Malenkov Comes Back
NICOLAEVSKY, BORIS I.
Former Soviet Premier, backed by economic chiefs, may share power with Khrushchev — at Bulganin's expense MALENKOV COMES BACK By Boris I. Nicolaevsky The events in Poland and Hungary have...
...It seems likely that behind the scenes an agreement is being charted between Khrushchev and Malenkov, which would make Bulganin the scapegoat for the sins of the last two years...
...Its central direction of Soviet economic activity will go far beyond anything previously created in the USSR, as far as prerogatives and leading personnel are concerned...
...Once again, as at many points during the last four years, the new developments make return to the old "monolithic" dictatorship less and less possible...
...It demands "a precise demarcation of functions between Party and Soviet organs...
...Nominally, of course, this was so that they could devote themselves completely to their new work...
...It may well be resolved at the plenary session of the Party Central Committee which precedes the opening of the Supreme Soviet on February 5. The direction of change was indicated at the Central Committee plenum of December 20-24, 1956...
...All the more symptomatic is the lead article in the January issue of the Soviet theoretical journal Kommunist, entitled "The Soviet Administrative Apparatus—an Important Instrument of Communist Construction...
...The policy of the multi-group bloc now taking shape will be worked out with due consideration for the divergencies which separate those groups...
...The economic resolutions adopted were a severe defeat for Bulganin...
...This Commission will serve as a center around which the economic managers will gradually be organized into an independent force...
...Kommunist declares that Party groups "in no case may interfere in the everyday, current work of economic organs and must refrain from issuing administrative orders in the area of Soviet work as a whole...
...It takes as its text a resolution of the 11th Party Congress—which was held in 1922, in the palmy days of the New Economic Policy—and keeps silent about the Party's zigzags on this question in succeeding years, including the zigzags of the Khrushchev period...
...According to these reports, Marshal Kliment Voroshilov is to retire as President of the USSR because of age, and will be succeeded by Bulganin...
...These shifts in personnel mean greater influence for the economic managers within the regime after a prolonged struggle...
...The Premiership will then go to Khrushchev, while Malenkov will return to his pre-1953 post as Party First Secretary...
...at the same time, however, it frees them of any direct dependence on Bulganin...
...Such a rapprochement may be backed by the Army groups, headed by Zhukov, which during the past year smashed Bulganin's political-police apparatus in the Army...
...Its cohesion will have to be achieved by overcoming conflicts whose existence is now "legally" recognized...
...He was made a Deputy Premier but not a First Deputy Premier, and it is the inner circle of First Deputies which makes foreign-policy decisions...
...One of them, Malyshev, was transferred in 1955 (under Bulganin) from the atomic industry to the Soviet equivalent of the Patent Office...
...In demanding "more precise figures," the December plenum buried Bulganin's claims...
...Malenkov's Budapest trip indicates that he has returned triumphantly to the inner group...
...By the 20th Congress, however, it was clear that in two highly important sectors—the Army and economic life—Khrushchev and Bulganin had been unable to prevail and had been forced to retreat...
...All of these men except Benediktov have been Deputy Premiers of the USSR...
...The events in Hungary and Poland have doubtless accel-lerated such a rapprochement...
...These facts provide a realistic backdrop to the recent Warsaw reports predicting major shifts in the Soviet leadership in the near future...
...Party organizations must bear in mind that "neither by nature nor by composition are [they] adapted to fulfilling the functions of direct administration of the economy," that their chief task is "the training and selection of cadres" and the political guidance of these cadres...
...This issue of Kommunist went to press on December 12, 1956, a week before the Central Committee meeting...
...Now a similar process is being prepared for the economy, with the reorganization of the State Economic Commission...
...The published decisions of that plenum dealt only with economic questions...
...The Commission includes, for the first time in Soviet history, both the Minister of Agriculture and the Minister of Collective Farms—which means that all Soviet farming comes within its province...
...But a rapprochement of the groups behind Khrushchev and behind Malenkov seems under way...
...Significantly, both First Deputies were originally named to the old Commission by ex-Premier Georgi Malenkov...
...All of this makes it quite likely that some arrangement between Khrushchev and Malenkov will "formalize" the major agreement reached between the economic managers and the Party men...
...At that time, Defense Minister Marshal Georgi Zhukov had already brought the Party-political apparatus of the Army under his control...
...For it was apparent at the 20th Party Congress a year ago that the coalition between Khrushchev and Bulganin was no longer running smoothly...
...Some shift along these lines would, indeed, seem to be indicated by Ma-lenkov's recent trip to Budapest, along with Khrushchev, for a crucial conference with Hungarian, Bulgarian, Rumanian and Czech Communist leaders...
...For, after his dismissal as Premier, Malenkov had been removed from participation in foreign policy-making...
...In addition to the widely-reported ferment among ordinary Russians, particularly among youth, a tense new struggle is in progress at the pinnacle of the regime itself...
...Because the Kremlin regime cannot preserve the Soviet Empire by the old methods, it is looking for new ones—not only in its relations with the satellites, but within the USSR itself...
...Whether or not the indicated personnel shifts will take place at this moment cannot, of course, be predicted with certainty...
...The entire article sounds like a popular exposition of the points of a backstage agreement between the leaders of the "Party" and "economic" sectors of the regime...
...Questions of foreign policy were undoubtedly discussed, too, but it is possible that final international decisions were deferred to the February session...
...At the same time, the plenum announced a fundamental reorganization of the State Economic Commission, transforming it into a virtual second government...
...It is quite unlikely that Bulganin dictated these appointments...
...Furthermore, all the new Deputies, immediately upon their appointment to the Economic Commission, were relieved of their functions as Deputy Premiers to Bulganin...
...Since lie became Premier in February 1955, Bulganin has been advancing himself for the role of a sort of "czar" over the Soviet economy...
...by that time, undoubtedly, the Presidium had already resolved to make the "control figures" of the Bulganin five-year plan "more precise," and to reorganize the Economic Commission...
...These called for making the "control figures" of the new five-year plan "more precise"—in other words, for rectification of the plan, drawn up under Bulganin's direct guidance and adopted by the 20th Congress after his lengthy and laudatory report...
...But politics does not rest merely on the intentions of politicians...
...Since each of these groups hopes to preserve as much as possible of the Kremlin's previous "imperial" policy, the present common aim is to maintain the unity of the Communist front...
...The Khrushchev-Bulganin victory over Malenkov two years ago had signaled the attempt to restore the ascendancy of the Party apparatus...
...Former Soviet Premier, backed by economic chiefs, may share power with Khrushchev — at Bulganin's expense MALENKOV COMES BACK By Boris I. Nicolaevsky The events in Poland and Hungary have inevitably had grave repercussions in the Soviet Union itself...
...The mood of the December plenum was by no means favorable to Soviet Premier Nikolai Bulganin and Communist Party Secretary Nikita Khrushchev...
...The Commission's presidium consists of Mikhail Pervukhin as Chairman, Alexei Kosygin and Vyacheslav Malyshev as First Deputies, and four ordinary Deputies: Vladimir Kuche-renko, Mikhail Khrunichev, Vladimir Matskevich and Ivan Benediktov...
Vol. 40 • February 1957 • No. 6
