Andrei Kirilenko (politician)

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Andrei Kirilenko
Андрей Кириленко
Senior Secretary of Cadres of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
In office
8 April 1966 – 5 March 1976
Preceded byAlexander Shelepin
Succeeded byKonstantin Chernenko
First Secretary of the Dnipropetrovsk Regional Committee
In office
June 1950 – December 1955
Preceded byLeonid Brezhnev
Succeeded byVolodymyr Shcherbytsky
Personal details
Born(1906-09-08)8 September 1906
civil servant
Central institution membership
Other political offices held

Andrei Pavlovich Kirilenko (Ukrainian: Андрій Павлович Кириленко; Russian: Андре́й Па́влович Кириле́нко; 8 September [O.S. 26 August] 1906 – 12 May 1990) was a Soviet politician, and a member of the Secretariat of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. He was one of the most loyal politicians to Leonid Brezhnev.

His role in the CPSU was to ensure Brezhnev's power base and, if possible, to strengthen Brezhnev's position within the party. In order to accomplish this task, he emerged as one of the leading figures in the Secretariat under Brezhnev's rule.

Early life and career

Andrei Kirilenko was born on 8 September 1906 in the village of

metallurgical and electrical engineering, but also other sorts of industry.[1]

During the

Bureau of the Central Committee. Brezhnev benefited from Kirilenko's position, Brezhnev used him to win over supporters of his conspiracy against Khrushchev.[4]

Brezhnev era

Rise to prominence

Immediately after Khrushchev's ouster, a "

member of the Political Bureau (Politburo).[7] In 1966, the Bureau of the Central Committee of the RSFSR was abolished, and Kirilenko became Brezhnev's chief lieutenant. Vadim Medvedev, a Soviet official, said Kirilenko's chief concern was maintaining and strengthening Brezhnev's position within the Party. Men who were loyal to Brezhnev were also loyal to Kirilenko.[8]

protégé, became a "counterweight" to Kirilenko's power within the Central Committee (CC).[8] Before Chernenko's rise in the Soviet hierarchy, Kirilenko provided detailed supervision of new party personnel and the economy. When Chernenko came on board in 1976, Kirilenko supervised the economy. By the mid-to-late 1970s, Kirilenko's health was beginning to decline, and his memory weakened.[9] Despite his failing health, he was still a high-standing member, and he usually presided over the meetings of the Secretariat when Suslov was not around.[1] While First World representatives treated Kirilenko as Second Secretary of the Communist Party because most of his duties had been associated with that office in the past, the position was actually held by Suslov.[10] During most of his term, Kirilenko was one of four who had both a seat in the secretariat and Politburo; the three others were Brezhnev, Suslov and Fyodor Kulakov.[11]

By 1976 Kirilenko's position within the Soviet leadership had grown to such an extent that leading officials, such as Brezhnev and Suslov, were beginning to worry about his "organisational tail" in the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR). His supervisory responsibilities led many of his colleagues to view him as a threat to the Party Organisational Work Department of the Central Committee – the Central Committee department overseeing the civilian economy and the military–industrial complex. His position was weakened drastically by the end of the year, his weakened position did not lead to a strengthening of the Collective leadership but to the weakening of it.[12]

Later career and resignation

As with Kosygin, Kirilenko's leading position in the Soviet leadership was in "limbo" due to his support for economic reform to countenance the country's stagnating economy.[13]Kirilenko grew increasingly estranged with Brezhnev in 1977, some believe that it was due to the growing economic hardship that faced the Soviet Union. It is said that the two argued over resource allocation and on how to modernise the ailing economy. However, the most common explanation is that Kirilenko grew estranged was because of his weakened position within the Collective leadership.[14]

Kirilenko led the Soviet delegation to the December 1977

Marxist-Leninism. This congress was important to the Soviet Union, and Kirilenko compared Angola's development with that of Vietnam.[15] Kirilenko, along with Premier Kosygin, had been one of the most vocal opponents to a Soviet intervention in Afghanistan. He blamed the Afghan Party leadership for the rebellion against them, claiming that the Soviets "gave them everything." He also disliked it when the Afghan leadership tried to justify their murderous actions on the grounds that Vladimir Lenin also did it.[16]

Kirilenko was seen as a possible candidate for the post of

Brezhnev's death and funeral, Kirilenko's mental condition deteriorated to where he could not remember the names of several leading Politburo members. He was unable to write properly during his later life; when asked by Andropov to write a letter of resignation in 1982, he was unable to do so.[22] The decision to remove Kirilenko was taken before Andropov rose to power, so in the event Brezhnev had died later, Kirilenko would still have been forced to resign.[23] The reason for the decision was that Kirilenko's son had tried to defect to the United Kingdom.[24]

Later life, death, and recognition

When compared to other Soviet politicians who shared the same fate, Kirilenko's downfall was, in the words of historian R. Judson Mitchell, a "relatively easy" fall from power. At

Brezhnev's lying-in-state and subsequent funeral, he was allowed to stand next besides Brezhnev's family even if he was not a member of the Soviet leadership at the time. Kirilenko made his last public appearance in 1983, and was given an honorary retirement the same year. Mitchell believes that Andropov gave Kirilenko the honorary retirement so that he could win over Kirilenko's "organisational tail", literally Kirilenko's appointees to top-ranking offices during his years in service.[24] He lived the rest of his life in Moscow and died on 12 May 1990 at age 83 and was buried at the Troyekurovskoye Cemetery
.

Awards and honors

During his lifetime, he was awarded the

Orders of Lenin and one Order of the October Revolution.[1]

USSR
Hero of Socialist Labor
, twice (1966, 1976)
Seven
Orders of Lenin
(1948, 1953, 1956, 1958, 1966, 1971, 1976)
Order of the October Revolution (1981)
Order of the Patriotic War, 2nd class (1985)
Medal "For the Defence of Odessa" (1942)
Medal "For the Defence of the Caucasus" (1944)
Medal "For the Victory over Germany in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945" (1945)
Medal "For Valiant Labour in the Great Patriotic War 1941–1945" (1945)
Medal "For Labour Valour"
Medal "For Distinction in Guarding the State Border of the USSR"
Jubilee Medal "In Commemoration of the 100th Anniversary of the Birth of Vladimir Ilyich Lenin" (1969)
Medal "Veteran of Labour" (1974)
Medal "For the Restoration of the Donbas Coal Mines" (1947)
Medal "For the Restoration of the Black Metallurgy Enterprises of the South" (1948)
Foreign
Order of Georgi Dimitrov (Bulgaria)
Order of Klement Gottwald (Czechoslovakia)

Notes

  1. ^ a b c d e f Кириленко, Андрей Павлович [Kirilenko, Andrei Pavlovich] (in Russian). warheroes.ru. Retrieved 20 November 2010.
  2. ^ Law 1975, p. 214.
  3. ^ Law 1975, p. 226.
  4. ^ Hough 1997, p. 87.
  5. ISBN 978-0-333-79463-0
    .
  6. ^ "170. Memorandum From the President's Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger) to President Nixon". history.state.gov. 10 April 1971. Retrieved 6 March 2018.
  7. ^ Law 1975, p. 227.
  8. ^ a b Hough 1997, pp. 87–88.
  9. ^ Hough 1997, p. 84.
  10. ISBN 978-0-202-24166-1
    .
  11. ^ Law 1975, p. 321.
  12. ^ Mitchell 1990, p. 40.
  13. ISBN 978-0-8179-8921-7
    .
  14. ^ Mitchell 1990, p. 58.
  15. ISBN 978-1-85043-649-2
    .
  16. ISBN 978-0-521-85364-4
    .
  17. ^ Mitchell 1990, p. 55–56.
  18. ^ Hough 1997, p. 90.
  19. ^ Mitchell 1990, p. 65–66.
  20. ^ "Soviet Leadership Expected to Choose a President". The Hour. 13 June 1983.
  21. ISBN 978-1-4051-9688-8
    .
  22. ISBN 978-0-224-07879-5
    .
  23. ISBN 978-0-691-01942-0
    .
  24. ^ a b Mitchell 1990, p. 75.

References

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