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| Объединённое государственное политическое управление при СНК СССР | |
 Badge commemorating 15 years of the Cheka–OGPU, issued in 1932 | |
| Agency overview | |
|---|---|
| Formed | 15 November 1923; 102 years ago (1923-11-15) |
| Preceding agency | |
| Dissolved | 10 July 1934; 91 years ago (1934-07-10) |
| Superseding agencies | |
| Type | Secret police Intelligence agency |
| Headquarters | 11-13 ulitsa Bol.Lubyanka, Moscow,RSFSR,USSR |
| Agency executives |
|
| Parent agency | Council of People's Commissars |
TheJoint State Political Directorate (Russian:Объединённое государственное политическое управление,IPA:[ɐbjɪdʲɪˈnʲɵn(ː)əjəɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)əjəpəlʲɪˈtʲitɕɪskəjəʊprɐˈvlʲenʲɪje]), abbreviated asOGPU (Russian:ОГПУ), was thesecret police of theSoviet Union from November 1923 to July 1934, succeeding theState Political Directorate (GPU). Responsible to theCouncil of People's Commissars, the OGPU was headed byFelix Dzerzhinsky until 1926, then byVyacheslav Menzhinsky until replaced by theMain Directorate of State Security (GUGB) within thePeople's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD).
The OGPU played an important role in the Soviet Union's forcedcollectivization of agriculture under the leadership ofJoseph Stalin, crushing resistance and deporting millions of peasants to the growing network ofGulag forced labor camps. The OGPU operated both inside and outside the country, persecutingpolitical criminals and opponents of theBolsheviks such asWhite émigrés,Soviet dissidents, andanti-communists.
Following the formation of theSoviet Union in December 1922, the rulingRussian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) saw the need for a unifiedintelligence service to exercise control overstate security throughout the new union. At the time, theState Political Directorate (GPU) served as thesecret police for theRussian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) and was successor to theCheka. It was responsible to theCouncil of People's Commissars, which functioned as the highestexecutive body of the Soviet Union after the formation.
On 15 November 1923, the GPU was dissolved and reformed into the Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU) with itsjurisdiction covering the entirety of the Soviet Union. Its official full name was the Joint State Political Directorate under theCouncil of People's Commissars of the USSR (Объединённое государственное политическое управление при СНК СССР,Ob"yedinyonnoye gosudarstvennoye politicheskoye upravleniye pri SNK SSSR), though the name is also translated as the All-Union State Political Administration or as Unified State Political Directorate.Felix Dzerzhinsky, who had served as the chairman of the State Political Directorate and of the Cheka, was appointed as the OGPU's first chief.
The OSNAZ (ОСНАЗ), a militarised section of the Cheka, had originated in 1921;[1]it became a component of OGPU.
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The OGPU, like the GPU before it, was in theory supposed to operate with more restraint than the Cheka, which had orchestrated theRed Terror from 1918 to 1922. Unlike the Cheka, the OGPU could not shoot "counter-revolutionaries" at will, and most suspectedpolitical criminals had to be brought before a judge. The OGPU's powers increased greatly in 1926, when theSoviet criminal code [ru] was amended to includeArticle 58, a section on anti-stateterrorism. The provisions were vaguely written and very broadly interpreted. Even before then, OGPU had set uptribunals to try the most exceptional cases of terrorism, usually without calling any witnesses.[2] In time, the OGPU'sde facto powers grew even greater than those of the Cheka. The OGPU achieved perhaps its most spectacular success with theTrust Operation of 1924–1925. OGPU agents contactedWhite émigrés andanti-communists inWestern Europe and pretended to represent a large group, known as "the Trust", working to overthrow the communist régime. Exiled Russians gave "the Trust" large sums of money and supplies, as did foreign intelligence agencies. Soviet agents finally succeeded in luring one of the leading anti-communist operators,Sidney Reilly, into Russia to meet with the Trust. Once in the Soviet Union in September 1925, Reilly was arrested and executed. The Trust was then dissolved, having become a hugepropaganda success. Dzerzhinsky died in 1926 and was succeeded as chief of the OGPU by deputy chairmanVyacheslav Menzhinsky.
From 1927 to 1929, the OGPU engaged in intensive investigations of an oppositioncoup d'etat. Soviet leaderJoseph Stalin issued a publicdecree that any and all opposition views should be considered dangerous and gave the OGPU the authority to seek out "hostile elements." That led in March 1928 to theShakhty Trial, which saw the prosecution of a group of supposed industrial saboteurs allegedly involved in a hostile conspiracy. That would be the first of many trials during Stalin's rule. The OGPU planned and set up theGulag system, and also became the Soviet government's arm for thepersecution of theRussian Orthodox Church, theGreek Catholics, theRoman Catholic Church,Islam and other religious organizations, in an operation headed byYevgeny Tuchkov. The OGPU was also the principal secret police agency responsible for the detection, arrest, and liquidation ofanarchists and other dissident left-wing factions in the early Soviet Union. It also enforced theDekulakization campaigns during theFirst Five-Year Plan through extrajudicialspecial troikas of local OGPU agents,Communist Party officials, andstate procurators with the authority to sentence suspects toexile ordeath without a formal trial in theSoviet judicial system.[3] OGPU troops took part inSoviet invasion of Xinjiang.[4]
Menzhinsky's health had deteriorated rapidly during his directorship of the OGPU and Stalin tended to deal with his first deputy,Genrikh Yagoda, who essentially took over as head in the late 1920s. Menzhinsky spent his last years as an invalid until his death in May 1934, for which Yagoda would later be blamed in theTrial of the Twenty One.
In July 1934, two months after Menzhinsky's death, the OGPU was dissolved and reincorporated into thePeople's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD), the newly createdinterior ministry of the Soviet Union, becoming itsMain Directorate of State Security (GUGB) under the leadership of Yagoda. The OGPU would later be transformed into the more widely knownCommittee for State Security (KGB) in 1954.
[...] 1921 г. при Президиуме ВЧК был создан Отряд особого назначения (ОСНАЗ). Он включал в себя: штаб батальона, три стрелковые роты, команду связи, хозяйственную команду, обоз батальона и кавалерийский эскадрон, всего 1097 бойцов [...].
