Maksim Zakharovich Saburov (russian: Макси́м Заха́рович Сабу́ров, 2 February 1900 – 24 March 1977) was a

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

engineer, economist and politician, three-time Chairman of Gosplan and later First Deputy Premier of the Soviet Union. He was involved in the

Anti-Party Group The Anti-Party Group ( rus, Антипартийная группа, r=Antipartiynaya gruppa) was a Stalinist group within the leadership of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union that unsuccessfully attempted to depose Nikita Khrushchev as Fir ...

's attempt to displace

Nikita Khrushchev Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (– 11 September 1971) was the First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964 and chairman of the country's Council of Ministers from 1958 to 1964. During his rule, Khrushchev s ...

in 1957.

Early life and career

Saburov was born in 1900 in the town of

Druzhkivka Druzhkivka ( uk, Дружківка, ; russian: Дружковка, Druzhkovka) is a city of oblast significance in Donetsk Oblast (province) of Ukraine. Population: ; 64,557 (2001). The area of the city is 46 km². Druzhkivka is a city lo ...

in the Yekaterinoslav Governorate of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War ...

(present-day

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inva ...

) in a working-class family of Russian ethnicity. He joined the

Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of '' The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engel ...

in 1920, serving in a detachment with the aim of suppressing resistance to the Communist regime.S. V. Utechin, ''Everyman's Concise Encyclopaedia of Russia''. 1961, J. M. Dent & Sons. p. 470. He attended the Sverdlov Communist University between 1923 and 1926, then studied to become an engineer at the

Bauman Moscow State Technical University The Bauman Moscow State Technical University, BMSTU (russian: link=no, Московский государственный технический университет им. Н. Э. Баумана (МГТУ им. Н. Э. Баумана)), some ...

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

. Between 1921 and 1926, Saburov was Secretary of the Bachmut

Komsomol The All-Union Leninist Young Communist League (russian: link=no, Всесоюзный ленинский коммунистический союз молодёжи (ВЛКСМ), ), usually known as Komsomol (; russian: Комсомол, links=n ...

Committee, and then that of the

Kostiantynivka Kostiantynivka ( uk, Костянтинівка, ; russian: Константиновка) is an industrial city in the Donetsk Oblast ( province) of eastern Ukraine, on the river. Administratively, it is incorporated as a city of oblast signi ...

raion A raion (also spelt rayon) is a type of administrative unit of several post-Soviet states. The term is used for both a type of subnational entity and a division of a city. The word is from the French (meaning 'honeycomb, department'), and is c ...

. Between 1926 and 1928, Saburov was a

propagandist Propaganda is communication that is primarily used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda, which may not be objective and may be selectively presenting facts to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded ...

working in the

Donets The Seversky Donets () or Siverskyi Donets (), usually simply called the Donets, is a river on the south of the East European Plain. It originates in the Central Russian Upland, north of Belgorod, flows south-east through Ukraine (Kharkiv, D ...

region. After five years of studying at the Bauman Institute, Saburov became head of the technological bureau of a factory in Moscow in 1933. Subsequently he was head of the instrumental division of the Stalin Novokramatorsk Machine Plant until 1937. Saburov advanced rapidly during the

Great Purge The Great Purge or the Great Terror (russian: Большой террор), also known as the Year of '37 (russian: 37-й год, translit=Tridtsat sedmoi god, label=none) and the Yezhovshchina ('period of Yezhov'), was Soviet General Secreta ...

, becoming a minister in the Narkomat for Heavy Machines in 1937, and then Gosplan Secretary for Machinery in 1938.

Party career

In 1940, Saburov became First Deputy Chairman of Gosplan, the committee responsible for planning the Soviet economy, giving him wide-ranging powers over the Soviet economic apparatus, marking the beginning of the most notable period of his career in the Party. In 1947, Saburov became a member of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR and in 1952 he became a member of the Central Committee of the CPSU. He served in the Presidium of this body until 1957, and he left the Committee in 1961.

Career in Gosplan

Saburov became full Chairman of Gosplan in 1941. Documents from the Russian State Economic Archives note that his responsibilities prior to assuming the chairmanship included personnel matters (he oversaw purges of unreliable employees in 1938) and mobilization efforts. He had a brief period in power here until 1942, when he was superseded by his predecessor Nikolai Voznesensky. After being demoted, Saburov moved between various bureaucratic posts in the supreme organs of Soviet government, first becoming a

Deputy Chairman The chairperson, also chairman, chairwoman or chair, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the grou ...

Council of People's Commissars The Councils of People's Commissars (SNK; russian: Совет народных комиссаров (СНК), ''Sovet narodnykh kommissarov''), commonly known as the ''Sovnarkom'' (Совнарком), were the highest executive authorities of ...

, a position he had also held during his Gosplan chairmanship, and then once more First Deputy Chairman of Gosplan in 1944. He was relegated to a Deputy Chairman of Gosplan in 1946. In 1947 he was made a

Council of Ministers A council is a group of people who come together to consult, deliberate, or make decisions. A council may function as a legislature, especially at a town, city or county/ shire level, but most legislative bodies at the state/provincial or ...

. In 1949 Saburov was made Chairman of Gosplan once again. In this function he helped to formulate and then presided over the Fifth Five-Year Plan. Saburov was partly responsible for the reconstruction of the Soviet Union after the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...

: agricultural production in 1950 was barely above the 1940 level. Milk production was lower by 100,000 tons; meat production was only 12,000 tons higher. The Plan, which Saburov co-ordinated as the Chairman of Gosplan, succeeded in increasing coal production by 12 million tons, oil production by over 30 million tons, and electricity production by nearly 80 billion kW. Saburov was temporarily displaced from his position as Chairman in 1953, shortly after the death of Stalin, by Grigory Kosyachenko for a period of three months; however, many sources, such as Utechin, leave out this brief interlude in favour of Saburov having two terms. Under this short period of time, Saburov was Minister of Machinery. In 1954 Saburov criticized the high rate of absenteeism in the Soviet Union, saying that labor productivity was "insufficient" and "further tightening" of "labor discipline" was required. He was responsible for helping to plan the Sixth Five-Year Plan, which would last from 1956 to 1961. However, in 1956 - after he had moved from being Chairman of Gosplan - Saburov, with the other planners, was criticized for having been unrealistic in planning."Ferment and Failure"
Time, 7 January 1957. Retrieved 2 December 2007. Saburov was removed as Chairman in 1955, becoming First Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers, and so the Deputy Premier of the Soviet Union. He was also made Chairman of the State Economic Commission for Short-Term Planning until 1956, when he was criticized for the Sixth Five-Year Plan, which was unprecedently sent back to the planners for revision.

First Deputy Premier

Saburov became First Deputy Premier in 1955. As the First Deputy Premier of the Soviet Union, Saburov agreed with Khrushchev that Soviet economic production would surpass that of the United States, saying at a Moscow embassy party that "the Soviet Union will draw even with the U.S. in the foreseeable future". Saburov was also responsible for using hard figures rather than percentages in the Five-Year Plan for the first time, giving the plan more meaning for experts. Saburov, however, belonged more to the faction headed by

Georgy Malenkov Georgy Maximilianovich Malenkov ( – 14 January 1988) was a Soviet politician who briefly succeeded Joseph Stalin as the leader of the Soviet Union. However, at the insistence of the rest of the Presidium, he relinquished control over the p ...

than to Khrushchev himself, and Malenkov was declining in power, being replaced in February 1955 by the rising Nikolai Bulganin as Chairman of Sovmin.

Anti-Party Group

In 1957, a failed attempt to depose Khrushchev was run by Malenkov,

Lazar Kaganovich Lazar Moiseyevich Kaganovich, also Kahanovich (russian: Ла́зарь Моисе́евич Кагано́вич, Lázar' Moiséyevich Kaganóvich; – 25 July 1991), was a Soviet politician and administrator, and one of the main associates of ...

and

Vyacheslav Molotov Vyacheslav Mikhaylovich Molotov. ; (;. 9 March Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates">O._S._25_February.html" ;"title="Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="nowiki/>Old Style and New Style dates">O. S. 25 February">Old_Style_and_New_Style_dat ...

, known as the

. Saburov, being a friend of Malenkov, was implicated in the coup attempt and removed from his position as First Deputy Premier. Malenkov, in this period was condemned as "loathsome", thus also bringing Saburov into the purge. Saburov recanted, saying that "It is well known, comrades, that I made a mistake in June 1957 by displaying political instability in the struggle of the Central Committee of the Soviet CP against the anti-Party group."Borba Quotes Saburov's Self-Criticism
Retrieved 2 December 2007. Saburov worked as Deputy Chairman of Comecon for a short period of time afterwards, before moving to a factory in Syzran, which he managed until his retirement in 1966.

Decorations and awards

* Three Orders of Lenin *

Order of the Red Banner of Labour The Order of the Red Banner of Labour (russian: Орден Трудового Красного Знамени, translit=Orden Trudovogo Krasnogo Znameni) was an order of the Soviet Union established to honour great deeds and services to th ...

Notes and references

External links

Guide to the History of the Communist Party and the Soviet Union 1898—1991