THE
CAREERIST-REVISIONIST BERIA
Some individuals erroneously view Beria as a supporter of Stalin who died
fighting a rear-guard action trying to prevent the final destruction of that which
Stalin had created when, in fact, he was nothing more than a
careerist/revisionist opposed to bona fide Marxist-Leninism. He also had
the distinction of being disliked or despised and rarely trusted by virtually
everyone in and out of the Soviet government. What follows are prime
examples of comments to this effect:
HE WAS TRAITOROUS
REVISIONIST
MOLOTOV: I regard Beria as an agent
of imperialism. Agent does not mean spy. He had to have some
support--either in the working class or in imperialism. He had no support
among the people, and he enjoyed no prestige. Even had he succeeded in
seizing power, he would not have lasted long.
...a big scum.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
MOLOTOV: I consider Khrushchev a
rightist, and Beria was even further right. We had the evidence.
Both of them were rightists. Mikoyan too.
...Being a rightist, Khrushchev was rotten through and through. Beria was
even more of a rightist and even more rotten.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
MOLOTOV: ...he
(Beria) was, in any event, a dangerous character.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
MIKOYAN: From the date when Comrade Stalin fell ill,
and the doctors told us he would not recover, the chief concern of each of us
was to preserve the iron unity of the Party leadership collective, since Party
unity had been secured during Stalin's lifetime.
Many comrades may ask how is it that members of the Central Committee who knew
Beria for many years weren't able to recognize in their midst this foreign and
dangerous person for such a long time. By the way this wasn't such a
simple matter, it wasn't so easy to achieve. In the first place, we
didn't know all the facts. In the second place, the facts occurred at
various times and, taking each one separately, they didn't have the same
significance which they take on when you see them all together. We
mustn't forget that there was a good deal of skillful work in masking these
facts, in muddying up their significance and interpreting them in a totally
different meaning. There were many instances of Beria's positive work,
and in the shadow of these successes the negative facts were hidden.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
CHUEV: Beria is called a diehard enemy of
Soviet power.
MOLOTOV: I don't know whether he was a diehard
or some other kind of enemy, but I do know he was an enemy.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
MOLOTOV: Beria, to my mind, was not
one of us. He crept into the party with ulterior motives.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
MOLOTOV: A man [Mikoyan] of very
few principles, unrestrained and easily influenced by others.... He began
to be closely associated with Khrushchev after Stalin's death. That
relationship had not existed before. It only developed in Khrushchev's
later years. Khrushchev's best friends had been Malenkov and Beria.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
BERIA HAD A POOR
KNOWLEDGE OF MARXISM AND WAS NOT A COMMUNIST
... he [Beria] himself not only underestimated this
theory, but simply didn't understand it--in his speeches, both published and
unpublished, you'll find very little Marxism-Leninism. He did not know
Marxism-Leninism. He had a poor theoretical foundation; the book
mentioned by Comrade Molotov was written not by him, he was using it to earn
points for himself.
Beria had a hostile response to statements that Stalin was a great continuer of
the work of Lenin, Marx, and Engels.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
MOLOTOV: He (Beria) was
unprincipled. He was not even a communist. I consider him a
parasite on the party.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
TEVOSYAN (Member of the Central Committee):
Yesterday, we learned from the speech of Comrade Kaganovich
that this scoundrel Beria protested against referring to Comrade Stalin--along
with the names of Marx, Engels, Lenin--when speaking
about the teachings which guide our Party. That's how far this scoundrel
went.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair
MOLOTOV: It is totally obvious that he kept his plan
secret, a plan aimed against building Communism in our country. He had
another course--a course for Capitalism. This faint-hearted traitor, like
other faint-hearted traitors whom the Party has dealt with satisfactorily, was
planning nothing less than a return to Capitalism.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
MOLOTOV: Beria strained might and
main to grab leading positions. Among the reactionary elements he was the
activist. That's why he strove to clear the way for a return of private
property. Anything else lay outside his field of vision. He did not
avow socialism. He thought he was leading us forward, but in fact he was
pulling us back, back to the worst.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
HE TOOK TITO’S
SIDE IN HIS CLASH WITH STALIN
“Beria offered assurances to
Deriabin, Peter. Inside Stalin's
Kremlin. Washington [D.C.]: Brassey's,
c1998, p. 148
I must again draw your attention to Beria's attempts to establish ties with Rankovich and with Tito, which Comrade Malenkov has already
mentioned.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
HE WORKED TO CHANGE
STALIN’S POLICIES
Molotov and Kaganovich could not prevent the reform
projects of Malenkov, Beria, and Khrushchev. Malenkov wanted to increase
payments to collective farms so as to boost agricultural production; he also
favored giving priority to light-industrial investment. Khrushchev wished
to plough up virgin lands in the
Service,
Robert. Stalin.
After Stalin's death, Beria demonstrated his "generosity" by letting
out a lot of criminals. He wanted to show off his
"liberalism." However, in actual fact, this action of his was
directed against the people because these criminals who got out of jail went
right back to their old trades-- thieving and murdering.
Talbott, Strobe, Trans. and Ed. Khrushchev Remembers.
BERIA HAD NO QUALMS
WHATEVER ABOUT GIVING
Beria... advanced the following argument: "Why should
socialism be built in the GDR? Let it just be a peaceful
country. That is sufficient for our purposes.... The sort of
country it will become is unimportant."
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
MOLOTOV: A stable
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
MOLOTOV: It became quite clear that Beria did not
hold Communist positions. In this situation we felt that in Beria we were
dealing with someone who had nothing in common with our Party, a person of the
bourgeois camp, the enemy of the
The capitulating essence of Beria's proposals regarding the German question is
obvious. He virtually demanded capitulation before the so-called
"Western" bourgeois states. He insisted that we reject the
course to strengthen the people's democratic order in the GDR, which would lead
to socialism. He insisted on untying the hands of German imperialism, not
only in
You see how what Beria had previously concealed in his political persona was
now exposed. Also, what we previously saw only vaguely in Beria, we now
began to see clearly. We now clearly saw that here was someone alien to
us, a man from the anti-Soviet camp.
It was not so easy to expose Beria. He artfully disguised himself, and
for many years--concealing his true face--he sat in the leadership center.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
MOLOTOV: What Beria proposed would
never have come up for discussion in Stalin's time. Stalin made a public
statement when the GDR was created, that this was a new stage in the
development of
I objected that there could not be a peaceful
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
ANDREYEV: It was only lately, in the German question,
and in other questions, that we saw his bourgeois degeneracy.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
BERIA DISGUISED HIS
NEFARIOUS ACTIVITIES
ANDREYEV: And Beria, of course, at times did great
work, but this was work done for a disguise, and in this was the difficulty of
exposing him. He created himself a halo, that, for example, during the
war he was during enormous work, etc., he was blackmailing in the name of
Comrade Stalin. He was difficult to expose.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
BAGIROV (Candidate Member of the Presidium of the
Central Committee): Beria--this chameleon, this most evil enemy of our Party,
our people--was so cunning and adept that I personally, having known him for
some 30-plus years before his exposure by the Presidium of the Central
Committee, could not see through him, could not draw out his true enemy
nature. I can only explain this as my excessive gullibility, and the
dullness of my Party and Communist vigilance toward this double-dealer and
scoundrel. This will be a serious lesson for me, too.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
Another provocation... an anonymous letter from
Stalin decided after this to set up a commission, under Malenkov, to look into
the finances. The commission detailed all of the expenses of running the
government Dacha. Malenkov brought this to Orlov
in order for him to sign. Orlov refused because
Stalin was a light eater, hardly drank, and took no liquors. A bottle of
"Tsinandali" was enough to last him for two
weeks. It was proven that it was Stalin's "friends," under the
aegis of Beria, who really lived it up, charging the cost to Stalin's
budget. Vodka was the main culprit in the inflated costs charged to
Stalin's name.
Rybin, Aleksei. Next to
Stalin: Notes of a Bodyguard.
BERIA WAS CORRUPT
SARKISOV (he worked in Beria's security force for 18
years) I also know that Beria cohabited with a certain Sophia. At Beria's
suggestion, through the Chief of the Health Department of the USSR MVD, she had
an abortion. I repeat, Beria had many, many such
relationships.
On Beria's instructions, I kept a special list of women with whom he cohabited.
Later, at his suggestion, I destroyed this list. However, I kept one
list. In this list are the names, surnames, and addresses of telephone
numbers of more than 25 such women. This list is in my apartment in my
jacket pocket. (The list to which Sarkisov was
referring was found, it contained 39 names of women.).
One or 1 1/2 years ago, I learned for a fact that, as a result of his
relationships with prostitutes, Beria contracted syphilis. He was treated
by a doctor in the MVD clinic, initials U.B. I don't remember his name.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
Everything had tended to indicate my father's complete trust in Beria and his
dependence on him, but of this one could never be quite sure. I shall
never forget how startled I had been by something my father said in 1941 during
the first days of the war. I was visiting Beria's wife at their
dacha. My father had always encouraged my friendship with her. I
was talked into staying the night. Next morning my father suddenly called
up in a fury. Using unprintable words, he shouted, "Come back at
once! I don't trust Beria!"
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Only One Year.
Beria, of course, was a bloody butcher, a rapist, and a revolting person.
Berezhkov, Valentin. At Stalin's Side.
BERIA WAS A SECRET AND
DECEPTIVE ENEMY OF STALIN
“Beria was absolutely insolent. He tried to find the smallest
insignificant detail of perceived slight, in order to try and get you fired or
arrested... this was in order to make Stalin either nervous or upset.
This came to such a state of outright provocation that once while Stalin was
away from the Dacha, Beria with his personal entourage started to snoop in the
offices of Stalin, rummaging through his papers and documents. After one
such "snooping search," Stalin's transistor radio went missing.
Needless to say, it was Stalin's own bodyguards who were suspected and
blamed. The offices were turned upside-down. Time passed and no
transistor was found. Then, the Guard Kuzin who
was shoveling snow, came across the transistor.
Who else could do something of this caliber? Only Beria
and his clique, of well-masked and hidden enemies of Stalin and the
Rybin, Aleksei. Next to
Stalin: Notes of a Bodyguard.
The newspaper "Niedelia-Sunday," in an
article about Beria, wrote that in the
Rybin, Aleksei. Next to
Stalin: Notes of a Bodyguard
BERIA MANIPULATED AND
FLATTERED STALIN TO FOOL HIM
Svetlana says, "Children have instincts
about people like this. There was something unpleasant about him
[Beria]. The others--Molotov, Voroshilov, Kaganovich--had a certain dignity, they talked to my
father as equals, calling him Joseph, and ti, the
familiar form of 'you". Beria could not handle these older statesmen
who remembered and loved Nadya {Stalin’s
deceased wife], and who had been close to the family for a long time.
They never flattered my father. Beria was always flattering him.
Father would say something, and Beria would immediately say, "Oh yes, you
are so right, absolutely true, how true!" in an obsequious way. None
of the others, even if they did agree with him, were flapping their wings like
this and being 'yes men'. He was a creep.”
Richardson,
Rosamond. Stalin’s Shadow.
With typical cunning Beria played on my father's bitterness and sense of loss
[at my mother’s death]. Up to then he had simply been an occasional
visitor to the house in
Once he was First Secretary in
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
I speak advisedly of his influence on my father and not the other way
around. Beria was more treacherous, more practiced in perfidy and
cunning, more insolent and single-minded than my father. In a word, he
was a stronger character. My father had his weaker sides. He was
capable of self-doubt. He was cruder and more direct than Beria, and not
so suspicious. He was simpler and could be led up the garden path by
someone with Beria's craftiness. Beria was aware of my father's
weaknesses. He knew the hurt pride and the inner loneliness. He was
aware that my father's spirit was, in a sense, broken. And so he poured
oil on the flames and fanned them as only he knew how. He flattered my
father with a shamelessness that was nothing if not Oriental. He praised
him and made up to him in a way that caused old friends, accustomed to looking
on my father as an equal, to wince with embarrassment.
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
MOLOTOV: Hence it follows that we must seriously dig
into his biography, into his past, in order to fully understand his rotten,
treacherous role in our country, in our Party. We have studied his
biography very little. Let as now take this up more seriously.
How did it happen, that such an inveterate enemy like Beria, could get into our
Party and into its leadership organs?
Without going into the deeper reasons for this type of fact, one can give a
simple answer to this question: This is the result of insufficient vigilance on
the part of our Central Committee, including Comrade Stalin. Beria found
certain human weaknesses in Comrade Stalin, and who doesn't have them? He
skillfully exploited them, and was able to do so for many, many years.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair
From the stories of his guards Stalin appears to have been a self-effacing,
fatherly person. On various occasions he angrily protested having watched
documentary films showing him in situations that had never taken place.
When Beria and Malenkov argued that the scenes were "needed for
history," he opposed them, saying: "Leave me alone with such history."
... Beria's book on the history of Bolshevism in the
Laqueur, Walter. Stalin: The Glasnost Revelations.
STALIN’S DAUGHER SVETLANA: Grandma Olga
and Anna used to say--which always sounded strange to me but now I don't think
it's so strange--"Your father could be influenced very easily. He
could be influenced by good people:
Richardson,
Rosamond. Stalin’s Shadow.
MALENKOV: As you see, comrades, great people, too,
can have weaknesses. Comrade Stalin had these weaknesses. We must
say this, in order to bring up the need for collective party leadership
properly, like Marxists, the need for criticism and self-criticism in all
branches of the party, including, before all else, the Central Committee in the
Presidium of the Central Committee.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
BERIA REMOVED THOSE
AROUND STALIN WHOM STALIN TRUSTED
“There is undocumented testimony that Beria intended to usurp power as
Stalin grew older. Stalin may have known this, as their relations grew
noticeably cooler in the last year and a half of his life. Among the many
witnesses who have told me about this, most interesting
was the testimony of M. S. Vlasik, wife of Lt. Gen. Vlasik, former chief of the Main Administration of the
Ministry of State Security (the KGB). For more than 25 years, Vlasik had been Stalin's chief of personal security: he
knew much and was trusted by the boss. Beria hated him, but Stalin would
not allow him to be touched. A few months before Stalin died, however,
Beria managed to compromise Vlasik, as well as Poskrebyshev, and to have them removed from Stalin's
entourage. Vlasik was arrested and given 10
years' prison and exile. When he returned after Stalin's death, he said
he was totally convinced that Beria had 'helped' Stalin to die after first
removing his physicians.
Volkogonov, Dmitri. Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy.
Vlasik went on to say that, once he had been summoned
by Beria for interrogation, 'I knew I could expect nothing but death, as I was
sure they had deceived the Head of government.'
Volkogonov, Dmitri. Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy.
"Beria certainly was very happy when my father died; he had always worked
towards that. He had removed my father's whole entourage, starting with Vlasik, who had been there 30 years. The doctor was arrested, the personal secretary was arrested, so something
had been brewing there. I hate folklore and making guesses, but something
was up."
"One of the guards attended the autopsy, Vlasik's
successor, a man named Krustalyov. They could
not permit a post-mortem to go ahead unsupervised because by this time nobody
trusted anybody. He sat there, and it made such an impression on him that
afterwards he collapsed completely and drank heavily, and of course he was
fired. He said that what hit him was when they opened the head, and he
saw the brain. One of the medics said, "This is obviously a very
fine brain, quite out of the ordinary." Krustalyov
never got over it."
Richardson,
Rosamond. Stalin’s Shadow.
Stalin began to decline more rapidly after his 70th birthday. His blood
pressure was continually high, but he did not want doctors, he did not trust
them. He still listened half-heartedly to Academician Vinogradov,
but gradually Beria convinced him that 'the old man [Vinogradov],
was suspect' and tried to foist other doctors on to him. Stalin, however,
would have no one new. When he heard that Vinogradov
had been arrested, he cursed ominously but did nothing about it. He now
finally stopped smoking, but continued his unhealthy life-style in all other
respects, rising late and working into the night.... he would not entrust
himself to doctors.
...His old belief in Georgian longevity was shaken by a series of dizzy spells
which knocked him off balance.
Volkogonov, Dmitri. Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy.
Voznesensky dared to cross Beria's path, and before
Beria finished with him, Voznesensky was just a shadow
of his former self.
I remember that more than once during this period Stalin asked Malenkov and
Beria, "Isn't it a waste not letting Voznesensky
work while we're deciding what to do with him?"
"Yes," they would answer, "let's think it over."
Some time would pass and Stalin would bring up the subject again: "Maybe
we should put Voznesensky in charge of the State
Bank. He's an economist, a real financial wizard."
No one objected, but nothing happened. Voznesensky
was still left hanging.
Stalin obviously felt a certain residual respect for Voznesensky.
Talbott, Strobe, Trans. and Ed. Khrushchev Remembers.
Apparently even after these arrests, Stalin felt a certain amount of goodwill
toward Shakhurin and Novikov.
He used to turn to Beria and Malenkov during dinner and ask, "Say, are Shakhurin and Novikov still in
jail?"
"Yes."
"Don't you think it might be all right to release them?" But
Stalin was asking the question to himself. He was just thinking out
loud. No one would say anything, and the matter would be left up in the
air until sometime later when he'd bring it up again. Once he even went
so far as to say, "You should give serious thought to releasing Shakhurin and Novikov. What
good are they doing us in jail? They can still work." He
always directed these remarks to Malenkov and Beria because they were in charge
of the case against Shakhurin and Novikov.
Talbott, Strobe, Trans. and Ed. Khrushchev Remembers.
Vasili Stalin [Stalin’s son] wrote in a letter
to Khrushchev: "When Beria spoke of arresting Redens,
Comrade Stalin protested sharply.... But Beria was supported by
Malenkov. And Comrade Stalin said, 'look into it very carefully....
I don't believe Redens is an
enemy.'"
Radzinsky, Edvard. Stalin.
Redens was arrested in 1937. That was the first
blow. Soon afterward both the Svanidzes were
arrested.
How could such a thing happen? How could my father [Stalin] do it?
The only thing I know is that it couldn't have been his idea. But if a
skillful flatterer, like Beria, whispered slyly in his ear that "these
people are against you," that they were "compromising material"
and "dangerous connections," such as trips abroad, my father was
capable of believing it.
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
MIKOYAN: A few days before his death the late
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
ANDREYEV (Member of the Central Committee and the
Presidium of the Supreme Soviet): In this sense, Beria's plan differed from the
plan of other traitors of the Soviet people, former enemies. As we now
know, this plan was about:
Firstly, worming his way into the trust of Comrade Stalin,
whatever the cost. This he considered a fundamental condition for
his enemy activity. And so in any way he tried to worm his way into
Stalin's trust. Did he achieve this? Undoubtedly he did.
Comrades here have already mentioned that Comrade Stalin had a weakness of
being too trusting. This is the truth.
The second, and obviously the central, task in his plan,
was to destroy the Bolshevik nucleus of our leadership.... to undermine the
trust Comrade Stalin had in various leaders, to sow strife among the Party
leaders and the leaders of the government.
Was he able to achieve any of this? Certainly, he was successful for a
time.
Now Comrade Voroshilov spoke about Comrade Ordjonikidze.
Ordjonikidze was the most honest, most noble
Bolshevik, and you may be sure that he was a victim of Beria's intrigues....
Beria divided Comrade Stalin and Ordjonikidze and
Comrade Ordjonikidze's noble heart couldn't take it;
thus Beria took out of commission one of the best leaders of the Party and
friends of Comrade Stalin.
Going on. All of us Chekists
and the new ones too, know what a warm key friendship there was between Comrade
Stalin and Molotov. We all considered this a natural friendship, and were
happy for it. But then Beria appeared in
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
STALIN DID NOT TRUST
BERIA AS THE YEARS WENT BY
In 1948 Stalin began to bring pressure to bear on
Beria,
Sergo. Beria, My Father: Inside Stalin's Kremlin.
When he [my father, Beria] gradually began to open my eyes to certain facts and
to get me ready to understand that there was a conflict between Stalin and him,
he always took care to emphasize that there was no one equal to Stalin when it
came to perseverance and capacity to achieve his aims.
Beria,
Sergo. Beria, My Father: Inside Stalin's Kremlin.
MIKOYAN: Even before Beria's coming to
I must say that lately Comrade Stalin didn't trust Beria. Beria was
forced to recognize, at his last session of the Presidium of the Central Committee,
that Comrade Stalin didn't trust him,...
During the war Comrade Stalin divided the MVD and State Security. It
seems to me that this, too, was done from a certain lack of trust in him, otherwise there was no point in dividing the ministry.
This had to be done in order to take away his rights as a Minister. At
that time they appointed him to the Council of Ministers and to the GOKO.
This, too, was one of the first signs of a lack of trust. But in spite of
all this, Comrade Stalin showed him a great deal of trust.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
BERIA WAS HATED BY
NEARLY EVERYONE
...Everyone close to us hated him [Beria],... Everyone in the family loathed him and felt a premonition
of fear, especially my mother, who, as my father himself told me, "made
scenes" and insisted as early as 1929 that "that man must not be
allowed to set foot in our house."
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
Beria's role was a terrible one for all our family. How my mother feared
and hated him! And it was her friends...who were the first to fall, the moment Beria was able to convince my father that
they were hostile to him.
...The spell cast on my father by this terrifying evil genius was extremely
powerful, and it never failed to work.
...Beria's role in the Civil War in the
But
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
"During the civil war," Svetlana reminds us, "Beria fought first
with the Reds and then with the Whites--as the situation changed so did his
allegiance. At one time, fighting for the Whites, he was taken prisoner
by
"Nobody in our family liked him [Beria], though at the beginning my father
regarded him as a very good worker. Yes, he committed this sin."...
The only thing that mattered to Beria was power, even in those early
days. He was both immoral and apolitical: his only creed was that the
ends justify the means....
Volodya said, "Everyone in our family knew then
he was a scoundrel. Nadya spoke out against him
quite openly, so did my mother, Anna Sergeyevna.
He was quite obviously a villain. He wanted to isolate Stalin from his
relatives, to close every possible uncontrolled channel through which reality
might reach Stalin."...
"He hated all of our family," adds Kyra
[the niece of Stalin's wife]. Svetlana said, "he
is very clever, and very manipulative. He got everything he wanted.
And he was a horrible man with a horrible face. According to my
[Svetlana] mother too he was horrible! She wouldn't have him
around. She was outspoken enough to tell father [Stalin] that he
shouldn't invite him to the house. Every time they went on vacation to
the Black Sea Beria would visit them because
Richardson,
Rosamond. Stalin’s Shadow.
He [
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
MALYSHEV (Member of the Central Committee): For
example, I as a minister, have worked under the
leadership of several comrades--Comrade Molotov, Comrade Kaganovich,
and Beria. I must say, that each time you go to report on some matter to
the comrades, you go with different feelings. You go to comrade Molotov
with one feeling--we know that he is a strict leader, demanding, but whenever
you go to him you know that there will be no hasty decisions, adventurist decisions, if you made a big and serious
mistake you will never be struck at because of his mood. Then there's
comrade Kaganovich--a sometimes hot tempered fellow,
but we know that he does not bear grudges. He'll erupt, but it quickly
passes and he makes the right decision. Beria is another thing. We
minister's knew that you would enter his office a minister, but who you would
be on return--you didn't know. Perhaps a minister,
or perhaps you'd land in prison. This was his method: "A knock on
the head"--and you'd come out staggering. In one word, Beria's
leadership style was the crude style of a dictator, no Party spirit. And
speaking of Party spirit, I worked under Beria during the war, in charge of
tanks,... and I was convinced that he never had any
Party spirit.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
I shall come back later to Beria, who seems to have had a diabolic link with
all our family and who wiped out a good half of its members....
Had it not been for the inexplicable support of my father, whom Beria had
cunningly won over,
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
MIKOYAN:... He [Beria]
feigned being a buddy--first of one-person, then another--saying one thing to
your face and another behind your back, he alienated the comrades -- first
some, then others--and stacked the deck for his purposes. We all saw
this, but didn't give it the significance which it all took on after Comrade
Stalin was gone.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
SOME SAY BERIA IS
RESPONSIBLE FOR STALIN’S DEATH
The question as to whether those close to him plotted Stalin's death remains
unanswered, although Svetlana is convinced of Beria's complicity,
and by implication of others' too.
Richardson,
Rosamond. Stalin’s Shadow.
MOLOTOV: Some people believe that
Beria killed Stalin. I believe this possibility cannot be excluded....
Beria was treacherous and unreliable. He could have done the deed just to
save his own skin.... I too am of the opinion that Stalin did not die a
natural death. He wasn't seriously ill. He was working steadily... And
he remained very spry.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
Stalin could not be permitted to live, I believe, due to the risk that he would
attempt a countercoup. The Politburo, therefore, overthrew Stalin in February
1953 to avert a purge. Stalin's timely death was the solution--Beria's,
Malenkov's, and possibly others'--to the problem of disposing of the deposed
Stalin. Discounting the information from official Soviet sources, I
conclude that Beria was responsible for the death of Stalin, Malenkov was his
accomplice, and Khrushchev & Bulganin were accessories after the fact.
Deriabin, Peter. Inside Stalin's
Kremlin. Washington [D.C.]: Brassey's,
c1998, p. 131
BERIA VIRTUALLY ADMITS
HE IS RESPONSIBLE FOR STALIN’S DEATH
EDITOR: Molotov wonders with good reason
whether Stalin really died a natural death. Shortly before Beria was
liquidated by his fearful colleagues, he took credit for Stalin's death.
He confided to Molotov that he had "saved them all," implying that he
had killed Stalin or at least seen to it that the stricken Stalin did not
receive adequate and timely medical attention.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
Melodramatic accounts of Stalin's death, of which there is no shortage, claim
that Stalin was murdered. “It is most likely that the denial of
medical care made not the slightest difference.” But Beria clearly
thought it had. “I did him in,” he later boasted to Molotov
and Kaganovich. “I saved you all!"
Montefiore, Sebag. Stalin: The
Court of the Red Tsar.
CHUEV: Beria himself was said to have killed
him.
MOLOTOV: Why Beria? It could have been
done by a security officer or a doctor. As he was dying, there were
moments when he regained consciousness. At other times he was writhing in
pain. There were various episodes. Sometimes he seemed about to
come to. At those moments Beria would stay close to Stalin.
Oh! He was always ready...
One cannot exclude the possibility that he had a hand in Stalin's death.
Judging by what he said to me and I sensed.... While on the rostrum of
the Mausoleum with him on May 1st, 1953, he did drop hints.... Apparently
he wanted to evoke my sympathy. He said, "I did him in!"--as if this had benefited me. Of course he wanted to
ingratiate himself with me: "I saved all of you!" Khrushchev
would scarcely have had a hand in it. He might have been suspicious of
what had gone on. Or possibly... All of
them had been close by. Malenkov knows more, much more, much more.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
THE EVENTS OCCURRING
WHILE STALIN WAS DYING IMPLICATE BERIA
Beria would not call the doctors and instead turned on the servants: 'Why did
you panic? Can't you see Comrade Stalin is sound asleep? All of you
get out and leave our leader in peace, I shall deal
with you in due course!'
Malenkov gave Beria some half-hearted support. According to Rybin, there seemed to be no intention at all of getting
medical help for Stalin, who must have had the stroke some six to eight hours
before. Everyone seemed to be following a scenario that best suited Beria.
Volkogonov, Dmitri. Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy.
Beria did not hide his look of triumph. All the other members of the
Politburo, including Malenkov, were afraid of this monster. The death of
one tyrant promised a new orgy of bloodletting by his successor.
Exhausted by all his exertions, and now sure that
Stalin had crossed the dividing line between life and death, Beria dashed away
to the Kremlin for some hours, leaving the other leaders at Stalin's
deathbed. I have already outlined the version of Beria, as first deputy
chairman of the Council of Ministers, now forcing the great political game that
he had long planned. His hasty departure for the Kremlin was possibly
connected with his effort to remove from Stalin's safe documents which might
contain instructions about how to deal with him, a last will that might not be
so easy to contest, made while Stalin was in full control of his faculties.
He returned to the dacha in a mood of self-confidence and proceeded to dictate
to his crestfallen colleagues that they must prepare a government statement to
the effect that Stalin was ill and also publish a bulletin on the state of his
health.
Meanwhile the last act of the drama was being played out. Stalin's son, Vasili, kept coming in and shouting in a drunken voice,
'They've killed my father, the bastards!'...
Voroshilov, Kaganovich, Khrushchev and some others
were weeping openly.
...On her knees, her head on his chest and wailing like a peasant, was Istomina, Stalin's housekeeper who for some 20 years had
looked after him, accompanied him on all his trips to the south and even on two
of the three international wartime conferences.
Volkogonov, Dmitri. Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy.
So the staff rang through to Malenkov to alert the politburo of what had
happened [to Stalin], but they could do nothing without Beria. Beria
could not be found, he was out carousing with
women. After finally being tracked down he marched in drunk at around 3
a.m. Looking triumphant, according to the assembled group, he glanced at
the comatose Stalin and summarily dismissed their fears telling them to leave
him to sleep in peace. He forbade anyone to use the telephone, ordered
the politburo to reconvene in the morning, and went away. He returned at
9 a.m., again with members of the politburo, to take another look.
Stalin had lain untreated for over 24 hours; it was 10 hours since he had been
found. Beria now ordered doctors to be summoned from the
Svetlana by this time had been summoned and stood immobilized amidst the
frantic scene beside her father's bed. She is convinced that there was
more to Stalin's stroke than met the eye.
"Beria finally plotted to murder my father. I don't know how he
plotted it, and there is a lot of folklore about it. But they withdrew
medical help for at least 12 hours; the whole politburo, Beria among them,
arrived at the scene instead of the doctors. He was the one who had said
hours earlier, "Nothing has happened. You are panicking. The
man is sleeping." And then turned around and walked away.
Richardson,
Rosamond. Stalin’s Shadow.
We did everything we could to raise Stalin to his feet. We saw he was
unconscious and therefore completely oblivious of his condition. But
then, while the doctors were taking a urine sample, I noticed he tried to cover
himself. He must have felt the discomfort. Once, during the day, he
actually returned to consciousness. Even though he still couldn't speak,
his face started to move. They had been spoon-feeding him soup and sweet
tea. He raised his left hand and started to point to something on the
wall. His lips formed something like a smile. I realized what he
was trying to say and called for attention. I explained why he was
pointing with his hand. There was a picture hanging on the wall, a
clipping from the magazine Ogonyok. It was a
reproduction of a painting by some artist of a little girl feeding a lamb from
a horn. At that moment Stalin was being spoon-fed and was trying to say,
"I'm in the same position as that lamb which the girl is feeding from the
horn. You're doing the same for me with a spoon."
Then he began to shake hands with us one by one. I gave him my hand, and
he shook it with his left hand because his right wouldn't move. By these
handshakes he conveyed his feelings.
No sooner had Stalin fallen ill than Beria started going around spewing hatred
against him and mocking him. It was simply unbearable to listen to
Beria. But, interestingly enough, as soon as Stalin showed these signs of
consciousness on his face and made us think he might recover, Beria threw
himself on his knees, seized Stalin's hand, and started kissing it. When
Stalin lost consciousness again and closed his eyes, Beria stood up and
spat. This was the real Beria--treacherous even toward Stalin, whom he
supposedly admired and even worshipped yet whom he was now spitting on.
Talbott, Strobe, Trans. and Ed. Khrushchev Remembers.
MOLOTOV: During his [Stalin] last
days I had in some sense fallen out of favor.... I had seen Stalin for
five weeks before he died. He was absolutely healthy. They called
for me when he was taken ill. When I arrived at the dacha some Politburo
members were there. Of non-Politburo members, only Mikoyan and myself, as I recall, had been called. Beria was
clearly in command.
Stalin was lying on the sofa. His eyes were closed. Now and then he
would make an effort to open them and say something, but he couldn't fully
regain consciousness. Whenever Stalin tried to say something, Beria ran
up to him and kissed his hand.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
They all felt that something portentous, something almost of majesty,
was going on in this room and they conducted themselves accordingly.
There was only one person who was behaving in a way that was very nearly
obscene. That was Beria. He was extremely agitated. His face,
repulsive enough at the best of times, now was twisted by his passions--by
ambition, cruelty, cunning, and a lust for power and more power still. He
was trying so hard at this moment of crisis to strike exactly the right
balance, to be cunning, yet not too cunning. It was written all over
him. He went up to the bed and spent a long time gazing into the dying
man's face. From time to time my father opened his eyes but was
apparently unconscious or in a state of semi-consciousness. Beria stared
fixedly at those clouded eyes, anxious even now to convince my father that he
was the most loyal and devoted of them all, as he had always tried with every
ounce of his strength to appear to be. Unfortunately, he had succeeded
for too long.
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
During the final minutes, as the end was approaching, Beria suddenly caught
sight of me and ordered: "Take Svetlana away!" Those who were
standing nearby stared, but no one moved. Afterward he darted into the
hallway ahead of anybody else. The silence of the room where everyone was
gathered around the deathbed was shattered by the sound of his loud voice, the
ring of triumph unconcealed, as he shouted, "Khrustalyov!
My car!"
He was a magnificent modern specimen of the artful courtier, the embodiment of
Oriental perfidy, flattering, and hypocrisy who had succeeded in confounding
even my father, a man whom it was ordinarily difficult to deceive.... But
I haven't the slightest doubt that Beria used his cunning to trick my father
into many other things and laughed up his sleeve about it afterwards. All
the other leaders knew it.
Now all the ugliness inside him came into the open--he couldn't hold
back. I was by no means the only one to see it. But they were all
terrified of him. They knew that the moment my father died no one in all
of
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
And that was why he [Beria] had been unable to conceal his joy at my father's
death.
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Only One Year.
...The members of the government then rushed for the door.
All of them except the utterly degenerate Beria spent those days in great
agitation, trying to help yet at the same time fearful of what the future might
bring. Many of them shed genuine tears. I saw Voroshilov, Kaganovich, Malenkov, Bulganin, and Khrushchev in tears.
Alliluyeva, Svetlana. Twenty Letters
to a Friend.
VOROSHILOV: We were by our Stalin's side until his
last breath, and Beria immediately demonstrated his
"activity"--as if to say don't forget, I'm here.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
BERIA WAS MAKING A
POWER GRAB AFTER STALIN DIED
Workers in Communist East Berlin staged demonstrations, riots, and a general
strike on June 17-19, 1953, against the work quotas and compensation scheme of
the East German government. Soviet tanks and troops halted the
disturbance, killing 16 rioters. On the first day of the disturbances,
Beria dispatched Deputy Minister Kobulov with a group
of 10 MGB officers to conduct on-the-scene investigations. Only after
their departure (but before Soviet tanks and troops put down the uprising) was
the Politburo told of Kobulov's mission.
With the MGB and MVD under his command, Beria came within a hair's breath of
seizing control of the country. He planned to become the new Stalin, to
achieve absolute power over the Party apparatus from the Politburo down.
Deriabin, Peter. Inside Stalin's
Kremlin. Washington [D.C.]: Brassey's,
c1998, p. 148-149
[According to Khrushchev] Abakumov, who actually
supervised the prosecution [in the Leningrad Affair]
was Beria's man; he never reported to anyone, not even to Stalin, without
checking first with Beria."
Deriabin, Peter. Inside Stalin's
Kremlin. Washington [D.C.]: Brassey's,
c1998, p. 181
MOLOTOV: ...Beria stopped keeping me informed during
Stalin's last years. I was on the sidelines then. Under Khrushchev
I was entirely in the dark about some events.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
BULGANIN: All these facts tell us that Beria was
acting on the principle of: the worst things are, the
better things are for him.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
MOLOTOV: Although it was written by certain of
Beria's self-serving cronies, he didn't hesitate to put his name on the
brochure, which was destined to play its role in his progress toward a central
job. Beria also used other methods for his careerist goals. The methods of a smooth operator and unforgivable careerist, when
activity in work is hardly explained by ideological ideas or true faithfulness
to the Party. We can't deny his organizational abilities, which
showed in organizing and implementing a number of economic measures. The
Party had to use these abilities when they were used to execute necessary
tasks. The Party does not refuse to use even the abilities of exposed
wreckers, when it has the opportunity to do so.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
SHATALIN (Secretary of the Central Committee): In the
light of materials we now have on Beria, it is absolutely clear that presenting
the Doctor's Affair was useful only to him and his protectors. He wanted
to use this incident to make points as a humanitarian and brave initiator.
What does this rogue care for the interests of the State.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
VOROSHILOV: However, the question reasonably arises,
why was this subject able to freely work in Party leadership and government for
so long, without being exposed sooner, why did he have such a great authority,
and hold such high Party and State positions? The question is entirely
legitimate.
First and foremost,... Beria is an insidious and
cunning enemy, a consummate adventurist, schemer, who
knows how to skillfully worm his way into the trust of a leader, who can hide
his base plans for a long time and wait for the proper moment. He
witnessed the daily life of the great Stalin. Together with all of us he
knew that Stalin, as the result of intense work, often fell sick in recent
years, obviously this circumstance to a certain extent was the basis for
Beria's vile tactics. He waited in the hope that sooner or later Stalin
would be no more. As the facts have now shown, after the death of Stalin
this adventurist was counting on the speedy
realization of his criminal plans against the Party and the State. That's
why he was in such a hurry after the death of Stalin, or perhaps he was being
hurried....
In all these characteristics of his, Beria feared Stalin, he ingratiated
himself with Stalin, but skillfully, in his own way; he would whisper all
manner of disgusting things, would completely confuse him. And we could
tell just by Comrade Stalin's mood, when we met either for business or other
reasons, we could all feel whom Beria had been "whispering" against
that day.
Stickle,
D. M., Ed. The Beria Affair.
STALIN DID NOT LIKE
BERIA
Deep down, Stalin no doubt despised Beria, but he could not manage without
him. Beria was his inquisitor, his right-hand man and his spy.
Beria, for instance, informed him that
Volkogonov, Dmitri. Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy.
STALIN KEPT BERIA
BECAUSE HE WAS A GOOD ORGANIZER
MOLOTOV: He [Beria] was a good
organizer, a good administrator--and a born security operative, of
course. But quite without principles.
I had a sharp clash with Beria the first week after Stalin's death. It is
quite possible that I was not the one to meet either his or Khrushchev's requirements.
Their policies would not have differed greatly.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.
MOLOTOV: ...He
[Beria] was a talented organizer but a cruel, merciless man.
Chuev, Feliks. Molotov
Remembers.