The Khrushchev Thaw (or Khrushchev's Thaw; in Russian Khrushchovskaya Ottepel or simply Ottepel; Russian: Хрущёвская о́ттепель, Russian pronunciation: [xruɕˈɕovskəjɐ ˈotʲɪpʲelʲ])[1] refers to the period from the mid 1950s to the early 1960s, when repression and censorship in the Soviet Union were partially reversed and millions of Soviet political prisoners were released from Gulag labor camps, due to Nikita Khrushchev's policies of de-Stalinization[2] and peaceful coexistence with other nations.
The Thaw became possible after the death of Joseph Stalin in March 1953. Khrushchev denounced Stalin[3] in "The Secret Speech" at the 20th Congress of the Communist Party,[4][5] then ousted the pro-Stalinists during his power struggle in the Kremlin. The term was coined after Ilya Ehrenburg's 1954 novel The Thaw, "Оттепель",[6] sensational for its time. The Khrushchev Thaw was highlighted by Khrushchev's 1954 visit to Beijing, People's Republic of China, his 1955 visit to Belgrade, Yugoslavia and his subsequent meeting with Dwight Eisenhower later that year, culminating in Khrushchev's 1959 visit to the United States.
The Thaw initiated irreversible transformation of the entire Soviet society by opening up for some economic reforms and international trade, educational and cultural contacts, festivals, books by foreign authors, foreign movies, art shows, popular music, dances and new fashions, massive involvement in international sport competitions; it was a chain of unprecedented steps to free people from fear and dictatorship that culminated in the removal of Stalin's body from Lenin's Mausoleum. Although the power struggle between liberals and conservative pro-Stalinists never stopped, it eventually weakened the Soviet Communist Party.
Khrushchev's Thaw allowed some freedom of information in the media, arts and culture; international festival, foreign movies, uncensored books, and new forms of entertainment on the emerging national TV, ranging from massive parades and celebrations to popular music and variety shows, satire and comedies, and all-star shows, like "Goluboy Ogonek." Such political and cultural updates all together helped liberate minds of millions and changed public consciousness of several generations of people in the Soviet Union.[7][8]
Khrushchev's Thaw had its genesis in the concealed power struggle among Stalin's lieutenants.[1] Several major leaders among the Red Army commanders, such as Marshal Georgy Zhukov and his loyal officers, had some serious tensions with Stalin's secret service.[1][9] On the surface the Red Army and the Soviet leadership seemed united after their victory in the Second World War. However, the hidden ambitions of the top people around Stalin, as well as Stalin's own suspicion and paranoia, had prompted Khrushchev that he could rely only on those few; they would stay with him through the entire political power struggle.[9][10] That power struggle was surreptitiously prepared by Khrushchev while Stalin was alive,[1][9] and came to surface after Stalin's death in March 1953.[9] By that time, Khrushchev's people were planted everywhere in the Soviet hierarchy, which allowed Khrushchev to execute, or remove his main opponents, and then introduce some changes in the rigid Soviet ideology and hierarchy.[1]
Stalin's dictatorship had reached new extremes in abusing people at all levels,[11] such as the deportations of nationalities, the Leningrad Affair, the Doctors' plot, and official attacks on writers and other intellectuals. At the same time, millions of soldiers and officers had seen Europe after World War II, and had become aware of the better ways of life which existed outside the Soviet Union. Upon Stalin's orders many were arrested and punished again,[11] including the attacks on the popular Marshal Georgy Zhukov and other top generals, who had exceeded the limits on taking trophies when they looted the defeated Germany. The loot was confiscated by Stalin's security apparatus, and Marshal Zhukov was demoted, humiliated and exiled; he became a staunch anti-Stalinist.[12] Zhukov waited until the death of Stalin, which allowed Khrushchev to bring Zhukov back for a new political battle.[1][13]
The temporary union between Nikita Khrushchev and Marshal Georgy Zhukov was founded on their similar backgrounds, interests and weaknesses:[1] both were peasants, both were ambitious, both were abused by Stalin, both feared the Stalinists, and both wanted to change these things. Khrushchev and Zhukov needed one another to eliminate their mutual enemies in the Soviet political elite.[13][14]
In 1953, Zhukov helped Khrushchev to eliminate Lavrenty Beria,[1] then a First Vice-Premier, who was executed in Moscow, as well as several other figures of Stalin's circle. Soon Khrushchev ordered the release of millions of political prisoners from the Gulag camps. Under Khrushchev's rule the number of prisoners in the Soviet Union was decreased from 13 million to 5 million people.[11]
Khrushchev also promoted and groomed Leonid Brezhnev,[13] whom he brought to Kremlin and introduced to Stalin in 1952.[1] Then Khrushchev promoted Brezhnev to Presidium (Politburo) and made him the Head of Political Directorate of the Red Army and Navy, and moved him up to several other powerful positions. Brezhnev in return helped Khrushchev by tipping the balance of power during several critical confrontations with the conservative hard-liners, including the ouster of pro-Stalinists headed by Molotov and Malenkov.[13][15]
Khrushchev denounced Stalin in his speech On the Personality Cult and its Consequences, delivered at the closed session of the 20th Party Congress, behind closed doors, after midnight on February 25, 1956.[16] In this speech, Khrushchev described the damages done by Joseph Stalin's Personality Cult, and the repressions, known as the Great Purge that killed millions and traumatized all people in the Soviet Union.[17] After the delivery of the speech, it was officially disseminated in a shorter form among members of the Soviet Communist Party across the USSR starting March 5, 1956.[1] Then Khrushchev initiated a wave of rehabilitations that officially restored the reputations of many millions of innocent victims, who were killed or imprisoned in the Great Purge under Stalin.[16] Further, tentative moves were made through official and unofficial channels to relax restrictions on freedom of speech that had been held over from the rule of Stalin.[1]
Khrushchev's 1956 speech was the strongest effort ever in the USSR to bring reconciliation and healing to the people,[1] at that time, after several decades of fear of Stalin's Terror, that took millions of innocent lives.[18] Khrushchev's speech was published internationally within a few months,[1] and his initiatives to open and liberalise the USSR had surprised the world. Khrushchev's speech had angered many of his powerful enemies, thus igniting another round of ruthless power struggle within the Soviet Communist Party. At that time, Moshe Dayan said that the USSR would disappear in 30 years, and he was only 5 years off in predicting the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Khruschev's denouncement of Stalin came as a shock to the Soviet people. Many in the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic, Stalin's homeland, especially the young generation, bred on the panegyrics and permanent praise of the "genius" of Stalin, perceived it as a national insult. In March 1956, a series of spontaneous rallies to mark the third anniversary of Stalin's death quickly evolved into an uncontrollable mass demonstration and political demands such as the change of the central government in Moscow and calls for the independence of Georgia from the Soviet Union appeared,[19] leading to the Soviet army intervention and bloodshed in the streets of Tbilisi.[20]
The first big international failure of Khrushchev's politics came in October–November 1956.
The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 was suppressed by the massive invasion of the Soviet tanks and the Red Army troops in Budapest. The street fighting against the invading Red Army caused thousands of casualties among Hungarian civilians and militia, as well as hundreds of the Soviet military personnel killed. The attack of the Soviet Red Army also caused massive emigration from Hungary, as hundreds of thousands of Hungarians had fled as refugees.[21]
At the same time, the Polish October emerged as the political and social climax in Poland. Such democratic changes in the internal life of Poland were also perceived with fear and anger in Moscow, where the hard-line "Stalinists" did not want to lose control, fearing the political threat to the Soviet strength and power in Eastern Europe.[22]
The conservative hard-line Stalinist elite of the Soviet communist party was enraged by Khrushchev's speech in 1956, and rejected Khrushchev's de-Stalinization and liberalisation of Soviet society. One year after Khrushchev's secret speech, the Stalinists attempted to oust Khrushchev from the leadership position in the Soviet Communist Party.[1]
Khrushchev's enemies considered him hypocritical as well as ideologically wrong, given Khrushchev's involvement in Stalin's Great Purges, and other similar events as one of Stalin's favourites. They believed that Khrushchev's policy of peaceful coexistence would leave the Soviet Union open to attack. Vyacheslav Molotov, Lazar Kaganovich, Georgy Malenkov and joined by Dmitri Shepilov[16] at the last minute after Kaganovich convinced him the group had a majority, attempted to depose Khrushchev as First Secretary of the Party in May 1957.[1]
But Khrushchev had used Marshal Georgy Zhukov again. Khrushchev was saved by several strong appearances in his support, especially powerful was support from both Zhukov and Brezhnev.[23] At the extraordinary session of the Central Committee held in late June 1957, Khrushchev labeled his opponents as Anti-Party Group[16] and won a vote which reaffirmed his position as First Secretary.[1] Then he expelled Molotov, Kaganovich and Malenkov from the Secretariat and ultimately from the Communist Party itself.
Khrushchev's attempts in reforming the Soviet industrial infrastructure led to his clashes with professionals in most branches of the Soviet economy. His reform of administrative organization created him more problems. In a politically motivated move to weaken the central state bureaucracy in 1957, Khrushchev replaced the industrial ministries in Moscow with regional Councils of People's Economy, sovnarkhozes, causing himself many new enemies among the ranks in Soviet government.[23]
Eventually Khrushchev's power, although indisputable, was slowly eroding and never became comparable to that of Stalin's. Some of the new people who came into the Soviet hierarchy, like Mikhail Gorbachev were younger, better educated and more independent thinkers.[24]
In 1956, Khrushchev introduced the concept of a minimum wage. The idea was met with much criticism with communist hardliners, they claimed that the minimum wage was so small, that most people were still underpaid in reality. The next step was a contemplated financial reform. However, Khrushchev stopped short of the real monetary reform, when he ordered to replace the old money with portraits of Stalin, and made a simple redenomination of the ruble 10:1 in 1961.
In 1961, Khrushchev finalized his battle against Stalin: the body of dictator was removed from the Lenin's Mausoleum on the Red Square and then buried outside the walls of the Kremlin.[1][9][13][23][25] The removal of Stalin's body out of the Lenin's Mausoleum was arguably among the most provocative moves made by Khrushchev during the Thaw. Stalin's body removal consolidated pro-Stalinists against Khrushchev[1][13], and alienated even his loyal apprentices, such as Leonid Brezhnev.
After 1953, Soviet society enjoyed a series of cultural and sports events and entertainment of unprecedented scale, such as the first Spartakiad, as well as several innovative film comedies, such as The Carnival Night, and several popular music festivals. Some classical musicians, filmmakers and ballet stars were allowed to make appearances outside the Soviet Union in order to better represent its culture and society to the world.[16]
In 1956, an agreement was achieved between the Soviet and US Governments to resume the publication and distribution in the Soviet Union of the US-produced magazine Amerika (magazine), and to launch its counterpart, the USSR magazine in the USA.[26]
In the summer of 1956, just a few months after Khrushchev's secret speech, Moscow became the center of the first Spartakiada of the Peoples of the USSR. The event was made pompous and loud in the Soviet style: Moscow hosted large sports teams and groups of fans in national costumes who came from all republics of the USSR. Khrushchev used the event to accentuate his new political and social goals, and to show himself as a new leader who was completely different from Stalin.[1][13]
In July 1957, the 6th World Festival of Youth and Students (Russian: Всемирный фестиваль молодёжи и студентов) was held in Moscow. This became possible after the bold political changes initiated by Nikita Khrushchev. It was the first World Festival of Youth and Students held in the Soviet Union, which was opening its doors for the first time to the world. The festival attracted 34 thousand people from 130 countries.[27]
In 1958, the first International Tchaikovsky Competition was held in Moscow. The winner was American pianist Van Cliburn, who gave sensational performances of Russian music. Khrushchev personally approved giving the top award to the American musician.[1]
Khrushchev's Thaw opened the Soviet society to a degree that allowed some foreign movies, books, art and music. Some previously banned writers and composers, such as Dmitri Shostakovich, Sergei Prokofiev, Anna Akhmatova, Mikhail Zoshchenko, among others, were brought back to public life, as the official Soviet censorship policies had changed. Books by some internationally recognised authors, such as Ernest Hemingway, were published in millions of copies to satisfy the interest of readers in the USSR.
In 1962, Khrushchev personally approved the publication of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's story One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, which became a sensation, and made history as the first uncensored publication about Stalin's Gulag labor camps.[1]
Despite the new freedoms in the Soviet Union, there was still a lot of persecution of religion that had temporarily halted during the war effort and the years after toward the end of Stalin's rule.
The death of Stalin in 1953 and the twentieth CPSU congress of February 1956 had a huge impact throughout Eastern Europe. Literary thaws actually preceded the congress in Hungary, Poland, Bulgaria, and the GDR and later burgeoned briefly in Czechoslovakia and Mao's China. With the exception of the arch Stalinist and anti-Titoist Albania, Romania was the only country where intellectuals avoided an open clash with the regime, influenced partly by the lack of any earlier revolt in post-war Romania that would have forced the regime to make concessions.[28]
In the West, Khrushchev's Thaw is known as a temporary thaw in the icy tension between the United States and the USSR during the Cold War. The tensions were able to thaw because of Khrushchev's de-Stalinization of the USSR and peaceful co-existence theory and also because of US President Eisenhower's cautious attitude and peace attempts. For example, both leaders attempted to achieve peace by attending the 1955 Geneva International Peace Summit and developing the Open Skies Policy and Quest for Arms Agreement. The leaders’ attitudes allowed them to, as Khrushchev put it, "break the ice."
Khrushchev's Thaw developed largely as a result of Khrushchev's theory of peaceful co-existence which believed the two superpowers (USA and USSR) and their ideologies could co-exist together, without war (peacefully). Khrushchev had created the theory of peaceful existence in an attempt to reduce hostility between the two superpowers. He tried to prove peaceful coexistence by attending international peace conferences, such as the Geneva Summit, and by traveling internationally, such as his trip to America’s Camp David in 1959.
This spirit of cooperation was severely damaged by the U-2 spy plane incident. The Soviet presentation of downed pilot Gary Powers at the May 1960 Paris Peace Summit and Eisenhower's refusal to apologize ended much of the progress of this era. Then Khrushchev approved the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961.
Further deterioration of the Thaw and decay of Khrushchev's international political standing happened during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962. At that time the Soviet and international media were making two completely opposite pictures of reality, while the world was at the brink of a Nuclear war. Although, direct communication between Khrushchev and the US president John Kennedy[29] helped to end the crisis, Khrushchev's political image, in the West, was damaged.
The "Khrushchev's Thaw" caused unprecedented social, cultural and economic transformations in the Soviet Union. The 60s generation actually started in the 1950s, with their uncensored poetry, songs and books publications.
The 6th World Festival of Youth and Students had opened many eyes and ears in the Soviet Union. Many new social trends stemmed from that festival. Many Russian women became involved in love affairs with men visiting from all over the world, what resulted in the so-called "inter-baby boom" in Moscow and Leningrad. The festival also brought new styles and fashions that caused further spread of youth subculture called "stilyagi". The festival also "revolutionized" the underground currency trade and boosted the black market, causing headaches for the Soviet KGB.
Emergence of such popular stars as Bulat Okudzhava, Edita Piekha, Evgeny Evtushenko, Bella Akhmadulina, and the superstar Vladimir Vysotsky had changed the popular culture forever in the USSR. Their poetry and songs liberated the public consciousness of the Soviet people and pushed guitars and tape recorders to masses, so the Soviet people became exposed to independent channels of information and public mentality was eventually updated in many ways.
Khrushchev finally liberated millions of peasants; by his order the Soviet government gave them identifications, passports, and thus allowed them to move out of poor villages to big cities. Massive housing construction, known as khrushchevkas, were undertaken during the 1950s and 1960s. Millions of cheap and basic residential blocks of low-end flats were built all over the Soviet Union to accommodate the largest migration ever in the Soviet history, when masses of landless peasants moved to Soviet cities. The move caused a dramatic change of the demographic picture in the USSR, and eventually finalized the decay of peasantry in Russia.
Economic reforms were contemplated by Alexei Kosygin, who was chairman of the USSR State Planning Committee in 1959 and then a full member of the Presidium (also known as Politburo after 1966) in 1960.[16]
On July 31, 1957, the Communist party decreed to increase housing construction and Khrushchev launched plans for building private apartments that differed from the old, communal apartments that exemplified the Leninist and Stalinist ideology that had hitherto governed the Soviet Union. Khrushchev stated that it was important “not only to provide people with good homes, but also to teach them…to live correctly.” He saw a high living standard as a precondition leading the path on the transition to full communism and believed that private apartments could achieve this.[30] Although the Thaw marked a time of openness and liberalization primarily located in the public sphere, the emergence of private housing allowed for a new formulation of a private sphere in Soviet life.[31] This resulted in a changing ideology that needed to make room for women, who were traditionally associated with the home, and consumption of goods in order to create a well-ordered “Soviet” home.
Khrushchev’s policies showed an interest in rebuilding the home and the family after the devastation of World War II. Soviet rhetoric exemplified a shift in emphasis from heavy industry to the importance of consumer goods and housing.[32] The Seven-Year Plan was launched in 1958 and promised to build 12 million city apartments and 7 million rural houses.[33] Alongside the increased number of private apartments was the emergence of changing attitudes toward the family. The prior Soviet ideology disdained conceptions of the traditional family, especially under Stalin, who created the vision of a large, collective family under his paternal leadership. The new emphasis on private housing created hope that the Thaw-era private realm would provide an escape from the intensities of public life and the eye of the government.[34] Indeed, Khrushchev introduced the ideology that private life was valued and was ultimately a goal of social development.[35] The new political rhetoric regarding the family reintroduced the concept of the nuclear family, and, in doing so, cemented the idea that the woman were responsible for the domestic realm and running the home.
Recognizing the necessity of rebuilding the family in the postwar years, Khrushchev enacted policies that attempted to reestablish a more conventional domestic realm, moving away from the policies of his predecessors, and most of these were aimed at women.[36] Despite being an active part of the workforce, women’s conditions were considered by the western, capitalist world to exemplify the “backwardness” of the Soviet Union. This concept goes back to traditional Marxism, which found the roots of woman’s inherent backwardness in fact that she was confined to the home; Lenin spoke of woman as a “domestic slave” who would remain in confinement as long as housework remained an activity for individuals inside the home. The prior abolition of private homes and the individual kitchen attempted to move away from the domestic regime that imprisoned women. Instead, the government tried to implement public dining, socialized housework, and collective childcare. These programs that fulfilled the original tenets of Marxism were widely resisted by women.[37]
In March 1958, Khrushchev admitted to the Supreme Soviet his embarrassment about the public perception of Soviet women as unhappily relegated to the ranks of a manual laborer.[38] The new private housing provided individual kitchens for many families for the first time. The new technologies of the kitchen came to be associated with the projects of modernization in the era of the Cold War’s “peaceful competition.” In this time, the primary competition between the U.S. and the Soviet Union was the battle of providing the better quality of life.[39] In 1959, at the American National Exhibition in Moscow, U.S. Vice-President Richard Nixon declared the superiority of the capitalist system while standing in front of an example of a modern American kitchen. Known as the “Kitchen Debate,” the exchange between Nixon and Khrushchev foreshadowed Khrushchev’s increased attention to the needs of women, especially by creating modern kitchens. While affirming his dedication to increasing the living standard, Khrushchev associated the transition to communism with abundance and prosperity.[40]
The Third Party Programme of 1961, the defining document of Khrushchev’s policies, related social progress with technological progress, especially technological progress inside the home. Khrushchev spoke of a commitment to increasing production of consumer goods, specifically household goods and appliances that would decrease the intensity of housework. The kitchen was defined as a “workshop” that relied on the “correct organization of labour” to be most efficient. Creating what were perceived to be the best conditions for the woman’s work in the kitchen was an attempt on the part of the government to ensure that the Soviet woman would be able to continue her labor inside and outside of the home. Despite the increasing demands of housework, women were expected to maintain jobs outside the home in order to sustain the national economy as well as fulfill the ideals of a Soviet well-rounded individual.[41]
During this time, women were flooded with pamphlets and magazines teeming with advice on how best to run a household. This literature emphasized the virtues of simplicity and efficiency.[42] Additionally, furniture was designed to suit the average height of Moscow women, emphasizing a modern, simple style that allowed for efficient mass production. However, in the newly built apartments of the Khrushchev era, the individual kitchens were rarely up to the standards invoked by the government’s rhetoric. Providing fully fitted kitchens were too expensive and time-consuming to be realized in the mass housing project.[43]
The streamlined, simple design and aesthetic of the kitchen was promoted throughout the rest of the home.[44] Prior to this time, Stalinist culture emphasized women as being responsible for the home, often characterizing them as collecting material possessions to maintain a cozy atmosphere. However, this was perceived to be cluttered and petit-bourgeois once Khrushchev came to power.[45] Khrushchev denounced the ornate style of high Stalinism for its wastefulness.[46] The arrangement of the home during the Thaw emphasized that which was simple and functional, for those items could be easily mass-produced. Khrushchev promoted a culture of increased consumption and publicly announced that the per capita consumption of the Soviet Union would exceed that of the United States. However, consumption consisted of modern goods that lacked decorative qualities and were often poor quality, which spoke to the society’s emphasis on production rather than consumption.[47]
Both the cultural and the political thaws were effectively ended with the removal of Khrushchev as Soviet leader in October 1964, and the installment of Leonid Brezhnev as General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1964. When Khrushchev was dismissed, Alexei Kosygin took over Khrushchev's position as Soviet Premier,[16] but Kosygin's reforms was not successful and conservative communists led by Brezhnev blocked any motions for reforms after Kosygin's failed attempt.
Brezhnev begun his career as the General Secretary with the Sinyavsky-Daniel trial in 1965[16], which showed the establishment of an authoritarian ideology. After that, Brezhnev approved the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968 (Prague Spring) and ended with the Soviet war in Afghanistan which continued after his death; he installed an authoritarian regime that lasted throughout his life and the lives of his two successors, Yuri Andropov and Konstantin Chernenko.[16]
Many historians compare the Khrushchev's Thaw and his massive efforts to change the Soviet society and move away from its past, with the Gorbachev's perestroika[16] and glasnost during the 1980s. Although they led the Soviet Union in different eras, both Khrushchev and Gorbachev had initiated dramatic reforms. Both efforts lasted only a few years, and both efforts were supported by the people, while being opposed by the hard-liners. Both leaders were dismissed, albeit with completely different results for their country.
Mikhail Gorbachev has been calling Khrushchev's achievements remarkable, he praised Khrushchev's 1956 speech, but stated that Khrushchev did not succeed in his reforms.[24]
| Preceded by Stalin era |
History of Russia History of the Soviet Union 5 March 1953 – 14 October 1964 |
Succeeded by Era of Stagnation |