anonymous informer was considered sufficient grounds for arrest. Use of "physical means of persuasion" (torture)

5832-483: The USSR, such as leaders of nationalist movements, former Tsarist officials, and personal rivals of Joseph Stalin . Among the officially confirmed victims of such plots were: Prominent political dissidents were also found dead under highly suspicious circumstances, including Walter Krivitsky , Lev Sedov , Ignace Reiss , and former German Communist Party (KPD) member Willi Münzenberg . Pro-Soviet leader Sheng Shicai in Xinjiang received NKVD assistance to conduct

5940-428: The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. Many regions in Russia were affected by the Soviet famine of 1932–1933 : Volga , Central Black Soil Region , North Caucasus , the Urals , the Crimea , part of Western Siberia , and the Kazakh ASSR . With the adoption of the 1936 Soviet Constitution on 5 December 1936, the size of the RSFSR was significantly reduced. The Kazakh ASSR and Kirghiz ASSR were transformed into

6048-459: The Union" and "each Union Republic shall retain the right freely to secede from the USSR". On 12 June 1990, the Congress of People's Deputies adopted the Declaration of State Sovereignty , established separation of powers (unlike in the Soviet form of government ), established citizenship of Russia and stated that the RSFSR shall retain the right of free secession from the Soviet Union. On 12 June 1991, Boris Yeltsin (1931–2007), supported by

6156-519: The United States. The NKVD recruited agents for its espionage efforts from all walks of life, from unemployed intellectuals such as Mark Zborowski to aristocrats such as Martha Dodd . Besides the gathering of intelligence, these networks provided organizational assistance for so-called wet business , where enemies of the USSR either disappeared or were openly liquidated. The NKVD's intelligence and special operations ( Inostranny Otdel ) unit organized overseas assassinations of political enemies of

6264-425: The Wehrmacht, for example the 10th NKVD Rifle Division , which fought at the Battle of Stalingrad . After the German invasion, the NKVD evacuated and killed prisoners . During World War II, NKVD Internal Troops were used for rear area security, including preventing the retreat of Soviet army divisions. Though mainly intended for internal security, NKVD divisions were sometimes used at the front, for example during

6372-427: The agreement was ratified by the Supreme Soviet (the parliament of the Russian SFSR); therefore the Russian SFSR had renounced the Treaty on the Creation of the Soviet Union and de facto declared Russia's independence from the Soviet Union itself and the ties with the other Soviet republics. On 25 December 1991, following the resignation of Gorbachev as President of the Soviet Union (and former General Secretary of

6480-638: The arrest of Lavrenty Beria , the MGB merged back into the MVD. The police and security services finally split in 1954 to become: In 1935–1945, the Main Directorate of State Security of NKVD had its own ranking system before it was merged into the Soviet military standardized ranking system. The main function of the NKVD was to protect the state security of the Soviet Union through massive political repression , including authorized murders of many thousands of politicians and citizens, as well as kidnappings, assassinations, and mass deportations. In implemention of Soviet internal policy towards perceived enemies of

6588-402: The death of Stalin in 1953, the new Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev halted NKVD purges. From the 1950s to the 1980s, thousands of victims were legally "rehabilitated," i.e., acquitted with their rights restored. Many of the victims and their relatives refused to apply for rehabilitation, either out of fear or a lack of documents. The rehabilitation was not complete; in most cases, the formulation

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6696-433: The denunciation of the union treaty was meaningless since it became invalid in 1924 with the adoption of the first constitution of the USSR . Although the 12 December vote is sometimes reckoned as the moment that the RSFSR seceded from the collapsing Soviet Union, this is not the case. It appears that the RSFSR took the line that it did not need to follow the secession process delineated in the Soviet Constitution because it

6804-476: The effects of seven years of war and a severe drought, contributed to a famine that caused between 3 and 10 million deaths. Coal production decreased from 27.5 million tons (1913) to 7 million tons (1920), while overall factory production also declined from 10,000 million roubles to 1,000 million roubles. According to the noted historian David Christian, the grain harvest was also slashed from 80.1 million tons (1913) to 46.5 million tons (1920). On 30 December 1922,

6912-422: The elements. On 3 February 1941, the 4th Department (Special Section, OO) of the GUGB NKVD security service responsible for the Soviet Armed Forces military counterintelligence, consisting of 12 sections and one investigation unit, was separated from the GUGB NKVD USSR. The official liquidation of OO GUGB within NKVD was announced on 12 February by joint order No. 00151/003 of NKVD and NKGB USSR. The rest of GUGB

7020-454: The fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets adopted both the new name, Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic (RSFSR), and the Constitution of the Russian SFSR . Internationally, the Russian SFSR was recognized as an independent state in 1920 only by its bordering neighbors ( Estonia , Finland , Latvia and Lithuania ) in the Treaty of Tartu and by the short-lived Irish Republic of 1919–1922 in Ireland. On 30 December 1922, with

7128-410: The first years of the existence of the RSFSR, the doctrine of war communism became the starting point of the state's economic activity. In March 1921, at the X Congress of the RCP (B), the tasks of the policy of "war communism" were recognized by the country's leadership as fulfilled, and a new economic policy was introduced at Lenin's suggestion. After the formation of the Soviet Union, the economy of

7236-423: The formation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics during the Tenth All-Russian Congress of Soviets , the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic, being a part of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, devolves to the Union the powers which according to Article 1 of the Constitution of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics are included within the scope of responsibilities of the government bodies of

7344-413: The founding state of the German Empire (1871–1918) and later the German province of East Prussia including the capital and Baltic seaport city of Königsberg – was annexed by the Soviet Union and made part of the Russian SFSR. After the death of Joseph Stalin on 5 March 1953, Georgy Malenkov became the new leader of the USSR. In January 1954, Malenkov transferred Crimea from the Russian SFSR to

7452-496: The interim Russian Provisional Government headed by Alexander Kerensky , which governed the Russian Republic , was overthrown in the October Revolution , the second of the two Russian Revolutions . The state it governed, which did not have an official name, would be unrecognized by neighboring countries for another five months. The initial stage of the October Revolution which involved the assault on Petrograd occurred largely without any human casualties . On 18 January 1918,

7560-524: The labor camps were part of the Soviet planned economy , and the NKVD had its own production plans. The most unusual part of the NKVD's achievements was its role in Soviet science and arms development . Many scientists and engineers arrested for political crimes were placed in special prisons, much more comfortable than the gulag, colloquially known as sharashkas . These prisoners continued their work in these prisons and were later released. Some of them became world leaders in science and technology. Among

7668-535: The last two years of the existence of the Soviet Union. The Russian SFSR was composed of sixteen smaller constituent units of autonomous republics , five autonomous oblasts , ten autonomous okrugs , six krais and forty oblasts . Russians formed the largest ethnic group . The capital of the Russian SFSR and the Soviet Union as a whole was Moscow and the other major urban centers included Leningrad (Petrograd until 1924), Stalingrad (Volgograd after 1961), Novosibirsk , Sverdlovsk , Gorky and Kuybyshev . It

7776-624: The mocking label Sovdepia ( Russian : Совдепия ) for the nascent state of the Soviets of Workers' and Peasants' Deputies. Speakers of colloquial English coined the term "Bololand" to refer to the land of the Bolos (a term identified from 1919 onwards with the Bolsheviks). On 25 January 1918 the third meeting of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets proclaimed the establishment of the Russian Soviet Republic . In July 1918,

7884-610: The new Russian Republic after the abdication of the Russian Empire government of the Romanov imperial dynasty of Tsar Nicholas II the previous March (Old Style: February). The October Revolution was thus the second of the two Russian Revolutions of the turbulent year of 1917. Initially, the new Soviet state did not have an official name and was not recognized by neighboring countries for five months. Anti-Bolsheviks soon suggested new names, however. By 1919 they had coined

7992-494: The newly elected Constituent Assembly issued a decree, proclaiming Russia a democratic federal republic under the name "Russian Democratic Federal Republic". However, the Bolsheviks dissolved the Assembly on the following day and declared its decrees null and void. Conversely, the Bolsheviks also reserved a number of vacant seats in the Soviets and Central Executive for the opposition parties in proportion to their vote share at

8100-699: The northwest; and to its southeast in eastern Asia were the Democratic People's Republic of Korea ( North Korea ), Mongolian People's Republic ( Mongolia ) and the People's Republic of China (China, formerly the Republic of China ; 1911–1949). Within the Soviet Union, the RSFSR bordered the Slavic states: Ukrainian SSR ( Ukraine ), Belarusian SSR ( Belarus ), the Baltic states: Estonian SSR ( Estonia ), Latvian SSR ( Latvia ) and Lithuanian SSR ( Lithuania ) (Included in USSR in 1940) to its west and

8208-718: The others to Lubyanka by the NKVD in the very same Ford Model A cars they had helped build, where they were tortured; nearly all were executed or died in labor camps. Many of the slain Americans were dumped in the mass grave at Yuzhnoye Butovo District , near Moscow. However, the people of the Soviet Republics were still the majority of NKVD victims. The NKVD also served as an arm of the Russian Soviet communist government for lethal mass persecution and destruction of ethnic minorities and religious beliefs, such as

8316-483: The parties agreed to the formation of the Commonwealth of Independent States . On 12 December, the agreement was ratified by the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR by an overwhelming majority: 188 votes for, 6 against and 7 abstentions. The legality of this ratification raised doubts among some members of the Russian parliament, since according to the Constitution of the RSFSR of 1978 consideration of this document

8424-533: The post of President of the RSFSR and on 12 June, Boris Yeltsin was elected president by popular vote . During the unsuccessful 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt of 19–21 August 1991 in Moscow , the capital of the Soviet Union and Russia, Yeltsin strongly supported the President of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev. On 23 August, Yeltsin, in the presence of Gorbachev, signed a decree suspending all activity by

8532-531: The pre-eminent figure in the country. On 8 December 1991, the heads of Russia, Ukraine and Belarus signed the Belovezha Accords . The agreement declared dissolution of the USSR by its original founding states (i.e., renunciation of the 1922 Treaty on the Creation of the Soviet Union) and established the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) as a loose replacement confederation. On 12 December,

8640-532: The previous Russian constitutions, the 1978 Constitution devoted an entire chapter (Chapter II) to the description of the economic system of the RSFSR, which defined the types of property and indicated the goals of the economic tasks of the state. Main Directorate for State Security (USSR) The Main Directorate of State Security ( Russian : Glavnoe upravlenie gosudarstvennoy bezopasnosti , Главное управление государственной безопасности, ГУГБ, GUGB )

8748-468: The project was supervised by the NKVD because of its great importance and the corresponding requirement for absolute security and secrecy. The project also used information obtained by the NKVD from the United States. The agency was headed by a people's commissar (minister). His first deputy was the director of State Security Service (GUGB). Note: In the first half of 1941 Vsevolod Merkulov transformed his agency into separate commissariat (ministry), but it

8856-493: The reorganization begun by Nikolai Yezhov with a purge of the regional political police in the autumn of 1936 and formalized by a May 1939 directive of the All-Union NKVD by which all appointments to the local political police were controlled from the center, there was frequent tension between centralized control of local units and the collusion of those units with local and regional party elements, frequently resulting in

8964-488: The republic providing education in 47 languages to some 23,941,000 students. A network of territorially organized public-health services provided health care. The economy, which had become stagnant since the late 1970s under General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev , began to be liberalized starting in 1985 under Gorbachev's " perestroika " restructuring policies, including the introduction of non-state owned enterprises (e.g. cooperatives). On 7 November 1917 ( O.S. 25 October), as

9072-405: The rights and obligations of the USSR under the Charter of the United Nations, including the financial obligations, and assumed control over its nuclear stockpile and the armed forces; Soviet embassies abroad became Russian embassies. On 25 December – just hours after Gorbachev resigned as president of the Soviet Union – the Russian SFSR was renamed the Russian Federation (Russia), reflecting that it

9180-512: The same borders of the old Tsardom of Russia before the Great Northern War of 1700 to 1721. The RSFSR dominated the Soviet Union to a significant extent. For most of its existence, the Soviet Union was commonly (but incorrectly) referred to as "Russia". While the RSFSR itself was only one republic within the larger union, it was the largest, most powerful and most highly developed of the 15 republics. According to Matthew White it

9288-731: The scale of his horrific tragedy but also provides evidence that the Katyn crime was committed on direct orders from Stalin and other Soviet leaders." NKVD units were also used to repress the prolonged partisan war in Ukraine and the Baltics , which lasted until the early 1950s. NKVD also faced strong opposition in Poland from the Polish resistance movement known as the Armia Krajowa . After

9396-630: The surrender of the last German troops near the Volga River , ultimately pushing German forces out of Russia by 1944. In 1943, Karachay Autonomous Oblast was dissolved by Joseph Stalin (1878–1953), General Secretary of the Communist Party , later Premier, when the Karachays were exiled to Central Asia for their alleged collaboration with the invading Germans in the Great Patriotic War ( World War II , 1941–1945), and territory

9504-665: The third meeting of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets , the establishment of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic (RSFSR) was proclaimed. On 3 March 1918, the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed, giving away much of the westernmost lands of the former Russian Empire to the German Empire , in exchange for peace on the Eastern Front of World War I. In July 1918, the fifth All-Russian Congress of Soviets adopted

9612-490: The thwarting of Moscow's plans. During Yezhov's time in office, the Great Purge reached its height. In the years 1937 and 1938 alone, at least 1.3 million were arrested and 681,692 were executed for 'crimes against the state'. The Gulag population swelled by 685,201 under Yezhov, nearly tripling in size in just two years, with at least 140,000 of these prisoners (and likely many more) dying of malnutrition, exhaustion and

9720-706: The treaty on the creation of the Soviet Union , Russia (the RSFSR), alongside the Transcaucasian SFSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the Byelorussian SSR, formed the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics . The final Soviet name for the constituent republic, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, was adopted in the later Soviet Constitution of 1936 . By that time, Soviet Russia had gained roughly

9828-401: Was "due to lack of evidence of the case of crime." Only a limited number of persons were rehabilitated with the formulation "cleared of all charges.". Very few NKVD agents were ever officially convicted of a particular violation of anyone's rights. Legally, those agents executed in the 1930s were also "purged" without legitimate a criminal investigation or court decision. In the 1990s and 2000s,

9936-763: Was abolished, and staff were moved to the newly created People's Commissariat for State Security (NKGB). Departments of former GUGB were renamed directorates. For example, the foreign intelligence unit known as the Foreign Department (INO) became the Foreign Directorate (INU); the GUGB political police unit represented by the Secret Political Department (SPO) became the Secret Political Directorate (SPU), and so on. The former GUGB 4th Department (OO),

10044-406: Was an open secret that the country's federal structure was "window dressing" for Russian dominance. On 25 December 1991, during the collapse of the Soviet Union , which concluded on the next day, the RSFSR's official name was changed to the Russian Federation , which it remains to this day. This name and "Russia" were specified as the official state names on 21 April 1992, in an amendment to

10152-547: Was in the exclusive jurisdiction of the Congress of People's Deputies of the RSFSR . However, by this time the Soviet government had been rendered more or less impotent, and was in no position to object. On the same day, the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR denounced the Treaty on the Creation of the USSR and recalled all Russian deputies from the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. A number of lawyers believe that

10260-704: Was incorporated into the Georgian SSR . On 3 March 1944, on the orders of Stalin, the Chechen-Ingush ASSR was disbanded and its population forcibly deported upon the accusations of collaboration with the invaders and separatism . The territory of the ASSR was divided between other administrative units of Russian SFSR and the Georgian SSR. On 11 October 1944, the Tuvan People's Republic

10368-554: Was joined with the Russian SFSR as the Tuvan Autonomous Oblast , becoming an Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in 1961. After reconquering Estonia and Latvia in 1944, the Russian SFSR annexed their easternmost territories around Ivangorod and within the modern Pechorsky and Pytalovsky Districts in 1944–1945. At the end of World War II Soviet troops of the Red Army occupied southern Sakhalin Island and

10476-456: Was merged back to the people's commissariat of Interior soon after the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union . In 1943 Merkulov once again split his agency this time for good. Andrei Zhukov singlehandedly identified every single NKVD officer involved in 1930s arrests and killings by researching a Moscow archive. There are just over 40,000 names on the list. See also: Bibliography of Stalinism and

10584-586: Was not possible to secede from a country that no longer existed. On 24 December, Yeltsin informed the Secretary-General of the United Nations that by agreement of the member states of the CIS the Russian Federation would assume the membership of the Soviet Union in all UN organs (including the Soviet Union's permanent seat on the UN Security Council ). Russia took full responsibility for all

10692-437: Was now a sovereign state with Yeltsin assuming the Presidency . That same night, the Soviet flag was lowered and replaced with the tricolor . The Soviet Union officially ceased to exist the next day. The change was originally published on 6 January 1992 ( Rossiyskaya Gazeta ). According to law, during 1992, it was allowed to use the old name of the RSFSR for official business (forms, seals, and stamps). On 21 April 1992,

10800-420: Was reached in 1931. National power output continued to increase significantly. It reached 13.5 billion kWh by the end of the first five-year plan in 1932, 36 billion kWh by 1937, and 48 billion kWh by 1940. Paragraph 3 of Chapter 1 of the 1925 Constitution of the RSFSR stated the following: By the will of the peoples of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic, who decided on

10908-563: Was responsible for foreign assassinations, including that of Leon Trotsky . Within 1941 and from 1943 to 1946, secret police functions were split into the People's Commissariat for State Security (NKGB). In March 1946, the People's Commissariats were renamed to Ministries; the NKVD became the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), and the NKGB became the Ministry of State Security (MGB). After

11016-593: Was returned to the NKVD as Directorate of Special Departments under Viktor Abakumov ; in January 1942, Navy CI followed. In April 1943, it was again transferred to the Narkomat of Defence and Narkomat of the Navy, becoming SMERSH (from Smert' Shpionam or "Death to Spies"); at the same time, the GUGB was again separated from the NKVD as NKGB . By the end of 1937, the GUGB was the most powerful and influential organ in

11124-627: Was run under the auspices of the Peoples Commissariat of Internal Affairs ( NKVD ). Its first head was first deputy of People's Commissar of Internal Affairs (then Genrikh Yagoda ), Commissioner 1st rank of State Security Yakov Agranov . The Main Directorate of State Security evolved from the Joint State Political Directorate (or OGPU ). On February 3, 1941, the Special Sections (or OO) of

11232-460: Was sanctioned by a special decree of the state, which opened the door to numerous abuses, documented in recollections of victims and members of the NKVD themselves. Hundreds of mass graves resulting from such operations were later discovered throughout the country. Evidence exists that the NKVD committed mass extrajudicial executions, guided by secret "plans." Those plans established the number and proportion of victims (officially "public enemies") in

11340-527: Was split into three sections. One section, which handled military counterintelligence in NKVD troops (former 11th Section of GUGB 4th Department OO) became the 3rd NKVD Department, or OKR (Otdel KontrRazvedki). The chief of OKR NKVD was Aleksander Belyanov. After the German invasion of the Soviet Union (June 1941), the NKGB USSR was abolished, and on July 20, 1941, the units that formed the NKGB became part of

11448-517: Was succeeded by Lavrenty Beria , then just promoted to Commissioner 1st rank of State Security. When Beria became People's Commissar of Internal Affairs (head of NKVD), Commissioner 3rd rank of State Security Vsevolod Merkulov became his first deputy and the new and final head of GUGB. Between 1934 and 1941, the Main Directorate of State Security went through several organizational changes. In January 1935, there were nine departments in

11556-483: Was the first socialist state in history. The economy of Russia became heavily industrialized, accounting for about two-thirds of the electricity produced in the Soviet Union. By 1961, it was the third largest producer of petroleum due to new discoveries in the Volga-Urals region and Siberia, trailing in production to only the United States and Saudi Arabia. In 1974, there were 475 institutes of higher education in

11664-605: Was the name of the Soviet Union's most important security body within the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD) USSR. At the time of its existence, which was from July 10, 1934 to February 3, 1941, the GUGB reflected exactly the Secret Operational Directorate within OGPU under the Council of People's Commissars, which operated within OGPU structure from 1923 to 1931/32. An intelligence service and secret police from July 1934 to February 1941, it

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