Sergei Kruglov (politician) - Security Services Career Under Stalin - 1945 To 1953: at The Height of Power

1945 To 1953: At The Height of Power

On December 29, 1945 Kruglov replaced Lavrentiy Beria as the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the Soviet Union (head of NKVD). In 1946 the Soviet government transitioned to the ministerial system and the security apparatus underwent substantial reorganization. NKVD became the Soviet Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD), with Kruglov as its chief, the Minister of Internal Affairs. NKGB became the Soviet Ministry of State Security (MGB), and it was headed by Viktor Abakumov, who replaced Beria's protégé Vsevolod Merkulov. Beria became Deputy Prime Minister and retained overall nominal control over both MVD and MGB, which were both, however, now led by Beria's adversaries.

Although Kruglov rose through the ranks of Beria's machine, he was not considered a Beria loyalist and after the war allied himself with Viktor Abakumov, a Beria rival. The elevation of Kruglov and Abakumov is now seen by historians as part of a deliberate strategy by Joseph Stalin to limit Beria's influence after the end of the war.

Kruglov's authority as the Minister of Internal Affairs fluctuated significantly over the period 1946-1953. In the beginning this authority included overall control over the Soviet Militsiya (the Soviet Union's regular police force), the paramilitary Internal Troops, running of the Gulag system, border guard, and other areas. In the late 1940s and early 1950s some of this authority had been transferred from MVD to MGB and by 1953 MVD has been mostly in charge only of running the Gulag prison camp system. However, for most of that period Kruglov remained the head of the State Special Commission (Особое совещание), an extrajudicial body with authority to prosecute those charged with crimes against the State.

In 1948 Kruglov organized mass deportation of the German population of the Kaliningrad oblast (formerly East Prussia) – the area around Königsberg that was annexed by the Soviet Union at the conclusion of World War II.

In January 1948 Kruglov and Abakumov presented for Stalin's signature a memorandum that significantly toughened the Gulag conditions for political prisoners. Many of those who had been arrested at the height of the Great Purge in 1937-38 and given 10 year prison sentences and managed to survive their time in Gulag were due for release. The Abakumov-Kruglov memorandum, approved by Stalin, authorized the creation of a special system of labor camps for political prisoners. MVD was authorized to hold, when deemed necessary, such political prisoners beyond the expiration dates of their sentences and to send them to the so-called administrative exile (административная ссылка) in the cases where formal release did occur. Thereafter, both significant terms of administrative exile, given after the completion of the nominal prison sentences, and significant delays of the nominal release after such completion of sentences (referred to as "overstaying one's welcome"), became standard MVD practices in running the Gulag system.

As head of the MVD, Kruglov played a key role in supplying the Gulag prison labor for the Soviet nuclear program headed by Beria. After a successful Soviet nuclear test in August 1949, Kruglov was awarded the Order of Lenin.

In 1948 Andrei Zhdanov, who had been a patron of both Kruglov and Abakumov, died and Kruglov's position was temporarily in danger. Beria and Malenkov engineered the so-called Leningrad Affair which resulted in the persecution of many party officials connected to Zhdanov. However, due to Stalin's protection, who still needed a counterweight to Beria, both Kruglov and Abakumov retained their posts, although Beria's position was strengthened.

In 1952-1956 Kruglov was a member of the Central Committee of Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), to which position he was elected at the 19th Congress of the CPSU. Kruglov was a member of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in 1946–1950 and 1954–1958.