Filipp Denisovich Bobkov (russian: Фили́пп Дени́сович Бобко́в; 1 December 1925 – 17 June 2019) was a Soviet and Russian KGB functionary, who worked as the chief of the KGB subunit responsible for repressing dissent (Fifth Main Directorate), which was responsible for suppression of internal dissent in the former
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
. He was widely regarded the chief KGB ideologist or "KGB brain".
Service in the Soviet secret services
Bobkov began his career in the Soviet secret services in 1945, under the guidance of
Lavrentiy Beria
Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria (; rus, Лавре́нтий Па́влович Бе́рия, Lavréntiy Pávlovich Bériya, p=ˈbʲerʲiə; ka, ლავრენტი ბერია, tr, ; – 23 December 1953) was a Georgian Bolshevik ...
and then known as the
People's Commissariat for State Security
The People's Commissariat for State Security (russian: Народный комиссариат государственной безопасности) or NKGB, was the name of the Soviet secret police, intelligence and counter-intelligence fo ...
, or NKGB. In the power struggles that followed the death of Soviet leader
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet Union, Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as Ge ...
, Bobkov survived Beria's removal and execution, and later outlasted eleven subsequent chairmen of the Ministry of State Security (MGB) and KGB. During the 1970s and 1980s, he "effectively became the KGB's real chairman, although officially he held the post of first deputy", according to Russian investigative journalist
Yevgenia Albats
Yevgenia Markovna Albats (russian: Евге́ния Ма́рковна Альба́ц, born 5 September 1958Anti-Zionist Committee of the Soviet Public, established in 1983. He also allegedly invented
Liberal Democratic Party of Russia
LDPR — Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (russian: ЛДПР — Либерально-демократическая партия России, LDPR — Liberal'no-demokraticheskaya partiya Rossii) is a right-wing populist and ultranationalist ...
, according to Soviet Politburo member
Alexander Yakovlev
Alexander Nikolayevich Yakovlev (russian: Алекса́ндр Никола́евич Я́ковлев; 2 December 1923 – 18 October 2005) was a Soviet and Russian politician, diplomat, and historian. A member of the Politburo and Secreta ...
. However, Bobkov denied these allegations, saying that he did not support the creation of a " Zubatov-style pseudo-party under KGB control, which directs interests and sentiments of certain social groups".
Ethnic conflicts
As described in his official biography, Bobkov was personally engaged in resolving ethnic conflicts in the Soviet Union. This included incidents such as the Sumgait pogrom, the
January Events
, partof = Revolutions of 1989, Singing Revolution, and Dissolution of the Soviet Union
, image =
, caption = A man with a Lithuanian flag in front of a Soviet tank, 13 January 1991
, date = ...
in Lithuania, the 1989 tribal clashes in Uzbekistan, and the
Jeltoqsan
, partof = Dissolution of the Soviet Union
, image =
, caption =
, date = 16–19 December 1986
, place = Alma-Ata, Kazakh SSR, Soviet Union
, coordinates =
, map_type =
, latitude =
, longitude =
, ...
. Former Politburo deputy and reformist leader Alexander Yakovlev, however, has claimed that Bobkov did not solve these conflicts, but rather created them in an effort to maintain the power of the KGB by showing its necessity.
Perestroika
According to Bobkov,
perestroika
''Perestroika'' (; russian: links=no, перестройка, p=pʲɪrʲɪˈstrojkə, a=ru-perestroika.ogg) was a political movement for reform within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU) during the late 1980s widely associated wit ...
had been invented by him and his KGB colleagues: "We in the KGB contributed quite a bit to the process of perestroika because ..ithout it the Soviet Union could not move ahead."
Documents discovered by political scientist
Robert van Voren
Robert van Voren (publishing pseudonym of Johannes Baks, nl, Johannes Bax, born 25 July 1959, Montreal, Quebec, Canada) is a Dutch human rights activist, sovietologist and historian.
He is a professor of Soviet and post-Soviet studies in the I ...
in the
Stasi
The Ministry for State Security, commonly known as the (),An abbreviation of . was the state security service of the East Germany from 1950 to 1990.
The Stasi's function was similar to the KGB, serving as a means of maintaining state autho ...
archives show that in summer 1989 Bobkov came to Berlin and told Stasi Director
Erich Mielke
Erich Fritz Emil Mielke (; 28 December 1907 – 21 May 2000) was a German communist official who served as head of the East German Ministry for State Security (''Ministerium für Staatsicherheit'' – MfS), better known as the Stasi, from 1957 u ...
that
German reunification
German reunification (german: link=no, Deutsche Wiedervereinigung) was the process of re-establishing Germany as a united and fully sovereign state, which took place between 2 May 1989 and 15 March 1991. The day of 3 October 1990 when the Ge ...
was the work of mentally ill persons.
Bobkov allegedly supervised the transfer of Communist Party money to foreign banks prior to the
1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt
The 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, also known as the August Coup,, "August Putsch". was a failed attempt by hardliners of the Soviet Union's Communist Party to forcibly seize control of the country from Mikhail Gorbachev, who was Soviet ...
.Нерсесов, Юрий (23 January 2003) Жертвы иудейской войны stringer-news.ru website. Retrieved 3 June 2021. In October 1990, Bobkov ordered the creation of commercial firms and banks, which were managed by KGB officers and their "trusted contacts". The project was funded by KGB and Party money, "which made up almost 80% of the amount invested in the new banks, stock exchanges, and businesses in 1990-1991", according to the testimony of Richard Palmer to the
United States Congress
The United States Congress is the legislature of the federal government of the United States. It is Bicameralism, bicameral, composed of a lower body, the United States House of Representatives, House of Representatives, and an upper body, ...
regarding Soviet infiltration of the Western financial system. Nikolay Kruchina, a high ranking
CPSU
"Hymn of the Bolshevik Party"
, headquarters = 4 Staraya Square, Moscow
, general_secretary = Vladimir Lenin (first)Mikhail Gorbachev (last)
, founded =
, banned =
, founder = Vladimir Lenin
, newspaper ...
official who was officially responsible for supervising the Communist Party money, fell to his death from the window of his luxury apartment in Moscow soon after the events.
Post-Soviet Russia
Bobkov officially retired in 1991 and organized a private security service in the Media Most company called SB MOST Group (russian: СБ „Группы МОСТ“), which included thousands of his former KGB colleagues.Григорьев, Андрей (Grigoriev, Andrei) (28 March 2000) Аполитичный Гусинский Apolitical Gusinsky. (in Russian). ''«Компания»'' — деловой еженедельник (''Company'') Archived from the original on 12 February 2012. Retrieved 15 January 2021. The entire archive of 5th KGB Main Directorate was taken to Media-Most. This security service allegedly organized an attempted assassination of Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky in 1994. On 3 July 2000, the FreeLance Bureau (FLB) under its editor-in-chief Sergei Sokolov released what was called ''Russiagate'' (russian: "Рашенгейт") or the “Database of SB MOST Group” (russian: «База данных СБ „Группы МОСТ“») although Sokolov stated that in addition to the MOST Group Security Bureau's database, Sokolov released other files, transcripts, etc from the FSB and other security structures as well.
His daughter Dasha or Daria Bobkova (russian: Дарья Бобкова) heads the Spanish branch of Most-Bank (russian: Мост-Банк - Испанский).
He also worked as a personal security adviser of Russian Parliament speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov.Personal security adviser of Ruslan Hasbulatov /ref>