“So That No Citizen Is Punished Unreasonably”: The KGB Concept of Profilaktika as a Tool for Suppressing Soviet Society, 1954–1991

Abstract

Since the mid-1950s, the Soviet Committee for State Security (KGB) developed the concept of profilaktika, aimed to ideologically discipline the masses and prevent them from aligning with the “malicious West” through “gentle,” supposedly nonantagonizing modes of coercion. Based on newly discovered Soviet primary sources, this article describes the intellectual and organizational efforts of the KGB Moscow headquarters to breathe life into this society-designing tool, as well as the actual inability to implement it successfully, demonstrated by the organization’s field structures. It is argued that, faced with growing popular unrest triggered by the deepening crisis of the entire Soviet system, these structures imitated the fruitful use of profilaktika’s “soft” methods, in fact widely practicing, without reporting, classic brutal suppression. The article discusses the possible relevance of this phenomenon in Putin’s Russia and other nondemocratic countries and suggests its further academic investigation.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 On the Babi Yar massacre, see: I. Al’tman, Zhertvy nenavisti. Kholokost v SSSR 1941–1945 gg. (Moscow: Fond “Kovcheg,” 2002), pp. 290–291

2 “News in Brief,” A Chronicle of Current Events: Journal of the Human Rights Movement in the USSR, Vol. 42 (8 October 1976), p. 254.

3 For examples, see T. H. Bagley and P. Deriabin, KGB Masters of the Soviet Union (New York: Hippocrene Books, 1990), pp. 122, 201–202, 207, 217, 315; J. Barron, KGB: The Secret Work of Soviet Agents (New York: Reader’s Digest Press, 1974), pp. 127–157; D. Glinski and P. Reddaway, The Tragedy of Russia’s Reforms: Market Bolshevism against Democracy (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2001), pp. 90–92; R. Hornsby, Protest, Reform and Repression in Khrushchev’s Soviet Union (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2013), pp. 134, 211–212, 218–221, 289; R. Hornsby, “The Outer Reaches of Liberalization: Combating Political Dissent in the Khrushchev’s Era,” in Khrushchev in the Kremlin: Policy and Government in the Soviet Union, 1953–64, edited by M. Ilic and J. Smith (London: Routledge, 2011), pp. 61–78; M. Lewin, The Soviet Century (London and New York: Verso, 2016), pp. 191–201; A. Myagkov, Inside the KGB (Richmond, UK: Foreign Affairs Publishing, 1976), pp. 31–35, 51–52, 64, 73–75.

4 Lewin, The Soviet Century, p. 192.

5 For examples, see E. Al’bats, Mina zamedlennogo deistviia (Moscow: Russlit, 1992), pp. 26–150; F. Bobkov, KGB i vlast’ (Moscow: Eksmo & Algoritm-Kniga, 2003), pp. 242–258, 273–400; E. Grig, Da, ia tam rabotal (Moscow: Geia, 1997), pp. 108–283; E. Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk: Ofitsery i dzhentel’meny (Moscow: Algoritm, 2002), pp. 173–227; V. Tol’ts, “‘Piaterka’ i ‘piateryshniki’. 5 Upravlenie KGB,” Radio Liberty, 14 and 28 July 2012, https://www.svoboda.org/a/24644056.html and https://www.svoboda.org/a/24665442.html

6 For examples, see a series of articles published in the special issue of the Russian historical journal Istoriya, titled “States and Religious Organizations: Strategies of Interaction in the History of the 20th Century,” Istoriya, Vol. 13, No. 6 (116) (2022), https://history.jes.su/issue.2022.2.6.6-116/

7 For the examples of KGB documents that have become available for academic research, see R. Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz: Istoriia vlasti, 1945–1991 (Novosibirsk: Sibirskii Khronograf, 2000), pp. 321–330.

8 Lewin, The Soviet Century, pp. 155–159; M. Whittock, The Secret History of Soviet Russia’s Police State: Cruelty, Co-Operation and Compromise, 1917–91 (London: Robinson, 2020), pp. 221–222.

9 Lewin, The Soviet Century, pp. 179–182.

10 On the authority of the Soviet prosecution organs to oversee the KGB investigative procedures, see “Vypiska iz protokola no. 200 zasedaniia Prezidiuma TsK KPSS s prilozheniem proekta polozheniia o KGB pri Sovete Ministrov SSSR,” The CC CPSU, 9 January 1959, § 12, The Russian State Archive of Contemporary History (RGANI), f. 4, op. 13, d. 45, l. 82. Retrieved from O. Mozokhin (ed.), Politbiuro i organy gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti [Collection of documents] (Moscow: Kuchkovo pole, 2017), Doc. no. 297, p. 718.

11 Lewin, The Soviet Century, p. 183.

12 Ibid., p. 184.

13 For a detailed analysis of the KGB’s concept of endless secret war, see Y. Falkov, “Intelligence-Exalting Strategic Cultures: A Case Study of the Russian Approach,” Intelligence and National Security, Vol. 37, No. 1 (2022), pp. 90–108.

14 B. Ivanov (ed.), Istoriia sovetskikh organov Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti: Uchebnik (Moscow: VSh KGB, 1977), pp. 503, 530–531.

15 N. Mironov, “Za smeloe primenenie profilakticheskikh predupreditel’nykh mer i usilenie sviazi s narodom,” Sbornik KGB, Vol. 1 (1959), p. 59.

16 I. Doroshenko, Sozdanie i sovershenstvovanie agenturnogo apparata organov gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti (1918–1933 gg.) (Moscow: The Red Banner Institute of the KGB, 1958) p. 31; V. Korochkin, Profilakticheskaia rabota organov gosbezopasnosti SSSR [Lecture] (Moscow: VSh KGB, 1961).

17 For the origin of the term profilaktika, see S. Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” Special department no. 3 of the KGB Highest School (VSh), late 1980s, pp. 181–183. Author’s private collection.

18 See S. Ozhegov, Slovar’ russkogo iazyka (Moscow: Sovetskaia entsiklopediia 1964), p. 618.

19 “Vypiska iz protokola no. 200,” § 12. Retrieved from Mozokhin, Politbiuro, Doc. no. 297, pp. 717–718.

20 G. Ermolenko, S. Marfunin, and A. Zubov, “O praktike raboty po provedeniiu profilakticheskikh meropriiatii,” Sbornik KGB, Vol. 1 (1959), pp. 44–46.

21 Ibid., pp. 51–54; Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” p. 185; Mironov, “Za smeloe primenenie profilakticheskikh predupreditel’nykh mer i usilenie sviazi s narodom,” pp. 69–71.

22 Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” pp. 186–187; Mironov, “Za smeloe primenenie profilakticheskikh predupreditel’nykh mer i usilenie sviazi s narodom,” p. 59.

23 V. Chebrikov, “Spravka o massovykh besporiadkakh, imevshikh mesto v strane s 1957 goda,” 4 March 1988, cited in N. Zen’kovich, Tainy ukhodiashchego veka (Moscow: Olma-Press, 1998), pp. 294–295.

24 Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz, p. 239.

25 See the story of Solomon Dolnik, a Zionist activist arrested in 1966 for secretly printing and distributing materials on Jewish history and culture. M. Margulis, Ha-Ta ha-Yehudi be-Lubianka (Tel Aviv: Misrad ha-Bitachon ha-Hotsa’a le-Or, 1998), pp. 116–125.

26 The KGB Chairman’s Order No. 00117 (1964), in Myagkov, Inside the KGB, p. 35.

27 Lewin, The Soviet Century, pp. 185–187; Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” p. 186.

28 K. Brutents, Tridsat’ let na Staroi ploshchadi (Moscow: Mezhdunarodnye Otnosheniia: 1998), p. 245; Y. Falkov, “Proxy Wars and the Cold War: An East-West Perspective,” in Routledge Handbook of Proxy Wars, edited by A. Moghadam, V. Rauta, and M. Wyss (London and New York: Routledge, 2023) pp. 137-52; Henry Kissinger, Diplomacy (New York: Touchstone, 1995), pp. 721–722; Mark Kramer, “The Role of the CPSU International Department in Soviet Foreign Relations and National Security Policy,” Soviet Studies, Vol. 42, No. 3 (1990), pp. 430–431; Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz, pp. 331–358.

29 On the notion of “ideological discipline” in the late 1960s and early 1970s, see Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz, p. 323.

30 Iu. Andropov, A note [zapiska] no. 1631–A to the CC CPSU, 3 July 1967, cited in O. Khlobustov, Istoriia sluzhby gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti: Ot Khrushcheva do Putina (Sankt-Petersburg: Pal’mira, 2018), pp. 162–163.

31 Khlobustov, Istoriia sluzhby gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti, p. 165.

32 Ivanov, Istoriia sovetskikh organov Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti, p. 552; Khlobustov, Istoriia sluzhby gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti, pp. 166–167, 174–175, 181; E. Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk: Ofitsery i dzhentel’meny (Moscow: Algoritm, 2002), p. 206.

33 V. Popov, “Zapiski byvshego podpolkovnika KGB: Literaturnaia diskussiia ‘Klassika i my’ ili politicheskaia provokatsiia?,” Gordon, 17 June 2020, https://gordonua.com/publications/zapiski-byvshego-podpolkovnika-kgb-literaturnaya-diskussiya-klassika-i-my-ili-politicheskaya-provokaciya-1504477.html; I. Zālīte, “LPSR VDK uzbūve un galvenie darba virzieni (1980.–1991. g.),” Latvijas Vēsture, Vol. 1, No. 33 (1999), http://lpra.vip.lv/vdk_uzbuve.htm

34 Bobkov, KGB i vlast’, p. 227; Khlobustov, Istoriia sluzhby gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti, pp. 162–178.

35 Khlobustov, Istoriia sluzhby gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti, pp. 178–179.

36 Ibid., p. 188.

37 N. Pivovarov and A. Popov, “In Word and in Deed: A Religious Issue in the Messages of State Security in the Central Committee of the Communist Party (1950s—The First Half of the 1960s),” Istoriya, Vol. 13, No. 6 (116) (2022), https://history.jes.su/s207987840021693-1-1/

38 B. Kassymbekova, “Memories of the Riots in Chimkent (Kazakh SSR) and Frunze (Kirghiz SSR) in 1967,” Jahrbuch für Historische Kommunismusforschung (2007), pp. 80–90, https://www.kommunismusgeschichte.de/jhk/jhk-2007/article/detail/memories-of-the-riots-in-chimkent-kazakh-ssr-and-frunze-kirghiz-ssr-in-1967. See also Chebrikov, “Spravka o massovykh besporiadkakh, imevshikh mesto v strane s 1957 goda,” pp. 296–297.

39 Khlobustov, Istoriia sluzhby gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti, pp. 178–179.

40 Ibid., pp. 180–181. On the devotion of Andropov to the idea of the KGB as a “correctional-educational” tool, see also S. Zhirnov, “Andropov: Pereosmyslenie istorii: Teoriia,” Proza.ru (31 August 2013), https://proza.ru/2013/08/31/976

41 For example, see Iu. Andropov, Izbrannye rechi I stat’i (Moscow: Izdatel’stvo politicheskoi literatury, 1979), pp. 168–169. See also chapters dedicated to the alleged U.S. subversive activity against the USSR and its allies in the textbook about the U.S. Intelligence Community published by the KGB in 1969: V. Eroshin, V. Fedianin, and E. Peskov, Razvedka SShA: A Textbook (Moscow: The Red Banner Institute of the KGB, 1969), pp. 7–58.

42 F. Shcherbak (ed.), Bor’ba sovetskoi kontrrazvedki s podryvnoi deiatel’nostiu razvedok imperialisticheskikh gosudarstv (Moscow: VSh KGB, 1981), pp. 25–26.

43 Ivanov, Istoriia sovetskikh organov Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti, pp. 454, 463, 476, 521–522, 549–550, 563, 576–580; Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” p. 187; Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk, p. 201.

44 D. Eremin, “Perevertyshi,” Izvestiia, 13 January 1966, p. 3.

45 V. Kurliandski and M. Mikhailov, Osobo opasnye gosudarstvennye prestupleniia (Moscow: Gosizdatel’stvo iuridicheskoi literatury, 1963), pp. 217–233.

46 Ivanov, Istoriia sovetskikh organov Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti, p. 582.

47 Ermolenko, Marfunin, and Zubov, “O praktike raboty po provedeniiu profilakticheskikh meropriiatii,” pp. 44–46; Ivanov, Istoriia sovetskikh organov Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti, pp. 581–582; Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk, p. 202.

48 M. Gerogadze and N. Podgornyi, Ukaz Prezidiuma Verkhovnogo Soveta SSSR o primenenii organami gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti predosterezheniia v kachestve mery profilakticheskogo vozdeistviia (Moscow: the Kremlin, 25 December 1972), https://shieldandsword.mozohin.ru/documents/order0150.htm

49 Zemtsov, Andropov (Jerusalem: IRICS Publishers), p. 39.

50 Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk, pp. 208–209.

51 E. Nesterenko, S. Nesterenko, and A. Nezdolia, Dos’e generala bezopasnosti Aleksandra Nezdoli (Kyiv: Chervona Ruta-Turs, 2003), p. 107; “Stat’ia 190 UK RSFSR: Rasprostranenie zavedomo lozhnykh izmyshlenii, porochashchikh sovetskii Gosudarstvennyi i obshchestvennyi stroi,” in Liubarskii, Vesti iz SSSR, https://vesti-iz-sssr.com/2016/12/11/statya-190-1-uk-rsfsr/

52 Ermolenko, Marfunin and Zubov, “O praktike raboty po provedeniiu profilakticheskikh meropriiatii,” pp. 46–52; Khlobustov, Istoriia sluzhby gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti, p. 159; Ivanov, Istoriia sovetskikh organov Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti, pp. 583–584; Mironov, “Za smeloe primenenie profilakticheskikh predupreditel’nykh mer i usilenie sviazi s narodom,” pp. 60–70; Nesterenko, Nesterenko, and Nezdolia, Dos’e generala bezopasnosti Aleksandra Nezdoli, pp. 144, 181; I. Zālīte, “Ideologiskās kontroles mehānismi LPSR augstskolās,” Latvijas Vēsture, Vol. 1, No. 21 (1998), http://vip.latnet.lv/LPRA/a_skol.html

53 For formal expression of this approach in the KGB publications, see Kontrrazvedyvatel’nyi slovar’ (Moscow: Vysshaia Shkola KGB, 1972), pp. 237–238; See also criticism of the “criminological approach” to profilaktika in Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” pp. 186–187.

54 Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” pp. 187–188; I. Zālīte, “Radošā intelligence—VDK kontroles objekts un propagandas ierocis,” 31 August 1998, http://lpra.vip.lv/inteligence.html

55 Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk, p. 201.

56 Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” p. 187.

57 Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk, p. 201.

58 Deiatel’nost’ organov gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape. Sbornik dokumentov i materialov (Moscow: Vysshaia Shkola KGB, 1983), p. 49; Khlobustov, Istoriia sluzhby gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti, p. 188; Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” p. 190.

59 Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz, pp. 325–326.

60 Letter no. 2743-A of the KGB to the CC CPSU, “On Some Results of the Preventive and Preventive Work of the State Security Agencies” (31 October 1975), cited by Khlobustov, “O profilakticheskoi rabote KGB SSSR,” Khronos (2010), http://www.hrono.ru/statii/2010/hlbst_profilak.php; and by Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz, pp. 327–330.

61 Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk, pp. 266, 279.

62 A. Makarov, “Kazhdaia posadka—Brak v nashei rabote,” OVD-Info, 11 July 2017, https://ovdinfo.org/articles/2016/07/11/kazhdaya-posadka-brak-v-nashey-rabote

63 About the competition between the mentioned KGB functions in recruiting sources, see E. Grig, Da, ia tam rabotal (Moscow: Geia, 1997), pp. 161–166.

64 A. Evteev, “O sostoianii i merakh usileniia bor’by s emissarskoi deiatel’nost’iu protivnika v sovremennykh usloviiakh,” Secret, Copy no. 4, pp. 7–9, Lithuanian Special Archives (LYA), f. K-1, ap. 49, b. 275, b. 281–283.

65 Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” p. 191.

66 K. Boldovskiy, “‘Era of Prophylaxis’: KGB Practices in Work with Religious Organizations during the ‘Khrushchev Period’ (Based on Leningrad Materials),” Istoriya, Vol. 13, No. 6 (116) (2022), https://history.jes.su/s207987840021689-6-1/

67 Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” pp. 189–190; Prikaz predsetadelia KGB SSSR no. 0630, “O merakh sovershenstvovaniia profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti” (13 October 1983).

68 Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” p. 191. <See also, Prikaz predsedatelia KGB SSSR no. 0305-87 (1987); “Spravka o profilakticheskoi rabote organov voennoi kontrrrazvedki. Dokument no. 3/OAS/2172-87,” Materialy 3-go Glavnogo Upravleniia KGB SSSR (Moscow: KGB 3rd Chief Department, 1987), pp. 8–10.

69 For examples, see “A New Way of Fighting Against Religion,” A Chronicle of Current Events: Journal of the Human Rights Movement in the USSR, Vol. 41 (3 August 1976), pp. 129–131; “Arrests, Searches and Interrogations,” ibid., pp. 142–145; “Events in Georgia,” ibid., Vol. 42 (8 October 1976), pp. 250–254. On the Russian section of Amnesty International established in 1973 by V. Turchin and N. Tverdokhlebov, see Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz, p. 327.

70 “Events in Lithuania,” A Chronicle of Current Events, Vol. 42 (8 October 1976), p. 140.

71 On the Moscow bombings, see “Concerning the Explosions in Moscow,” A Chronicle of Current Events, Vol. 44 (16 March 1977), https://chronicle-of-current-events.com/2019/06/26/concerning-the-explosions-in-moscow-march-1977-44-16/; on an attempt by a group of Soviet Georgians to hijack a jetliner to Turkey see D. Turashvili, Flight from the USSR (Tbilisi: Salakauri Publishing, 2016).

72 Chebrikov, “Spravka o massovykh besporiadkakh, imevshikh mesto v strane s 1957 goda,” pp. 298–299; Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz, pp. 415–416, 446–450, 463–474.

73 For example, see “Perestroika i rabota chekistov: Chlen Politbiuro TsK KPSS, predsedatel’ Komiteta gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov. Chebrikov V. M. otvechaet na voprosy ‘Pravdy,’” 2 September 1988, in V. Pirozhkov (ed.), Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape: Sbornik dokumentov i materialov, 4th ed. (Moscow: VSh KGB, 1988), pp. 142–156. See also A. Knight, Spies without Cloaks: The KGB’s Successors (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1996), p. 15.

74 “O zadachakh organov KGB, vytekaiushchikh iz postanovleniia TsK KPSS ‘O negativnykh proiavleniiakh v deiatel’nosti nekotorykh neformal’nykh obshestvennykh ob’edinenii’ ot 18 iunia 1987 g. Vystuplenie pervogo zamestitelia predsedatelia Komiteta Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov. Bobkova F. D. na soveshchanii rukovodiashchego sostava tsentral’nogo apparata i territorial’nykh organov KGB SSSR,” 25 September 1987, in Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape, p. 206.

75 For examples, see “Velikii primer sluzheniia revoliutsionnym idealam: Doklad chlena Politbiuro TsK KPSS, predsedatelia Komiteta gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov. Chebrikova V. M. na torzhestvennom sobranii, posviashchennom 110-letiiu so dnia rozhdeniia F. E. Dzerzhinskogo,” in Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape, p. 81; “Vstupitel’noe slovo chlena Politbiuro TsK KPSS, predsedatelia Komiteta gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov: Chebrikova V. M. na torzhestvennom sobranii, posviashchennom 70-letiiu sovetskikh organov gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti,” 18 December 1987, in Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape, pp. 94–95; “Po mandatu naroda: Na voprosy spetsial’nykh korrespondentov gazety ‘Trud’ otvechaet zamestitel’ predsedatelia Komiteta Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov. Ageev G. E.,” 19 April 1987, Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape, pp. 169–176.

76 “O merakh po perestroike raboty organov voennoi kontrrazvedki v svete trebovanii ianvarskogo, iiun’skogo plenumovTsK KPSS i resheniia Kollegii KGB SSSR ot 18 maia 1987 g.,” 28 July 1987, Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape,., pp. 187–188.

77 “Ob itogakh ianvarskogo (1987 g.) Plenuma TsK KPSS i zadachakh partiinoi organizatsii KGB SSSR, vytekaiushchikh iz ego reshenii: Doklad chlena Politbiuro TsK KPSS, predsedatelia Komiteta gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov. Chebrikova V. M. na sobranii partiinogo aktiva tsentral’nogo apparata Komiteta gosbezopasnosti SSSR,” 14 February 1987, Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape,, pp. 27–28.

78 Ibid.; See also “Ob itogakh iiun’skogo (1987 g.) Plenuma TsK KPSS i zadachakh organov i voisk KGB SSSR po uglubleniiu perestroika operativno-sluzhebnoi deiatel’nosti: Doklad chlena Politbiuro TsK KPSS, predsedatelia Komiteta gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov. Chebrikova V. M. na soveshchanii rukovodiashchego sostava, sekretarei partkomov i partbiuro podrazdelenii tsentral’nogo apparata KGB SSSR,” 8 July 1987, Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape, pp. 47, 54, 57–58; “Vystuplenie chlena Politbiuro TsK KPSS, predsedatelia Komiteta gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov. Chebrikova V. M. na vsesoiuznoi nauchno-prakticheskoi konferentsii organov i voisk KGB SSSR,” 10 December 1987, Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape, p. 90.

79 “Ob itogakh ianvarskogo (1987 g.) Plenuma TsK KPSS i zadachakh partiinoi organizatsii KGB SSSR, vytekaiushchikh iz ego reshenii,” p. 27.

80 Ibid., p. 59.

81 “O merakh po perestroike raboty organov voennoi kontrrazvedki v svete trebovanii ianvarskogo, iiun’skogo plenumovTsK KPSS i resheniia Kollegii KGB SSSR ot 18 maia 1987 g.,” 28 July 1987, in Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape, pp. 177–197.

82 S. Drozdov, “Vozdushnye piraty Strany Sovetov,” Aviatsiia i vremia, Vol. 5 (2009), http://www.nnre.ru/transport_i_aviacija/aviacija_i_vremja_2009_02/p4.php; Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz, pp. 463–474.

83 Makarov, “Stanovlenie i razvitie profilakticheskoi raboty, provodimoi organami voennoi kontrrazvedki,” p. 194.

84 For the expressions of this belief, see A. Kriuchkov, Lichnoe delo, Part 1 (Moscow: Olimp-Ast, 1996), pp. 414–415; “Vystuplenie chlena Politbiuro TsK KPSS, predsedatelia Komiteta gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov. Chebrikova V. M. na sobranii partiinogo aktiva tsentral’nogo apparata Komiteta gosbezopasnosti SSSR, obsudivshem otchet partkoma KGB SSSR o rabote po rukovodstvu perestroikoi,” 22 January 1988, in Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape, p. 103; “Perestroika i rabota chekistov. Chlen Politbiuro TsK KPSS, predsedatel’ Komiteta gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR tov. Chebrikov V. M. otvechaet na voprosy ‘Pravdy,’” 2 September 1988, Pirozhkov, Deiatel’nost’ organov Gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti SSSR na sovremennom etape, pp. 152–153.

85 Nesterenko, Nesterenko, and Nezdolia, Dos’e generala bezopasnosti Aleksandra Nezdoli, p. 147.

86 Knight, Spies without Cloaks, pp. 15–16; A. Kriuchkov, Lichnoe delo, Part 2 (Moscow: Olimp-Ast, 1996), pp. 28–33; Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk, pp. 225–226; Pikhoia, Sovetskii Soiuz, pp. 550–551.

87 Makarevich, Politicheskii sysk, pp. 226–227.

88 Knight, Spies without Cloaks, p. 166.

89 V. Bukovskii, Moskovskii protsess (Paris: Russkaia Mysl’, 1996), pp. 44–45.

90 S. Dontsov, “Izbavlenie ot KGB: Kakim byl Vadim Bakatin,” Moskovskii komsomolets, 7 August 2022, https://www.mk.ru/politics/2022/08/07/izbavlenie-ot-kgb-kakim-byl-vadim-bakatin.html. See also: Knight, Spies without Cloaks, pp. 29–31.

91 For examples, see D. Childs and R. Popplewell, The Stasi: The East German Intelligence and Security Service (Houndmills, Basingstoke, and London: Macmillan Press, 1999), pp. 98–99; K. Kravtsov and O. Murtazaliev, Stanovlenie kontrrazvedyvatel’nykh organov MGB Afganistana v usloviiakh krizisnogo razvitiia operativnoi obstanovki v strane (Moscow: VShK KGB, 1990), p. 37.

92 For examples, see V. Baryshnikov, “Vtoraia sluzhba,” Radio Svoboda, 31 August 2017, https://www.svoboda.org/a/28705258.html; I. Borogan and A. Soldatov, Svoi sredi zhuzhikh: Politicheskie emigranty i Kreml’ (Moscow: Al’pina Publisher, 2021), p. 281; A. Papp, “Zakon o profilaktike,” Barometr Reformy Politsii, 6 June 2017, https://police-barometer.ru/zakon-o-profilactike; “Russia’s Counterproductive Counterterrorism,” Hearings at the U.S. Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe, the U.S. Federal Government, Washington, DC, United States, 12 June 2019, https://www.csce.gov/international-impact/events/russias-counterproductive-counterterrorism; “Treasury Sanctions Russian Operatives and Entities Linked to the Poisoning of Aleksey Navalny, Chemical Weapons Program” [Press release], U.S. Department of the Treasury, 20 August 2021, https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy0328; U.S. Department of State, Russia 2021 Human Rights Report, https://www.state.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/3136152_RUSSIA-2021-HUMAN-RIGHTS-REPORT.pdf, pp. 25–26.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Yaacov Falkov

Yaacov Falkov is an Israeli-Latvian historian, a former Visiting Research Fellow of Oxford University and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, and a Scientific Advisor to the Ghetto Fighters Museum in Israel and the Riga Ghetto Museum in Latvia. His new book, Between Hitler and Churchill: Two Jewish Agents and the Effort Made by British Intelligence to Prevent Secret Polish-Nazi Collusion, will be published by the U.S.-based Academic Studies Press in 2024. The author can be contacted at [email protected].