First established in 1917 as the NKVD of theRussian SFSR,[4] the ministry was tasked with regular police work and overseeing the country's prisons and labor camps.[1] It was disbanded in 1930, and its functions dispersed among other agencies before being reinstated as acommissariat of the Soviet Union in 1934.[5] 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 theGulag system offorced labor camps and, during World War II, carried out themass deportations of hundreds of thousands of Poles, Balts, and Romanians, and millions of ethnic minorities from theCaucasus, to remote areas of the country, resulting in millions of deaths. Hundreds of thousands of NKVD personnel served inInternal Troops divisions in defensive battles alongside theRed Army, as well as in "blocking formations," preventing retreat. The agency was responsible for foreign assassinations, including that ofLeon Trotsky.[6][7]
After the RussianFebruary Revolution of 1917, theProvisional Government dissolved theTsarist police and set up thePeople'sMilitias. The subsequent RussianOctober Revolution of 1917 saw a seizure of state power led byLenin and theBolsheviks, who established a newBolshevik regime, theRussian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR). The Provisional Government'sMinistry of Internal Affairs (MVD), formerly underGeorgy Lvov (from March 1917) and then underNikolai 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 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 theWorkers' and Peasants' Militias staffed by proletarians were largely inexperienced and unqualified. Realizing that it was left with no capable security force, theCouncil of People's Commissars of the RSFSR established (20 December [O.S. 7 December] 1917) a secret political police, theCheka, led byFelix 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."
TheCheka was reorganized in 1922, as theState Political Directorate, or GPU, of the NKVD of the RSFSR.[8] In 1922 theUSSR formed, with the RSFSR as its largest member. The GPU became theOGPU (Joint State Political Directorate), under theCouncil of People's Commissars of the USSR. The NKVD of the RSFSR retained control of themilitsiya and various other responsibilities.
In 1934, the NKVD of the RSFSR was transformed into an all-USSR security force, the NKVD (which theCommunist Party of the Soviet Union leaders soon came to call "the leading detachment of our party"), and the OGPU was incorporated into the NKVD as theMain 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 thegulag), as well as the regular police. At various times, the NKVD had the following Chief Directorates, abbreviated as "ГУ"—Главное управление,Glavnoye upravleniye.
Until the reorganization begun byNikolai 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 the thwarting of Moscow's plans.[10]
During Yezhov's time in office, theGreat 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 the elements.[11]
On 3 February 1941, the 4th Department (Special Section, OO) of the GUGB NKVD security service responsible for the Soviet Armed Forces military counterintelligence,[12] 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 was abolished, and staff were moved to the newly createdPeople'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), 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 theGerman 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 the NKVD. The military CI was also upgraded from a department to a directorate and put in the NKVD organization as theDirectorate 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 intoSMERSH and transferred to 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 theMinistry of Internal Affairs (MVD), while the NKGB was renamed theMinistry of State Security (MGB).
In 1953, after the arrest ofLavrenty Beria, the MGB merged back into the MVD. The police and security services finally split in 1954 to become:
The USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), responsible for the criminal militia andcorrectional facilities.
The USSR Committee for State Security (KGB), responsible for thepolitical police, intelligence, counterintelligence, personal protection (of the leadership), and confidential communications.
In 1935–1945, theMain Directorate of State Security of NKVD had its own ranking system before it was merged into the Soviet military standardized ranking system.
Top-level commanding staff
Commissioner General of State Security (later in 1935)
Commissioner of State Security, 1st Class
Commissioner of State Security, 2nd Class
Commissioner of State Security, 3rd Class
Commissioner of State Security (Senior Major of State Security, before 1943)
Senior commanding staff
Colonel of State Security (Major of State Security, before 1943)
Lieutenant Colonel of State Security (Captain of State Security, before 1943)
Major of State Security (Senior Lieutenant of State Security, before 1943)
Mid-level commanding staff
Captain of State Security (Lieutenant of State Security, before 1943)
Senior Lieutenant of State Security (Junior Lieutenant of State Security, before 1943)
Lieutenant of State Security (Sergeant of State Security, before 1942)
Junior Lieutenant of State Security (Sergeant of State Security, before 1942)
The main function of the NKVD was to protect thestate security of the Soviet Union through massivepolitical repression, including authorized murders of many thousands of politicians and citizens, as well as kidnappings, assassinations, and mass deportations.
In implementation of Soviet internal policy towards perceived enemies of 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.[13] Formally, most of these people were convicted byNKVD troikas ("triplets") – specialcourts martial. Evidence standards were very low: a tip-off by an anonymous informer was considered sufficient grounds for arrest.[citation needed] Use of "physical means of persuasion" (torture) 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 ofmass graves resulting from such operations were later discovered throughout the country.[citation needed] Evidence[citation needed] 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 a given region (e.g., the quotas for clergy, formernobles, etc., regardless of identity). The families of the repressed, including children, were also automatically repressed according toNKVD Order no. 00486.
A number ofmass operations of the NKVD related to persecution of entire ethnic categories. For example, thePolish Operation of the NKVD in 1937–1938 resulted in the execution of 111,091 Poles.[18] Whole populations of certain ethnicitieswere forcibly resettled. Foreigners living in the Soviet Union were given particular attention. When disillusionedAmerican citizens in the Soviet Union thronged the gates of theU.S. embassy in Moscow to plead for newU.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 toLubyanka Prison and later shot.[19] American factory workers at the Soviet FordGAZ plant, suspected by Stalin of being 'poisoned' by Western influences, were dragged off with the others to Lubyanka by the NKVD in the very same FordModel 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 atYuzhnoye Butovo District, near Moscow.[20] However, the people of theSoviet Republics were still the majority of NKVD victims.
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 asPavel Sudoplatov andIskhak Akhmerov were established in nearly every major Western country, including the United States. The NKVD recruited agents for its espionage efforts from all walks of life, from unemployed intellectuals such asMark Zborowski to aristocrats such asMartha Dodd. Besides the gathering of intelligence, these networks provided organizational assistance for so-calledwet business,[21] where enemies of the USSR either disappeared or were openly liquidated.[22]
The NKVD'sintelligence andspecial operations (Inostranny Otdel) unit organized overseas assassinations of political enemies of the USSR, such as leaders of nationalist movements, former Tsarist officials, and personal rivals ofJoseph Stalin. Among the officially confirmed victims of such plots were:
Leon Trotsky, a personal political enemy of Stalin and his most bitter international critic, killed inMexico City in 1940.
Yevgeny Miller, former General of theTsarist (Imperial Russian) Army; in the 1930s, he was responsible for funding anti-communist movements inside the USSR with the support of European governments. Kidnapped in Paris and brought to Moscow, where he was interrogated and executed.
Noe Ramishvili, Prime Minister of independentGeorgia, fled to France after the Bolshevik takeover; responsible for funding and coordinatingGeorgian nationalist organizations and theAugust uprising, he was assassinated in Paris.
Boris Savinkov, a Russian revolutionary and anti-Bolshevik terrorist lured back into Russia and allegedly killed in 1924 by theTrust Operation of theGPU.
Sidney Reilly, a British agent ofMI6, deliberately entered Russia in 1925, trying to expose theTrust Operation to avenge Savinkov's death.
Alexander Kutepov, former General of the Tsarist (Imperial Russian) Army, was active in organizing anti-communist groups with the support of French and British governments.
Pro-Soviet leaderSheng Shicai inXinjiang received NKVD assistance to conduct a purge coinciding with Stalin'sGreat Purge in 1937. Sheng and the Soviets alleged a massiveTrotskyist conspiracy and a "Fascist Trotskyite plot" to destroy the Soviet Union. Soviet Consul GeneralGaregin Apresoff, GeneralMa Hushan,Ma Shaowu, Mahmud Sijan, the official leader ofXinjiang province, Huang Han-chang, andHoja-Niyaz were among the 435 alleged conspirators in the plot. Xinjiang came under Soviet influence.[28]
In theSpanish Civil War, the NKVD ran Section X, coordinating the Soviet intervention on behalf of theSpanish Republicans.[29] NKVD agents acting in conjunction with theCommunist Party of Spain exercised substantial control over theRepublican government, using Soviet military aid to further Soviet influence.[30] The NKVD established numerous secret prisons around Madrid, used to detain, torture, and kill hundreds of the NKVD's enemies, first focusing onSpanish Nationalists andSpanish Catholics, then after late 1938 increasingly anarchists andTrotskyists as objects of persecution.[31] In 1937,Andrés Nin, the secretary of theTrotskyist POUM, and his colleagues were tortured and killed in an NKVD prison in Alcalá de Henares.[32]
Memorial to the NKVD employee in the city ofZnamianka
Before the German invasion, to accomplish its own goals, the NKVD was prepared to cooperate even with such organizations as the GermanGestapo. In March 1940, representatives of the NKVD and the Gestapo met for a week inZakopane 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 ofWilhelm 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.[33] Furthermore, many NKVD units later fought the Wehrmacht, for example the10th NKVD Rifle Division, which fought at theBattle of Stalingrad.
After the German invasion, the NKVDevacuated and killed prisoners. During World War II, NKVDInternal 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 theBattle of Stalingrad and theCrimean offensive.[34] to stemdesertions under Stalin'sOrder No. 270 andOrder 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.[34] Unlike theWaffen-SS, the NKVD did not field any armored or mechanized units.[34]
In enemy-held territories, the NKVD carried out numerous missions of sabotage. After thefall of Kiev, NKVD agents set fire to the Nazi headquarters and various other targets, eventually burning down much of the city center.[35] Similar actions took place across theoccupied Byelorussia andUkraine.
The NKVD (later theKGB) carried out mass arrests, deportations, and executions. The targets included bothcollaborators with Germany and members of non-communistresistance movements such as the PolishHome Army and theUkrainian 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 theKatyń massacre where chief NKVD executionerVasily Blokhin personally oversaw and carried out thousands of the executions.[36][37] On November 26, 2010, theState Duma issued a declaration acknowledging Stalin's responsibility for the Katyn massacre and the execution of intellectual leaders and 22,000Polish POWs by Stalin's NKVD. The declaration stated that archival material "not only unveils 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."[38]
NKVD units were also used to repress the prolonged partisan war inUkraine and theBaltics, which lasted until the early 1950s. NKVD also faced strong opposition in Poland from the Polish resistance movement known as theArmia Krajowa.
After the death of Stalin in 1953, the new Soviet leaderNikita 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 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 a legitimate criminal investigation or court decision. In the 1990s and 2000s, a small number of ex-NKVD agents in theBaltic states were convicted of crimes against the local population.
The extensive system of labor exploitation in theGulag made a notable contribution to theSoviet economy and the development of remote areas. Colonization ofSiberia, theFar North, and theFar East were among the explicitly stated goals in the first laws concerning Sovietlabor camps. Mining, construction works (roads, railways, canals, dams, and factories), logging, and other functions of the labor camps were part of the Sovietplanned economy, and the NKVD had its own production plans.[citation needed]
The most unusual part of the NKVD's achievements was its role inSoviet science andarms development. Many scientists and engineers arrested for political crimes were placed in special prisons, much more comfortable than the gulag, colloquially known assharashkas. These prisoners continued their work in these prisons and were later released. Some of them became world leaders in science and technology. Among thesharashka wereSergey Korolev, head designer of the Soviet rocket program and first human space flight mission in 1961, andAndrei Tupolev, the famous airplane designer.Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was also imprisoned in a sharashka and based his novelThe First Circle on his experiences there.
After World War II, the NKVD coordinated work on Soviet nuclear weaponry under the direction of GeneralPavel Sudoplatov. The scientists were not prisoners, but 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.
Note: In the first half of 1941 Vsevolod Merkulov transformed his agency into separate commissariat (ministry), but it was merged back to the people's commissariat of Interior soon after theNazi invasion of the Soviet Union. In 1943 Merkulov once again split hisagency 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.[39]
NKVD special camps in Germany 1945–1950, internment camps set up at the end of World War II in eastern Germany (often in former Nazi POW or concentration camps) and other areas under Soviet domination, to imprison those suspected of collaboration with the Nazis, or others deemed to be troublesome to Soviet ambitions.
^Григоренко П.Г. В подполье можно встретить только крыс… (Petro Grigorenko, "In the underground one can meet only rats") – Нью-Йорк, Издательство «Детинец», 1981, p. 403,Full text of the book (Russian)
^Tzouliadis, Tim,The Forsaken: An American Tragedy in Stalin's Russia Penguin Press (2008),ISBN978-1-59420-168-4: Many of the Americans asking to return home were communists who had voluntarily moved to the Soviet Union, while others moved to Soviet Union as skilled auto workers at the recently constructed GAZ automobile factory built by theFord Motor Company. All were U.S. citizens.
^Tzouliadis, Tim,The Forsaken: An American Tragedy in Stalin's Russia Penguin Press (2008),ISBN978-1-59420-168-4
^Barmine, Alexander,One Who Survived, New York: G.P. Putnam (1945), p. 18: NKVD expression for a political murder
^John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr,Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999)
^Barmine, Alexander,One Who Survived, New York: G.P. Putnam (1945), pp. 232–233
^Andrew, Christopher and Mitrokhin, Vasili,The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB, Basic Books (2000),ISBN978-0-465-00312-9, p. 75
^Barmine, Alexander,One Who Survived, New York: G. P. Putnam (1945), pp. 17, 22
^Sean McMeekin,The Red Millionaire: A Political Biography of Willi Münzenberg, Moscow's Secret Propaganda Tsar in the West, 1917–1940, New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press (2004), pp. 304–305
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