PART 1: NEW LIES FOR OLD: THE COMMUNIST STRATEGY OF DECEPTION AND DISINFORMATION

NEW LIES FOR OLD 
The Communist Strategy of 
Deception and Disinformation 
by Anatoliy Golitsyn

Editors' Foreword 

VERY RARELY disclosures of information from behind the Iron Curtain throw new light on the roots of communist thought and action and challenge accepted notions on the operation of the communist system. We believe that this book does both these things. It is nothing if not controversial. It rejects conventional views on subjects ranging from Khrushchev's overthrow to Tito's revisionism, from Dubcek's liberalism to Ceausescu's independence, and from the dissident movement to the Sino-Soviet split. The author's analysis has many obvious implications for Western policy. It will not be readily accepted by those who have for long been committed to opposing points of view. But we believe that the debates it is likely to provoke will lead to a deeper understanding of the nature of the threat from international communism and, perhaps, to a firmer determination to resist it. 

The author's services to the party and the KGB and the unusually long periods he spent in study, mainly in the KGB but also with the University of Marxism-Leninism and the Diplomatic School, make the author uniquely well qualified as a citizen of the West to write about the subjects covered in this book. 

He was born near Poltava, in the Ukraine, in 1926. He was thus brought up as a member of the post revolutionary generation. From 1933 onward he lived in Moscow. He joined the communist youth movement (Komsomol) at the age of fifteen while he was a cadet in military school. He became a member of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) in 1945 while studying at the artillery school for officers at Odessa. 

In the same year he entered military counterintelligence. On graduation from the Moscow school of military counterespionage in 1946, he joined the Soviet intelligence service. While working in its headquarters he attended evening classes at the University of Marxism-Leninism, from which he graduated in 1948. From 1948 to 1950 he studied in the counterintelligence faculty of the High Intelligence School; also, between 1949 and 1952 he completed a correspondence course with the High Diplomatic School. 

In 1952 and early 1953 he was involved, with a friend, in drawing up a proposal to the Central Committee on the reorganization of Soviet intelligence. The proposal included suggestions on the strengthening of counterintelligence, on the wider use of the satellite intelligence services, and on the reintroduction of the "activist style" into intelligence work. In connection with this proposal, he attended a meeting of the Secretariat chaired by Stalin and a meeting of the Presidium chaired by Malenkov and attended by Khrushchev, Brezhnev, and Bulganin. 

For three months in 1952-53 the author worked as a head of section in the department of the Soviet intelligence service responsible for counterespionage against the United States. In 1953 he was posted to Vienna, where he served for two years under cover as a member of the apparat of the Soviet High Commission. For the first year he worked against Russian emigres, and for the second against British intelligence. In 1954 he was elected to be a deputy secretary of the party organization in the KGB residency in Vienna, numbering seventy officers. On return to Moscow he attended the KGB Institute, now the KGB Academy, as a full-time student for four years, graduating from there with a law degree in 1959. As a student of the institute and as a party member, he was well placed to follow the power struggle in the Soviet leadership that was reflected in secret party letters, briefings, and conferences. 

From 1959 to 1960, at a time when a new long-range policy for the bloc was being formulated and the KGB was being reorganized to play its part in it, he served as a senior analyst in the NATO section of the Information Department of the Soviet intelligence service. He was then transferred to Finland, where, under cover as vice-consul in the Soviet embassy in Helsinki, he worked on counterintelligence matters until his break with the regime in December 1961. By 1956 he was already beginning to be disillusioned with the Soviet system. The Hungarian events of that year intensified his disaffection. He concluded that the only practical way to fight the regime was from abroad and that, armed with his inside knowledge of the KGB, he would be able to do so effectively. Having reached his decision, he began systematically to elicit and commit to memory information that he thought would be relevant and valuable to the West. The adoption of the new, aggressive long-range communist policy precipitated his decision to break with the regime. He felt that the necessity of warning the West of the new dimensions of the threat that it was facing justified him in abandoning his country and facing the personal sacrifices involved. His break with the regime was a deliberate and long-premeditated political act. Immediately on his arrival in the United States, he sought to convey a warning to the highest authorities in the U.S. government on the new political dangers to the Western world stemming from the harnessing of all the political resources of the communist bloc, including its intelligence and security services, to the new long-range policy. 

From 1962 onward the author devoted a large proportion of his time to the study of communist affairs as an outside observer reading both the communist and Western press. He began work on this book. While working on the book he continued to bring to the attention of American and other Western authorities his views on the issues considered in it, and in 1968 allowed American and British officials to read the manuscript as it then stood. Although the manuscript has since been enlarged to cover the events of the last decade and revised as the underlying communist strategy became clearer to the author, the substance of the argument has changed little since 1968. Owing to the length of the manuscript, a substantial part of it has been held over for publication at a later date. 

With few exceptions, those Western officials who were aware of the views expressed in the manuscript, especially on the Sino-Soviet split, rejected them. In fact, over the years it became increasingly clear to the author that there was no reasonable hope of his analysis of communist affairs being seriously considered in Western official circles. At the same time, he became further convinced that events continued to confirm the validity of his analysis, that the threat from international communism was not properly understood, and that this threat would shortly enter a new and more dangerous phase. The author therefore decided to publish his work with the intention of alerting a wider sector of world public opinion to the dangers as he sees them, in the hope of stimulating a new approach to the study of communism and of provoking a more coherent, determined, and effective response to it by those who remain interested in the preservation of free societies in the non-communist world. 

In order to give effect to his decision to publish, the author asked the four of us, all former U.S. or British government officials, for editorial advice and help. Three of us have known the author and his views for twelve years or more. We can testify to his Sisyphean efforts to convince others of the validity of what he has to say. We have the highest regard for his personal and professional integrity. The value of his services to national security has been officially recognized by more than one government in the West. Despite the rejection of his views by many of our former colleagues, we continue to believe that the contents of this book are of the greatest importance and relevance to a proper understanding of contemporary events. We were, therefore, more than willing to respond to the author's requests for help in editing his manuscript for publication, and we commend the book for the most serious study by all who are interested in relations between the communist and non-communist worlds. 

The preparation of the manuscript has been undertaken by the author with the help of each of us, acting in an individual and private capacity. 

The author is a citizen of the United States of America and an Honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE). 

STEPHEN DE MOWBRAY 

ARTHUR MARTIN 

VASIA C. GMIRKIN 

SCOTT MILER

Author's Note 

THIS BOOK is the product of nearly twenty years of my life. It presents my convictions that, throughout that period, the West has misunderstood the nature of changes in the communist world and has been misled and outmaneuvered by communist guile. My researches have not only strengthened my belief, but have led me to a new methodology by which to analyze communist actions. This methodology takes into account the dialectical character of communist strategic thinking. It is my hope that the methodology will come to be used by students of communist affairs throughout the Western world. 

I accept sole responsibility for the contents of the book. In writing it, I have received no assistance of any kind from any government or other organization. I submitted the text to the appropriate US authorities, who raised no objection to its publication on grounds of national security. 

For the transliteration of Russian names I have used the system adopted by US government agencies. The transliteration of Chinese names follows the old system. 

I wish to thank my friends, Stephen de Mowbray and Arthur Martin, who did the lion's share of the editing and helped me throughout with their editorial advice. I thank, too, Vasia C. Gmirkin and Scott Miler for their contributions to editing and for their editorial advice. 

I am grateful to PC, PW, RH, PH, and AK for their dedication in typing the manuscript, to the wives of my friends who suffered in silence during its preparation, and especially to my wife, Svetlana, for her encouragement and her forbearance. 

I wish to express my deep gratitude to two of my American friends, who will remain unnamed, for their help and their efforts in bringing my manuscript to the attention of the publishers, Dodd, Mead & Company. The publishers deserve my admiration for their grasp of the significance of the manuscript and for having the courage to publish such a controversial book. I am especially grateful to Allen Klots, of Dodd, Mead & Company, who revealed a great personal interest in the publication and also made the final editing of the manuscript. 

Finally, I thank the Soviet government and party for the excellent educational facilities that made this book possible; and I thank Russian history and literature for the inspiration they gave when guiding me toward my decision of conscience to serve the people rather than the party. 

ANATOLIY GOLITSYN

Men will not receive the truth from their enemies and it is very seldom offered to them by their friends; on this very account I have frankly uttered it. 

Alexis de Toqueville, 

DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA 

New lies for old. 

Attributed to Anna Akhmatova

PART ONE 

The Two Methodologies

1 

The Problems Facing Western Analysts

THE NON-COMMUNIST WORLD devotes considerable effort to the study of the communist world, and rightly so, since Western policy toward the communist world is based on Western assessments of the situation therein. Many institutions have sprung up in the United States, Great Britain, France, and elsewhere to study communist problems. Apart from traditional historical studies of pre-revolutionary Russia and China, new specialties have been invented, such as "Sovietology" or the more limited "Kremlinology," which study the policy-making level in the Soviet Union. Analogous specialties have been established in the fields of "China-watching" and East European studies. 

The results of Western studies are valid only if two sorts of difficulty are successfully overcome: the general difficulties stemming from the concern for secrecy displayed by communist regimes and the special difficulties arising from their use of disinformation. The failure of current Western studies is due in large part to the failure to appreciate the second set of difficulties. 

The General Difficulties 

The general difficulties and obstacles in the way of Western studies derive from the nature of communist regimes and are broadly recognized in the West. Principal among these difficulties are: 

• Special measures taken to prevent leakage of secret information relating to problems of policy-making and its execution, such as the payment of a 15 percent salary supplement to KGB officers for maintaining secrecy. 

• The existence of immensely powerful security service resources devoted to protecting state secrets and suppressing true freedom of expression. 

• The party and state monopoly over the publishing and communications media and the dissemination of information for both internal and external consumption. 

• Effective control and observation of foreign embassies, journalists, and visitors to communist countries and of their contacts in those countries. 

In principle, these measures are not new; they are the concomitants of all totalitarian systems, which apply them with varying techniques and degrees of efficiency. 

Although these difficulties complicate the study in the West of communist regimes and policies, they do not make it impossible. Western scholars have accumulated experience in dealing with the difficulties. The eyewitness accounts of many former inhabitants of the communist world now resident in the West have proved extremely helpful to the serious study of communist regimes and their problems in the past.1 If these general difficulties were the only ones, Western assessments of the situation in the communist world might be more or less accurate; however, there are other, special difficulties. 

The Special Difficulties: Disinformation 

The special difficulties derive from the deliberate efforts of communist governments to mislead and misdirect Western studies and assessments. These deliberate efforts are known as disinformation (in Russian, dezinformatsiya). The Great Soviet Encyclopedia says that the word is taken from two French roots, de(s), implying removal or elimination, and information, meaning knowledge.2 The G.S.E defines disinformation as the dissemination through press and radio of false data with the purpose of misleading public opinion. It goes on to say that the capitalist press and radio broadly use disinformation to deceive the people of the world and to portray the new war that the Anglo-American imperialist bloc are preparing as defensive and the peaceful policy of the Soviet Union and the people's democracies as aggressive. 

This would have been a broadly accurate definition of disinformation if the alleged roles of the "imperialist" and Soviet blocs had been reversed. In fact, disinformation has been used to a varying extent throughout the history of the Soviet Union. 

This book is primarily concerned with the communist use of strategic disinformation. The term means a systematic effort to disseminate false information and to distort or withhold information so as to misrepresent the real situation in, and policies of, the communist world and thereby to confuse, deceive, and influence the non-communist world, to jeopardize its policies, and to induce Western adversaries to contribute unwittingly to the achievement of communist objectives. Since 1958 a program of strategic political disinformation operations has been brought into effect. Its purpose has been to create favorable conditions for the implementation of long-range communist bloc policy, to impede the adoption of effective countermeasures or policies by the non-communist world, and to secure strategic gains for world communism. An understanding of the disinformation program is crucial to a correct analysis of the situation in the communist world, but its existence has been either ignored or discounted in the West. An attempt will be made in this book to explain, on the basis of the author's inside information and new methodology, the role of the disinformation program and the techniques employed in it. 

Disinformation in Communist Regimes 

It is not only by communist governments that disinformation is practiced. Nevertheless, disinformation plays a more significant role in communist regimes than in any other type. Its role is determined by the particular ways in which communist regimes respond to crises within their systems, by the unlimited extent of communist external objectives, and by the communist capacity for executing a worldwide, long-term, offensive political strategy. 

The role of disinformation in communist regimes can be clarified by comparing communist and democratic systems in the manner in which they respond to internal crises and in the nature of their external policies. 

In democratic societies internal crises are usually open and limited in their extent. A democratic system allows for the absorption of the forces of popular resentment through democratic elections, judicial processes, and flexible responses in the form of negotiation and mediation. For this reason political or social protest movements do not normally lead to revolts of the entire population against the regime. Crises usually result in some readjustments in the system and may seal the fate of individual politicians, groups, or parties, but the basic stability of the system remains unaffected. This kind of flexible, democratic response could be seen in the United States during the campaign against the Vietnam War and during the Watergate crisis and in France after the events of May 1968. 

In communist regimes crises are usually hidden from the outside world; because of the absence of democratic processes and the suppression of internal opposition, popular political, social, and economic discontents accumulate and threaten to develop into serious upheavals or revolts of the entire population against the system as a whole. This happened in Hungary in 1956. The manner of solving such a crisis in a communist system is normally arbitrary and authoritarian. 

As far as external policies are concerned, those of non-communist countries are normally dictated by national interest and have limited, short-term objectives. Except in time of war, they are usually defensive. Democratic governments deal directly with the governments of other countries and are constrained in their dealings with the opposition except in the event of civil war. Democratic governments tend to be either disinclined or unprepared to take advantage of crises in other countries that they may or may not regard as adversaries. 

Communist external policy, on the other hand, is global, ideological, and long-range, and has the final objective of world domination. It is inherently inclined to take the initiative unless it is forced onto the defensive by an extraordinary combination of circumstances. Whatever the appearances, communist foreign policy also tends to place considerable emphasis on its dealings with the extreme left-wing opposition to the established government as well as on its dealings with the government itself. Communism is always inclined, and usually prepared, to take advantage of any crisis in a non-communist country; it is required to do so by its long-term, unlimited objectives. 

The differences between communist and non-communist systems in their reactions to internal crises and in their external policies determine the different roles of disinformation in their respective systems. Democratic systems, being more open and therefore inherently more stable politically, do not need disinformation to hide the internal crises that occur from time to time and the means by which they are resolved. Crises become common knowledge and cannot be concealed. The Watergate crisis is a case in point. The main condition for the successful solution of such a crisis is that it should become public knowledge; therefore, there is no place for disinformation. Although democratic governments do manage news to some extent to project a better image of their performance, the use of special, clandestine methods for internal purposes is liable to be disclosed and exploited by the opposition in the next election campaign. In external policy democratic governments may practice disinformation on a limited scale in pursuit of their limited, national, and normally defensive objectives, but such disinformation tends to be on a modest scale and restricted to the military and counterintelligence fields. 

In communist regimes the role of disinformation is entirely different. It is conditioned in part by the inherent instability of communist systems. The political vulnerability of communist regimes, their concern for stability, and their undemocratic methods of resolving internal crises oblige them to use disinformation on a wide scale in order to conceal and dispel the threats to their existence and to present themselves in a favorable light as stable forms of society. The internal role of disinformation is, on the one hand, to conceal the undemocratic, anti-national, unlawful, and even criminal methods of resolving internal crises and, on the other, to minimize or neutralize internal anti-regime activities while at the same time preventing or neutralizing any attempt from outside to foment and exploit those activities. 

The special role of disinformation is enhanced by the aggressive and ambitious character of communist external policy. This aims at promoting and establishing communist regimes in non-communist countries throughout the world by giving support to the extreme left-wing opposition, by gaining temporary political allies, by exploiting and deepening whatever internal crises may occur, and even by creating artificial crises. In order to be successful, such a policy needs a cloak or screen to mask or distort its specific objectives, tactics, and maneuvers while at the same time it creates favorable conditions in the countries concerned for the achievement of its goals. Disinformation provides this cloak or screen and also a means of exerting influence. It is the combination of aggressiveness with disinformation that gives communist policy its conspiratorial character. This combination is not a matter of speculation but an existing and constant reality in communist activity that cannot be arbitrarily ignored by Western governments and scholars without affecting the accuracy and realism of their assessments of the communist world. 

The scope and scale of disinformation activity by communist regimes is virtually unlimited. There are no legal or political obstacles to disinformation operations. A police state with its centralized authority, its total control over resources, its untrammeled ability to execute maneuvers and sudden shifts in policy, and its immunity from the pressures of organized public opinion offers tremendous advantages for disinformation operations as compared with a democratic system. 

Given total control over the communications media, communist governments need have no fear of adverse publicity; they can say one thing in public and do the opposite in private with complete impunity. They can also use for disinformation purposes the facilities of their intelligence and security services, which operate on a scale and with an immunity unparalleled in the West. 

Given these advantages, it is not surprising that communist regimes should engage in disinformation at a state level as a significant part of their activities; they have unlimited opportunities to practice total disinformation, that is to say, to use all possible types of, and channels for, disinformation. 

Communist disinformation operations are controlled at the highest level of government. They serve to support the interests of long-range policy, and their forms, patterns, and objectives are therefore determined by the nature of the policy in any given period. 

In assessing the potentialities of communist strategic disinformation, it should be remembered that during the Second World War the Western allies showed themselves capable of devising ingenious and effective military and strategic deception operations. The three main conditions for the success of these operations were the existence of clearly defined and agreed allied war aims, the wartime system of press and radio censorship, and the insight the allies had gained into German intelligence, particularly through their ability to decipher German communications. In 1958-60 the communist regimes enjoyed comparable conditions and advantages in relation to the West.

2

 The Patterns of Disinformation: 

"Weakness and Evolution" 

THREE PATTERNS OF COMMUNIST STRATEGIC DISINFORMATION may be distinguished: a pattern for a period in which a specific, long-range policy is being pursued; a pattern for a period of crisis in a communist regime or its policy; and a pattern for a transitional period. 

The "Weakness and Evolution" Pattern 

The pattern of disinformation used during the implementation of a long-range policy may be called the "weakness and evolution" pattern, or the pattern of "calculated ideological moderation." Its aim is to calm the fears of the adversaries of international communism by understating real communist strength and to confound the policies of those adversaries by masking the realities of communist policy. 

When following this pattern, therefore, disinformation reflects real or imaginary weaknesses, splits, and crises in the communist world and projects an image of evolution away from an ideological toward a conventional, national system. The intention is that the nations of the non-communist world, accepting the alleged disunity and evolution of the communist world as genuine, will fail to respond effectively to communist offensive strategy and, in their confusion, will be induced to make practical miscalculations and mistakes in their dealings with the communist world. The major role of disinformation in the weakness and evolution pattern is to conceal and misrepresent the real nature, objectives, tactics, and techniques of communist policy. 

In order to gain and exploit temporary, tactical political allies and to avoid alarming them, efforts are made to conceal or understate the actual strength and aggressiveness of communism. Factual information favorable to communist regimes is withheld or downgraded; unfavorable information is disclosed, leaked, or invented. Given that communist, unlike democratic, governments are not concerned about their electoral prospects, they can afford to reveal true or false information unfavorable to themselves. During a period of policy implementation, real and artificial weaknesses in the system are emphasized; readjustments and solutions are presented as failures; ideological differences between communist and non-communist systems are played down; calculated moderation in, and even some departures from, communist dogma are permitted; common features and common interests between communist and democratic systems are overemphasized or exaggerated; long-range communist objectives and coordinated action in pursuit of them are hidden. But the major feature of this pattern is the projection of alleged splits and crises in the communist world and the alleged evolution of communist states into independent, conventional nation-states motivated like any others primarily by national interests. The pattern determines the forms and means. Special disinformation operations play the leading part; propaganda is relegated to a supporting role. 

The Precedent of the N.E.P 

The weakness and evolution pattern was used successfully by Lenin in the 1920's. In 1921 Soviet Russia faced imminent collapse. Industry lay ruined by the war; agriculture was in crisis. The Russian people, disillusioned by the rigid policy of "war communism," were on the brink of revolt; the policy of terror was proving ineffective; there were peasant uprisings in Siberia and along the Volga; nationalist movements in the Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, and Central Asia were openly proclaiming separatism and posed a serious threat to national unity; the sailors at the Kronstadt Naval Base revolted. Abroad, the hopes of world revolution had faded after communist defeats in Germany, Poland, and Hungary. The major European powers, although not united, were individually hostile to communism and to the new Soviet state; a huge Russian emigre movement, spread across Europe, was plotting the overthrow of the regime. Soviet Russia was in complete political and economic isolation. 

It was in this situation, facing a highly unfavorable balance of power vis-a-vis the West, that Lenin conceived and launched a long range policy that, over the following eight years, was to show spectacular success. It was given the deliberately misleading title of the New Economic Policy, or N.E.P. In fact, it ranged far beyond the economy, defining also the principal political and ideological objectives and tactics for the regime internally and externally and the strategy for the international communist movement. Within the terms of the N.E.P, the Soviet leaders were to eliminate separatism by creating a federation of national republics, the USSR. They were to introduce national long-term economic planning. They were to plan and build an electric power system to cover and bind together the whole country. They were to start to change the world balance of power in communist favor. 

To the world at large, the N.E.P meant that foreign industrialists were offered concessions in Soviet industry and invited to open businesses in Soviet Russia; that Soviet industrial enterprises were to be reorganized as trusts and operated on a profit basis; that smaller enterprises and properties could be owned by cooperatives or private individuals; that money was back in use and private trade permitted; that restrictions on travel were relaxed; that emigres were encouraged to return under amnesty, while some Soviet citizens were allowed to emigrate; and that Soviet diplomacy was seeking peaceful coexistence with the West. 

The Soviet leaders saw it differently. They intended that the N.E.P would not only bring about economic recovery, but would also serve to prevent internal revolt, expand foreign trade, attract foreign capital and expertise, gain diplomatic recognition from non-communist countries, prevent major conflict with the Western powers, help to exploit the contradictions in and between the capitalist countries, neutralize the emigre movement, and help to promote world revolution through the communist movement. 

Lenin believed that this fundamentally aggressive and ideological policy could prove effective if it was accompanied by the systematic use of misrepresentation and deception, or, to use the current word,disinformation. The characteristics of this disinformation were an apparent moderation in communist ideology, the avoidance of references to violence in communist methods, the exaggeration of the degree of the restoration of capitalism in Soviet Russia, the use of a sober and businesslike style in diplomatic and commercial negotiations with the West, and emphasis on disarmament and peaceful coexistence. All of this was intended to induce the belief in the outside world that the communist system was weak and losing its revolutionary ardor. Left to itself, it would either disintegrate or come to terms with the capitalist system. 

The Soviet security service was reorganized, renamed the O.G.P.U, and given new political tasks. It was directed to mount disinformation and political operations. False opposition movements were set up and controlled secretly by the O.G.P.U. They were designed to attract to their ranks genuine opponents of the regime inside and outside the country. These innocent persons could then be used by the regime in various ways. They could act as channels for disinformation; they could be blackmailed and recruited as agents; they could be arrested and given public trials. A characteristic, but not unique, example of this technique is provided by the so-called "Trust" operation. 

In 1921, as the N.E.P was being launched, the O.G.P.U created inside Soviet Russia a false anti-Soviet organization, the Monarchist Alliance of Central Russia. It had once been a genuine organization, founded by Czarist generals in Moscow and Leningrad but liquidated by the Soviet security service in 1919-20. Former members of this organization, among them Czarist generals and members of the old aristocracy who had come over to the Soviet side, nominally led the movement. Their new loyalty to the Soviet regime was not in doubt, for they had betrayed their former friends in the anticommunist underground. They were the Czarist generals Brusilov and Zaynchkovskiy; the Czarist military attache in Yugoslavia, General Potapov; and the Czarist transport official Yakushev. The most active agent in the Trust was a former intelligence officer of the General Staff in Czarist Russia whose many names included Opperput. 

Agents of the Trust traveled abroad and established confidential contact with genuine anticommunist emigre leaders in order (ostensibly) to coordinate activity against the Soviet regime. Among the important emigres they met were Boris Savinkov and Generals Wrangel and Kutepov. 

These agents confided in their contacts that the anti-Soviet monarchist movement that they represented was now well established in Soviet Russia, had penetrated into the higher levels of the army, the security service, and even the government, and would in time take power and restore the monarchy. They convinced the emigre leaders that the regime had undergone a radical change. Communism had completely failed; ideology was dead; the present leaders had nothing in common with the fanatical revolutionaries of the past. They were nationalists at heart, and their regime was evolving into a moderate, national regime and might soon collapse. The N.E.P should be seen as the first important concession on the road to restoring capitalism in Russia. Soon political concessions would follow. Because of this, said the Trust agents, any intervention or gesture of hostility from the European powers or the emigre movements would be ill-advised, if not tragic, since it would only unite the Russian people around their government and so extend its survival. The European governments and the emigre leaders should put a stop to anti-Soviet terrorist activities and change their attitude from hostility toward the Soviet regime to one of passive acceptance. They should grant diplomatic recognition and increase trade. In this way they would have a better opportunity to contribute to the evolutionary process. The emigre leaders should return to Russia to make their contribution. 

Naturally there were doubters among the emigres, but the prestige of the leaders of the organization (particularly, of General Brusilov) convinced the majority. They accepted at face value the Trust's disinformation and passed it on to their influential friends in the European intelligence services. By the time it had been circulated to governments as "secret" intelligence it sounded most impressive, and when as time went on the same story was confirmed by source after source, it became "secret and reliable." The intelligence services of Europe were committed and it was unthinkable that they could all be wrong. 

While the Trust was thriving the O.G.P.U took control, wholly or partially, of two other movements calculated to influence the political climate in support of the N.E.P. They were the "Change of Signposts" movement and the "Eurasian" movement. The first was used by the Soviet security service to mislead emigres and intellectuals in Europe into believing that the strength of communist ideology was on the wane and that the Soviet regime was evolving into a more moderate, national state. The movement published, with unofficial government assistance, a weekly magazine in Prague and Paris, The Change of Signposts, and in Berlin a paper, On the Eve. In 1922, at some risk, the Soviet government allowed two magazines to be published in Leningrad and Moscow, New Russia and Russia. They were intended to exert a similar influence on intellectuals inside the country. 

By 1926 all publications of the Change of Signposts movement had been wound up, the movement disbanded, and some of its leaders in the Soviet Union arrested. An official Soviet publication partially confirms the exploitation of the movement and describes its end. Shortly afterward, operation Trust was terminated with the arrest of those opponents of the regime who had been unwise enough to reveal themselves as such by associating with the Trust. 

To impress the Soviet people, trials of members of the opposition— some genuine, some false—were held throughout the country. Abroad, various means were used to damage, disrupt, and discredit both the emigre movements and the European intelligence services. Agents of both—some genuine, some false—were publicly tried in absentia; leaders of the emigre movements, European journalists, businessmen, diplomats, and government officials were blackmailed, on the basis of their involvement, into working for Soviet intelligence; individual emigre leaders, including Boris Savinkov and General Kutepov, and the Estonian ambassador in Moscow, Birk, were kidnapped; compromised spies were exchanged or recovered; selected persons and governments were held up to ridicule as "fools who had been deluded by the clever O.G.P.U provocation" or were pressured or blackmailed by the threat of being discredited. For example, as late as 1944, during the Soviet occupation of Finland, Zhdanov threatened Finnish President Mannerheim that if he did not comply with Soviet demands, he would be put on public trial for his involvement in anti-Soviet activities during operation Trust and thus be squeezed out of politics. 

The N.E.P was officially ended by Stalin in 1929 with what was called "a socialist offensive on all fronts." The concessions to foreign industrialists were canceled; private enterprise in the Soviet Union was prohibited; private property was confiscated; agriculture was collectivized; repression of political opposition was intensified. The N.E.P might never have been. 

The Results of the N.E.P 

Agriculture, industry, and trade all improved dramatically under the N.E.P. Although the N.E.P failed to attract large credits from the West, it brought technology and efficient new equipment. Thousands of Western technicians helped to industrialize the Soviet Union, and Western firms built essential factories there. It is fair to say that the foundations of Soviet heavy and military industry were laid in the 1920's with American, British, Czechoslovak, and, after the Treaty of Rapallo (1922), German help. Germany played an especially significant role in the Soviet militarization. According to the secret clauses of the treaty, Germans helped to build modern aviation and tank factories in the USSR. Communists spoke cynically of foreign concessionaires and businessmen as "assistants of socialism." Long range planning and industrialization were launched. De jure recognition of the Soviet Union by the West helped the regime to neutralize internal opposition and so to stabilize itself politically. The remnants of other political parties (Socialist Revolutionaries, Mensheviks, Zionists) were suppressed, liquidated, or exiled. The peasants were pacified. The independence of the churches was broken and new, controlled "living churches" accepted the regime. The nationalist and separatist movements in Georgia, the Ukraine, Armenia, and the Asian republics were crushed and their nations fully incorporated into the federal union. No new organized political opposition to the regime emerged during the N.E.P. Regular purges of communist party membership kept ideological purity intact; a minority of members succumbed to the temptations of capitalism and were expelled. The party and security service gained experience in activist methods and in controlling contacts with the West. The security service began to exercise effective control over Soviet society. 

The European bloc that it was anticipated would be formed against the Soviet Union did not materialize. De jure recognition was granted by all major countries except the USA. The Russian emigre movement was successfully penetrated, discredited, and left to disintegrate. The Treaty of Rapallo, signed with Germany in 1922 (the crowning achievement of Lenin's activist diplomacy), raised Soviet prestige, helped to increase Soviet military strength, precluded a united anti-communist front in Europe, and weakened the Weimar Republic. 

Between 1921 and 1929 twelve new communist parties joined the Comintern, bringing the total to forty-six. By the use of legal tactics, communist parties increased their influence in trade unions and parliaments. Though the bid to form a united front with the Socialist Internationals failed, some socialist parties—the German, French, Spanish, and Czechoslovak—split under the influence of the communist approach; the left-wing groups joined communist parties or formed new ones. Valuable experience was gained by the Comintern in the simultaneous use of revolutionary as well as legal tactics, in its readiness to switch from the one to the other, and in its ability to coordinate with Soviet diplomacy. United front tactics were successfully used by the communists in Nationalist China. Mongolia became the first Soviet satellite. 

The Lesson of the NEP 

The disinformation of the N.E.P period had been successful. Seen through Western eyes, the threat of communism under the N.E.P seemed to have become diffused. Fear of Bolshevism waned. The position of anticommunists was undermined. Expectations of rapprochement were aroused. The Western public, reluctant to make sacrifices, urged their governments toward further accommodation with the Soviet regime. In reality, of course, the challenge of communism had been reinforced: Western expectations were later to be rudely shattered. But the communist strategists had learned the lesson that Western leaders could be deceived and induced to make mistakes in their assessments of, and policy toward, the Soviet Union. Disinformation had in fact created favorable conditions for the success of Soviet internal policy, activist diplomacy, and Comintern activity.

3 

The Patterns of Disinformation: 

"Facade and Strength" 

IF A COMMUNIST REGIME IS IN A STATE OF CRISIS, if the regime is weak, if its leadership is split or compromised, the logical pattern for disinformation is to conceal the crisis and its dimensions, to attract attention to other areas and problems, and to present the situation both domestically and to the outside world in as favorable a light as possible. This is the "facade and strength," or Potemkin village, pattern of disinformation.1 It has been applied in all communist countries, including, for example, China and Romania as well as the Soviet Union. 

The general pattern of disinformation determines the forms it takes and the techniques used. In the facade and strength pattern, information damaging to the regime is suppressed and information favorable to it is exaggerated. The real issues are reflected vaguely, if at all, in the press. Statistics are withheld or inflated. Propaganda plays a leading role to the extent that it becomes in itself the main form of disinformation. Special deceptions are carried out to support the credibility of the propaganda. The failures and weakness of the regime are presented as its successes and strengths. Political and ideological passivity and retreat are presented as political and ideological victories. Concern about the future is presented as confidence. The fears of the outside world at communist strength are deliberately aroused and the communist threat is exaggerated out of proportion to its actual potential in order to discourage external intervention in communist affairs. 

Massive use of disinformation in accordance with this pattern was made during Stalin's purges and during the last years of his life. For instance, during the mass repressions of the 1930s the regime projected itself to the outside world, not without success, as a model democratic system under a strong leader. The Red Army, whose officer corps had been all but eliminated, was presented as the most powerful army in the world. In the postwar period the decline in the influence of communist ideology and the degree of popular discontent in the Soviet Union and its East European satellites were hidden; the significance of the opposition to Stalin from Zhdanov and his Leningrad group in 1948 was successfully concealed; so were tensions between the Soviets and Chinese and other communist countries. The bloc was misrepresented as a monolith. The political, military, and economic strength of the so-called monolith was grossly exaggerated in communist propaganda, the main vehicle for disinformation. 

To prevent the West from detecting the depth of the internal crisis in the bloc that the propaganda was intended to conceal, contact between the communist and non-communist worlds was reduced to the absolute minimum. Soviet and satellite citizens were prohibited from foreign travel except as members of official delegations; delegates were thoroughly checked before they left and kept under close watch while abroad. The only visitors to the bloc from non-communist countries were communists or fellow travelers, and even they were thoroughly screened before their visits were authorized. When they arrived their itineraries were firmly supervised, with a large part of their program being devoted to visiting collective farms and factories that were organized as showplaces. Foreign diplomats and journalists were subjected to rigid restrictions; their travel was limited to a twenty-five-kilometer zone around the capital. Strict procedures for official contacts between foreign diplomats and communist officials were established; special decrees were enacted in 1946-47 defining the responsibility of Soviet officials when handling state secrets. Western contact with the man in the street hardly existed; and when it did, it was controlled. By these measures the communist countries were literally sealed off from the rest of the world. 

Communist newspapers were devoid of any genuine news. Their articles were concerned only with the strength of the regime, the achievements of the leaders, and the shortcomings of the non-communist world. Only those skilled at analyzing propaganda and disinformation could sometimes read between the lines and deduce an inkling of what was really going on. 

Official Speeches and Party Documents 

An example of the facade and strength pattern practiced at the time can be found in the report of the Central Committee of the C.P.S.U to the Nineteenth Party Congress in October 1952. It dealt with the political and economic situation in the USSR and the communist bloc after the war. These are some extracts: 

The grain problem in the Soviet Union has been solved, solved definitely and finally. 

The achievements in all branches of the national economy have led to a further improvement in the material and cultural standards of Soviet society. 

Undeviatingly implementing the national policy of Lenin and Stalin, our Party strengthened the Soviet multi-national state, promoted friendship and co-operation between the peoples of the Soviet Union, did everything to support, ensure and encourage the efflorescence of the national cultures of the peoples of our country, and waged an uncompromising struggle against all and sundry nationalist elements. The Soviet political system, which has gone through the severe test of war and has become for the whole world an example and model of true equal rights and co-operation of nations, stands witness to the great triumph of the ideas of Lenin and Stalin on the nationality question. 

The USSR's relations with these countries [the communist satellites] are an example of entirely new relations among states, not met with before in history. They are based on the principles of equal rights, economic cooperation and respect for national independence. Faithful to its treaties of mutual assistance, the USSR is rendering, and will continue to render, assistance and support in the further consolidation and development of these countries. 

This report was a travesty of the real state of affairs. What it said was the direct opposite of the truth. Those who composed it, those who approved it, and those who spoke it knew full well that it was totally false. 

Special Disinformation Operations 

A special Disinformation Service (Service 5) was created in 1947 as part of the Soviet intelligence service, known then as the Committee of Information (K.I). It was headed by Colonel Grauehr.2 

Special disinformation operations by communist intelligence services are never regarded as ends in themselves. They are intended to serve the ends of policy, usually by creating and shaping the conditions for its successful implementation. Since in the last years of Stalin's life there was an acute crisis in Soviet affairs and a lack of any coherent policy for resolving it, the special operations of Service 5 were limited in scope to unattributed propaganda operations designed to conceal the crisis and to justify some of the more outrageous and irrational instances of Stalin's behavior. One example was the effort to plant the suspicion that Tito and other Yugoslav leaders were long-term Western agents. 

A further limiting factor on the scope of special disinformation operations was the cult of personality, which pervaded Stalin's dictatorship and forbade frankness even when it was required to give credibility to a falsehood. Two examples illustrate this. A Soviet agent was sent on a mission to the West. He was to pretend that he was a defector seeking political asylum. The host country allowed him to give a press conference, at which, not unnaturally, he criticized the Soviet regime. When Stalin read the report of the press conference, he asked who was the agent's controller, and then said: "Where did he work before he went into intelligence?" "He was a collective farmer," answered the chief of the service. "Then," said Stalin, "send him back to his kolkhoz if he cannot understand how damaging his agent's statements are. They point to our political instability." 

On another occasion the Polish security service created the fiction that an underground organization in Poland, which had in fact been liquidated, was still active. They wanted to use the national organization as a channel for political and military disinformation. When Stalin was asked to authorize the passing of this disinformation, he refused. "It gives the wrong impression of Poland's political stability," he explained. 

In 1951, when Soviet intelligence was transferred from the K.I (Committee of Information) to the M.G.B (Ministry of State Security), Service 5 became a directorate in the new K.I under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, dealing only with diplomatic disinformation. During the anti-Semitic campaign in 1951-53 Service 5 was as demoralized as the rest of the intelligence service. In fact, its head, Grauehr, went mad. He was succeeded by Ivan Ivanovich Tugarinov, who later became head of the K.I.

4 

The Patterns of 

Disinformation: Transition 

THE STRUGGLE FOR POWER BETWEEN STALIN'S SUCCESSORS lasted from Stalin's death in 1953 to Khrushchev's final victory in June 1957. To an important extent, the struggle was not only between rival personalities, but between rival policies. In the absence of a settled and consistent policy, it is not surprising that there should have been no centralized disinformation department in Soviet intelligence during the period. Disinformation was practiced sporadically by heads of departments acting on the instructions of the head of the service. 

The aims of disinformation at this time were to conceal from the West the dimensions of the internal crisis in the communist world, to blur the differences in policy of the contenders for the succession, to hide the savagery of the struggle, and to misrepresent the process of de-Stalinization. 

The successful concealment of internal crisis can be illustrated by the handling of information on events in Georgia. On March 5, 1956, the anniversary of Stalin's death, the first mass disturbance happened in Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia. 

Large crowds of people, especially students, gathered spontaneously for an anti-Soviet meeting in the main square. The speakers demanded the abolition of one-party rule, dissolution of the security service, freedom of speech, and the independence of Georgia from the Soviet Union. The students appealed to the crowds to join the revolt, and many Georgians responded to the appeal. On Khrushchev's order the special troops were put on the streets, with orders to fire on the crowds. Many were killed and wounded. Many students were arrested. The national units of the Georgian and Armenian troops in the local military district were disarmed and demobilized in one night. 

What happened in Georgia in the spring of 1956 can be likened to "Bloody Sunday" (January 9, 1905), a day infamous in Russian history when, on the orders of the Czar, a people's demonstration was dispersed with bloodshed. In 1905 Bloody Sunday was headlined in every newspaper in Russia, arousing mass indignation throughout the country. In 1956 the event was ignored. Not a newspaper mentioned it. It was as if it had never happened. It still remains a state secret that Khrushchev and Serov, the Chairman of the KGB, rushed to Georgia to direct the suppression of the disturbance. 

Georgia was completely isolated from the rest of the country. The area, which attracts holidaymakers from all over the Soviet Union to its famous resorts, was deserted throughout the summer of 1956. Rigid travel control was imposed. It was explained, semi-officially, that the strong nationalist feelings of the Georgians had been upset by the condemnation of Stalin. 

News of the disturbance in Georgia did later filter through to the West, but it was interpreted as a nationalist outburst of discontent with the treatment of Stalin, not as a spontaneous demonstration against the whole Soviet system. 

The Misrepresentation 

of De-Stalinization 

As for the struggle for power, the Central Committee, the K.I under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the K.G.B were all involved by Khrushchev in a successful disinformation operation to misrepresent the reasons for the removal of his rivals and the real character of his own position and policy. Since this operation involved misrepresentation of the issues involved in Stalinism and deStalinization and provided part of the basic technique for the program of strategic disinformation operations launched in 1959, it merits detailed explanation. 

To avoid misunderstanding, it is useful to begin by drawing a distinction between anticommunism and anti-Stalinism and by defining the extent to which de-Stalinization is a genuine process.

Anticommunism 

Anticommunism is not specifically linked with hostility to any individual communist leader. It means opposition to communist principles and practice; it is critical of communism in the broadest sense. It has existed in various forms inside and outside the Soviet Union since before 1917. It developed in Lenin's time, flourished under Stalin, and persisted, if less vigorously, under his successors. Within it three trends can be distinguished: a conservative trend, which is more or less rigid and consistent in its opposition; a liberal trend, which from time to time favors a degree of accommodation with communism; and a neutralist trend, particularly among non-communist neighbors of the communist bloc who try to make practical arrangements with communist regimes to secure their own survival. 

Anticommunism in the intelligentsia may spring from the rejection on intellectual grounds of the dogmatic pretensions of Marxism as a philosophy. At all levels of society it is nurtured by the belief that communism is an unnatural, intolerant, and inhuman system that disregards the individual, maintains itself largely by force and terror, and pursues an aggressive ideological policy aimed at eventual domination of the world. In the past, communist theory and practice in such matters as the seizure of power, the abuse and destruction of democratic institutions, the suppression of personal liberty, and the use of terror provoked a militant response from social democrats, which led to a deepening gulf between socialist and communist parties and a split in the international labor movement. 

The strength of international anticommunism has waxed and waned. The two high peaks were the Anglo-French effort to create a European anti-Soviet coalition during the civil war in Russia from 1918 to 1921, and the creation of NATO after the Second World War. 

Inside and outside the Soviet Union, anticommunism has expressed itself in various forms from 1917 onward. Typical examples are found in the civil war in Russia, 1918-21; the separatist movements in the non-Russian republics; the revolts in the Caucasus and Central Asia in the 1920's; the later underground resistance movements in the Ukraine and Baltic republics; and in the activities of emigre organizations, political refugees, and those who broke with the Western communist parties. Opposition of this kind would have existed whether or not Stalin had ever been in power, though it was strengthened and hardened by his repressive influence. In fact, so personal and despotic was Stalin's rule that, for a while, Stalinism became almost synonymous with communism, and opposition to the one became confused with opposition to the other, particularly since Stalin repressed both kinds of opposition with equal ruthlessness and severity. In the 1930s he crushed actual and imaginary opposition to himself by mass repressions, even of party members. Some of the leaders of the Third International, like Zinovyev, Bukharin, and Bela Kun, were shot. Trotskiy, who along with social democratic leaders was regarded by Stalin as being among the most dangerous enemies of the Soviet Union, was assassinated in 1940 by secret agents acting on Stalin's orders. Social democratic leaders in Eastern Europe after the Second World War were physically eliminated. 

Anti-Stalinism 

All anti-communists are anti-Stalinists. But the important point to note is that anti-Stalinism has traditionally been embraced by many communists who have sought not to abolish the communist system, but to strengthen and purify it by eliminating certain elements in Stalin's policy and practice. Anti-Stalinism of this type is critical of communism only in a narrow sense. It has existed in the communist movement since 1922. After Stalin's death it became an element in official party life and policy and gave rise to the genuine process of de-Stalinization. 

In many respects Stalin's policy followed classical Leninist doctrine: for example, in the dictatorship of the proletariat and the communist party, industrialization, the collectivization of agriculture, the elimination of the capitalist classes, the construction of "socialism" in the Soviet Union, and in support for "socialist" revolutions abroad. But there were also departures from Leninist principles and practice in Stalin's establishment of his personal dictatorship, in his ruthless physical elimination of opposition and repression of loyal elements within the party, in the widening gulf he created between the ruling class and the underprivileged workers and collective farmers, and in the manipulation and discrediting of communist ideology. 

Communist opposition to Stalin was expressed over the years: 

• By Lenin, who in his testament criticized Stalin's rudeness and intolerance and suggested that he should be removed from the post of general secretary of the party. 

• Publicly, in the 1920's and 1930's, by Trotsky and his followers, who distinguished between the Leninist and Stalinist elements in Stalin's policies. 

• Publicly by Tito and the Yugoslav Communist party, during and after the split with Stalin in 1948. 

• Secretly by Zhdanov and his Leningrad group in 1948. 

• Secretly by the Chinese Communist leaders from 1950 to 1953 and openly in 1956. 

• In deeds rather than words from 1953 to 1956, and openly from 1956 onward, by the leaders of the C.P.S.U and other communist parties. 

The criticisms of these individuals and groups varied in intensity and outspokenness, but all of them remained communists in their different ways and, in particular, they all retained their loyalty to Leninism. Theirs was a true expression of de-Stalinization; that is to say, they believed in the restoration of Leninist communism without Stalinist deviations. 

The dangers of Stalinism to the communist movement were ignored or overlooked in the 1930's and 1940's because of the threat of fascism and the opportunities that it provided for the formation of popular fronts with socialist parties in the 1930's and for the forging of the wartime alliance with the Western powers. But by 1953-56, the damage Stalinism had done to the communist cause was apparent. It could be seen in the following: 

• The distortion, degradation, and discrediting of communist ideology. The image of Marxism as a philosophy had been tarnished in the eyes of Western intellectuals. 

• Deepening discontent in the Soviet Union and its satellites, leading to explosive revolutionary situations in East Germany, Poland, and Hungary. 

• The decline of communist influence and the isolation of communist parties and regimes. 

• The revulsion against Stalinist communism of Western liberals who had earlier been sympathetic. 

• The increased influence and prestige of anticommunism. 

• Strong opposition from various religious movements, including Catholicism and Islam. 

• The formation of Western military alliances, such as N.A.T.O, S.E.A.T.O, and the Baghdad pact (later C.E.N.T.O). 

• Hostility from moderate, genuinely nonaligned national leaders of the developing countries, such as Nehru. 

• Cooperation between Western democratic governments and anticommunist emigre organizations. 

• Collaboration between social democratic and conservative governments and parties against the Soviet threat. 

• Yugoslavia's break with the communist bloc and rapprochement with the West in the period 1948-55. 

• The serious tensions between the Soviet Union and Communist China, which threatened to create a split between them in 1950-53. 

• Zhdanov's opposition to Stalin. 

• The major power struggle in the Soviet leadership that followed Stalin's death. 

In some areas Stalinism brought together the two kinds of opposition: anticommunism and anti-Stalinism. In the case of Yugoslavia, which found itself closer to the West than to the communist bloc after 1948, they almost fused. In the present context, the most significant episode in the history of unsuccessful opposition to Stalin during his lifetime was the attempt to form a group around Zhdanov in 1948. Although it was a failure, it was known to Stalin's immediate heirs in the Soviet leadership. It was part of their accumulated store of knowledge of the various forms of opposition to communism and Stalinism and an important argument in compelling them to face the need to correct Stalinist distortions in the system if they were to avoid disaster. DeStalinization was the obvious course, and an account must now be given of how it was put into effect after Stalin's death.

De-Stalinization in Practice 

Three different phases of De-Stalinization can be distinguished: first, an initial, unrehearsed, and ill-considered but genuine De-Stalinization, carried out from 1953 to 1956 by a confused, divided, and competing leadership under pressure from the populace and in the absence of any long-range policy for the bloc; second, a setback to De-Stalinization in 1956-57, when Khrushchev was resorting to Stalinist methods to suppress revolt in Hungary and opposition to himself in order to secure his own personal preeminence; third, a cautious revival from 1958 onward of some genuine elements of DeStalinization (for instance, the gradual release and rehabilitation of some of Stalin's victims) coupled with a calculated political exploitation of the process in which some of its elements were deliberately misrepresented. 

Improvised De-Stalinization 

from 1953 to 1956 

De-Stalinization began not, as is often assumed, with Khrushchev's secret report to the Twentieth C.P.S.U Congress in February 1956, but immediately after Stalin's death in March 1953. Each one of the pretenders to the succession, Beriya, Malenkov, Molotov, Bulganin, and Khrushchev, was in his different way an anti-Stalinist. All of them without exception knew of the crisis in the communist system and all of them agreed on the urgent necessity of abandoning Stalinist policies. On the other hand, there was disagreement on the nature and extent of the changes needed. None of the pretenders was preeminent, none of them had worked out the details of his own policies, and— living as they had done under Stalin's shadow— no agreements on policy had been worked out among them. 

The different personalities and policies of the pretenders affected the course of de-Stalinization. Beriya had in mind the deepest and most heterodox forms of change, including the abolition of collective farms. Malenkov, the most confident of the leaders in his own position, went further than the others in open condemnation of secret police methods and advocacy of concessions to popular demands. DeStalinization was initiated not by Khrushchev, but by Malenkov, Beriya, and Molotov, who dominated the Presidium after Stalin's death.

Several steps were taken more or less immediately. The cases of certain leading personalities who had been tried and imprisoned under Stalin were reviewed. The Kremlin doctors were released. A ban on mass arrests was issued. International tension was eased by the settlement of the Korean War. Stalin's instruction of December 1952 on the reactivation of Soviet intelligence abroad was canceled, lest it should compromise the impact of the new moderation in Soviet foreign policy. 

The first hint of the downgrading of Stalin's role and the admission of his mistakes was given in July 1953 in a secret party letter to the party membership informing them of Beriya's dismissal and the reasons for it. It referred to Stalin not as an outstanding leader, but simply as "Stalin, I. V.," and bracketed his name with that of Beriya, stating that Stalin's favoritism had prevented Beriya's exposure. It was the first tacit admission to the party membership of the fallibility of Stalin. 

Later it became known in party circles that a discussion took place in the Presidium on Malenkov's initiative in July 1953 after Beriya's arrest. It was unanimously decided to make changes in Stalinist practices in the party and administration, although without public criticism of Stalin. In particular the Presidium recommended a reexamination and reform of the practices of the security service with the idea that, at a future date when the situation in the party and in the country had settled down, a reasonable explanation should be found for Stalin's deviations from communist principles, such as his unjustified repressions of personnel, including party members. All members of the Presidium, including Khrushchev, agreed that only Stalin and Beriya should be criticized and that there should be no admission of mistakes by other members of the Presidium. 

Thus the secret report on Stalin's crimes, delivered by Khrushchev in February 1956 at the Twentieth Party Congress, which later found its way to the West but which has never been published in the Soviet Union, was in fact the consequence of a Presidium decision. The report was prepared by Pospelov, the head of the Marx-Engels-Lenin-Stalin Party Research Institute. The facts were taken from secret security service archives, and many of the ideas from accounts of Stalin's repression of the Leninist "Old Guard" found in the memoirs of former communist leaders published in the West in the 1930's, especially in those of Trotsky. The draft of Pospelov's report was discussed and approved by the Presidium on the eve of the party congress.1 While delivering the report, Khrushchev added some personal touches of his own. 

The most important point about the report was that it prevented de-Stalinization from developing into an attack on communist principles as a whole. The changes that Beriya and Malenkov had in mind in their revisionist version of de-Stalinization might have altered the regime in principle. Furthermore, given the depth of the crisis in the communist world and the intensity of the struggle for power in the Soviet leadership, if those changes had been pursued, they might have developed a momentum of their own and brought about a radical transformation of Soviet society regardless of the wishes of their initiators and with incalculable consequences for the Soviet Union and the rest of the communist and non-communist world. It was not without reason that Beriya was shot for being an "agent of world imperialism," and that Malenkov was dismissed as Prime Minister in 1955 for "departing from Lenin's and Stalin's theories." Their ideas had indeed threatened the regime and could have led to a situation that they would have been unable to control. By pinning the blame for all past mistakes on the misdeeds—not the theories—of one single individual, Stalin, the party leadership was able, while introducing some tactical changes, to preserve the essence of the communist regime. 

Re-Stalinization 

The exposure of Stalin's mistakes gave a substantial boost to anticommunism in general and to anti-Stalinist feeling in both the bloc and non-bloc communist parties. Revolts occurred in Georgia, Poland, and Hungary. The crisis in many other communist parties deepened. 

Khrushchev's response was to revert to Stalinist methods. The security service was strengthened; armed force was used to crush revolt in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. 

Khrushchev's progress toward his own form of personal dictatorship alarmed his colleagues in the leadership. Molotov[L] and Malenkov[R] emerged as the leaders of the opposition. At this time Molotov was forming his own attitude and policy on de-Stalinization. He and his supporters made it clear that they wanted to remove Khrushchev in order to secure a continuation of the de-Stalinization process that Khrushchev had arrested. As communists they wanted to stabilize the system, and they viewed with dismay Khrushchev's establishment of his own cult of personality. It threatened their own position. In their view his resort to a policy of repression might lead to an even bigger explosion than the Hungarian revolt, and it completely contradicted the course adopted after Stalin's death. Khrushchev, in their eyes, was a new Stalin who had to be removed. 

The showdown came in June 1957. With the help of the army and the security service, Khrushchev defeated the "antiparty group" by the narrowest of margins. Had the opposition been successful, it would once more have opened up the possibility of a genuine and uncontrolled process of de-Stalinization and liberalization of the regime. Public exposure of the Stalinist methods used by Khrushchev to gain personal power, coupled with renewed denunciations of secret police repression and a public trial of the KGB chairman, Serov, would have led to popular demands for further changes. Being divided, the opposition group, had it come to power, would have been obliged to make concessions regardless of the wishes of the individual members. An intensified power struggle would have ensued and a new, agreed-upon, long-range policy could not have been adopted. 

Khrushchev's defeat of the opposition in June 1957 left him in an unchallengeable position, free to reconsider the situation in the Soviet Union and the bloc without interference from inside the leadership. His first move was to turn the tables on the anti-party group by falsely, but successfully, pinning the Stalinist label on them. He managed to take for himself the credit for the exposure of Stalin's crimes, to conceal his own use of Stalinist methods in the pursuit of power, and to distract attention from the nature of the opposition's charges against him. Misrepresented as a victory over the forces of Stalinism, his defeat of the opposition was made to look like a blessing for the Soviet public and the world at large. Although there was some initial skepticism at home, even in a few party organizations, both domestic and international pressures on the government were eased.

to be continued...next
The New Policy and Disinformation Strategy48s