Kremlin power struggle

Stalin's death triggered wave of intrigue among would-be successors

It was like a scene out of a gangster film. In a surprise power grab, a long-ridiculed member of a ruling coalition orders armed henchmen to seize his chief rival during a meeting. But this scene was real -- and it took place in the Kremlin.

The death of Joseph Stalin on March 5, 1953, came as a shock to millions of Soviets -- many of whom had known no other leader. It also unleashed a power struggle within the Kremlin leadership that lasted for years.

Stalin's absolute power meant that his death was sure to create a power vacuum. Even as he lay dying, his potential successors were already jockeying for position.

Lavrenti Beria, Stalin's much-feared chief of state security, was reportedly overjoyed by news the dictator was near death. After Stalin's death was announced, Beria retained his duties as Soviet security head and was elevated to deputy prime minister.

Beria's political ally in the Kremlin, Georgi Malenkov, became prime minister. Vyacheslav Molotov retained his role as foreign minister while also taking on the position of deputy prime minister.

At first it appeared Malenkov -- who had inherited Stalin's governmental and party titles -- would become heir to Stalin's legacy. Malenkov, along with Beria, was an essential part of Stalin's "state within a state" -- the political structure that kept Stalin's hold on power unquestioned.

But that identification with Stalin apparently worked against Malenkov and Beria -- particularly Malenkov, who was seen as "Stalin's man." And no one within the collective leadership appeared ready to assume Stalin's mantle.

"After Stalin's death, nobody was prepared to occupy two chairs," says Vladislav Zubok, a senior fellow at the National Security Archive in Washington and co-author of "Inside The Kremlin's Cold War." "Malenkov was just too modest and cautious to take two seats."

Malenkov remained Soviet premier. But another member of the Kremlin leadership, Nikita Khrushchev, became party chief.

Malenkov and Beria tried to loosen the state's grip on its people -- and the Soviet Union's relationship with the outside world. Less then a month after Stalin's death, a U.S. State Department official noted a momentous change in U.S.-Soviet relations, saying there had been "more Soviet gestures toward the West than at any other similar period."

But with the apparent end of Stalinist methods came an unexpected challenge from within East Germany. In June 1953, East German workers revolted against their government. The rebellion was short-lived and quickly suppressed, but it gave an opening to Khrushchev, the man Beria once described as a "moon-faced idiot."

Some historians believe that one of the factors that turned Khrushchev against Beria was the security chief's reported willingness to ease political restrictions in the Soviet bloc.

While the Kremlin was preoccupied with the crisis in East Berlin, Khrushchev secretly secured Malenkov's support to bring charges against Beria.

Khrushchev also sought out the support of Soviet Marshal Zhukov, the World War II hero, and through him was able to bring the military into his plan.

"The military hated Beria," says Zubok. "They viewed him as part of the machine that had murdered so many able officers in the 1930s and '40s."

On June 26, at a Presidium meeting, Beria was arrested.

Malenkov -- keeping with Khrushchev's plan -- started to raise the question of Beria at the meeting. But Malenkov, says Zubok, "stammered and seemed to be paralyzed by fear." According to Khrushchev, he seized the initiative and denounced Beria as a traitor. Malenkov pushed a button, and troops entered and seized Beria -- who held in his trembling hand a piece of paper with one word on it: "Alarm."

Other accounts of the incident say Khrushchev was carrying a gun in his pocket in case Beria resisted.

Beria's arrest "was a big act of deception by Khrushchev," says Zubok, "and later, Khrushchev was quite proud of it."

Beria was executed in December 1953. Malenkov was forced to resign as premier in February 1955, a victim of Khrushchev's political maneuvering. As for Khrushchev, he survived an attempted ouster in 1957 and was able to consolidate his power -- making his leadership of the Soviet Union unquestioned.

"But the same people who supported Khrushchev against the Stalinist Old Guard and saved him in '57 turned against him in '64," says Zubok, "because Khrushchev was too unpredictable and unleashed too many international crises."

During a vacation on the Black Sea in October 1964, Khrushchev was unexpectedly called back to Moscow.

Once there, he found a group of Soviet officials had moved against him. Khrushchev was stripped of all his positions by the Central Committee. The Soviet news agency Tass reported that he had resigned due to ill health. Leonid Brezhnev took over as premier.

Khrushchev, unlike other Soviets ousted from power, lived on -- in his dacha outside Moscow. When asked to comment on international events he refused, saying he was "just a pensioner". Khrushchev died of a heart attack in 1971, soon after the publication of his memoirs.