BACKGROUND: SOVIET FOREIGN OFFICE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79R00890A000800090034-3
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 12, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 8, 2002
• Sequence Number: 34
• Publication Date: July 9, 1957
• Content Type: BRIEF

Approved For Release 2002/01/ C`TA! P79R0089OA000800090034-3
9 July 1957
BACKGROUND: SOVIET FOREIGN OFFICE
Repercussions of the purge may affect the Soviet foreign ministry
but most of the ministry's personnel probably feel reasonably
secure in their jobs.
A. Foreign Minister Gromyko may be the most vulnerable.
1. He was one of Molotov's right hand men for almost a
decade.
2. He continued as First Deputy Foreign Minister under
kepi l ov .
Gromyko, however, is a foreign policy technician rather
than a policy maker and he in not likely to have opposed
Khrushchev's policies. In fact, he probably stayed
pletely aloof from political machinations.
C. His appointment an Foreign Minister seems to have been
agreeable to Khrushchev.
1. He was named to the post by the Central Committee in
February 1937 at a meeting dominated by ghrushehev.
2. If he has kept his nose politically clean in the
recent Kremlin power struggle he may continue to be
Eesa rata to the top leadership.
Control of personnel appointments in the foreign ministry since
Stalin's death appears to have been exercised by the collective
leadership as a whole rather than by Molotov ertighepilov_ agg_ne1
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A. Molotov's prestige and political standing were progressively
undermined until he probably had little influence on diplomatic
appointments for some months prior to his replacement by
Shepilov in June 2966.
1. None of the men affected by personnel actions after
ok over appears to have had any special
relationship with him.
2. Six of the top eleven positions in the ministry and 17
of the 50 ambassadorial posts are now held by men
transferred since Stalin's death from leading posts
outside the ministry, principally high level party
jobs.
The conclusion, then, is that few, if any, Soviet diplomats
are likely to carry any stigma because they worked in the
ministry when Molotov or Shepilov were minister.
The possibility remains that some of them became involved
in the sinister plot of the "anti-party" group. If so,
less nights now are only the prelude of things
Approved For Release 2002 O ; : CJA-RDP79R0089OA000800090034-3