Eastern Bloc Politics - State Police

State Police

Further information: Chronology of Soviet secret police agencies

Eastern Bloc secret police organizations were formed on Vladimir Lenin's theory and Joseph Stalin's practical application of "the defense of the revolution." One of the first acts of Lenin after the October 1917 Revolution was the establishment of a secret police, the Cheka. Such organizations in the Eastern Bloc became the "shield and sword" of the ruling Communist party. The party's claim was based on Lenin's general theory of class struggle, imperialism, legitimate socialism, and the dictatorship of the proletariat.

The police served to deter opposition to party directives, and contain it should it appear. The political police were the core of the system. Large numbers of citizens were recruited, sometimes through blackmail, to become informers for the secret police. Sophisticated police networks monitored all strata of society while persecuting only those who overtly expressed dissatisfaction or disagreement with the regime. The names of each political police organization became synonymous with unbridled power and threats of violent retribution should an individual become active against the collective. After Stalin's death in 1953, in general, the profile of the secret police declined, and became less a means to instill terror than to preserve the existing distribution of political power, overall becoming more reactive than proactive. The exceptions to this lower profile were in Albania under Enver Hoxha and in Romania under Nicolae Ceauşescu. The linchpin of Soviet control early in the Eastern Block was General Ivan Serov, who was appointed to chairman of the new Soviet KGB in 1954 as a reward for having effectively applied his secret police expertise to the sovietization of the Eastern Bloc.