SECRET POLICE IN COMMUNIST EASTERN EUROPE.   Term Paper ID:24979 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Examines power & effectiveness in controlling dissent in Soviet-era East Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia & Hungary.... More...

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Paper Abstract: Examines power & effectiveness in controlling dissent in Soviet-era East Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia & Hungary. Paper Introduction: POWERS OF THE SECRET POLICE IN COMMUNIST EAST CENTRAL EUROPE This research paper discusses the powers of the secret police in the communist-controlled nations of East Central Europe--East Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary--and their role in controlling the populations of these countries during the Cold War. Introduction In his speech of March 4, 1946 in Fulton, Missouri, Winston Churchill said the following: From Stettin on the Baltic to Trieste on the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Behind that line all the capitals of the ancient States of Central and Eastern Europe -East Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia. All these famous cities and Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. These securityagencies, especially Stasi in East Germany and AVO-AVH in Hungary, largelyoperated according to their own desires and kept an eye on their leaders aswell as everyone else. A house of horrors. 29). New York: G. During the period 1957-1968, Czechoslovakia then evolved into aStalinist state under the leadership of Party First Secretary AntoninNovotny. He says that, during the 194 sand 195 s, AVO-AVH was "a semi-autonomous institution which only Moscowcould directly control" and that KGB "kept its own independent secretpolice apparatus in Hungary" (p. 61). The Communists held key ministries, such as Interior, under thecoalition governments headed by Eduard Benes. According to Hoensch (1984), the Russians "placedHungarian adherents completely loyal to Moscow in all key positions in theadministration, army and police" (p. . 192). All these famous cities and the populations around them lie in the Soviet sphere, and all are subject in one form or another not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and increasing measure of control from Moscow (Gelb, 1986, p. (1997, June 1). . 155). 164). (1986). Checinski, M. Czech communists such as Klement Gottwald,Rudolph Slanksy and Josef Smrkovsky returned from Russia with the Red Army.Szulc says that Smrkovsky may have forestalled occupation of Prague by thearmored forces of General George Patton in 1945 by radioing Patton'sheadquarters with the false message that the Czechs "would rather beliberated by the Russians than by the Americans" (p. . . Poland a country study. During the reign of Ulbricht and his successor, Erich Honecker (1971-1989), Craig (1982) said, Stasi was a bulwark of the Party and the State,engaging in "the never-ending heresy-hunting and the horrendous penaltiesmeted out for supposed crimes against the state . 151-157). As of 1996, the democratic Hungarian Parliament wasconsidering opening for public inspection the AVH's III/III files("Legislation", 1996, January 21, p. Finally, in July, 1989, the new coalition government declared thatAVH was no longer an organization "placed above the citizens" (Burant,199 , p. During 1945-1947, Hoensch (1984) cites "increasingly open attacks onliberal democratic politicians by the state security agencies" (p. Economist, 42. How didthe Russians and the local communist regimes use the secret police to seizeand consolidate their power and to maintain control over the populations ofthese countries for more than four decades? Legislation on the secret police. of a diligent party functionary aswell as the mask of indifference" (Dornberg, 1968, pp. The other Germany. Putnam's Sons. Checinski (1982) said that"Gomulka, himself a victim of the secret police, never underrated theimportance of the secret police as an instrument for the consolidation ofCommunist rule" (p. ix). Craig, G. . Hungary After seizing Budapest in late 1944, the KGB in cooperation withHungarian Communists Ernst Gero and Matayas Rakosi, who became PartySecretary in 1945, lost no time in establishing a 'Political PoliceSection,' the Allamvedelmi Ostaly Avo, or AVO, later the AVH, whichresulted in 195 from the amalgamation within the Interior Ministry of thepolitical department of the gendarmerie and the political department of theHungarian General Staff. Until 1944,Polish anti-Nazi communist activities were carried out by Poles in theRussian military counterintelligence service who were controlled by KGB[then called NKVD]/Smersh agents under Lavrenti Beria. He says that "after 1989 . Poland. Checinski (1982) saysof this period, "for their raids, the police relied on gangs of speciallyrecruited hooligans and thugs, rather than their own officers" but "Gierek,to the amazement and disgust of the security police, made no. (1996, January 21). The intraparty purges in Czechoslovakia which were ordered by Stalinafter Josef Tito's defection were carried out between 1949 and 1954. 284). . Stasi grew to1 , employees and 5 , informers and, according to the Economist(199 , March 31), "collected material on more than one in three of EastGermany's 16 million people" (p. (1982). 26 ). In and out ofoffice, President Imre Nagy, according to Hoensch (1984) "tried very hardto establish control over . During 1945-1947, the Polish secret service became the Informacja section of the PolishMinistry of Defence. The extent of its tentaclesenvenoms political life in these countries even today, a decade after theend of the Cold War. During the late 195 s, after Rakosi fell from power, some reforms wereinstituted, and Kadar and others were released from prison. 285). Czechoslovakia Szulc (1971, p. Elements of the secret police then conspired with the KGB topersuade the Soviets to intervene militarily. under the authority of the interior ministry" (p. Checinksi (1982)says that the focus of these efforts then was "redirected against actual orpotential resistance to Soviet domination of Poland" (p. AVO leader Peter waspurged from HWP. While it became partially 'polonized' during thisperiod, Soviet officers and advisers retained, Checinski says (1982), a"pivotal position" (1982, p. Szulc, T. 266). (1987). As Czechoslovakiagradually became more autonomous during the Gorbachev era, the secretpolice came under tighter control by the government and collapsed in 1989.As of May 3 , 1997, Czech citizens have the right to inspect their StBfiles under a lustration law passed by the Czech Parliament (Czech Intell,1997, June 1, p. In 1954, Lt. 23). Nagy was in power at thetime of the Hungarian Revolution of the fall of 1956 and among other thingswhich infuriated the Soviets, he abolished AVH and "created a new securitydepartment . 1). 196). 47). New York: Doubleday. 12) says the Communists enjoyed little popularsupport in post-war Czechoslovakia, polling only once in 1946 more than 1 percent of the vote in free elections which were held prior to the Soviet-engineered coup d'etat in 1948. McLean's, 22-24. Informacja played a major role "in thereign of terror to eliminate any political resistance," which included themurder of Polish officers and politicians invited back to join the post-warcoalition government (Checinski, 1982, pp. After the War, the secret police was renamed the Urzad Bezpieczstwa,or UB, and later the Sluzba Bezpieczstwa, or SB, and became the dreadedTenth Department of the Ministry of Public Security. 5 ). 52). 79, 153). In 1956,Curtis (1994) says that UB "crushed the Poznan workers ruthlessly" (p. For a time thereafter, Szulc says that the Czech secret police "waslike a state-within-a-state . . 183). Jozef Swiatlo, a senior member of the 1 thDepartment, defected to the West and broadcast on Radio Free Europe"revelations of torture and blackmail, and the extent to which Sovietofficials interfered in Polish affairs" (Aschenson, 1987, p. 279). with virtually no reference to the[government] or even the Party Presidium" (p. 256-257). Conversations with Stalin. (1971). According to Dornberg (1968), Stasi expanded under Mielcke into aforce which maintained "hysterical watchfulness" and "hypertrophicdevelopment" (p. 12). Djilas, M. Burant, S. Conclusion The Soviets helped establish subsequent communist regimes, even thoselike Hungary's and Poland's, which enjoyed a fair degree of autonomy fromthe Soviet Union in the 198 s and relied heavily upon their secret policeto maintain themselves in power and to control dissent. Under the regime of Janos Kadar (1956-1969), Hungary moved toward amixed socialist/market economy, slowed down collectivization of agricultureand moved ever so slightly toward an independent foreign policy. 5 ). Czech intell files. Ladislaw Kopriva emergedin 195 as the 'police czar' in charge of the secret police which wasrelocated from Interior to the Ministry of State Security and renamed (forshort) the StB. Curtis (1994) says that SB was "particularly active during themartial law period of the early 198 s because the Jaruzelski [Wojciech]government sought to separate regular military forces from unpopularcivilian control actions" (p. . Under their first leaders,Wilhelm Zaisser and Ernst Wollweber, they "adopted many of the KGB'spractices, torture, temporary detainment [without trial], wiretapping,entrapment and the use of a huge informer network" (Dornberg, 1968, p.256). After the failure of the Prague Spring of 1968, which Brezhnevrepressed by sending in Soviet tanks, SB suppressed intellectual dissentand in 197 fired on the first major worker's demonstration in Gdansk. . During this period, Dubcek removedthe director of the Central Committee's Eighth Department, who Szulc saidwas "Czechoslovakia's top security agent and active associate of the KGB"(p. At first content to exercise controlthrough coalition governments, except in East Germany and the Soviet zoneof East Berlin, which was under direct Russian military control, Djilas(1963) says that the Soviet dictator Josef Stalin by the fall of 1947"sought solutions and forms for the East European countries that wouldsolidify and secure Moscow's domination and hegemony for a long time tocome" (p. . . . Barely had the non-Communist parties surfaced in the city when it became evidence that the Communists did not intend to confine themselves to conventional political action to compete with them (p. During the 196 s,the regime had to deal with unrest among workers, students andintellectuals, culminating in the uprising of spring 1968 in whichAlexander Dubcek, an apparatchik who had moved up in party circles afterhis superiors were removed, made concessions to the rebels, which SovietPremier Leonid Brezhnev finally crushed. New York: Karz-Cohn Publishing. During the late 195 s, SB under Deputy Minister inCharge of Security Services General Mieczslaw Mozcar tightened its grip onthe nation. One of the victims wasformer Interior Minister Laszlo Rajk, one of the founders of AVO, who wasconvicted on charges fabricated by the secret police of espionage with theWest through American CIA agent Noel Field and hung. The Germans. . 16 ). (Ed.). (1982). According to Aschenson(1987), "with the UB . Hispredecessor, Wollweber, said that "the enemy is all around us and canappear in any conceivable mask; . According toCurtis, the reputation of the new Office of State Protection (UOP) "wasclouded by the discovery that many records from the communist era had beendestroyed . The Czech secret police isbelieved to have worked with the KGB in the assassination of ForeignSecretary Jan Masaryk, who fell (probably was pushed) from his apartmentwindow in March 1948. 279). 3). . 284). K. . serious effort to smash the opposition beyond recovery" (p. 147). Dornberg, W. The use oftorture and political killings declined. . (1994). and an air of scandal as many top government figures,including [Lech] Walesa [the Solidarity leader] were implicated ascollaborators in SB activities" (p. Ithelped new party and government leader Edward Gierek, who replaced Gomulkain 197 ,keep under control the intellectuals and the workers who displayed broad-based support in the 1976 strikes, the precursor of Solidarity. All these countries, except for Yugoslavia, were conquered from theNazis by the Red Army in 1944-1945. 255). UBplayed a key role in developing the phony dossier which was used to purgeveteran communist leader and Deputy Party Leader Wladyslaw Gomulka in 1949. 42). . A. By 1957, repression began again against intellectuals and otheropponents of the regime. . AVOalso in 1948 arrested and tortured Catholic Cardinal Josef Mindszenty, whowas given a life sentence. 256). (1963). Many veteran communists includingSlansky, who was tried and liquidated, Smrkovsky, Gustave Husak, laterafter 1968 restored to power, and others were expelled from the party.Szulc (1976) cites tens of thousands of arrests and hundreds of thousandsof dismissals (p. Only democratic Czechoslovakia until1938 had relied on regular police. . Poland The Lublin Committee which Stalin set up in 1944 to rule post-warPoland was composed of Polish communists in Russia handpicked by him.Checinksi (1982) says that "all Polish communists . Hungary a country study. The successful strikes of Solidarity in the 198 s which weresupported by the Catholic Church forced the government to make majorconcessions. (199 ). After it took power, the Communist Party (KSC)through its Central Committee created, Szulc (1971) says, "a parallelsecret police in cooperation with Soviet . Internet:http.//mineral.umd.edu/hungary/archive/1996/Jan/ 74.htm. 177). R. After Mielcke resigned, most ofStasi's files mysteriously disappeared, but many East Germans learned totheir stupefaction after Germany was re-unified that Stasi had used theirspouses, friends and colleagues to snoop on them and that its informersincluded some political leaders and high government officials of theinterim communist regime set up under the interim communist-ledadministration of Hans Modrow and later (Nemeth, 1992, Janury 27, p. 223). (1968). . 84-85). . Behind that line all the capitals of the ancient States of Central and Eastern Europe -East Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia. . 219). thecomplex and sinister system of internal security organizations . He says that during this confusing period "varioussegments of the Czech security machine were working at cross-purposes or,at least, without much coordination" (pp. the SEDtransformed itself from a radical democratic mass party to a cadre party ofthe Stalinist type and became the organizing force of the GDR" (p. Szulc(1971) says that "it was Czechoslovakia, one of the most docile satellites,that was dealt the worst blows" (p. London:Longmans. Mielcke expanded it into a 'statewithin a state,' what Dornberg called "a nebulous and much fearedorganization," which had a monopoly on clandestine operations whichincluded "a melange of secret police, criminal investigation, [counter-intelligence] and espionage work" (Dornberg, 1968, p. New York: VikingPress.----------------------- 3 East Germany Stalin told Djilas that "they [the Germans] are a queer people, likesheep . . Gelb (1986) saysthe following: The Soviets had reestablished a German communist party in Berlin within days of the war's end. New York: Simon & Schuster. Mozcar, who, Checinski (1982) said, was a "veritable powerbehind the throne," was regarded as Khruschev's man in Warsaw and workedwith the Russians to restrain Gomulka's nationalistic tendencies (p. Introduction In his speech of March 4, 1946 in Fulton, Missouri, Winston Churchillsaid the following: From Stettin on the Baltic to Trieste on the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. .. From the Stasi with love. Stasi worked with KGB to carry out the purges ordered by Stalin in195 -1951 of second-line party and government officials. The system of totalitarian controls they establishedover ordinary citizens was pervasive, comprehensive and frightening to adegree that can only be imagined by anyone who did not live under theirconstant surveillance and interference. The Russians, however, imposed on thesenations a more comprehensive and pervasive secret police system. all independent opinion was snuffed out" (pp. New York: Harcourt,Brace & World. Internet: https//www.infowar.com/iwftp/cloaks/ 6 197.txt. . Craig (1982) says that "in 1948-49 . It also remainedloyal to the regime during the strikes and riots of East German workerswhich occurred in East Berlin and other East German cities, and Stasisavagely repressed this disorganized movement with the aid of Soviet tanks. New York: Random House. (1992, January 27). 256). Poland andHungary had been ruled in the late 192 s and 193 s by authoritarian regimeswhich had their own secret police. Washington, DC:Library of Congress. the AVH" (p. Until the late198 s, however, Kadar relied on the security police to "ensure that no . After the Soviets crushed the revolt with 2,5 tanks, AVH, which hadbeen attacked by crowds often with the acquiescence of the Hungarian Armyand regular police, was back in business and managed the great purges of1956-1957, as a result of which thousands were executed, including Nagy andhis Minister of Defense General Pal Maleter, and at least 2 , were sentto Soviet labor camps (Hoensch, 1984, p. advisers" (pp. The struggle for Poland. Gelb, N. The West will make Western Germany their own, and we shall turnEastern Germany into our own state" (1963, pp. 232). . The Berlin wall. 192). The Germans who were to be its leaders had been flow in from Moscow . 239)after they went on strike, which led to Gomulka's return to power with theconsent of Soviet Premiere Nikita Khrushchev. A history of modern Hungary 1867-1983. During the purge trials of 1949-1954, Hoensch says, "thesecret police played a vital role in the process of exposing the classenemy and preparing political trials" (p. POWERS OF THE SECRET POLICE IN COMMUNIST EAST CENTRAL EUROPE This research paper discusses the powers of the secret police in thecommunist-controlled nations of East Central Europe--East Germany, Poland,Czechoslovakia and Hungary--and their role in controlling the populationsof these countries during the Cold War. Maintaining close links with KGB, Stasi was notalways totally under the control of Ulbricht and his successors, and"spearheaded the opposition to Ulbricht" in 1953 and again in 1958(Dornberg, 1968, p. Socialist Legality was proclaimedand reflected in successive liberalization of the Hungarian Criminal Code.Hungary even abolished capital punishment in 1961, but not for crimesagainst the State. 21 ). . Burant (199 ) saysthat "until the late 198 s the Security Police continued to harass andarrest those persons deemed to be political enemies" (p. According to Dornberg (1968), during the occupation, these new Germancommunist leaders headed by Walter Ulbricht relied largely on "local stateand police forces [which] were staffed with political commissariats whowork with Soviet secret police" (p. 18 ).Even though they never drew more than 22.3 percent of the vote, theCommunist Party [renamed in 1949 the Hungarian Workers' Party (HWP)] had bythe spring of 1948 "unchallenged monopoly of political power" (Hoensch,1984, p. References Aschenson, N. Curtis, G. . The secret police helped the Czech Army put down a worker'srebellion in 1953 at the Skoda munitions plant in Pilsen. Burant (199 ) says that "confinement to penitentiary wasthe most severe regime under the new system" (p. snapping at its heels, the whole nation wasmobilized into a breakneck drive to create a Soviet model state on theVistula. Political opponents were intimidated, beaten, killed, abducted,deported or killed. (199 , March 31). . P. 95). 84-85). . (1984). gaveway to a political and professional police force" (p. The German secret police, the State Security Service,Staatssicherheitsdienst, or SSD or Stasi for short, was under the controlof Minister of State Security Erich Mielcke from 1957 to 1989 and a memberof the ruling Politburo after 1975. were primarilyinstruments of the Soviet Union and its secret police" (p. 257). Czechoslovakia since World War II. Col. . Germany had experienced totalitarian rule under the Nazis which wasexercised with the assistance of the Gestapo and the S.S. Washington, DC:Library of Congress. unrelieved thoughtcontrol, and the tedious nagging by party watchdogs" (p. After the Socialist Unity Party(SED) was formed as a front for the communists, and the German DemocraticRepublic (GDR) was proclaimed in 1949, German secret police were absorbedinto the Ministry of State Security (MSS). Nemeth, M. . The secretpolice conducted raids and beatings at universities. Hoensch, J. 5 ). Later Hungarian communist leader and Chief of State JanosKadar was jailed, tortured by AVO and kept in prison for three years. 51-55). 256). organized opposition emerges" (Hoensch, 1984, p. . UB providedthe raw data used in the purge trials of 1949-1954, which eliminated allelements Stalin distrusted, including former veterans of the Spanish CivilWar, Jews, the Catholic Church, Home Army partisan leaders and others. If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.

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