All the first secretaries of the USSR. General secretaries of the ussr in chronological order
October 14, 1964 - April 8, 1966
General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
April 8, 1966 - November 10, 1982
Brezhnev Leonid Ilyich (1906–1982), General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) from 1964 to 1982. Born on December 6 (19), 1906 in a Russian family in Dneprodzerzhinsk (until 1936 - Kamenskoye) in the southeast of Ukraine.
In 1923 he joined the Komsomol; since 1931 - a member of the CPSU (b). In 1935 he graduated from the Dneprodzerzhinsk Metallurgical Institute. After completing military service, Brezhnev was engaged in party work and quickly made a career in the party apparatus of the Dnepropetrovsk region. He was promoted during the purges of the late 1930s with the support of N.S. Khrushchev, at that time the first secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine. He was the head of the political department of the 4th Ukrainian Front during the Great Patriotic War.
In 1950, Khrushchev introduced Brezhnev to the central organs of the party, after which he was twice appointed the highest party leader at the republican level - in Moldova (1950-1952) and Kazakhstan (1955-1956). Brezhnev was responsible for the implementation of the program for the development of agriculture in Kazakhstan (development of virgin lands). In 1957 he became a member of the Politburo of the CPSU, and in 1960-1964 - Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.
In 1964, Brezhnev participated in the October conspiracy to remove Khrushchev from power, whose voluntaristic leadership of the country aroused more and more serious dissatisfaction. Brezhnev became the first (since 1966 - General) Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU, and the Council of Ministers was headed by A.N. Kosygin. In 1977, Brezhnev also became head of state (chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Council).
Brezhnev was a consistent supporter of the policy of detente - in 1972 in Moscow he signed important agreements with US President R. Nixon; the next year he visited the US; in 1975 he was the main initiator of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe and the signing of the Helsinki Accords. In the USSR, 18 years of his tenure in power turned out to be the most calm and socially stable, housing construction was actively developing (almost 50 percent of the housing stock of the USSR was built), the population received free apartments, a system of free medical care developed, all types of education were free, developed aerospace, automotive, oil and gas and military industries. On the other hand, Brezhnev did not hesitate to suppress dissent both in the USSR and in other countries of the "socialist camp" - in Poland, in Czechoslovakia, in the GDR.
In the 1970s, the defense capability of the USSR reached such a level that the Soviet armed forces alone could withstand the combined armies of the entire NATO bloc. The authority of the Soviet Union at that time was unusually high in the countries of the "third world", which, thanks to the military might of the USSR, which counterbalanced the policy of the Western powers, could not be afraid of NATO. However, having got involved in the arms race in the 1980s, especially in the fight against the Star Wars program, the Soviet Union began to spend prohibitively large funds for military purposes to the detriment of the civilian sectors of the economy. An acute shortage of consumer goods and foodstuffs began to be felt in the country, “food trains” from the provinces were pulled to the capital, on which residents of remote areas took food from Moscow.
Since the late 1970s, large-scale corruption began at all levels of government. A serious foreign policy mistake by Brezhnev was the introduction of Soviet troops into Afghanistan in 1980, during which significant economic and military resources were diverted to support the government of Afghanistan, and the USSR became involved in the internal political struggle of various clans of Afghan society. Around the same time, Brezhnev's health deteriorated sharply, he raised the question of his resignation several times, but his colleagues in the Politburo, primarily M.A. Suslov, driven by personal interests and the desire to remain in power, persuaded him not to retire. By the end of the 1980s, the Brezhnev personality cult was already observed in the country, comparable to the similar cult of Khrushchev. Surrounded by the praise of his aging colleagues, Brezhnev remained in power until his death. The system of "praising the leader" was preserved after the death of Brezhnev - under Andropov, Chernenko and Gorbachev.
During the reign of M.S. Gorbachev, the Brezhnev era was called "the years of stagnation." However, Gorbachev's "leadership" of the country turned out to be much more disastrous for her and eventually led to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
See also:
BREZHNEV LEONID ILYICH (TSB) FROM THE BIOGRAPHICAL CHRONICLE OF L.I. BREZHNEV
1906, December 19. Born in the family of Ilya Yakovlevich and Natalia Denisovna Brezhnev in the city of Kamenskoye (since 1936 - the city of Dneprodzerzhinsk) of the Yekaterinoslav province in Ukraine.
1915. Admitted to the Kamensk Men's Classical Gymnasium.
1921. Graduates from the First Labor School (former gymnasium) in Kamenskoye. Fireman at the Dnieper Metallurgical Plant. Oil mill worker in Kursk.
1923. He enters the Kursk land management technical school, joins the Komsomol.
1927. Graduates from a technical school, begins working as a land surveyor in the Kursk region.
1927–1928 Moves to Sverdlovsk, works as a deputy district land commissioner, head of the land department in the Sverdlovsk region.
1929. Accepted as a candidate member of the CPSU (b).
1930. Works as deputy head of the district land administration in Sverdlovsk.
1930–1931 Student at the Kalinin Agricultural Machinery Institute in Moscow.
1931. Chairman of the trade union committee of the Institute. Arsenicheva in Kamenskoye. October 24th. Accepted as a member of the CPSU (b).
1932–1933 Secretary of the Party Committee of the Institute named after Arsenichev in Kamenskoye.
1933–1935 Director of the metallurgical technical school in Kamenskoye.
1935. Graduated with honors from the Arsenichev Institute in Kamenskoye (in absentia) and received the specialty of a thermal engineer. Works as a shift supervisor of the power department of the Dzerzhinsky plant.
1935. Cadet of the armored school in Chita. Political instructor of the tank company of the 14th mechanized corps of the DVK.
1937–1938 Deputy Chairman of the City Council of Dneprodzerzhinsk.
1938. Head of the trade department of the Dnepropetrovsk Regional Committee of the Communist Party (b) of Ukraine.
1940. Secretary of the Dnepropetrovsk regional committee of the CP (b) U for the defense industry.
1942 March He is awarded the first combat award - the Order of the Red Banner. Appointed Deputy Head of the Political Directorate of the Black Sea Group of Forces of the Transcaucasian Front.
1943. In connection with the abolition of the old military ranks, Brigadier Commissar Brezhnev is assigned a new rank - colonel. April 1st. Appointed head of the political department of the 18th army.
1945, May. Appointed head of the political department of the 4th Ukrainian Front. June 24. Participates in the Victory Parade in Moscow. Appointed head of the political department of the Carpathian military district.
1952, October. He delivers a speech at the 19th Congress of the CPSU. 16 October. At the plenum after the end of the 19th Party Congress, he was elected, at the suggestion of Stalin, a candidate member of the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee, secretary of the CPSU Central Committee.
1953 March Appointed Chief of the Political Directorate of the Naval Forces, Deputy Chief of the Main Political Directorate of the Soviet Army and Navy. The military rank of lieutenant general is assigned. June 26th. Included in the capture group with the aim of arresting Beria.
1956, February. At the plenum of the Central Committee of the Party after the end of the XX Congress of the CPSU, he is elected as a candidate member of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU, Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU, in charge of defense, heavy engineering and capital construction.
1957, June. Carries a microinfarction. June. Supports N.S. Khrushchev in his fight against the "anti-party group", is elected a member of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU.
1958. Deputy Chairman of the Bureau of the Central Committee of the CPSU for the RSFSR (concurrently).
1961. Awarded the title of Hero of Socialist Labor.
1963. Elected Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU.
1964, July. Leaves the post of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, focusing on the activities of the Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU.
1966, March 29 Makes a Report at the XXIII Congress of the CPSU. April 8th. Elected member of the Politburo, General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU.
1968, July-August. He chairs meetings of the Politburo, where the issue of bringing troops of the Warsaw Pact countries into Czechoslovakia is being decided.
1970, August 12 Signs together with German Chancellor W. Brandt the Moscow Treaty between the USSR and the FRG.
1972, May. Signs in Moscow, together with US President R. Nixon, the Interim Agreements on Certain Measures in the Sphere of Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms and the Treaty on the Organization of Anti-Missile Defense Systems between the USSR and the USA.
1973. Awarded with the International Lenin Prize "For strengthening peace between peoples."
1975, August. Participates in Helsinki in the signing of the Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe. November 27th. Awarded by the World Peace Council with the F. Joliot Curie Gold Peace Medal.
1976, February 24. He delivers a report at the XXV Congress of the CPSU. May 8 Awarded the title of Marshal of the Soviet Union. December 19th. In connection with the 70th anniversary of his birth, he is awarded the second Gold Star medal of the Hero of the Soviet Union.
1976. Suffering a stroke.
1977, May 24. At the Plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU, a decision is made to combine the posts of General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU and Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. June 16th. Elected Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.
1977. Awarded the highest award in the field of social sciences - the Karl Marx Gold Medal.
1978. The memoirs "Small Land", "Renaissance", "Tselina" are published. February 20th. He is awarded the highest military order "Victory" (after his death, the Decree on the award was canceled). December 19th. Awarded with the third "Gold Star" of the Hero of the Soviet Union.
1979, June 18 Signs in Vienna, together with D. Carter, the Treaty between the USSR and the USA on the limitation of strategic arms. December. Authorizes the entry of Soviet troops into Afghanistan.
1980, March 31. Presentation of the Lenin Prize in Literature. October 13th. Awarded with the Golden Mercury International Prize for Peace and Cooperation. December 18th. Awarded the second Order of the October Revolution (the only award).
1981, February 23. He delivers a report at the XXVI Congress of the CPSU. December 19th. In connection with the 75th anniversary of his birth, he is awarded the fourth Gold Star medal of the Hero of the Soviet Union.
1982, March 23. The incident at the Tashkent Aviation Plant (the collapse of the overpass along with people), during which L.I. Brezhnev received a fracture of the collarbone of his right hand. 10th of November. The death of L.I. Brezhnev. 15th of November. Funeral in Moscow on Red Square.
Source of information: A.A. Dantsev. Rulers of Russia: XX century. Rostov-on-Don, publishing house "Phoenix", 2000. Events during the reign of Brezhnev:
1968 - entry of ATS troops into Prague, Czechoslovakia, in connection with the announcement of radical reforms by A. Dubcek.
1970 - Lunokhod 1 is delivered to the Moon. The first on the Moon was the automatic interplanetary station (AMS) Luna-2, which left a badge with the Soviet coat of arms back in 1959.
Since 1974 - the construction of BAM by Komsomol members.
1977 - adoption of the new constitution of the USSR.
1979 - the entry of a limited contingent of Soviet troops (OKSV) into Afghanistan to strengthen the southern borders of the Soviet Union.
1980 - Olympics in Moscow. The United States initiated a boycott of the Olympics-80 in connection with the introduction of troops into Afghanistan, which was supported by 64 countries.
The path of the Soviet Union finally ended in 1991, although in a sense, its agony lasted until 1993. The final privatization started only in 1992-1993, simultaneously with the transition to a new monetary system.
The bright period of the Soviet Union, more precisely, its dying, was the so-called "perestroika". But what brought the USSR first under perestroika, and then under the final dismantling of socialism and the Soviet system?
The year 1953 was marked by the death of the long-term de facto leader of the USSR, Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin. After his death, a struggle for power began between the most influential members of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU. On March 5, 1953, the most influential members of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU were Malenkov, Beria, Molotov, Voroshilov, Khrushchev, Bulganin, Kaganovich, Mikoyan. On September 7, 1953, at the plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU, N. S. Khrushchev was elected First Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU.
At the Twentieth Congress of the CPSU in February 1956, Stalin's personality cult was condemned. But the most important mine was planted under the very structure of the Leninist principle of the Soviet state at the 22nd Congress in October 1961. This congress removed the main principle of building a communist society - the dictatorship of the proletariat, replacing it with the anti-scientific concept of a "state of the whole people". What was also terrible here was that this congress became a virtual mass of voiceless delegates. They accepted all the principles of a virtual revolution in the Soviet system. The first shoots of decentralization of the economic mechanism followed. But since the pioneers often do not stay in power for a long time, already in 1964 the plenum of the Central Committee of the CPSU removed N. S. Khrushchev from the post of First Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU.
This time is often called the "restoration of the Stalinist order", the freezing of reforms. But this is just philistine thinking and a simplified worldview, in which there is no scientific approach. Because already in 1965 the tactic of market reforms won out in the socialist economy. The "People's State" came into its own. In fact, under the strict planning of the national economic complex, the result was summed up. The unified national economic complex began to unravel, and subsequently to disintegrate. One of the authors of the reform was A. N. Kosygin, Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR. Reformers constantly boast that as a result of their reform, enterprises have gained "independence." In fact, this gave power to the directors of enterprises and the right to conduct speculative transactions. As a result, these actions led to the gradual emergence of a shortage of necessary products for the population.
We all remember the "golden days" of Soviet cinema in the 1970s. For example, in the film “Ivan Vasilyevich Changes His Profession”, the viewer is clearly shown how the actor Demyanenko, who plays the role of Shurik, buys the semiconductors he needs not in stores that are closed for repairs or for lunch for some reason, but from a speculator. A speculator who was kind of "condemned and condemned" by the Soviet society of that period.
The political and economic literature of that time acquires a unique anti-scientific terminology of "developed socialism". But what is "developed socialism"? Strictly following the Marxist-Leninist philosophy, we all know that socialism is a transitional period between capitalism and communism, a period of the withering away of the old order. An acute class struggle led by the working class. And what do we get as a result? That some incomprehensible stage of something appears there.
The same thing happened in the party apparatus. Hardened careerists and opportunists rather than ideologically hardened people began to willingly join the CPSU. The party apparatus becomes virtually uncontrolled by society. No trace of the dictatorship of the proletariat remains here.
In politics, at the same time, there is a tendency towards the irremovability of leading cadres, their physical aging and decrepitude. Career ambitions emerge. Soviet cinematography also did not ignore this moment. In some places this was ridiculed, but there were also brilliant tapes of that time that gave a critical analysis of the ongoing processes. For example, the film of 1982 - the social drama "Magistral", which posed with all its frankness the problem of decomposition and degradation in a single industry - on the railway. But in the films of that time, mainly in comedies, we already find direct glorifications of individualism, ridicule of the working man. In this field, the film "Office Romance" especially distinguished itself.
There are already systematic disruptions in trade. Of course, now the directors of enterprises are in fact the masters of their destinies, they have “independence”.
Anti-communists often mention in their "scientific" and anti-scientific writings that in the 1980s the country was already seriously ill. Only an enemy can be closer than a friend. Even if we do not take into account the frank slop that the anti-communists poured out on the USSR, a rather difficult situation actually loomed in the country.
For example, I myself remember well how in the early 1980s we traveled from the “undeveloped” Pskov region of the RSFSR to the “developed” and “advanced” Estonian SSR for groceries.
Such a country approached the turn of the mid-1980s. Even from the films of that period, it is already clear that the country no longer believes in building communism. Even the 1977 film "Racers" clearly shows what ideas were in the minds of the townsfolk, although at that time they also tried to show the character of this film in a negative light.
In 1985, after a series of deaths of "irremovable" leaders, a relatively young politician, M. S. Gorbachev, came to power. His long speeches, the very meaning of which went into the void, could go on for many hours. But the time was such that the people, as in the old days, believed the deceitful reformers, since the main thing on their minds was changes in life. But what happens to the layman? What do I want - I do not know?
Perestroika became a catalyst for accelerating all the destructive processes in the USSR, which had been accumulating and smoldering for a long time. Already by 1986, openly anti-Soviet elements appeared, which set as their goal the dismantling of the workers' state and the restoration of the bourgeois order. By 1988 it was already an irreversible process.
Anti-Soviet groups of that period appeared in the culture of that time - "Nautilus Pompilius" and "Civil Defense". According to an old habit, the authorities try to "drive" everything that does not fit into the framework of the official culture. However, even here dialectics threw out strange things. Subsequently, it was the "Civil Defense" that became a bright revolutionary beacon of anti-capitalist protest, thereby forever fixing all the contradictory phenomena of that era behind the Soviet era, as rather Soviet than anti-Soviet phenomena. But even the criticism of that time was at a fairly professional level, which was clearly reflected in the song of the Aria group - “What did you do with your dream?”, where the entire path traveled is actually overturned as erroneous.
In its wake, the era of perestroika brought out the most disgusting characters, the vast majority of whom were just members of the CPSU. In Russia, B. N. Yeltsin became such a person, who lowered the country into a bloody mess. This is the shooting of the bourgeois parliament, which, out of habit, still had a Soviet shell, this is the Chechen war. In Latvia, such a character was the former member of the CPSU A. V. Gorbunov, who continued to rule bourgeois Latvia until the mid-1990s. These characters were praised by the Soviet encyclopedias of the 1980s, calling them "outstanding leaders of the party and government."
"Sausage inhabitants" usually judge the Soviet era by perestroika horror stories about Stalin's "terror", through the prism of their narrow-minded perception of empty shelves and shortages. But their mind refuses to accept the fact that it was the large-scale decentralization and capitalization of the country that led the USSR to such results.
But how much strength and mind of the ideological Bolsheviks was applied in order to raise their country to a cosmic level of development by the mid-1950s, to go through a terrible war with the most terrible enemy on Earth - fascism. The dismantling of communist development, which began in the 1950s, continued for more than 30 years, preserving the main features of socialist development and a just society. After all, at the beginning of its journey, the Communist Party was a truly ideological party - the vanguard of the working class, a beacon of the development of society.
Throughout this story, it is clearly manifested that not owning one's ideological weapon - Marxism-Leninism, leads the leaders of the party to the betrayal of the entire people.
We did not set ourselves the goal of analyzing in detail all the stages of the decomposition of Soviet society. The purpose of this article is only to describe the chronology of some significant events of Soviet life and its individual significant aspects of the post-Stalin period.
Nevertheless, it would be fair to mention that the relative modernization of the country continued throughout the entire period of the country's existence. Until the end of the 1980s, we observed the positive development of many social institutions and technological development. Somewhere the pace of development slowed down significantly, something continued to remain at a very high level. Medicine and education developed, cities were built, infrastructure improved. The country moved forward by inertia.
In the Dark Ages, our path went at an accelerated pace and irreversibly only since 1991.
Andrey Krasny
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Over the 69 years of the existence of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, several people have become the head of the country. The first ruler of the new state was Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (real name Ulyanov), who led the Bolshevik Party during the October Revolution. Then the role of the head of state was actually performed by a person who held the post of General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU (Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union).
IN AND. Lenin
The first significant decision of the new Russian government was the refusal to participate in the bloody world war. Lenin managed to achieve it, despite the fact that some members of the party were against the conclusion of peace on unfavorable terms (the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk). Having saved hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of lives, the Bolsheviks immediately put them at risk in another war - the civil one. The fight against the interventionists, anarchists and White Guards, as well as other opponents of the Soviet regime, brought quite a few human casualties.
In 1921, Lenin initiated the transition from the policy of war communism to the New Economic Policy (NEP), which contributed to the rapid recovery of the country's economy and national economy. Lenin also contributed to the establishment of a one-party system in the country and the formation of the Union of Socialist Republics. The USSR in the form in which it was created did not meet the requirements of Lenin, however, he did not manage to make significant changes.
In 1922, the hard work and the consequences of the assassination attempt made on him by the Socialist-Revolutionary Fanny Kaplan in 1918 made themselves felt: Lenin fell seriously ill. He took less and less part in government and other people came to the fore. Lenin himself spoke with anxiety about his possible successor, the general secretary of the party, Stalin: “Comrade Stalin, having become general secretary, has concentrated immense power in his hands, and I am not sure whether he will always be able to use this power with sufficient caution.” On January 21, 1924, Lenin died, and Stalin, as expected, became his successor.
One of the main directions to which V.I. Lenin paid great attention to the development of the Russian economy. At the direction of the first leader of the country of the Soviets, many factories for the production of equipment were organized, the completion of the AMO automobile plant (later ZiL) in Moscow began. Lenin paid great attention to the development of domestic energy and electronics. Perhaps if fate had given the “leader of the world proletariat” (as Lenin was often called) more time, he would have raised the country to a high level.
I.V. Stalin
A tougher policy was pursued by Lenin's successor, Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (real name Dzhugashvili), who in 1922 took the post of General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU. Now the name of Stalin is mainly associated with the so-called "Stalinist repressions" of the 30s, when several million inhabitants of the USSR were deprived of their property (the so-called "dispossession"), went to prison or were executed for political reasons (for condemning the current government).
Indeed, the years of Stalin's rule left a bloody trail in the history of Russia, but there were also positive features of this period. During this time, from an agrarian country with a secondary economy, the Soviet Union turned into a world power with a huge industrial and military potential. The development of the economy and industry affected the years of the Great Patriotic War, which, although it cost the Soviet people dearly, was nevertheless won. Already during the hostilities, it was possible to establish a good supply of the army, to create new types of weapons. After the war, many were restored at an accelerated pace, destroyed almost to the foundation of the city.
N.S. Khrushchev
Shortly after Stalin's death (March 1953), Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev became General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU (September 13, 1953). This leader of the CPSU became famous, perhaps, most of all for his extraordinary deeds, many of which are still remembered. So, in 1960, at the UN General Assembly, Nikita Sergeevich took off his shoe and, threatening to show Kuz'kin's mother, began to knock on the podium with it in protest against the speech of the Filipino delegate. The period of Khrushchev's rule is associated with the development of an arms race between the USSR and the USA (the so-called "Cold Out"). In 1962, the deployment of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba almost led to a military conflict with the United States.
Of the positive changes that occurred during the reign of Khrushchev, one can note the rehabilitation of the victims of Stalinist repressions (having taken the post of general secretary, Khrushchev initiated the dismissal of Beria and his arrest), the development of agriculture through the development of unplowed lands (virgin lands), as well as the development of industry. It was during the reign of Khrushchev that the first launch of an artificial satellite of the Earth and the first manned flight into space took place. The period of Khrushchev's rule has an unofficial name - "Khrushchev's thaw."
L.I. Brezhnev
Khrushchev was replaced as General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee by Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev (October 14, 1964). For the first time, a party leader was replaced not after his death, but by removal from office. The era of Brezhnev's rule went down in history as "stagnation". The fact is that the Secretary General was a staunch conservative and an opponent of any reforms. The Cold War continued, which caused most of the resources to go to the military industry at the expense of other areas. Therefore, during this period, the country practically stopped in its technical development and began to lose to other leading powers of the world (excluding the military industry). In 1980, the XXII Summer Olympic Games were held in Moscow, which were boycotted by some countries (USA, Germany and others), in protest against the introduction of Soviet troops into Afghanistan.
During the Brezhnev era, some attempts were made to defuse tensions with the United States: US-Soviet treaties on the limitation of strategic offensive weapons were concluded. But these attempts were crossed out by the introduction of Soviet troops into Afghanistan in 1979. In the late 80s, Brezhnev was no longer actually able to govern the country and was only considered the leader of the party. On November 10, 1982, he died at his dacha.
Yu. V. Andropov
On November 12, Khrushchev's place was taken by Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov, who previously headed the State Security Committee (KGB). He achieved sufficient support among party leaders, therefore, despite the resistance of former supporters of Brezhnev, he was elected General Secretary, and then Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.
Having taken the helm, Andropov proclaimed a course for socio-economic transformation. But all the reforms were reduced to administrative measures, strengthening discipline and exposing corruption in the highest circles. In foreign policy, the confrontation with the West only intensified. Andropov strove to strengthen his personal power: in June 1983 he held the post of chairman of the presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, while remaining secretary general. However, Andropov did not stay in power for long: he died on February 9, 1984 due to kidney disease, before he could make significant changes in the life of the country.
K.U. Chernenko
On February 13, 1984, the post of head of the Soviet state was taken by Konstantin Ustinovich Chernenko, who was considered a contender for the post of general secretary even after the death of Brezhnev. Chernenko held this important post at the age of 72, being seriously ill, so it was clear that this was only a temporary figure. During the reign of Chernenko, a number of reforms were undertaken, which were never brought to their logical conclusion. On September 1, 1984, the Day of Knowledge was celebrated for the first time in the country. March 10, 1985 Chernenko died. His place was taken by Mikhail Sergeevich Gorbachev, who later became the first and last president of the USSR.
He began his career after graduating from the 4th grade of the zemstvo school in the house of the nobleman Mordukhai-Bolotovsky. Here he served as a footman.
Then there were hard ordeals in search of work, later the position of an apprentice at a turner at the Stary Arsenal gun factory.
And then there was the Putilov factory. Here, for the first time, he encountered underground revolutionary organizations of workers, whose activities he had long heard about. He immediately joined them, joined the Social Democratic Party, and even organized his own educational circle at the factory.
After the first arrest and release, he left for the Caucasus (he was forbidden to live in St. Petersburg and its environs), where he continued his revolutionary activities.
After a second short imprisonment, he moves to Revel, where he also actively establishes ties with revolutionary figures and activists. He begins to write articles for Iskra, collaborates with the newspaper as a correspondent, distributor, liaison, etc.
For several years, he was arrested 14 times! But he continued his work. By 1917 he played an important role in the Petrograd organization of the Bolsheviks and was elected a member of the executive commission of the St. Petersburg party committee. Actively participated in the development of the revolutionary program.
At the end of March 1919, Lenin personally proposed his candidacy for the post of chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. Simultaneously with him, F. Dzerzhinsky, A. Beloborodov, N. Krestinsky and others applied for this post.
The first document that Kalinin spoke during the meeting was a declaration containing the immediate tasks of the All-Union Central Executive Committee.
During the civil war, he often visited the fronts, conducted active propaganda work among the soldiers, traveled to the villages of the village, where he held conversations with the peasants. Despite his high position, he was easy to communicate with, able to find an approach to anyone. In addition, he himself was from a peasant family and worked for many years at the factory. All this instilled confidence in him, forced to listen to his words.
For many years, people who faced a problem or injustice wrote to Kalinin, and in most cases received real help.
In 1932, thanks to him, the operation to expel several tens of thousands of dispossessed and expelled families from collective farms was stopped.
After the end of the war for Kalinin became a priority issues of economic and social development of the country. Together with Lenin, he developed plans and documents for electrification, the restoration of heavy industry, the transport system and agriculture.
It was not without him when choosing the statute of the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, drafting the Declaration on the Formation of the USSR, the union treaty, the Constitution and other significant documents.
During the 1st Congress of Soviets of the USSR, he was elected one of the chairmen of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR.
The main activity in foreign policy was the work on the recognition of the country of councils by other states.
In all his affairs, even after the death of Lenin, he strictly adhered to the line of development outlined by Ilyich.
On the first day of winter 1934, he signed a resolution that subsequently gave the "green light" for mass repressions.
In January 1938 he became chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. He has been in this position for over 8 years. Resigned a few months before his death.
Image caption The royal family hid the illness of the heir to the throne
Disputes about the state of health of President Vladimir Putin make us recall the Russian tradition: the first person was regarded as an earthly deity, which was not supposed to be remembered irreverently and in vain.
Possessing practically unlimited power for life, the rulers of Russia fell ill and died like mere mortals. It is said that in the 1950s, one of the liberal-minded young "stadium poets" once said: "Only they have no control over heart attacks!"
Discussion of the personal lives of the leaders, including their physical condition, was banned. Russia is not America, where the analysis data of presidents and presidential candidates and their blood pressure figures are published.
Tsesarevich Alexei Nikolayevich, as you know, suffered from congenital hemophilia - a hereditary disease in which blood does not coagulate normally, and any injury can lead to death from internal hemorrhage.
The only person capable of improving his condition in some way still incomprehensible to science was Grigory Rasputin, who, in modern terms, was a strong psychic.
Nicholas II and his wife categorically did not want to make public the fact that their only son is actually a disabled person. Even the ministers knew only in general terms that the Tsarevich had health problems. Ordinary people, seeing the heir during rare public outings in the arms of a hefty sailor, considered him a victim of an assassination attempt by terrorists.
Whether Alexei Nikolayevich could subsequently lead the country, or not, is unknown. His life at less than 14 years was cut short by a KGB bullet.
Vladimir Lenin
Image caption Lenin was the only Soviet leader whose health was not a secret.The founder of the Soviet state died unusually early, at the age of 54, from progressive atherosclerosis. An autopsy showed damage to the cerebral vessels incompatible with life. There were rumors that the development of the disease was provoked by untreated syphilis, but there is no evidence for this.
The first stroke, which resulted in partial paralysis and loss of speech, happened to Lenin on May 26, 1922. After that, for more than a year and a half he was at the dacha in Gorki in a helpless state, interrupted by short remissions.
Lenin is the only Soviet leader whose physical condition was not a secret. Medical bulletins were published regularly. At the same time, comrades-in-arms assured until the last days that the leader would recover. Joseph Stalin, who visited Lenin in Gorki more often than other members of the leadership, posted optimistic reports in Pravda about how he and Ilyich joked merrily about reinsurer doctors.
Joseph Stalin
Image caption Stalin's illness was reported the day before his deathThe “Leader of the Peoples” in recent years suffered from severe damage to the cardiovascular system, probably aggravated by an unhealthy lifestyle: he worked hard, while turning night into day, ate fatty and spicy foods, smoked and drank, and did not like to be examined and treated.
According to some reports, the "doctors' case" began with the fact that professor-cardiologist Kogan advised a high-ranking patient to rest more. The suspicious dictator saw this as someone's attempt to remove him from business.
Having started the "doctors' case", Stalin was left without qualified medical care at all. Even the closest people could not talk to him on this topic, and he intimidated the servants so much that after a stroke that happened on March 1, 1953 at the Middle Dacha, he lay on the floor for several hours, as he had previously forbidden the guards to disturb him without calling.
Even after Stalin turned 70, public discussion of his health and forecasts of what would happen to the country after his departure were absolutely impossible in the USSR. The idea that we would ever be "without him" was considered blasphemous.
For the first time, the people were informed about Stalin's illness the day before his death, when he had long been unconscious.
Leonid Brezhnev
Image caption Brezhnev "ruled without regaining consciousness"Leonid Brezhnev in recent years, as the people joked, "ruled without regaining consciousness." The very possibility of such jokes confirmed that after Stalin the country had changed a lot.
The 75-year-old general secretary had enough senile illnesses. In particular, sluggish leukemia was mentioned. However, it is difficult to say from what, in fact, he died.
Doctors spoke of a general weakening of the body, caused by the abuse of sedatives and sleeping pills, which caused memory lapses, loss of coordination and speech disorder.
In 1979, Brezhnev lost consciousness during a meeting of the Politburo.
"You know, Mikhail," Yuri Andropov said to Mikhail Gorbachev, who had just been transferred to Moscow and was not accustomed to such scenes, "everything must be done to support Leonid Ilyich in this position as well. This is a matter of stability."
Brezhnev was politically killed by television. In the old days, his condition could have been hidden, but in the 1970s it was impossible to avoid regular appearances on the screen, including on the air.
The obvious inadequacy of the leader, combined with the complete absence of official information, caused an extremely negative reaction from society. Instead of pity for the sick person, the people responded with jokes and anecdotes.
Yuri Andropov
Image caption Andropov suffered from kidney damageYuri Andropov most of his life suffered from severe kidney damage, from which, in the end, he died.
The disease caused an increase in blood pressure. In the mid-1960s, Andropov was intensively treated for hypertension, but this did not give results, and there was a question about his retirement due to disability.
Kremlin doctor Yevgeny Chazov had a dazzling career thanks to the fact that he correctly diagnosed the head of the KGB and gave him about 15 years of active life.
In June 1982, at the plenum of the Central Committee, when the speaker called from the rostrum to "give a party assessment" to the spreaders of rumors, Andropov unexpectedly intervened and said in a harsh tone that he was "warning for the last time" those who talk too much in conversations with foreigners. According to the researchers, he meant, first of all, leaks of information about his health.
In September, Andropov went on vacation to the Crimea, where he caught a cold and never got out of bed again. In the Kremlin hospital, he regularly underwent hemodialysis, a blood purification procedure using equipment that replaces the normal functioning of the kidneys.
Unlike Brezhnev, who once fell asleep and did not wake up, Andropov died a long and painful death.
Konstantin Chernenko
Image caption Chernenko rarely appeared in public, spoke breathlesslyAfter Andropov's death, the need to give the country a young dynamic leader was obvious to everyone. But the old members of the Politburo nominated 72-year-old Konstantin Chernenko, formally the No. 2 man, as general secretary.
As the former Minister of Health of the USSR Boris Petrovsky later recalled, they all thought exclusively about how to die in office, they had no time for the country, and even more so, no time for reforms.
Chernenko had suffered from emphysema for a long time, heading the state, almost did not work, rarely appeared in public, spoke, choking and swallowing words.
In August 1983, he suffered a severe poisoning after eating on vacation in the Crimea fish caught and smoked by his neighbor in the country, Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR Vitaly Fedorchuk. Many were treated to the gift, but nothing bad happened to anyone else.
Konstantin Chernenko died on March 10, 1985. Three days earlier, elections to the Supreme Soviet were held in the USSR. Television showed the General Secretary, who unsteadily walked up to the ballot box, dropped the ballot into it, languidly waved his hand and slurred: "Good."
Boris Yeltsin
Image caption Yeltsin, as far as is known, suffered five heart attacksBoris Yeltsin suffered from severe heart disease and reportedly suffered five heart attacks.
The first president of Russia was always proud of the fact that nothing takes him, went in for sports, swam in ice water and built his image on this in many respects, and was used to enduring ailments on his feet.
Yeltsin's health deteriorated sharply in the summer of 1995, but elections were ahead, and he refused extensive treatment, although doctors warned of "irreparable harm to health." According to journalist Alexander Khinshtein, he said: "After the elections, at least cut, but now leave me alone."
On June 26, 1996, a week before the second round of elections, Yeltsin had a heart attack in Kaliningrad, which was concealed with great difficulty.
On August 15, immediately after taking office, the president went to the clinic, where he underwent coronary bypass surgery. This time he conscientiously followed all the instructions of the doctors.
In the conditions of freedom of speech, it was difficult to hide the truth about the state of health of the head of state, but the entourage tried as best they could. It was admitted, in extreme cases, that he had ischemia and temporary colds. Press Secretary Sergei Yastrzhembsky said that the president rarely appears in public, because he is extremely busy working with documents, but his handshake is iron.
Separately, the question of Boris Yeltsin's relationship with alcohol should be mentioned. Political opponents constantly exaggerated this topic. One of the main slogans of the Communists during the 1996 campaign was: "Instead of the drunken El, let's choose Zyuganov!"
Meanwhile, Yeltsin appeared in public "under the fly" the only time - during the famous conducting of the orchestra in Berlin.
The former head of the presidential guard, Alexander Korzhakov, who had no reason to shield the former chief, wrote in his memoirs that in September 1994 in Shannon, Yeltsin did not get off the plane to meet with the Prime Minister of Ireland, not because of intoxication, but because of a heart attack. After a quick consultation, the advisers decided that people should believe the "alcoholic" version rather than admit that the leader was seriously ill.
Retirement, regime and peace had a beneficial effect on the health of Boris Yeltsin. He lived in retirement for almost eight years, although in 1999, according to doctors, he was in serious condition.
Is it worth hiding the truth?
According to experts, illness is certainly not a plus for a statesman, but in the era of the Internet it is pointless to hide the truth, and with skillful PR, one can even extract political dividends from it.
As an example, analysts point to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who made good publicity out of his fight against cancer. Supporters got a reason to be proud that their idol does not burn in the fire and even in the face of illness thinks about the country, and rallied around him even stronger.