Semantically, soviet may be used as an abbreviation, with the understanding that it denotes no democratic practices of any sort.
The U.S.S.R. formula ignores communist and the communist party. It includes socialist, which signifies that private property is restricted or abolished.
The formula does not refer to the fact that the CPSU is the only permitted party and monopolizes political authority. The constitution mentions and legalizes this situation.
The expression Soviet Union is used more often than the clumsy “U.S.S.R.” or “Union of Soviet Socialist Republics,” and many people believe, falsely, the two terms mean the same.
The U.S.S.R. formula is designed to indicate that the multi-ethnic state is constituted as a democratic federation. Constitutionally, the principle of ethnic self-determination may be invoked if a constituent nation wants to secede. By contrast, the Soviet Union formula asserts that all the Soviet nations and peoples are united and will stay together. This is ensured since the union republics, together and singly, are ruled by the CPSU, which is committed to oppose every seccession.
The “Soviet Union” formula has no standing in international law, nor have the communists proposed that it become an official appelation of the state. The communists distinguish between state and party structure, and insist that in international relations the two entities be kept apart. The state may sign a treaty, but it accepts no responsibility for Party actions which violate the commitment.
The communist party is the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, and the top military officers are “Marshals of the Soviet Union.” This means the military force within the U.S.S.R. is unitary, and there is only one communist party.
This construction has become brittle below the top. The armed forces are subordinate to the Supreme Soviet, to the Council of Ministers, and especially to the CPSU “Summit.” The Summit, which is an informal designation, consists of the Politburo, Secretariat, and Central Committee.
As to the single communist party, there are CP organizations in each union republic, which have a local-ethnic membership. They are run by a central committee, which is subordinate to the Central Committee in Moscow. Hence there is a usage referring to the Ukrainian CP and the Byelorussian CP, which is connected with the membership of these two union republics in the UN. The style is referring to the CP boss in a union republic is: “First Secretary, Kazakh Central Committee.” The First Secretary is native to the republic, and the Second Secretary is Russian.
Each union republic has (almost) equal representation in the Presidium, Supreme Council, and each has a council of ministers. There is unequal republic and ethnic representation in the U.S.S.R. Council of Ministers, in the Central Committee, in the Secretariat, and in the Politburo.
In brief, the term Soviet Union, which is so popular in the U.S., is disinformation to pretend that there are no national problems in the U.S.S.R., and to hide the fact that this state, while it has federal features, is not a real federation, but is ruled by the CPSU, which is largely Russian in composition.
It was said about the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, which existed until 1806, that it was not holy, not Roman, not an empire, and had nothing to do with the German nation. Similarly, it may be said that the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is not a union; instead, the fifteen republics are ruled by a super-dictatorship from above those republics; that the Soviets were de-democratized; and that its socialism is exploitation.
Since Brezhnev, this system is officially referred to as “socialism as it actually exists”—realnyi sotsializm—meaning it’s not working, but that’s the best we are able to do. The expression real socialism does not make much sense in English. But this is no excuse for keeping this revealing term from the Western media.
Now the really important question arises: after we have looked at various groups which are not hostile to the West, is the assumption correct that the CPSU is the group which is hostile to the West? For all practical purposes, this assumption is not wrong, with the qualification that the CPSU was not worrying much about the U.S. before World War II, and that during that war the U.S.S.R.-CPSU under Stalin needed U.S. and British help.
The U.S.S.R.-CPSU enmity against the U.S. started in earnest during 1946, and was announced publicly by Stalin on February 9, 1946. The hostility against the U.S. was built up steadily and quickly until Stalin’s death in March 1953. During the consolidation phase after Stalin’s disappearance the animosity was reduced. The Kremlin switched back to crescendo during 1973-1976. Hostility was growing during Andropov’s rise and tenure. It has been continuing during Chernenko’s and Gorbachev’s regime until this writing.
What is the meaning of CPSU hostility? As early as 1903 Lenin distinguished between the rank and file Party members, and the “professional revolutionaries,” the only ones entitled to lead the struggle. After 1912, Trotsky mocked Lenin’s version of the “dictatorship of the proletariat.” First, the proletariat is supposed to perform as the dictator, then the Party. Since this does not work, the dictatorship devolves on the Central Committee, but soon it passes to the Politburo. Finally, it is in Lenin’s hands. Afterwards, Trotsky said later, the dictatorship is exercised over the proletariat.
Is the Party identical with the single dictator, the three members of a Troika whenever it exists, the Politbureau, the Central Committee secretaries, the Central Committee Plenum, or the Party Congress?
Lenin surrounded himself with “professional revolutionaries” whom he knew from the struggles which led to his seizure of power. Some were helpful, others were troublesome, most were useless. All found it difficult to adjust to ruling. After Lenin died, those professionals were unable to block Stalin.
Stalin had prepared for the critical moment of succession by organizing a group of persons on whom he was able to rely, partly because he had “the goods on them,” and partly because they owed their careers to him. The persons he selected understood his commands, and carried them out energetically.
Stalin marked the Party members he deemed hostile or incompetent, and who lacked ambition. The chosen functionaries were entered into a special list of names, or “nomenklatura.” The names and qualifications were matched with the “leverage” positions throughout the Party.
The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary indicates that nomenklatura goes back to Pliny and that servants in antique Rome had to inform their patrons of the names of persons (references?) when canvassing for a position. The word stands for catalogue or register, or the terminology of a science. According to Micropaedia, Linnaeus used the expression for his “binomial” classification of organisms: the nomenclature named genus and species, and indicated taxonomic position. Stalin’s roster soon included the degree of access to Party secrets, in addition to the functions, the privileges, and the monies that were granted to each listed person. Stalin promoted and deployed those who fitted into his plans; the others, and especially Lenin’s confidants, were demoted or killed.
The name list was consulted as early as 1922, and it entered into full use during Lenin’s final illness in 1923.
This resulted in the CPSU living on two floors. Trotsky observed: “After decisions are made on the upper floor, they are communicated to the lower floor.” Trotsky dubbed this change “the bureaucratization of the party,” but he did not comprehend the scope of the development.
According to Stalin’s interpretation, the name list served to manage the cadre of the party.
The novelty was marked, among others, by the following features:
1. The list of candidates for promotion and emoluments relates to a corresponding group of persons. Thus, the term nomenklatura denotes both a list and a group of persons, and both are known as “Nomenklatura.” This arrangement can be compared with that of an army which consists of enlisted men, noncoms, and officers. Each soldier is carried on a particular personnel list, and each list corresponds to a particular class of soldiers.
The Nomenklatura group is a subset of CPSU
membership, and like the officers corps in an army, the Nomenklaturists have different ranks ranging from junior to senior and flag ranks. In other words, the Nomenklatura is the group within the CPSU that commands. In modern and unclassified CP usage, the Nomenklatura comprises the “directing organs” in the CPSU, and everywhere else in the U.S.S.R.
The existence of the Nomenklatura is semi-secret; that is, people in the U.S.S.R. know about its existence, power, and functions, but they ignore details about its structure, operations, and purposes. The confusion between the name list and the group, the existence of different lists overlapping with different groups serves the purposes of disinformation within the CPSU. The intermingling between rulers and beneficiaries also serves to conceal the ruling function and its prerogatives, and the privileges of the regime’s favorites.
2. Unlike Lenin’s professional revolutionaries who wanted to make revolution, the Nomenklatura aims to preserve and enlarge its power. That is, the Nomenklatura may foment, feed, and operate revolutions abroad, but it is set up to prevent unrest, overthrows, and revolution at home.
3. The Nomenklatura group is estimated to include less than 300,000 Party functionaries, or less than 2 percent of CPSU membership. The group that is listed as receiving special remunerations is significantly larger; it does not belong to the Party rulers, only to the Party’s beneficiaries.
4. The remaining 17-18 million Party members are employed for the jobs that must be accomplished in a political body, except that none has the authority to issue orders or to make decisions affecting the Party apparatus. The Party members are doing the work the Nomenklatura is telling them to do, and which it supervises.
5. Professional soldiers, including the top commanders, are not members of the Nomenklatura. There are Nomenklaturists in uniform, up to the rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union, but those are not professional soldiers. Their assignment is to control the military.
To return to the question, who in the U.S.S.R. deems itself to be the real enemy of the United States and the West in general? The 17-18 million Party members, or 6 to 7 percent of the total population, can be assumed to be unfriendly or hostile to the West and the U.S. in particular; or it can be hypothesized that a portion is neutral, perhaps friendly. It does not matter. The rank-and-file Party members know nothing about, and do not participate in the decision making that relates to the enmity against the West, or which deals with foreign policy or war.
True, experts who are Party members participate in staff work, and carry out assignments of hostility, which they are ordered to undertake. As pointed out, the Party members are used as work horses. But they possess neither authority, nor responsibility. Without exception, all decisions that bear on the conflict with the U.S. are made by the Nomenklatura.
Therefore, granting overlaps between Nomenklatura and rank-and-file party members, the Nomenklatura is the real enemy of the United States and its allies.
It is not the Party membership as such, nor the U.S.S.R., nor the Soviet Union, nor Russia, nor even the armed forces of the Soviet Union. All of those, and a few others, are factors in the struggle, and in case of armed conflict the Soviet armed forces will be the “concrete” enemy of the U.S. on the battlefield. But the decision to go to war will be made by the Nomenklatura.
For as long as Stalin was alive, he was using the Nomenklatura as he saw fit, as its personal commander. His power was so overwhelming that the Nomenklatura was not considered an independent body, or a policy-defining authority, let alone a decision maker. It performed essentially as Stalin’s extended staff, which he needed to exercise control over a large number of ministries, agencies, planning groups, forces, and federal substates. Sometimes the Nomenklatura was out of control but Stalin stayed on top without interruption, even though there are doubts about his end.
After Stalin’s death, the lines of authority were in confusion, and several top persons disappeared. The incubation period of the Nomenklatura had lasted thirty-one years and ended in chaos.
Much of Stalin’s heritage had to be denied, especially his lawlessness and criminality. First, a procedure was needed to regulate the succession to the General Secretary of the CPSU; second, the dictatorship had to be modernized; third, the ideology had to be reformulated; and fourth, the relationship between Nomenklatura and the military had to be established.
De-Stalinization was inevitable, including a drastic reduction of the Gulag Archipelago. This was paired with a decision, largely arranged by M.A. Suslov, to ensure that only a true Stalinist ascend to the post of General Secretary.
This position is that of the highest ranking Secretary of the Central Committee, that of boss of all secretaries, and of the Party apparatus. The General Secretary is also chairman of the Politburo. He may assume additional positions, but as General Secretary, CPSU Central Committee, and Chairman, Political Bureau, CPSU Central Committee, he is also nominal head of the Nomenklatura, and thus the number one man in the U.S.S.R.
The Iron Angel, by Don Hawthorne
Editor’s Introduction
The Nomenklatura do not merely govern the U.S.S.R.; they own the land in fee simple. They control every resource; and as Trotsky observed, “Where the State is the sole employer, resistance means starvation.” Such total control is not an unmixed blessing.
In one of the most important books of this decade, Survival Is Not Enough (Simon and Schuster Touchstone Books, 1984), Richard Pipes, Baird Professor of History at Harvard University and onetime member of the National Security Council says:
The Communist Bloc is in a political crisis in the sense that its ruling elites no longer are able satisfactorily to carry out the extremely broad responsibilities that they have taken upon themselves. The Party is growing increasingly ossified and corrupt, self-serving and out of touch with the population, among whom doubts are spreading about its ability to rule. The Soviet Communist Party is under attack from conservative and democratic dissenters, who, for their own and different reasons, regard it as inimical to the interests of the Russian people. The non-Russian inhabitants of the Empire, though outwardly quiet, show no inclination to shed their national identity and assimilate. Soviet client states and parties press demands that the Soviet nomenklatura cannot meet, displaying a degree of independence that puts in question Moscow’s imperial aspirations.
The nomenklatura is highly competent in dealing with overt challenges to its authority; indeed, this may be the only political skill that it has mastered to perfection. Its abilities are much less impressive when the challenge comes not from identifiable individuals or groups but from faceless forces and processes that the KGB and its tanks cannot disperse or arrest. Declines in productivity and fertility, cynicism and indifference among the country’s young, nationalism among the subjugated peoples and foreign Communist parties—all these are phenomena immune to repression. The same applies to the pervasive corruption among the ruling apparatus. How much such adverse processes can erode the authority of the Party was demonstrated recently in Poland. There, in less than two years, the Communist Party was compelled to surrender power, first to the trade unions, and then to the armed forces. This catastrophe occurred under the pressure of spontaneous movements, whose leaders deliberately avoided violence. They did not take the Party by assault—they made it irrelevant. Whether the Polish revolution occurred because the local Communists were too rigid or not rigid enough is a question that deeply divides the Soviet nomenklatura, because it has fundamental bearing on its own future.
In the meantime, as problems accumulate and nothing is done to resolve them, a sense of malaise spreads across the Soviet Union. The Russian people can suffer almost any kind of deprivation except weak leadership: the whole constitution of the Communist state postulates firm authority, and this has been missing for some time. The citizenry, unable to express its discontent actively, resorts to passive resistance on a grand scale that creates a very dangerous situation for the elite and propels it toward decisions it desperately wishes to avo
id.
Don Hawthorne has been an actor, script writer, set dresser, magazine salesman, graphics artist, and editorial assistant working for me here at Chaos Manor. He is also an avid student of history and political science.
“The Iron Angel” tells of a time when the nomenklatura have lost control, and only naked power rules in the remains of the Soviet state.
The Iron Angel
Don Hawthorne
“Once there was a People—Terror gave it birth;
Once there was a People and it made a Hell of Earth;
Earth arose and crushed it. Listen, O ye slain!
Once there was a People—it shall never be again!”
—Rudyard Kipling, “MacDonough’s Song”
The moon was down, and Moscow lay silent in the deepest darkness Russia had ever known. From a hiding place in the tumbled ruin that had been Lenin’s tomb, Lieutenant Aleksei Aleksandrovitch Rostov gazed out across the rubble-strewn expanse of Red Square, to the burned-out remnants of Saint Basil’s Cathedral. The gilt had long since been stripped from its onion domes, the graceful spires and curving flutes given to jagged edges of great, gaping holes. When he tipped the rim of his helmet back over his fair hair, Rostov could see stars through those holes, pinpoints of light coldly gleaming.
Our stars, Rostov thought. Or they might have been, once. If we had kept our eyes on them, instead of trying to take the world around us first.
Lieutenant Rostov was, had been, an officer of the Soviet Fifth Guards Armored Engineers, the “tekniks,” as they were called by the regular army troops. Once objects of respect, the tekniks’ exclusive access to usable petrol now kept them in constant peril—as much from their own countrymen as from the invaders still occupying much of the U.S.S.R. Men would kill for petrol, now. Even before water.
There Will Be War Volume VII Page 21