Vadim Bakatin

Vadim Bakatin
Вадим Бакатин
Chairman of the Inter-republican Security Service of the Soviet Union
In office
23 August 1991  15 January 1992
Premier Ivan Silayev
Preceded by Leonid Shebarshin
Succeeded by Post abolished
Minister of Interior of the Soviet Union
In office
20 October 1988  1 December 1990
Premier Nikolai Ryzhkov
Preceded by Alexander Vlasov
Succeeded by Boris Pugo
Personal details
Born 6 November 1937
Kiselyovsk, Kemerovo Oblast, Soviet Union
Nationality Soviet/Russian
Political party Communist Party of the Soviet Union

Vadim Viktorovich Bakatin (Russian: Вадим Викторович Бакатин) (born 6 November 1937) is a former Soviet politician who served as the last chairman of the KGB in 1991. He is the last surviving former chairman of this organization. He was appointed to dismantle the KGB, but he was unable to control this organization and to fulfill the task.[1]

Early life and education

Bakatin was born in Kiselyovsk, Kemerovo Oblast in 1937.[2] He is a graduate of the Novosibirsk Civil Engineering Institute and the Academy of Social Sciences under the CPSU Central Committee.[2]

Career

From 1960 to 1971 Bakatin was supervisor, chief engineer, director of construction works. From 1964 to 1991 he was the member of the CPSU. From 1986 to 1990 he served as the member of CPSU Central Committee. Bakatin was appointed minister of internal affairs in 1988, replacing Alexander Vlasov.[3] Bakatin's tenure lasted until 1990. In 1991, he was made the head of KGB. From 1991 to 1992 he served as head of the Interrepublican Security Service. In 1992, he was appointed vice-president and director of department of political and international relations of the international "Reforma" fund.

In 1991 Bakatin, as a Chief of KGB revealed to the US ambassador, Robert Schwarz Strauss, the methods that had been used to install covert listening devices in the building that had been intended to replace Spaso House as the American embassy in Moscow. Strauss reported that this revelation was made out of a sense of cooperation and goodwill, with "no strings attached". Bakatin's action was met with harsh criticism, including allegations of treason, and his position was eliminated following the collapse of the Soviet Union, when Boris Yeltsin merged the KGB with other government agencies.[4]

Quotes

The traditions of chekism must be eradicated, must cease to exist as an ideology.[5]

References

  1. Yevgenia Albats and Catherine A. Fitzpatrick. The State Within a State: The KGB and Its Hold on Russia--Past, Present, and Future. 1994. ISBN 0-374-52738-5
  2. 2.0 2.1 "Soviet Union: Political Affairs". JPRS. 12 December 1989. Retrieved 30 March 2013.
  3. Starov, Vadim. "MDV. The Ministry of Internal Affairs". Systema Spetnaz. Retrieved 31 March 2013.
  4. Martin Ebon (1994). KGB: Death and Rebirth. Praeger Publishers. pp. 58–65. ISBN 978-0-275-94633-3.
  5. J. Michael Waller Secret Empire: The KGB in Russia Today., Westview Press. Boulder, CO., 1994., ISBN 0-8133-2323-1

External links

Government offices
Preceded by
Leonid Shebarshin
Head of Soviet Committee of State Security
1991
Succeeded by
office disestablished