On February 25, 1956, on the last day of the 20th Congress of the CPSU, the First Secretary of the Central Committee Nikita Khrushchev made a speech at a closed meeting "On the cult of the individual and its consequences."

He condemned the activities of Joseph Stalin, who died in 1953, and called for the struggle "against the arbitrariness of those who abuse power."

Nikita Khrushchev and the XX Congress of the CPSU

The report delivered by Khrushchev at the XX Congress of the CPSU completely contradicted what the future First Secretary of the Central Committee did and said for decades.

In the mid-1920s, he was closely engaged in party work in the Donbass, in 1929 he entered the Industrial Academy in Moscow and in 1934 took the post of 1st secretary of the Moscow City Committee of the CPSU (b), becoming a member of the Central Committee.

Four years later, Khrushchev became the 1st secretary of the Central Committee of the CP (b) of Ukraine.

During the Great Patriotic War, he served as the 1st secretary of the Kiev regional committee and the city party committee, and since 1944 he headed the Council of People's Commissars of the Ukrainian SSR.

After the war, Khrushchev returned to Moscow, simultaneously heading the capital city committee and the regional party committee, as well as taking the post of secretary of the Central Committee.

According to historians, during the life of Joseph Stalin, Khrushchev enjoyed his full confidence and, in turn, showed devotion and loyalty to the Soviet leader.

However, after Stalin's death, it was Khrushchev, who entered the struggle for power, who initiated the reprisal against members of the Stalinist team.

So, with his submission, Lavrenty Beria was arrested and executed, Georgy Malenkov was removed from the post of chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers. 

In 1953, Khrushchev took over as 1st secretary of the CPSU Central Committee.

After gaining power, he began to place his supporters in key positions in government bodies.

At the same time, as experts note, part of the party leadership reacted negatively to Khrushchev's activities, not considering the decisions he made to be correct.

An important aspect of the change in the internal policy of the state was the reduction in the number of persons convicted under "counter-revolutionary" articles in places of deprivation of liberty.

A few months after Stalin's death, the Special Meeting of the NKVD, a body endowed with broad extrajudicial powers, including the right to make decisions on execution, was liquidated.

After that, large-scale reforms of the correctional system began.

According to historians, in two years the number of prisoners has decreased several times.

On February 14, 1956, less than three years after Nikita Khrushchev came to power, the XX Congress of the CPSU Central Committee opened in Moscow.

He gathered in the Grand Kremlin Palace about one and a half thousand delegates, as well as representatives of 55 communist and workers' parties from various countries of the world.

“For the most part it was a regular convention.

It solved many problems associated with the economic development of the USSR, with the acceleration of the development of industry and agriculture.

It was decided to stop the construction of steam locomotives and switch to more modern locomotives, "Mikhail Myagkov, scientific director of the Russian Military Historical Society, told RT.

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The agenda of the congress included the reports of the Central Committee and the Central Auditing Commission of the CPSU, a report on the sixth "five-year plan" for the development of the national economy and elections to the central bodies of the party.

But besides this, the congress participants had to listen to an important report from Nikita Khrushchev himself - about the personality cult of Stalin.

The Presidium of the Central Committee, even before the start of the congress, made a decision to provide the first secretary of the Central Committee with an appropriate opportunity.

Personality Cult Report

Nikita Khrushchev made a report on the personality cult at a closed meeting on the last day of the congress - February 25, 1956.

At the same time, the first secretary of the Central Committee used materials collected by a special commission in late 1955 - early 1956 on the mass repressions in the USSR in the 1930-1950s.

“The exact text of Khrushchev’s report is not known for certain.

During the preparation, he underwent edits, and during the speech itself, according to eyewitnesses, Khrushchev broke away from the prepared text and indulged in lengthy arguments.

Today there are several different versions of the report.

And which of them corresponds to reality, it is impossible to say, "- said the advisor to the rector of the Moscow State Pedagogical University Evgeny Spitsyn.

Khrushchev subjected Stalin's activities to many-sided criticism - both in private matters and in assessing his policy as a whole.

He recalled the statements of Vladimir Lenin about the concentration of "immense power" in Stalin's hands, Stalin's rudeness when communicating with Nadezhda Krupskaya, and then moved on to the topic of mass repressions.

Khrushchev accused the former leader of the USSR of both illegal persecution of party members and excessive cruelty to those who were previously opponents of the Soviets.

Reading out the report, Khrushchev gave the specific names of the repressed party functionaries, who, in his opinion, could not have anything to do with what they were accused of.

The massive repression, he said, caused enormous damage to the country.

In addition to repressions, Khrushchev paid considerable attention to criticizing Stalin's work during the Great Patriotic War.

He accused his former leader of ignoring intelligence information about the approaching German attack, of incompetence, of exaggerating his own merits, and of deporting entire nations.

Khrushchev called Stalin's book, Brief Biography, an expression of "the most unbridled flattery" and an example of "the deification of man."

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Summing up the results of his speech, Khrushchev urged those present to "forever debunk the personality cult" and "completely restore the Leninist principles of Soviet socialist democracy", correcting violations of "socialist legality."

Historians today assess Khrushchev's statements at the XX Congress ambiguously.

“In his report, Khrushchev admitted distortions of the truth.

For example, he claimed that Stalin controlled the hostilities on a globe, which was clearly not true, "Mikhail Myagkov shared with RT.

According to the historian and writer Alexander Shirokorad, speaking about the personality cult, Khrushchev tried to achieve full power in the country and eliminate opponents in the party leadership.

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“Khrushchev needed success, but he could not achieve sufficient economic success.

Therefore, he needed something spectacular and bright.

Exposing the cult of personality, he hoped to achieve popularity inside and outside the country, ”the expert noted.

According to Yevgeny Spitsyn, criticizing Stalin, Khrushchev pursued personal goals.

“Khrushchev needed to discredit the Stalinist course in order to perch on the ruins of this course and become a leader, not hesitating to use false facts.

At the same time, Khrushchev himself was one of Stalin's most bloodthirsty associates.

He was involved in mass repressions both in Ukraine and in Moscow - he personally initiated them, ”the historian emphasized.

The delegates of the XX Congress adopted a resolution on the approval of Khrushchev's report.

Its text was sent for familiarization to the party organizations of the CPSU and to foreign communist parties, but it was not published in the open press until 1989.

But one of its copies, presumably through the Polish communists, got to the West and was published in English.

In June 1956, a resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU "On overcoming the personality cult and its consequences" appeared, in which the theses expressed by Khrushchev were presented in a softer form.

According to the associate professor of the Faculty of History, Moscow State University.

M.V.

Lomonosov Yuri Shchetinov, Khrushchev's report changed the life of Soviet citizens.

“The thaw that began after the 20th Congress had a beneficial effect on the life of society after the frozen Stalinist state.

The consequences of the congress are a breath of freedom, an impetus to the development of democratic moments in society.

However, this movement turned out to be inconsistent: one step forward - two steps back.

There was a desire to build a just society, but it was cut short over time, ”Shchetinov said.

In turn, Alexander Shirokorad noted that Khrushchev's report had both positive and negative consequences.

“After the XX Congress, for example, art got the opportunity to develop more freely.

But the evolution of society from totalitarian to freer could have been done in other ways - as in China or Spain, for example.

In the PRC, it was announced that Mao was wrong by 30%, and 70% was right.

At the same time, Mao's authority as the creator of the PRC is indisputable.

You can criticize some of his actions, but not himself.

Khrushchev's speech dealt a serious blow to the mentality and ideology of Soviet citizens.

According to Khrushchev, the war was generally won in spite of Stalin.

All this led to confusion in the minds of ordinary citizens and to the irritation of ideological communists.

As a result, the XX Congress was the beginning of the end of socialism, ”the historian said.

According to Mikhail Myagkov, the results of the XX Congress for the USSR were epoch-making.

“Renaming of streets began, monuments were demolished.

Unrest against de-Stalinization broke out in Georgia and other regions.

Society was divided, a split occurred.

On the one hand, there were people who warmly supported the report, on the other, those who believed that Stalin did a lot for the country and did not deserve such derogatory criticism.

In addition, as a result of de-Stalinization, an uprising began in Hungary, splits in the communist parties around the world, deterioration of relations with a number of communist states.

As Vyacheslav Molotov said, if before the XX Congress half of humanity clearly supported the policy of the USSR, then after the Congress this could not be said.

At the same time, in the Union itself, Khrushchev emerged victorious from the confrontation with the anti-party group, and the consequences of the congress were felt for many years, "Myagkov summed up.