HOW THE KGB KEEPS ITS IRON GRIP ON SOVIET LIFE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201440020-2
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 20, 2012
• Sequence Number: 20
• Publication Date: March 25, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201440020-2
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U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT
25 March, 1985
ers. It controls 250.0(
border guards equipped
with tanks, helicopters
and armored vehicles.
^ At home. the respon-
sibilities of the KGB in-
clude counterespionage,
cracking down on political
opposition, ferreting out
dissidents, guarding head-
quarters of the Commu-
nist Party, probing crimes
such as treason and moni-
toring political views in-
side the armed forces. It
also runs a prison system,
safeguards nuclear-weap-
ons storage dumps and in-
vestigates all Soviet citi-
zens before they leave the
country.
^ Abroad, the KGB is
reputed to employ 2,500
agents-at least 500 in the
united States. Their task is
to infiltrate government
agencies, acquire official
documents and advanced
Headquarters of the Soviet Union's KGB is L.ubyanka in downtown Moscow. technology and recruit cit-
How the KGB Keeps Its
Iron Grip on Soviet life
The secret police are known
for espionage abroad. But it
is at home that their ominous
shadow is feared by everyone.
MOSCOW
Leaders may come and leaders may
go in the Soviet union, but there is one
all-important force that retains its pow-
er no matter who runs the Kremlin-
the KGB.
In the United States, the Central In-
telligence Agency is under strict orders
to concentrate only on intelligence op-
erations overseas and to keep its hands
off undercover work at home.
In the Soviet union, however, the
KGB spreads its shadow across the en-
tire spectrum of Soviet life. combining
the functions of the CIA, Federal Bu-
reau of Investigation, Coast Guard,
Border Patrol and Secret Service.
A continuing reality. That is a fact of
Soviet life that Mikhail Gorbachev
would be unable to change-even if he
wanted to.
The KGB-officially the Komitet Go-
sudarstvennoi Bezopastnosti, or Com-
mittee for State Security-is familiar to
foreigners as Moscow's espionage arm
abroad, the secret agency that spies
against friend and foe alike.
Virtually unknown outside the Sovi-
et union is the iron grip it holds on the
Soviet people. Here, the KGB is de-
scribed with such words as ruthless,
pervasive, cunning.
Today, more than 67 years after the
world's first so-called workers' state
was founded, the KGB is as vital as
ever to continuation of Kremlin power.
"The KGB is every-
where." says one Musco-
vite. "That means we al-
ways are looking over
our shoulders. We cannot
trust one another. When
will a leader come for-
ward who will do away
with these internal espio-
nage activities?"
Western experts here
in the Soviet capital pro-
vide this partial profile
of the massive, shadowy
organization:
^ The KGB now em-
ploys a nationwide staff
of 90,000 officers sup-
ported by 150,000 tech-
nicians and clerical work-
izens to serve Moscow.
^ The KGB's annual budget, depend-
ing on wha, items are included, is put at
between 6 billion and 12 billion dollars
out of a national budget of 425 billion.
By comparison, 3.2 billion dollars is
spent each year to run the government
bureaucracy and the judicial system.
Despite its vast size and wide-ranging
roles. the KGB is subordinate in more
than name to the Communist Party.
Much of its activity is controlled by the
party Central Committee. And from
time to time. it is supervised directly by
the ruling Politburo.
Renewal of strength. All indications
are, however, that the KGB's stature
and independence have grown sharply
since Nikita Khrushchev abruptly
pared its influence in the 1950s after
the death of Ioseph Stalin.
Over the past 20 years,
the number of KGB offi-
cials on the Central Com-
mittee has increased four-
fold. Yuri Andropov-
head of the KGB from
1967 to 1982-drama-
tized this resurgence
when he brought the or-
ganization into the inner
sanctums of the Kremlin
after taking over from
Leonid Brezhnev in 1982.
The KGB's impact
within the Politburo may
have waned slightly since
Andropov died in 1984.
But it remains a highly
potent force. Headquar-
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201440020-2
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201440020-2
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tered in a nine-story building known as
Lubvanka in downtown Moscow, the
KGB today is run by Viktor Chebrikov,
an Andropov protege who has the par-
ty rank of candidate (nonvoting) mem-
ber of the Politburo.
Balding and bespectacled, the 61-
year-old Chebrikov wears civilian
clothes and seems more a cautious bu-
reaucrat than a police chief. But this
bland exterior masks a single-minded-
ness that easily rationalizes use of force.
But the modern KGB does not dwell
upon its bloodstained past and its use of
coercion. Instead, under Chebrikov, it
has gone out of its way to cultivate a
more moderate image.
One public sign of this effort oc-
curred last summer when Soviet televi-
sion broadcast a 10-part series showing
KGB officers as tough but fair, intelli-
gent and well educated in uncovering
an American spy. People questioned
by the KGB confirm that agents are
polite-at least in initial contacts.
Gains from ploys. To a certain ex-
tent, analysts here say, such efforts are
paying off. Helped by substantial per-
quisites, the KGB is reportedly flooded
with iob applications. Though fears re-
main, most Soviets no longer worry
about a predawn knock on the door.
From time to time, youths even dare to
defy the KGB's authority.
Despite its dubious past and public
resentment over the ability of secret-
poiice agents to escape punishment for
serious crimes, the amount of coopera-
tion citizens voluntarily give the KGB
is striking. Soviets emplgyed by for-
eigners, for instance, routinely report
on their bosses to the KGB. So do
guides who accompany foreign tourists
around the Soviet Union and scientists
returning from trips abroad.
AO NOW,
THE LEFTS...
It is not only foreigners who are the
target of such surveillance. By one
Western estimate, as many as 1 in 3
Soviet citizens is an occasional police
informer against other citizens. Very
little is too trivial for the KGB.
When voluntary help is refused, the
KGB uses still stronger medicine. "A
usual method is to threaten you with a
criminal action on some grounds or
other," one Russian explains. "That of-
ten has the desired effect."
If this fails, the KGB resorts to other
ploys: The use of mind-bending drugs,
illegal searches, planting evidence or
even outright violence. In 1980, An-
drei Sakharov, the leading Soviet dissi-
dent, was arrested by the KGB on his
way to work and sent into internal ex-
ile. No legal charges ever have been
brought against him.
Occasionally, the KGB tries to turn
an interrogation into a recruitment.
One would-be le%vish emigrant recalls
how the secret police offered to help
him leave the country in return for
reports on activities of former Soviet
citizens living in the United States.
When he refused, he was told: "You
are not a true Soviet person and cannot
be trusted. We must inform your insti-
tute director."
Conscious of the odds against them,
Soviet citizens often prepare them-
selves in advance for encounters with
the KGB.
One dissident even produced a man-
ual on how to stand up to questioning.
He was arrested and convicted of
"anti-Soviet activities."
As such vignettes show, the KGB has
a virtual free hand within the Soviet
Union. Reinforcing its power is an oc-
topuslike structure that stretches into
all 15 Soviet republics, every city, ev-
ery government ministry. every insti-
tute. military unit and workpi. ee.
" lou ve got to realize tha', even a
chief doctor in a hospital probable has
a KGB connection," says an elderly
Muscovite who suffered under Stalin.
lust how deeply such wariness is in-
grained here is underlined by it piece
of Moscow folk wisdom. Dial 7 or 115,
the saying goes, and if you hear rapid
beeps, your telephone is hugged. Even
today, when sensitive subjects are dis-
cussed indoors, Muscovites unplug
their phones and play loud music.
The ireling of being under constant
surveillance has political impact, too.
"Knowing silent ears and eves are
watching has a remarkably sobering ef-
fect at high levels," notes a Westerner.
"It contributes a lot to the prevailing
conservatism and do-nothingness."
A rise in stock. Boosting the KGB's
importance to the Kremlin has been its
success over the past seven years in
confronting and crushing the Soviet
dissident movement.
Starting in the late 1970s-with a re-
quest to the Politburo by Andropov
when he was chief of the secret police
for permission to seize up to 2.000 per-
sons-the KGB has arrested or silenced
almost the entire human-rights com-
munity in this country.
Hand in hand with this crackdown
has gone a drastic KGB-directed as-
sault on emigration. In 1979, 51,320
Jews and several thousand ethnic Ger-
mans and Armenians left the country.
Last year, fewer than 1.000 Jews and
an even smaller number of Germans
and Armenians got out.
Behind this switch is an extreme def-
inition of national security. Explains a
Jew who is trying to reach Israel: "If
you are a soccer player and compete
against a team from a secret institute,
you are deemed to have access to se-
crets and are barred from emigration."
The KGB now is in the middle of a
modernization program that is fitting it
with sophisticated surveillance equip-
ment, computerized data banks and re-
trieval systems. This means that its
powers will increase even more.
Such a prospect may seem reassuring
for a Communist Party that is wary of
any criticism.. committed to one-party
rule and confident of its ability to hold
the KGB in check.
But for the Soviet Union's 276 million
people, a strengthened KGB means
that citizen still will be set against citi-
zen, and the Soviets will continue to
reserve their loyalties for trusted
friends, not the Communist system.
It is a system that is likely to endure
through the era of Mikhail Gorbachev.O
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/20: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201440020-2