The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (Народный комиссариат внутренних дел: Narodnyy Komissariat Vnutrennikh Del), abbreviated NKVD
NKVD (НКВД listen (help·info)), was the interior ministry of the Soviet Union. Established in 1917 as NKVD
NKVD of Russian SFSR,[1] the agency was originally tasked with conducting regular police work and overseeing the country's prisons and labor camps.[2] It was disbanded in 1930, with its functions being dispersed among other agencies, only to be reinstated as an all-union ministry in 1934.[3] The functions of the OGPU
OGPU (the secret police organization) were transferred to the NKVD
NKVD in 1934, giving it a monopoly over law enforcement activities that lasted until the end of World War II.[2] During this period, the NKVD
NKVD included both ordinary public order activities, as well as secret police activities.[4] The NKVD
NKVD is known for its role in political repression and for carrying out the Great Purge
Great Purge under Joseph Stalin. It was led by Genrikh Yagoda, Nikolai Yezhov
Nikolai Yezhov and Lavrentiy Beria.[5][6][7] The NKVD
NKVD undertook mass extrajudicial executions of untold numbers of citizens, and conceived, populated and administered the Gulag
Gulag system of forced labour camps. Their agents were responsible for the repression of the wealthier peasantry, as well as the mass deportations of entire nationalities to uninhabited regions of the country. They oversaw the protection of Soviet borders and espionage (which included political assassinations), and enforced Soviet policy in communist movements and puppet governments in other countries, most notably the repression and massacres in Poland. In March 1946 all People's Commissariats were renamed to Ministries, and the NKVD
NKVD became the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD).[8]

Contents

1 History and structure

1.1 Yezhov era 1.2 Main Directorates (Departments)

2 Ranking system (State Security) 3 NKVD
NKVD activities

3.1 Domestic repressions 3.2 International operations 3.3 Spanish Civil War 3.4 World War II operations 3.5 Postwar operations 3.6 Intelligence activities 3.7 Soviet economy

4 People's Commissars 5 Officers 6 See also 7 References 8 Further reading 9 External links

History and structure[edit]

Chronology of Sovietsecret police agencies

1917–1922

Cheka
Cheka under SNK of the RSFSR(All-Russian Extraordinary Commission)

1922–1923

GPU under NKVD
NKVD of the RSFSR(State Political Directorate)

1923–1934

OGPU
OGPU under SNK of the USSR(Joint State Political Directorate)

1934–1941

NKVD
NKVD of the USSR(People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs)

1941

MGB of the USSR(Ministry of State Security)

1941–1943

GUGB
GUGB of the NKVD
NKVD of the USSR( Main Directorate of State Security
Main Directorate of State Security of People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs)

1943–1946

N KGB
KGB of the USSR(People's Commissariat for State Security)

1946–1953

MGB of the USSR(Ministry of State Securtiy)

1953–1954

MVD of the USSR(Ministry of Internal Affairs)

1954–1978

KGB
KGB under SM of the USSR(Committee for State Security)

1978–1991

KGB
KGB of the USSR(Committee for State Security)

1991

MSB of the USSR(Interrepublican Security Service)

1991

TsSB of the USSR(Central Intelligence Service)

1991

Committee of protection of the USSR
USSR state border

Main articles: Cheka
Cheka and Chronology of Soviet secret police agencies Early NKVD
NKVD leaders Genrikh Yagoda, Vyacheslav Menzhinsky
Vyacheslav Menzhinsky and Felix Dzerzhinsky, 1924 After the Russian February Revolution
February Revolution of 1917, the Provisional Government dissolved the Tsarist police and set up the People's Militsiya. The subsequent Russian October Revolution
October Revolution of 1917 saw a seizure of state power led by Lenin
Lenin and the Bolsheviks, who established a new Bolshevik
Bolshevik regime, the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR). The Provisional Government's Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), formerly under Georgy Lvov
Georgy Lvov (from March 1917) and then under Nikolai Avksentiev
Nikolai Avksentiev (from 6 August [O.S. 24 July] 1917) and Alexei Nikitin (from 8 October [O.S. 25 September] 1917), turned into NKVD
NKVD (People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs) under a People's Commissar. However, the NKVD apparatus was overwhelmed by duties inherited from MVD, such as the supervision of the local governments and firefighting, and the Workers' and Peasants' Militsiya
Militsiya staffed by proletarians was largely inexperienced and unqualified. Realizing that it was left with no capable security force, the Council of People's Commissars
Council of People's Commissars of the RSFSR established (20 December [O.S. 7 December] 1917) a secret political police, the Cheka, led by Felix Dzerzhinsky. It gained the right to undertake quick non-judicial trials and executions, if that was deemed necessary in order to "protect the Russian Socialist- Communist
Communist revolution". The Cheka
Cheka was reorganized in 1922 as the State Political Directorate, or GPU, of the NKVD
NKVD of the RSFSR.[9] In 1922 the USSR
USSR formed, with the RSFSR as its largest member. The GPU became the OGPU
OGPU (Joint State Political Directorate), under the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR. The NKVD
NKVD of the RSFSR retained control of the militsiya, and various other responsibilities. In 1934 the NKVD
NKVD of the RSFSR was transformed into an all-union security force, the NKVD
NKVD (which the Communist
Communist Party of the Soviet Union leaders soon came to call "the leading detachment of our party"), and the OGPU
OGPU was incorporated into the NKVD
NKVD as the Main Directorate for State Security (GUGB); the separate NKVD
NKVD of the RSFSR was not resurrected until 1946 (as the MVD of the RSFSR). As a result, the NKVD
NKVD also took over control of all detention facilities (including the forced labor camps, known as the GULag) as well as the regular police. At various times, the NKVD
NKVD had the following Chief Directorates, abbreviated as "ГУ"– Главное управление, Glavnoye upravleniye.

ГУГБ – государственной безопасности, of State Security (GUGB, Glavnoye upravleniye gosudarstvennoi bezopasnosti) ГУРКМ– рабоче-крестьянской милиции, of Workers and Peasants Militsiya
Militsiya (GURKM, Glavnoye upravleniye raboče-krest'yanskoi militsyi) ГУПВО– пограничной и внутренней охраны, of Border and Internal Guards (GUPVO, GU pograničnoi i vnytrennei okhrany) ГУПО– пожарной охраны, of Firefighting Services (GUPO, GU požarnoi okhrany) ГУШосДор– шоссейных дорог, of Highways(GUŠD, GU šosseynykh dorog) ГУЖД– железных дорог, of Railways (GUŽD, GU železnykh dorog) ГУЛаг– Главное управление исправительно-трудовых лагерей и колоний, (GULag, Glavnoye upravleniye ispravitelno-trudovykh lagerey i kolonii) ГЭУ – экономическое, of Economics (GEU, Glavnoye ekonomičeskoie upravleniye) ГТУ – транспортное, of Transport (GTU, Glavnoye transportnoie upravleniye) ГУВПИ – военнопленных и интернированных, of POWs and interned persons (GUVPI, Glavnoye upravleniye voyennoplennikh i internirovannikh) Yezhov era[edit] Nikolai Yezhov, head of the NKVD
NKVD from 1936–1938 Until the reorganization begun by Nikolai Yezhov
Nikolai Yezhov with a purge of the regional political police in the autumn of 1936 and formalized by a May 1939 directive of the All-Union NKVD
NKVD by which all appointments to the local political police were controlled from the center, there was frequent tension between centralized control of local units and the collusion of those units with local and regional party elements, frequently resulting in the thwarting of Moscow's plans.[10] Following its establishment in 1934, the NKVD
NKVD underwent many organizational changes; between 1938 and 1939 alone, the NKVD's structure and leadership changed three times.[citation needed] During Yezhov's time in office, the Great Purge
Great Purge reached its height from the years 1937 and 1938 alone, at least 1.3 million were arrested and 681,692 were executed for 'crimes against the state'. The Gulag population swelled by 685,201 under Yezhov, nearly tripling in size in just two years, with at least 140,000 of these prisoners (and likely many more) dying of malnutrition, exhaustion and the elements in the camps (or during transport to them).[11] On 3 February 1941, the 4th Department ( Special
Special Section, OO) of GUGB NKVD
NKVD security service responsible for the Soviet Armed Forces military counter-intelligence,[12] consisting of 12 Sections and one Investigation Unit, was separated from GUGB
GUGB NKVD
NKVD USSR. The official liquidation of OO GUGB
GUGB within NKVD
NKVD was announced on 12 February by a joint order № 00151/003 of NKVD
NKVD and N KGB
KGB USSR. The rest of GUGB
GUGB was abolished and staff was moved to newly created People's Commissariat for State Security
People's Commissariat for State Security (NKGB). Departments of former GUGB
GUGB were renamed Directorates. For example, foreign intelligence unit known as Foreign Department (INO) became Foreign Directorate (INU); GUGB
GUGB political police unit represented by Secret Political Department (SPO) became Secret Political Directorate (SPU), and so on. The former GUGB
GUGB 4th Department (OO) was split into three sections. One section, which handled military counter-intelligence in NKVD
NKVD troops (former 11th Section of GUGB
GUGB 4th Department OO) become 3rd NKVD
NKVD Department or OKR (Otdel KontrRazvedki), the chief of OKR NKVD
NKVD was Aleksander Belyanov. After the German invasion of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union (June 1941), the NKGB USSR
USSR was abolished and on July 20, 1941 the units that formed NKGB becomes part of NKVD
NKVD USSR. The military CI was also upgraded from department to directorate and pot in NKVD
NKVD organization as (Directorate of Special
Special Departments or UOO NKVD
NKVD USSR). The only section did not return to UOO NKVD
NKVD till 11 of January 1942 was one responsible for counterintelligence in NKVMF (Navy). It returned to NKVD
NKVD control in January 11 1942 as UOO 9th Department controlled by P. Gladkov. In April 1943 Directorate of Special
Special Departments was transformed in to SMERSH and transferred to People's Defense and Commissariates. At the same time, the NKVD
NKVD was reduced in size and duties again by creating N KGB
KGB as independent State Security Commissariate. In 1946, all Soviet Commissariats were renamed "ministries". Accordingly, the Peoples Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD) of the USSR
USSR became the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), while the NKGB was renamed as the Ministry of State Security (MGB). In 1953, after the arrest of Lavrenty Beria, the MGB merged back into the MVD. The police and security services finally split in 1954 to become:

The USSR
USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), responsible for the criminal militia and correctional facilities. The USSR
USSR Committee for State Security (KGB), responsible for the political police, intelligence, counter-intelligence, personal protection (of the leadership) and confidential communications. Main Directorates (Departments)[edit] State Security Workers-Peasants Militsiya Border and Internal Security Firefighting security Correction and Labor camps Other smaller departments Department of Civil registration Financial (FINO) Administration Human resources Secretariat Special
Special assignment Ranking system (State Security)[edit] In 1935–1945 Main Directorate of State Security
Main Directorate of State Security of NKVD
NKVD had its own ranking system before it was merged in the Soviet military standardized ranking system.

Top-level commanding staff Commissioner General of State Security (later in 1935) Commissioner of State Security 1st Class Commissioner of State Security 2nd Class Commissioner of State Security 3rd Class Commissioner of State Security (Senior Major of State Security, before 1943) Senior commanding staff Colonel of State Security (Major of State Security, before 1943) Lieutenant Colonel of State Security (Captain of State Security, before 1943) Major of State Security (Senior Lieutenant of State Security, before 1943) Mid-level commanding staff Captain of State Security (Lieutenant of State Security, before 1943) Senior Lieutenant of State Security (Junior Lieutenant of State Security, before 1943) Lieutenant of State Security (Sergeant of State Security, before 1942) Junior Lieutenant of State Security (Sergeant of State Security, before 1942) Junior commanding staff Master Sergeant of Special
Special Service (from 1943) Senior Sergeant of Special
Special Service (from 1943) Sergeant of Special
Special Service (from 1943) Junior Sergeant of Special
Special Service (from 1943) NKVD
NKVD activities[edit] The main function of the NKVD
NKVD was to protect the state security of the Soviet Union. This role was accomplished through massive political repression, including authorised murders of many thousands of politicians and citizens, as well as kidnappings, assassinations and mass deportations.

Domestic repressions[edit] NKVD
NKVD chief Genrikh Yagoda
Genrikh Yagoda (middle) inspecting the construction of the Moscow-Volga canal, 1935 See also: Political repression in the Soviet Union In implementing Soviet internal policy towards perceived enemies of the Soviet state ("enemies of the people"), untold multitudes of people were sent to GULAG camps and hundreds of thousands were executed by the NKVD. Formally, most of these people were convicted by NKVD
NKVD troikas ("triplets")– special courts martial. Evidential standards were very low: a tip-off by an anonymous informer was considered sufficient grounds for arrest. Use of "physical means of persuasion" (torture) was sanctioned by a special decree of the state, which opened the door to numerous abuses, documented in recollections of victims and members of the NKVD
NKVD itself. Hundreds of mass graves resulting from such operations were later discovered throughout the country. Documented evidence exists that the NKVD
NKVD committed mass extrajudicial executions, guided by secret "plans". Those plans established the number and proportion of victims (officially "public enemies") in a given region (e.g. the quotas for clergy, former nobles etc., regardless of identity). The families of the repressed, including children, were also automatically repressed according to NKVD
NKVD Order no. 00486. The purges were organized in a number of waves according to the decisions of the Politburo
Politburo of the Communist
Communist Party. Some examples are the campaigns among engineers (Shakhty Trial), party and military elite plots ( Great Purge
Great Purge with Order 00447), and medical staff ("Doctors' Plot"). One case of gas van usage was documented in the Soviet Union
Soviet Union during the Great Purge[13] A number of mass operations of the NKVD
NKVD were related to the prosecution of whole ethnic categories. For example, the Polish Operation of the NKVD
NKVD in 1937–1938 resulted in the execution of 111,091 Poles.[14] Whole populations of certain ethnicities were forcibly resettled. Foreigners living in the Soviet Union
Soviet Union were given particular attention. When disillusioned American citizens living in the Soviet Union
Soviet Union thronged the gates of the U.S. embassy in Moscow
Moscow to plead for new U.S. passports to leave USSR
USSR (their original U.S. passports had been taken for 'registration' purposes years before), none were issued. Instead, the NKVD
NKVD promptly arrested all of the Americans, who were taken to Lubyanka Prison
Prison and later shot.[15] American factory workers at the Soviet Ford GAZ plant, suspected by Stalin
Stalin of being 'poisoned' by Western influences, were dragged off with the others to Lubyanka by the NKVD
NKVD in the very same Ford Model A cars they had helped build, where they were tortured; nearly all were executed or died in labor camps. Many of the slain Americans were dumped in the mass grave at Yuzhnoye Butovo District near Moscow.[16] Even so, the people of the Soviet Republics still formed the majority of NKVD
NKVD victims[*17][*18]. The NKVD
NKVD also served as arm of the Russian Soviet communist government for the lethal mass persecution and destruction of ethnic minorities and religious beliefs, such as the Russian Orthodox Church, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church[disambiguation needed], the Roman Catholic Church, Greek Catholics, Islam, Judaism
Judaism and other religious organizations, an operation headed by Yevgeny Tuchkov.

International operations[edit] Lavrentiy Beria
Lavrentiy Beria with Stalin
Stalin (in background) and Stalin's daughter Svetlana During the 1930s, the NKVD
NKVD was responsible for political murders of those Stalin
Stalin believed to oppose him. Espionage networks headed by experienced multilingual NKVD
NKVD officers such as Pavel Sudoplatov
Pavel Sudoplatov and Iskhak Akhmerov
Iskhak Akhmerov were established in nearly every major Western country, including the United States. The NKVD
NKVD recruited agents for its espionage efforts from all walks of life, from unemployed intellectuals such as Mark Zborowski to aristocrats such as Martha Dodd. Besides the gathering of intelligence, these networks provided organizational assistance for so-called wet business,[17] where enemies of the USSR
USSR either disappeared or were openly liquidated.[18] The NKVD's intelligence and special operations (Inostranny Otdel) unit organized overseas assassinations of political enemies of the USSR, such as leaders of nationalist movements, former Tsarist officials, and personal rivals of Joseph Stalin. Among the officially confirmed victims of such plots were:

Leon Trotsky, a personal political enemy of Stalin
Stalin and his most bitter international critic, killed in Mexico City in 1940; Yevhen Konovalets, prominent Ukrainian patriot leader who was attempting to create a separatist movement in Soviet Ukraine; assassinated in Rotterdam, Netherlands Yevgeny Miller, former General of the Tsarist (Imperial Russian) Army; in the 1930s, he was responsible for funding anti-communist movements inside the USSR
USSR with the support of European governments. Kidnapped in Paris and brought to Moscow, where he was interrogated and executed Noe Ramishvili, Prime Minister of independent Georgia, fled to France after the Bolshevik
Bolshevik takeover; responsible for funding and coordinating Georgian nationalist organizations and the August uprising, he was assassinated in Paris Boris Savinkov, Russian revolutionary and anti- Bolshevik
Bolshevik terrorist (lured back into Russia and killed in 1924 by the Trust Operation of the GPU); Sidney Reilly, British agent of the MI6
MI6 who deliberately entered Russia in 1925 trying to expose the Trust Operation to avenge Savinkov's death; Alexander Kutepov, former General of the Tsarist (Imperial Russian) Army, who was active in organizing anti-communist groups with the support of French and British governments Prominent political dissidents were also found dead under highly suspicious circumstances, including Walter Krivitsky, Lev Sedov, Ignace Reiss
Ignace Reiss and former German Communist
Communist Party (KPD) member Willi Münzenberg.[19][20][21][22][23] The pro-Soviet leader Sheng Shicai
Sheng Shicai in Xinjiang received NKVD assistance in conducting a purge to coincide with Stalin's Great Purge in 1937. Sheng and the Soviets alleged a massive Trotskyist conspiracy and a "Fascist Trotskyite plot" to destroy the Soviet Union. The Soviet Consul General Garegin Apresoff, General Ma Hushan, Ma Shaowu, Mahmud Sijan, the official leader of the Xinjiang province Huang Han-chang and Hoja-Niyaz
Hoja-Niyaz were among the 435 alleged conspirators in the plot. Xinjiang came under virtual Soviet control. Stalin
Stalin opposed the Chinese Communist
Communist Party.[24]

Spanish Civil War[edit] During the Spanish Civil War, NKVD
NKVD agents, acting in conjunction with the Communist
Communist Party of Spain, exercised substantial control over the Republican government, using Soviet military aid to help further Soviet influence.[25] The NKVD
NKVD established numerous secret prisons around the capital Madrid, which were used to detain, torture, and kill hundreds of the NKVD's enemies, at first focusing on Spanish Nationalists and Spanish Catholics, while from late 1938 increasingly anarchists and Trotskyists were the objects of persecution.[26] In 1937 Andrés Nin, the secretary of the Trotskyist POUM and his colleagues were tortured and killed in an NKVD prison in Barcelona.[27]

World War II operations[edit] The corpses of victims of the NKVD
NKVD murdered in last days of June 1941, in one of the NKVD prisoner massacres
NKVD prisoner massacres just after outbreak of the German-Soviet War. Prior to the German invasion, in order to accomplish its own goals, the NKVD
NKVD was prepared to cooperate even with such organizations as the German Gestapo. In March 1940 representatives of the NKVD
NKVD and the Gestapo
Gestapo met for one week in Zakopane, to coordinate the pacification of Poland; see Gestapo– NKVD
NKVD Conferences. For its part, the Soviet Union delivered hundreds of German and Austrian Communists to the Gestapo, as unwanted foreigners, together with their documents. However, many NKVD
NKVD units were later to fight the Wehrmacht, for example the 10th Rifle Division NKVD, which fought at the Battle of Stalingrad. After the German invasion the NKVD
NKVD evacuated and killed prisoners. During World War II, NKVD
NKVD Internal Troops
Internal Troops units were used for rear area security, including preventing the retreat of Soviet Union
Soviet Union army divisions. Though mainly intended for internal security, NKVD divisions were sometimes used at the front to stem the occurrence of desertion through Stalin's Order No. 270 and Order No. 227
Order No. 227 decrees in 1941 and 1942, which aimed to raise troop morale via brutality and coercion. At the beginning of the war the NKVD
NKVD formed 15 rifle divisions, which had expanded by 1945 to 53 divisions and 28 brigades.[28] A list of identified NKVD
NKVD Internal Troops divisions can be seen at List of Soviet Union
Soviet Union divisions. Though mainly intended for internal security, NKVD
NKVD divisions were sometimes used in the front-lines, for example during the Battle of Stalingrad
Battle of Stalingrad and the Crimean Offensive of 1944.[28] Unlike the Waffen-SS, the NKVD did not field any armored or mechanized units.[28] In the enemy-held territories, the NKVD
NKVD carried out numerous missions of sabotage. After fall of Kiev, NKVD
NKVD agents set fire to the Nazi headquarters and various other targets, eventually burning down much of the city center.[29] Similar actions took place across the occupied Byelorussia and Ukraine. The NKVD
NKVD (later KGB) carried out mass arrests, deportations, and executions. The targets included both collaborators with Germany and non- Communist
Communist resistance movements such as the Polish Armia Krajowa and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army
Ukrainian Insurgent Army aiming to separate from the Soviet Union, among others. The NKVD
NKVD also executed tens of thousands of Polish political prisoners in 1939–1941, including the Katyń massacre.[30][31] NKVD
NKVD units were also used to repress the prolonged partisan war in Ukraine
Ukraine and the Baltics, which lasted until the early 1950s.

Postwar operations[edit] This section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (July 2015) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) After the death of Stalin
Stalin in 1953, the new Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev halted the NKVD
NKVD purges. From the 1950s to the 1980s, thousands of victims were legally "rehabilitated" (i.e., acquitted and had their rights restored). Many of the victims and their relatives refused to apply for rehabilitation out of fear or lack of documents. The rehabilitation was not complete: in most cases the formulation was "due to lack of evidence of the case of crime". Only a limited number of persons were rehabilitated with the formulation "cleared of all charges". Very few NKVD
NKVD agents were ever officially convicted of the particular violation of anyone's rights. Legally, those agents executed in the 1930s were also "purged" without legitimate criminal investigations and court decisions. In the 1990s and 2000s (decade) a small number of ex- NKVD
NKVD agents living in the Baltic states
Baltic states were convicted of crimes against the local population.

Intelligence activities[edit] These included:

Establishment of a widespread spy network through the Comintern. Operations of Richard Sorge, the "Red Orchestra", Willi Lehmann, and other agents who provided valuable intelligence during World War II. Recruitment of important UK officials as agents in the 1940s. Penetration of British intelligence (MI6) and counter-intelligence (MI5) services. Collection of detailed nuclear weapons design information from the U.S. and Britain. Disruption of several confirmed plots to assassinate Stalin. Establishment of the People's Republic of Poland
People's Republic of Poland and earlier its communist party along with training activists, during World War II. The first President of Poland after the war was Bolesław Bierut, an NKVD
NKVD agent. Soviet economy[edit] Sergei Korolev
Sergei Korolev shortly after his arrest, 1938 The extensive system of labor exploitation in the Gulag
Gulag made a notable contribution to the Soviet economy and the development of remote areas. Colonization of Siberia, the North and Far East was among the explicitly stated goals in the very first laws concerning Soviet labor camps. Mining, construction works (roads, railways, canals, dams, and factories), logging, and other functions of the labor camps were part of the Soviet planned economy, and the NKVD
NKVD had its own production plans.[citation needed] The most unusual part of the NKVD's achievements was its role in Soviet science and arms development. Many scientists and engineers arrested for political crimes were placed in special prisons, much more comfortable than the Gulag, colloquially known as sharashkas. These prisoners continued their work in these prisons. When later released, some of them became world leaders in science and technology. Among such sharashka members were Sergey Korolev, the head designer of the Soviet rocket program and first human space flight mission in 1961, and Andrei Tupolev, the famous airplane designer. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was also imprisoned in a sharashka, and based his novel The First Circle
The First Circle on his experiences there. After World War II, the NKVD
NKVD coordinated work on Soviet nuclear weaponry, under the direction of General Pavel Sudoplatov. The scientists were not prisoners, but the project was supervised by the NKVD
NKVD because of its great importance and the corresponding requirement for absolute security and secrecy. Also, the project used information obtained by the NKVD
NKVD from the United States.

People's Commissars[edit] The agency was headed by a people's commissar (minister). His first deputy was the director of State Security Service (GUGB).

1934–1936 Genrikh Yagoda, both people's commissar of Interior and director of State Security 1936–1938 Nikolai Yezhov, people's commissar of Interior 1936–1937 Yakov Agranov, director of State Security (as the first deputy) 1937–1938 Mikhail Frinovsky, director of State Security (as the first deputy) 1938 Lavrentiy Beria, director of State Security (as the first deputy) 1938–1945 Lavrentiy Beria, people's commissar of Interior 1938–1941 Vsevolod Merkulov, director of State Security (as the first deputy) 1941–1943 Vsevolod Merkulov, director of State Security (as the first deputy) 1945–1946 Sergei Kruglov, people's commissar of Interior Note: In the first half of 1941 Vsevolod Merkulov transformed his agency into separate commissariat (ministry), but it was merged back to the people's commissariat of Interior soon after the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union. In 1943 Merkulov once again split his agency this time for good.

Officers[edit] Andrei Zhukov has singlehandedly identified every single NKVD
NKVD officer involved in 1930s arrests and killings by researching a Moscow archive. There are just over 40,000 names on the list.[32]

See also[edit]

Soviet Union
Soviet Union portal Poison laboratory of the Soviet secret services 10th NKVD
NKVD Rifle Division Hitler Youth conspiracy, an NKVD
NKVD case pursued in 1938, later found to be baseless NKVD
NKVD filtration camp NKVD
NKVD special camps in Germany 1945–49, internment camps set up at the end of World War II in eastern Germany (often in former Nazi POW or concentration camps) and other areas under Soviet domination, to imprison those suspected of collaboration with the Nazis, or others deemed to be troublesome to Soviet ambitions. References[edit]

^ Semukhina, Olga B.; Reynolds, Kenneth Michael (2013). Understanding the Modern Russian Police. CRC Press. p. 74. ISBN 9781482218879..mw-parser-output cite.citation font-style:inherit .mw-parser-output .citation q quotes:"""""""'""'" .mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-free a background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/65/Lock-green.svg/9px-Lock-green.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center .mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-limited a,.mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-registration a background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d6/Lock-gray-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-gray-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center .mw-parser-output .citation .cs1-lock-subscription a background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/aa/Lock-red-alt-2.svg/9px-Lock-red-alt-2.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center .mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration color:#555 .mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription span,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration span border-bottom:1px dotted;cursor:help .mw-parser-output .cs1-ws-icon a background:url("//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4c/Wikisource-logo.svg/12px-Wikisource-logo.svg.png")no-repeat;background-position:right .1em center .mw-parser-output code.cs1-code color:inherit;background:inherit;border:inherit;padding:inherit .mw-parser-output .cs1-hidden-error display:none;font-size:100% .mw-parser-output .cs1-visible-error font-size:100% .mw-parser-output .cs1-maint display:none;color:#33aa33;margin-left:0.3em .mw-parser-output .cs1-subscription,.mw-parser-output .cs1-registration,.mw-parser-output .cs1-format font-size:95% .mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-left,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-left padding-left:0.2em .mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-right,.mw-parser-output .cs1-kern-wl-right padding-right:0.2em

^ a b Huskey, Eugene (2014). Russian Lawyers and the Soviet State: The Origins and Development of the Soviet Bar, 1917-1939. Princeton University Press. p. 230. ISBN 9781400854516.

^ Semukhina, Olga B.; Reynolds, Kenneth Michael (2013). Understanding the Modern Russian Police. CRC Press. p. 58. ISBN 9781439803493.

^ Khlevniuk, Oleg V. (2015). Stalin: New Biography of a Dictator. Yale University Press. p. 125. ISBN 9780300166941.

^ Yevgenia Albats, KGB: The State Within a State. 1995, page 101

^ Robert Gellately. Lenin, Stalin, and Hitler: The Age of Social Catastrophe. Knopf, 2007 ISBN 1-4000-4005-1 p. 460

^ Catherine Merridale. Night of Stone: Death and Memory in Twentieth-Century Russia. Penguin Books, 2002 ISBN 0-14-200063-9 p. 200

^ Statiev, Alexander (2010). The Soviet Counterinsurgency in the Western Borderlands. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 9780521768337.

^ Blank Pages by G.C.Malcher ISBN 1-897984-00-6 Page 7

^ James Harris, "Dual subordination ? The political police and the party in the Urals region, 1918–1953", Cahiers du monde russe 22 (2001):423–446.

^ Figes, Orlando (2007) The Whisperers: Private Life in Stalin's Russia ISBN 0-8050-7461-9, page 234.

^ GUGB
GUGB NKVD. DocumentsTalk.com, 2008.

^ Человек в кожаном фартуке. Новая газета - Novayagazeta.ru (in Russian). August 2, 2010. Retrieved January 21, 2019.

^ Goldman, Wendy Z. (2011). Inventing the Enemy: Denunciation and Terror in Stalin's Russia. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-19196-8. p. 217.

^ Tzouliadis, Tim, The Forsaken: An American Tragedy in Stalin's Russia Penguin Press (2008), ISBN 1-59420-168-4: Many of the Americans desiring to return home were communists who had voluntarily moved to the Soviet Union, while others moved to Soviet Union
Soviet Union as skilled auto workers to help produce cars at the recently constructed GAZ
GAZ automobile factory built by the Ford Motor Company. All were U.S. citizens.

^ Tzouliadis, Tim, The Forsaken: An American Tragedy in Stalin's Russia Penguin Press (2008), ISBN 1-59420-168-4

^ Barmine, Alexander, One Who Survived, New York: G.P. Putnam (1945), p. 18: NKVD
NKVD expression for a political murder

^ John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr, Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999)

^ Barmine, Alexander, One Who Survived, New York: G.P. Putnam (1945), pp. 232–233

^ Orlov, Alexander, The March of Time, St. Ermin's Press (2004), ISBN 1-903608-05-8

^ Andrew, Christopher and Mitrokhin, Vasili, The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB, Basic Books (2000), ISBN 0-465-00312-5, ISBN 978-0-465-00312-9, p. 75

^ Barmine, Alexander, One Who Survived, New York: G. P. Putnam (1945), pp. 17, 22

^ Sean McMeekin, The Red Millionaire: A Political Biography of Willi Münzenberg, Moscow's Secret Propaganda Tsar
Tsar in the West, 1917–1940, New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press (2004), pp. 304–305

^ Andrew D. W. Forbes (1986). Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia: a political history of Republican Sinkiang 1911–1949. Cambridge, England: CUP Archive. p. 151. ISBN 978-0-521-25514-1. Retrieved December 31, 2010.

^ Robert W. Pringle (2015). Historical Dictionary of Russian and Soviet Intelligence. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 288–89. ISBN 9781442253186.

^ Christopher Andrew (2000). The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB. Basic Books. p. 73. ISBN 9780465003129.

^ David Clay Large (1991). Between Two Fires: Europe's Path in the 1930s. W.W. Norton. p. 308. ISBN 9780393307573.

^ a b c Zaloga, Steven J. The Red Army of the Great Patriotic War, 1941–45, Osprey Publishing, (1989), pp. 21–22

^ Birstein, Vadim (2013). Smersh: Stalin's Secret Weapon. Biteback Publishing. ISBN 978-1849546898. Retrieved June 4, 2017.

^ Edvins Snore (2008). History Documentary film: The Soviet Story (PDF). Riga, Latvia: SIA Labvakar. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 24, 2014.

^ Red Square (2014). History Documentary – A Must See For All Students of History. The Peoples Cube. Retrieved March 11, 2014.

^ Walker, Shaun (February 6, 2017). "Stalin's secret police finally named but killings still not seen as crimes". The Guardian.

Further reading[edit] Hastings, Max (2015). The Secret War: Spies, Codes and Guerrillas 1939 -1945 (paperback). London: William Collins. ISBN 978-0-00-750374-2. External links[edit]

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For evidence on Soviet espionage in the United States during the Cold War, see the full text of Alexander Vassiliev's Notebooks from the Cold War International History Project (CWIHP) NKVD.org: information site about the NKVD (in Russian) MVD: 200-year history of the Ministry (in Russian) Memorial: history of the OGPU/NKVD/MGB/KGB vtePeople's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (NKVD)Minsters Genrikh Yagoda Nikolai Yezhov Lavrentiy Beria Sergei Kruglov NKVD
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