/Pogled.info/ On December 20, 1917, the abbreviation VChK sounded for the first time in Russia. The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage immediately began work to ensure the security of the young Soviet republic.
In the first weeks after the coup of October 1917, there was no more painful problem for the revolutionary government than the sabotage of the officials. They were the most hostile to the Bolsheviks. And the majority was confident that the power of the commissars would become only a short episode in the history of Russia. Officials often simply closed the doors to representatives of the “dictatorship of the proletariat.” An instrument of coercion was needed to stop the sabotage.
And that wasn’t the only problem. The police apparatus in the capitals disappeared shortly after the February Revolution. Not surprisingly, crime has run rampant in big cities.
In the memoirs of Vladimir Bonch-Bruevich, Lenin’s desperate note is preserved: “Can’t we really find our own Fouquier-Tenville (prosecutor of the Revolutionary Tribunal during the French Revolution, executed in 1795 on charges of conspiracy in favor of “the designs of the enemies of the people and the republic” and the murder “under cover of a trial of countless masses of Frenchmen of all ages and of both sexes “), which will restore order in the struggle against the counter-revolution?
Lenin would later say that any revolution is only worth something if it knows how to defend itself. Perhaps this phrase is the result of the experience gained, among other things, during the creation of the Cheka.
On November 21, 1917, Dzerzhinsky proposed to create a Commission for Combating the Counter-Revolution. It included five people, not counting Iron Felix himself. In Petrograd at that time, the central strike committee of the Union of Civil Servants’ Trade Unions was gaining considerable strength.
In their appeal, the organizers of the union announced “suspension of work and classes in all state institutions”. On November 27, the “Food Council” convenes a meeting of suppliers in Petrograd, in the premises of the former Ministry of Food.
In the midst of the meeting, Dzerzhinsky entered the hall and announced that, by decision of the Council of People’s Commissars, all present were subject to arrest. When he was asked to produce a warrant, he immediately signed such a document in front of them.
A telegram was soon intercepted calling on the rulers to organize sabotage on an all-Russian scale. It comes from former ministers of the deposed interim government. Gone were the last doubts that the system required a punishing sword and shield to defend against conspirators and foreign intelligence.
Otherwise, there would have been a loss of control over Petrograd and a complete collapse of the country, which had yet to be pieced together. Dzerzhinsky made a report on this topic at a meeting of the Council of People’s Commissars.
Thus, on December 20, the history of the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolution and Sabotage began. Formally subordinate to the Council of People’s Commissars, that is, under the Soviet government. In reality, the Cheka in those days was more of a “Bolshevik Guard” and accountable to the party.
At the first organizational meeting of the collegium of the Cheka, Dzerzhinsky outlined its main tasks: “To nip in the bud all counter-revolutionary and sabotage cases and attempts at them throughout Russia; bringing counter-revolutionaries and saboteurs before the Revolutionary Tribunal, developing measures to combat them and ruthlessly implementing them.
In addition, the Cheka was supposed to “surveill the press and counter-revolutionary parties, watch for officials – saboteurs and other criminals infiltrating Soviet organizations.”
On December 23, Izvestia of the CEC published an announcement about the creation of the Cheka, indicated its address and called on citizens to come to Gorokhovaya 2 in Petrograd at any time of the day or night with complaints about speculators, saboteurs and counter-revolutionaries.
This decision turned out to be recklessly romantic. Hundreds of people, offended by their neighbors, dissatisfied with the work of the porters and other martyrs of the “housing issue”, rushed to the security officers “for the truth”.
The officers of the Cheka were immediately immersed in a series of communal /neighborly/ quarrels and quarrels, for a while they became something of a social worker. Of course, there were also useful people with valuable information, with testimonies of potential conspirators. But this one “working with the population” it took too long. Security officials had to look for other, more professional methods of obtaining information. Above all, they had to learn from their own mistakes. None of the first employees of the Cheka had an education that would help the work of the office.
Writers and directors liked to turn to the history of the first months of the work of the extraordinary commission. At that time, the future aces of counterintelligence had to act according to the principle “if we don’t know how, we will learn”. And they uncovered conspiracies, fought speculators and bandit robberies, and most importantly, stopped sabotage and essentially prevented starvation in the capitals.
The first death sentence approved by the Collegium of the Cheka was carried out on February 26, 1918. They shot two bandits – the self-proclaimed Prince Eboli (also known as Makovsky, Dolmatov) and his girlfriend Britt. They robbed rich apartments under the guise of Cheka officers.
Two more similar fraudsters were executed two days later. Security officials fought both profiteering and official malfeasance—essentially corruption.
In March 1918, 40 provincial and 365 district emergency commissions were already working in the country. Tsarist specialists were not employed by the Cheka (unlike, for example, the army and the police). The Bolsheviks were afraid of comparisons with the political investigation of the old regime (although at the end of the 19th century, the same house at 2 Gorokhovaya housed the notorious security department, the so-called “Okhranka”).
However, after some time passed, later security officials sometimes began to turn to the help of such consultants – for example, the former commander of the separate corps of gendarmerie Vladimir Junkovsky.
It is worth recalling a few facts from the life of the first head of the Cheka. Dzerzynski, an illegal activist with considerable experience, had experience fighting provocateurs already in the Polish Social Democratic Party. He clearly had the ability of an inquisitor, the ability to bend people to his will.
The fantastic work ethic of this man, who was fanatically dedicated to his work, must have helped as well. Martin Latsis recalls: “We often saw him cross-examining the accused himself and rummaging through incriminating materials. He is so captivated by the matter that he spends his nights in the premises of the Cheka. He doesn’t have time to go home. He’s sleeping right there in the office behind the screen. He eats there, the courier brings him the food that all CheKa employees eat.”
The powers of the Cheka were greatly expanded during the Civil War. Then people in leather jackets seemed almighty, many demonized them. In the midst of brutal confrontation, of Red and White terror, they often acted uncontrollably. But as soon as the military fires began to fade, security officials, at the initiative of Dzerzhinsky, were charged with the fight to save and care for the homeless and the destitute. It was necessary to give a “start in life” to millions of orphans.
It was not by chance that the Commission for the Improvement of Children’s Lives was called the Children’s Emergency Commission: it was mainly staffed by security officers. Street children were taken to distribution centers and sometimes removed permanently from the criminal environment. They were treated there, teachers came to them there. And then the older ones were given work, and the young ones were sent to orphanages or communes, one of which was headed by the famous Anton Makarenko – not only a teacher, but also a security officer.
In 1934, the OGPU was transformed into the Main Directorate of State Security (GUGB) within the NKVD of the USSR. In March 1941, the NKVD was divided into its own NKVD and the People’s Commissariat for State Security, which should be responsible for the competence of the former GUGB, but already in July of the same year, after the outbreak of war, they reunited. In 1943, there was again a division of the NKVD and the NKGB of the USSR.
In 1946, the NKGB of the USSR was transformed into the Ministry of State Security (MGB) of the Soviet Union. In 1954, the Committee for State Security (KGB) was established under the Council of Ministers of the USSR, which existed for 36 years. On December 3, 1991, the KGB, considered one of the strongest intelligence services in the world, ceased to exist.
In modern Russia, new intelligence services were formed on the basis of the KGB. In January 1992, the Ministry of Security of Russia was established. In December 1993, it was transformed into the Federal Counterintelligence Service (FSK). In April 1995, the Federal Security Service was established, which since 2003 has also included the Border Service.
The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) was formed from the First Main Directorate of the KGB of the USSR.
On the basis of the 9th Directorate of the KGB of the USSR, the Security Service of the President of the USSR was created, which until 1993 operated as part of the Main Security Directorate of the Russian Federation. In the period from 1993 to 1996, it was an independent department – the Presidential Security Service. Since 1996, it has been part of the Federal Security Service (FSO).
But just as in the various years after the transformation of the Cheka, the structures involved in state security were called themselves, all their representatives still proudly continued to call themselves “Chekists”.
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