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The Palace of the Republic (Palast der Republik) in Berlin

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Nikita Khrushchev at the UNGA, 1962.

Khrushchev, Nikita Sergeevich

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End of the Cold War

Soviet Foreign Policy

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Semenov, V. S.

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Grechko, Andrei Antonovich

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Mikhail Gorbachev, 1986

Gorbachev, Mikhail Sergeevich

1931- 2022

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Mitrokhin, Vasili

1922- 2004

Mitrokhin Archive

Andrei Gromyko at the UN, 1981

Gromyko, Andrei Andreevich

1909- 1989

Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)

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May 25, 1988	Military Exercise Shchit-88 Operational Summary No. 1 for the period 0800 25 May to 0800 2 June 1988 This document describes Warsaw Pact military exercises conducted between 25 May and 2 June 1988. Summarized in detail, the comprehensive exercise brought all facets of the combined forces to "wartime strength" in response to a theoretical threat posed by NATO.
June 5, 1956	Memorandum of Conversation with Pak Ui-wan Ambassador Ianov discusses with Vice Premier and Minister of Light Industry Pak Ui-wan on his hope that Kim Il Sung's trip to the GDR would bring changes in North Korean economic policy.
June 2, 1953	USSR Council of Ministers Order, 'On Measures to Improve the Health of the Political Situation in the GDR' Council of Ministers of the USSR Order to improve the political and economic situation in GDR
June 17, 1953	Report from A. Grechko and Tarasov in Berlin to N.A. Bulganin, 11:00 p.m. The demonstrations in Berlin and several other cities had been stopped. Grechko and Tarasow came to the conclusion that "the provocation was prepared in advance, organized, and directed from Western sectors of Berlin." The losses of the strikers in the whole territory of the GDR had been: 84 people killed and wounded, 700 men arrested.
June 18, 1953	Report from A. Grechko and Tarasov to N.A. Bulganin, 2:30 p.m. The authors state that Berlin was calm, but there were a few demonstrations in some smaller GDR cities. The authors referred to military intelligence information according to which the US 7th Army and the 12th Air Force Army were put on alert in the US zone at 5.30 a.m. on June 18. But the alert state for the 7th Army was canceled after three hours.
June 2007	On Human Rights. Folder 51. The Chekist Anthology. Outlines the KGB’s response to the USSR’s signing of the Helsinki Accords in 1975. The accords obligated signatories to respect their citizens’ human rights. This gave Soviet dissidents and westerners leverage in demanding that the USSR end persecution on the basis of religious or political beliefs. Some of the KGB’s active measures included the establishment of a charitable fund dedicated to helping victims of imperialism and capitalism, and the fabrication of a letter from a Ukrainian group to FRG President Walter Scheel describing human rights violations in West Germany. The document also mentions that the Soviet Ministry of Defense obtained an outline of the various European powers’ positions on human rights issues as presented at the March 1977 meeting of the European Economic Community in London from the Italian Foreign Ministry. The KGB also initiated Operation “Raskol” [“Schism”], which ran between 1977 and 1980. This operation included active measures to discredit Soviet dissidents Andrei Sakharov, Yelena Bonner, and Alexander Solzhenitsyn, measures designed to drive a wedge between the US and its democratic allies, and measures intended to convince the US government that continued support for the dissident movement did nothing to harm the position of the USSR.
July 1, 1953	Telephonogram from Miroshnichenko and Lunkov to Semenov, [early July 1953] On 17 June, the Soviet military had stopped all cross-sector travel, causing widespread resentment among many East Germans who worked in the Western sectors or crossed them on their way to work. Under pressure from the East German population in the days following the uprising, SED leaders and local Soviet High Commission officials urged Semenov, then in Moscow for the Extraordinary CPSU Plenum, to normalize the traffic situation in Berlin. Semenov, following Molotov’s orders, informed Ulbricht that the question of free movement across the sector border “must be decided by the [German] comrades themselves, taking the situation into account.” On 7 July, tram and metro traffic between the sectors in Berlin was restored.
July 4, 1953	Telephonogram from Miroshnichenko and Lun’kov to Soviet High Commissioner V. Semyonov Regarding Inter-zone Travel Telegram describing discontent of the German population living in East Berlin at the disruption caused by the restrictions imposed on intra-zones travel as a result of the events of 17 June 1953. The telegram recommends actions to be taken to improve the movement of people across the Berlin border.
September 25, 1953	Draft Instructions to Chuikov and Semyonov In March 1953, Moscow had declined Ulbricht’s request for tightening up the sector border in Berlin, then the major loophole in the SED leadership’s efforts to seal off East Germany. In the aftermath of the demonstrations and unrest in Berlin, the SED leadership apparently tried to reintroduce the idea of increased “border security” in Berlin. Eager to salvage whatever was left of its political position as a champion of German unity, Moscow again held such measures as politically “disadvantageous” and “unacceptable.” Certainly, the Kremlin was also aware of the continued widespread resentment among the Berlin and GDR population which made any more restrictive measures a risky undertaking. Instead, the Soviets urged the SED to increase its “fight against hostile elements” in West Berlin—an issue that would become more and more the focus of Soviet attitude on Berlin.
June 18, 1953	Report from A. Grechko and Tarasov to N.A. Bulganin, 8:00 a.m Soviet General, Tarasov, reports on the situation in the GDR and in the city of Berlin on the morning of 18 June, 1953. He primarily discusses the location and movements of sectors of the Soviet Occupation Forces in Germany.