Yuri Andropov. Part 4. In The Labyrinths Of The KGB

2024 Author: Adrian Jeff | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:06

Yuri Andropov. Part 4. In the labyrinths of the KGB

"And at this time, when the West was actively arming itself and building up military-political groups in various regions of the planet against the USSR and its allies, Moscow unilaterally gave up the most important strategic foothold in Central Europe - Austria."

Part 1. An intellectual from the KGB

Part 2. In connections that defame himself, noticed …

Part 3. Khrushchev's hard times

Initiative Khrushchev did not confine himself to "putting things in order" in his country, that is, its internal politics. His betrayal spread much further and affected international relations. First, in October 1955, according to the peace policy of the USSR invented by Nikita Sergeevich, a contingent of Soviet troops from Austria, which had been there after its liberation in 1945, was voluntarily withdrawn within three months.

“And at this time, when the West was actively arming itself and lining up military-political groups in various regions of the planet against the USSR and its allies, Moscow unilaterally surrendered the most important strategic bridgehead in Central Europe - Austria” (Alexander Samsonov, Khrushchevshchyna).

Due to the short-sighted act of the secretary general, the Soviet Union lost control over Western Europe from its very heart. Thirty years later, another "dove of peace", with a deficiency of endorphin, will "surrender" another European state - the GDR, in the Constitution of which it was written that it is an ally of the USSR.

In 1955, after a visit to the Soviet Union by West German Chancellor Adenauer, diplomatic relations were established with the FRG, developing with great concessions from Moscow. At the same meeting, the "pacifist" Khrushchev made a broad gesture of "goodwill", proposing to return German prisoners of war to Germany. Other collaborationist war criminals - Bandera and Vlasovites - fell under this amnesty.

Several years will pass, and it will be Andropov and his people who will have to rebuild the bridges between the USSR and the FRG, conduct a delicate political dialogue with Willy Brandt, so that he officially announced that West Germany is ready to accept Solzhenitsyn, giving the Soviet Union the opportunity to send the writer's troubled water for border.

“In fifteen to twenty years we will be able to afford what the West allows itself now - greater freedom of opinion, awareness, diversity in society, in art. But it will be only fifteen or twenty years later, when it will be possible to raise the living standard of the population … And now - you can't even imagine what the mood is in the country, - said Andropov. - Maybe everything will go haywire - the living standard of the people is extremely low, the cultural level too, the school work is disgusting, literature … What kind of literature is this? Why should the KGB - and not the culture ministry and the Central Committee department - work with cultural and literary figures? Why are they putting it all on us? Because they can't do anything …”(Roy Medvedev, Andropov, ZhZL).

“Smell is the ability to negotiate,” says Yuri Burlan at the lectures “System-Vector Psychology”.

Khrushchev's report at the XX Party Congress on the far-fetched personality cult of Stalin, which looked more like public repentance and removal of rubbish from public, rather than exposure, turned most of the USSR's admirers and admirers away from the country and undermined faith in the communist idea itself.

The echo of the blitz withdrawal of Soviet troops from Austria at the beginning of 1956, by the fall of this year, will come back to haunt the Hungarian counter-revolution, the witness and participant of which will be Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov. The political provocation returned to Hungary, which back in 1945 was Hitler's ally, immigrants who had spent a difficult time in neighboring countries, the same Austria. We must not forget that at the beginning of the twentieth century both countries formed a single Austro-Hungarian state, and now well-armed pro-fascist elements have appeared on the streets of Budapest.

Imre Nagy, a popular leader in Hungary at that time, called by modern historians "the Hungarian Gorbachev" for his desire to destroy and rebuild the pro-Stalinist course, hoped to get out of the Kremlin's control. On the conscience of Nagy was the death of not only the Comintern, but also the cruel, atrocious massacres in the streets of Budapest.

The UN General Assembly did not want to intervene in what is happening in Hungary and stop the destruction of one part of the Hungarian people by another, but condemned the execution of Nagy, and then condemned the actions of the governments of the USSR and Hungary for ignoring the UN resolution on the Hungarian issue. The development of the Hungarian events is not much different from what is happening today in Ukraine, the assessment of international organizations that are trying to whitewash criminals and condemn citizens who defend their right to life remains unchanged.

In the labyrinths of the KGB

After the liquidation of Beria, his organization was practically destroyed. The importance of the NKVD organs was downgraded after 1953, and the level of one of the most powerful intelligence services in the world fell, and failures began.

The wave of Khrushchev's reshuffle and repression covered diplomats, intelligence officers, employees of military research institutions dealing with nuclear weapons, Soviet rocketry and even the first space developments. The long-term activities of the Kremlin's secret special services aimed at protecting the Motherland from an external enemy, which the whole world continued to be in relation to the USSR, was exposed to the West, blurted out and betrayed.

It was at this time that Andropov was transferred from Staraya Square to Lubyanka, receiving the post of chairman of the KGB of the USSR. With the arrival of Yuri Vladimirovich, the "golden era" of the Soviet special services began.

Some historians believe that the appointment of Andropov by Brezhnev in 1967 as the main man in the KGB was caused by intrigues in the corridors of the Kremlin. The actual demotion was not without the participation of Suslov and Kosygin, Andropov's longtime opponents.

Andropov did not just have to get used to the role of the head of a department that was unusual for him. Here he also starts with discipline in the team. There can not and should not be in the security services truants, idlers and filons.

The chairman of the KGB, Yuri Vladimirovich, changes the principles of work, retires the non-initiative, and dismisses many security officers because of inconsistency with their duties or the spirit of the times. Many grievances from the dismissed have accumulated, and the Internet is still full of them.

Possessing organizational skills in creating at the International Department of the Central Committee of the sector of European countries of people's democracies and the sector of eastern countries of people's democracies, having behind him the difficult experience of Hungary, therefore, not by hearsay knowing and understanding the political mood outside the borders of the USSR and the ease with which there can be changes were made in the government, which means that the likely changes in the socialist system, Yuri Vladimirovich takes up work with all responsibility.

This time, his staff are half-footed authors and journalists. An analytical mind and sad memories of the events in Budapest tell him that the old, well-worn path and hackneyed methods of building a happy socialist future in the countries of the Eastern Bloc and people's democracy cannot be dispensed with.

“You can't imagine what it is - crowds of hundreds of thousands, uncontrolled by anyone, take to the streets …”, Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov once said (from the memoirs of diplomat V. Troyanovsky).

The introduction of Soviet troops into Czechoslovakia, where the Prague Spring broke out in August 1968, caused strong unrest among young people and students within the Soviet Union. Frightened by this turn of affairs, the Soviet government demanded that the KGB intensify its work with dissidents inside the country. The Khrushchev thaw - the beginning of the end of a great power - has come to its final stage.

"Aristocrats of the Spirit": Advisors to the Chief Counselor

We needed a new approach, new thinking, and therefore new knowledge. How could Yuri Vladimirovich, who was not “traveling” further than Budapest, know how it was there, abroad? Suslov stubbornly relies on ideology, Brezhnev begins to realize what inheritance he inherited from Khrushchev, Andropov understands that over the post-war 20 years the world has changed dramatically, people on both sides of the border have new shortages, which he and his service had to sort out, no one else.

“How can you talk about socialism in Africa and Europe and strive to make it the same? It's impossible. There are national characteristics, different levels of development,”explained Yuri Vladimirovich.

Andropov needs an understanding of the interests of the Kremlin (USSR) and its antagonists, in fact the rest of the world, in a game of anticipation. His personal safety and careful, thoughtful steps on the slippery "deck of life" will be built on this, because for the olfactor the guarantee of personal survival is proportional to the survival of the flock.

Just like in the International Department of the Central Committee, he created a team of like-minded people from employees of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, academic universities and scientific journals invited from the side - young specialists who are not experienced in the work of the party apparatus, and therefore think in other categories, he expands the staff of committee members for the account of educated, thinking outside the box intellectuals.

New thinking can be taught by people who have worked abroad for a long time and who knew the mood and views of the West. Andropov chose Georgy Arbatov, Alexander Bovin, Georgy Shakhnazarov, Fyodor Burlatsky as his consultants …

“It was interesting to work with Andropov,” recalled journalist, publicist, political scientist, diplomat Alexander Bovin. - He knew how and loved to think. He loved to fence with arguments. He was not embarrassed by unexpected, non-stencil lines of thought."

Having started work in the KGB, he did not stop working with these journalists and political scientists.