Foreign department (5th department of the NKVD of the USSR). "black myth" about security officers: NKVD troops in the Great Patriotic War - What enterprises
To better understand that historical period, let us point out its main problem - the terrible shortage of housing in the cities. In the 1920s and early 1930s, millions of peasants poured into the cities. There was almost no housing construction during these years. As a result, in new industrial centers like Magnitogorsk, there was an average of 4-5 square meters per person. m per person, in large cities (like Gorky) - 6-7 sq. m, in Moscow and Leningrad - 7-8 sq. m. m.
Most of the townspeople huddled in communal apartments, barracks, basements and utility rooms. Individual apartments were a luxury, and the remnants of the tsarist middle class (intelligentsia), or the new middle class - Soviet managers, nomenklatura and red intelligentsia, continued to live in them. Under these conditions, denunciation of a neighbor was one of the ways to improve living conditions - to take his room in a communal apartment. Those who had administrative resources had the opportunity, using Article 58, to move into the elite (by those standards) housing of the repressed - separate apartments and houses.
The NKVD officers used this administrative resource especially zealously (prosecutors and judges less zealously). The stories of those years show how the real estate market of large cities was redistributed. At the same time, we must not forget that these stories became public thanks to the “Beria purges” of the NKVD, carried out by him from the end of 1938 to 1941. The security officers who worked during the “Great Terror” in 1936-1938 were accused, among other things, of theft, fraud, and abuse of office.
Here are a few episodes about the activities of NKVD workers in the Kuntsevo district of Moscow.
“The size of the living space and the number of people living on it were carefully recorded in the arrest and search protocol. If only the arrested person was registered there, the rooms were sealed and transferred to the balance of the Administrative and Economic Department of the NKVD, and then distributed among the department's employees in need. If family members lived in the apartment, it remained at their disposal. However, there were no rules without exceptions, and the latter included the so-called “elite housing”.
The investigative files of 1937-1938 contain materials that reveal the mechanism of apartment “self-supply”. During a search of Muralov’s apartment, located in Petrovsky Lane, an employee of the Kuntsevo regional department of the NKVD Karetnikov sealed two of the three rooms and warned the household that they should expect a “compaction.”
After Muralov was convicted, his wife in the summer of 1939 tried to regain her living space. In vain: after a couple of weeks, an NKVD officer was already moving into the sealed rooms.
After being transferred to Kuntsevo, Kuznetsov received a three-room apartment in the center of Moscow, on Gogolevsky Boulevard. Kuznetsov moved into the apartment of the Korean San-Tagi Kim. The latter worked in 1919 in the Moscow City Council, later traveled to his homeland on assignments from the Comintern, and on the eve of his arrest he worked as a deputy shop manager at the Odintsovo brick factory, located in the Kuntsevo district.
///At the end of March 1938, Karetnikov conducted an investigation against a large group of employees of the Kuntsevo plant No. 46. During the arrest of V.P. Kuborsky, the former head of the plant’s supply department, he drew attention to a three-room apartment in the center of Moscow, in Bolshoi Vlasyevsky Lane, where the arrested man My wife and I occupied two rooms. Karetnikov himself only received a room in Moscow in January 1938, but clearly did not intend to stop there. It soon became clear that there was also a tenant registered in the desired living space.
“Karetnikov, using physical coercion, obtained testimony from Kuborsky that, allegedly, Litvak Yakov Grigorievich, who remained living in Kuborsky’s apartment, is a member of a criminal espionage and sabotage organization. Not having the right to sign arrest warrants, as an investigator, Karetnikov on March 22, 1938 signed an arrest warrant for Y. G. Litvak. Having arrested Litvak, who was Jewish, Karetnikov instructed Petushkov, an employee of the regional department of the NKVD, to show Litvak in the investigative case as a Pole. Petushkov carried out Karetnikov’s instructions by criminally falsifying documents - he entered “Pole” instead of “Jew” in the arrestee’s questionnaire, and also left an empty space in the interrogation protocol and, after Mr. Litvak signed the page, added the word “Pole.”
Considering the fact that after the arrest of Kuborsky and Litvak, Kuborsky’s wife, Maria Alekseevna Kuborskaya, remained living in the apartment, Karetnikov entered into a deal with the accused Kuborsky, asking to exchange his room with his wife. Having received Kuborsky’s consent to exchange his apartment for the Kuborsky apartment, Karetnikov illegally allowed a meeting with M.A. Kuborskaya. with her husband, the accused Kuborsky. Further, having decided not to exchange his room for the Kuborskys’ apartment, Karetnikov, through Petushkov, obtained testimony from Litvak and other accused that Maria Kuborskaya was also a spy and on March 29, 1938, she was also arrested.
Wanting to cover up the traces of the crime and present Kuborskaya in the most negative form, Petushkov, who led the investigation, according to Karetnikov’s instructions, forged a document - in the arrestee’s questionnaire, after the arrestee’s signature, he added the inscription “father is a large landowner,” while Kuborskaya testified that her father was a tradesman. After Kuborskaya’s arrest, Karetnikov, having received a note from the former deputy. the head of the NKVD Department of the Moscow Region Yakubovich to obtain a warrant, moved into the Kuborskys’ apartment, exchanged his own room with citizen Zaitsev, who lived across the corridor from the Kuborskys, and now occupies a separate apartment of 3 rooms. Using his official position, Karetnikov renovated the entire apartment at the expense of plant No. 95.”
The same processes took place in the regions. In Teplyakov’s book “Machine of Terror. OGPU-NKVD of Siberia in 1929-1941" tells about the "everyday life" of the NKVD officers in Siberia.
A very common occurrence was the distribution among security officers of valuable items: watches, guns, bicycles, gramophones, seized as evidence.
The apogee of profit was the time of the “Great Terror”. The security officers occupied the houses and apartments of those arrested, stealing furnishings and valuables, even savings books. The traces of the theft were covered up: for example, during the period of rehabilitation it turned out to be impossible to find out the fate of the money confiscated from those arrested, since documents on cash transactions during the “Great Terror” at the NKVD NSO were destroyed.
In 1937-1938 in Barnaul, “beginning. department P.R. Perminov was the head. housing department, and the head of the SPO department K.D. Kostromin - housing department agent. They had a large bunch of keys and allocated apartments. From behind-the-scenes conversations one could understand that the grounds for the arrest were decent houses.
The head of the Special Department of the Siberian Military District then drove around in a GAZ-A car, confiscated from an employee of the Siberian Military District Air Force headquarters M.A. Zubov in 1937.
The rich property of the head of Zapsibkraizdrav M.G. Trakman, confiscated without an inventory, completely disappeared, later valued by his daughter at 100 thousand rubles, about the confiscation of which there were subsequently no documents. Many security officers enriched themselves by buying up cheaply or simply appropriating the things of those arrested and especially executed.
They also did not disdain transfers for prisoners: cash transfers for the Novosibirsk region. Prosecutor I. Barkov (and after his suicide) was appropriated by P.I. Sych, who was leading the investigation in his case. Assistant to the head of the SPO UNKVD NSO M.I. Dluzhinsky stole several savings books of those arrested and many bonds; For the theft of valuable things of those arrested for 50 thousand rubles in April 1938, the head of the KRO department of the NKVD NSO, G.I. Beiman, was sentenced to death.
In 1939, the former head of the special inspection of the Novosibirsk regional police, I. G. Chukanov, testified that the head of the NKVD department, I. a. Maltsev “encouraged looting, he did not take any measures against those who removed valuables from those arrested and sentenced to military punishment.” During the repressions, a large number of cultural valuables disappeared. It is known that manuscripts, rare books and icons disappeared after the arrest of the poet N.A. Klyuev, books, letters and autographs from the collections of Novosibirsk writers G.A. Vyatkin, V.D. Veshan, V. Itin (at the time of Veshan’s arrest, he kept Lenin's note was personally burned by the head of the SPO UNKVD ZSK I.A. Zhabrev).
A large library of 256 titles (including books with autographs of the authors), as well as letters from Maxim Gorky, Alexander Blok, Romain Rolland were confiscated from the writer G.A. Vyatkin and disappeared without a trace. Prominent employees of the NKVD in the Altai Territory G.L. Birimbaum, F. Kryukov, M.I. Danilov and V.F. Leshin distinguished themselves in looting. However, the heads of the NKVD department actually sanctioned the crimes of the last two, citing the fact that “Danilov and Leshin are doing a lot of work to carry out sentences.”
Many of the things arrested were appropriated by the head of the Tomsk GO NKVD I.V. Ovchinnikov, as well as employees of the Yamalo-Nenets regional department of the NKVD in the Omsk region. In 1939, N.A. Beloborodov, assistant to the head of the Kemerovo City Department of the NKVD, received 2 years in prison for undocumented spending of 15 thousand rubles confiscated from those arrested for the needs of the city department.
The head of the Nerchinsk RO UNKVD in the Chita region, M.I. Bogdanov, was expelled from the party in the spring of 1939 and then sentenced to 8 years for violating the law, “embezzlement of things confiscated from those arrested, for organizing collective drunkenness with money confiscated from those arrested.” The head of the NKVD for Dalstroy, V.M. Speransky, was charged with spending 80 thousand rubles, confiscated from those arrested and executed, among various criminal charges.
Soviet intelligence officers were involved in drug trafficking abroad. In 1939, INO resident Ya.G. Gorsky was accused of having, while working for the NKVD in Mongolia, established close relations with trade representative A.I. Birkenhof (who was shot in 1936), bought opium from him and speculated on it.
Gorsky was not the only intelligence officer to whom such claims were made. Thus, in the investigative file of Beria, the reasons for the secret liquidation of the plenipotentiary representative in China and at the same time resident of the INO NKVD I.T. Luganets-Orelsky, who was killed on July 8, 1939 in Georgia, were mentioned. In the case it was said that the plenipotentiary intelligence officer allegedly controlled drug trafficking, and he was eliminated secretly so as not to “scare off” his accomplices.” Perhaps the opium trade was a form of financing the KGB stations.”
The tradition of KGB raiding has survived to this day. Only now members of the protective-punitive class are “squeezing out” not only books and apartments, but also factories and oil companies.
Also in the Interpreter’s Blog about the NKVD.
One of the most famous “black myths” of the Great Patriotic War is the tale of the “bloody” security officers (special officers, NKVD, Smershev). They are held in special esteem by filmmakers. Few people have been subjected to such widespread criticism and humiliation as the security officers. The bulk of the population receives information about them only through “pop culture,” works of art, and primarily through cinema. Few films “about war” are complete without the image of a cowardly and cruel special security officer knocking out the teeth of honest officers (Red Army soldiers).
This is practically a mandatory part of the program - to show some scoundrel from the NKVD who sits out in the rear (guarding prisoners - all innocently convicted) and in a barrage detachment, shooting unarmed with machine guns and machine guns (or with “one rifle for three” Red Army soldiers). Here are just a few of these “masterpieces”: “Penal Battalion”, “Saboteur”, “Moscow Saga”, “Children of the Arbat”, “Cadets”, “Bless the Woman”, etc., their number increases every year. Moreover, these films are shown at the best time, they gather a significant audience. This is generally a feature of Russian TV - at the best time they show dregs and even outright abomination, and broadcast analytical programs and documentaries that carry information for the mind at night, when the majority of the working people are sleeping. Practically the only normal film about the role of “Smersh” in the war is Mikhail Ptashuk’s film “In August 44th...”, based on the novel by Vladimir Bogomolov “The Moment of Truth (In August 44th)”.
What do security officers usually do in movies? In fact, they prevent normal officers and soldiers from fighting! As a result of watching such films, the younger generation, which does not read books (especially of a scientific nature), gets the feeling that the people (the army) won in spite of the country’s top leadership and the “punitive” authorities. Look, if the representatives of the NKVD and SMERSH had not gotten in the way, we could have won earlier. In addition, the “bloody security officers” in 1937-1939. destroyed the “flower of the army” led by Tukhachevsky. Don’t feed the Chekist bread - let him shoot someone under a flimsy pretext. At the same time, as a rule, the standard special officer is a sadist, a complete bastard, a drunkard, a coward, etc. Another favorite move of filmmakers is to show the security officer in contrast. To do this, the film introduces the image of a valiantly fighting commander (soldier), who is hindered in every possible way by a representative of the NKVD. Often this hero is from among previously convicted officers, or even “political” ones. It is difficult to imagine such an attitude towards tank crews or pilots. Although fighters and commanders of the NKVD, military counterintelligence are a military craft, without which not a single army in the world can do. It is obvious that the ratio of “scoundrels” and ordinary, normal people in these structures is at least no less than in tank, infantry, artillery and other units. And it is possible that it is even better, since the selection is more strict.
A collective photo of active saboteur fighters of the 88th fighter battalion of the UNKVD of the city of Moscow and the Moscow region - a special school for demolition workers of the UNKVD of the city of Moscow and the Moscow region. In the fall of 1943, they were all transferred to the special company of the NKVD Troops Directorate for protecting the rear of the Western Front, and on March 6, 1944, most of them joined the ranks of secret employees of the Intelligence Department of the headquarters of the Western (from April 24, 1944 - 3rd Belorussian) Front. Many did not return from the front-line business trip to East Prussia.
Defenders of the armed forces
In war conditions, information takes on special importance. The more you know about the enemy and the less he knows about your armed forces, economy, population, science and technology, depends on whether you win or lose. Counterintelligence is responsible for protecting information. It happens that a single enemy scout or saboteur can cause much more damage than an entire division or army. Just one enemy agent missed by counterintelligence can render the work of a significant number of people meaningless and lead to enormous human and material losses.
If the army protects the people and the country, then counterintelligence protects the army itself and the rear. Moreover, it not only protects the army from enemy agents, but also maintains its combat effectiveness. Unfortunately, there is no escape from the fact that there are weak people, morally unstable, this leads to desertion, betrayal, and panic. These phenomena are especially evident in critical conditions. Someone must carry out systematic work to suppress such phenomena and act very harshly; this is a war, not a resort. This kind of work is a vital necessity. One undetected traitor or coward can destroy an entire unit and disrupt a combat operation. Thus, by October 10, 1941, operational barriers of special departments and barrage detachments of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (there were also army barrage detachments created after order No. 227 of July 28, 1942) detained 657,364 soldiers and commanders of the Red Army who had lagged behind their units or those who fled from the front. Of this number, the overwhelming majority were sent back to the front line (according to liberal propagandists, death awaited them all). 25,878 people were arrested: of which 1,505 were spies, 308 were saboteurs, 8,772 deserters, 1,671 suicide bombers, etc., 10,201 people were shot.
Counterintelligence officers also performed a host of other important functions: they identified enemy saboteurs and agents in the front-line zone, trained and dispatched task forces to the rear, and played radio games with the enemy, passing on disinformation to them. The NKVD played a key role in organizing the partisan movement. Hundreds of partisan detachments were created on the basis of task forces deployed behind enemy lines. Smershevites carried out special operations during the offensive of Soviet troops. Thus, on October 13, 1944, the operational group of the UKR “Smersh” of the 2nd Baltic Front, consisting of 5 security officers under the command of Captain Pospelov, penetrated Riga, which was still held by the Nazis. The task force had the task of seizing the archives and files of German intelligence and counterintelligence in Riga, which the Nazi command was going to evacuate during the retreat. The Smershovites liquidated the Abwehr employees and were able to hold out until the advanced units of the Red Army entered the city.
NKVD sergeant Maria Semenovna Rukhlina (1921-1981) with a PPSh-41 submachine gun. Served from 1941 to 1945.
Repression
Archival data and facts refute the widely circulated “black myth” that the NKVD and SMERSH indiscriminately registered all former prisoners as “enemies of the people” and then shot or sent to the Gulag. Thus, A.V. Mezhenko cited interesting data in the article “Prisoners of war returned to duty...” (Military Historical Journal. 1997, No. 5). Between October 1941 and March 1944, 317,594 people were sent to special camps for former prisoners of war. Of these: 223,281 (70.3%) were checked and sent to the Red Army; 4337 (1.4%) - to the convoy troops of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs; 5716 (1.8%) - in the defense industry; 1529 (0.5%) went to hospital, 1799 (0.6%) died. 8255 (2.6%) were sent to assault (penalty) units. It should be noted that, contrary to the speculation of the falsifiers, the level of losses in the penal units was quite comparable with ordinary units. 11,283 (3.5%) were arrested. For the remaining 61,394 (19.3%), verification continued.
After the war the situation did not change fundamentally. According to the data of the State Archive of the Russian Federation (GARF), which is cited by I. Pykhalov in the study “Truth and lies about Soviet prisoners of war” (Igor Pykhalov. The Great Slandered War. M., 2006), by March 1, 1946, 4,199,488 Soviet citizens were repatriated (2,660,013 civilians and 1,539,475 prisoners of war). As a result of the inspection, of the civilians: 2,146,126 (80.68%) were sent to their place of residence; 263,647 (9.91%) were enrolled in labor battalions; 141,962 (5.34%) were drafted into the Red Army and 61,538 (2.31%) were located at assembly points and were used in work at Soviet military units and institutions abroad. Only 46,740 (1.76%) were transferred to the disposal of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs. Of the former prisoners of war: 659,190 (42.82%) were re-conscripted into the Red Army; 344,448 people (22.37%) were enrolled in labor battalions; 281,780 (18.31%) were sent to their place of residence; 27,930 (1.81%) were used for work at military units and institutions abroad. The order of the NKVD was transmitted - 226,127 (14.69%). As a rule, the NKVD handed over Vlasov and other collaborators. Thus, according to the instructions that were available to the heads of the inspection bodies, from among the repatriates the following were subject to arrest and trial: management, command staff of the police, ROA, national legions and other similar organizations and formations; ordinary members of the listed organizations who took part in punitive operations; former Red Army soldiers who voluntarily went over to the enemy’s side; burgomasters, major officials of the occupation administration, employees of the Gestapo and other punitive and intelligence institutions, etc.
It is clear that most of these people deserved the most severe punishment, even capital punishment. However, the “bloody” Stalinist regime, in connection with the Victory over the Third Reich, showed leniency towards them. Collaborators, punishers and traitors were exempted from criminal liability for treason, and the matter was limited to sending them to a special settlement for a period of 6 years. In 1952, a significant part of them were released, and their questionnaires did not show any criminal record, and the time they worked during exile was recorded as work experience. Only those accomplices of the occupiers who were found to have committed serious, specific crimes were sent to the Gulag.
Reconnaissance platoon of the 338th NKVD regiment. Photo from the family archive of Nikolai Ivanovich Lobakhin. Nikolai Ivanovich was at the front from the first days of the war, was in a penal battalion 2 times, and had several wounds. After the war, as part of the NKVD troops, he eliminated bandits in the Baltic states and Ukraine.
On the front line
The role of NKVD units in the war was not limited to performing purely special, highly professional tasks. Thousands of security officers honestly fulfilled their duty to the end and died in battle with the enemy (in total, about 100 thousand NKVD soldiers died during the war). The first to take the Wehrmacht's blow in the early morning of June 22, 1941 were the border units of the NKVD. In total, 47 land and 6 sea border detachments, 9 separate border commandant's offices of the NKVD entered the battle on this day. The German command allocated half an hour to overcome their resistance. And the Soviet border guards fought for hours, days, weeks, often completely surrounded. Thus, the Lopatin outpost (Vladimir-Volynsky border detachment) repelled attacks by many times superior enemy forces for 11 days. In addition to border guards, units of 4 divisions, 2 brigades and a number of separate operational regiments of the NKVD served on the western border of the USSR. Most of these units entered the battle from the very first hours of the Great Patriotic War. In particular, the personnel of the garrisons who guarded bridges, objects of special national importance, etc. The border guards who defended the famous Brest Fortress, including the 132nd separate battalion of the NKVD troops, fought heroically.
In the Baltics, on the 5th day of the war, the 22nd NKVD motorized rifle division was formed, which fought together with the 10th Rifle Corps of the Red Army near Riga and Tallinn. Seven divisions, three brigades and three armored trains of the NKVD troops took part in the battle for Moscow. The division named after them took part in the famous parade on November 7, 1941. Dzerzhinsky, combined regiments of the 2nd NKVD division, a separate motorized rifle brigade for special purposes and the 42nd NKVD brigade. An important role in the defense of the Soviet capital was played by the Separate Special Purpose Motorized Rifle Brigade (OMSBON) of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs, which created minefields on the approaches to the city, carried out sabotage behind enemy lines, etc. The separate brigade became a training center for the preparation of reconnaissance and sabotage detachments (they were formed from NKVD employees, anti-fascist foreigners and volunteer athletes). Over the four years of war, the training center trained 212 groups and detachments with a total number of 7,316 fighters under special programs. These formations carried out 1084 combat operations, eliminated approximately 137 thousand Nazis, destroyed 87 leaders of the German occupation administration and 2045 German agents.
The NKVD soldiers also distinguished themselves in the defense of Leningrad. The 1st, 20th, 21st, 22nd and 23rd divisions of the internal troops fought here. It was the NKVD troops that played the most important role in establishing communication between surrounded Leningrad and the mainland - in the construction of the Road of Life. During the months of the first blockade winter, the forces of the 13th Motorized Rifle Regiment of the NKVD delivered 674 tons of various cargo to the city along the Road of Life and took out more than 30 thousand people, mostly children. In December 1941, the 23rd division of the NKVD troops received the task of guarding the delivery of goods along the Road of Life.
NKVD fighters were also present during the defense of Stalingrad. Initially, the main fighting force in the city was the 10th NKVD division with a total strength of 7.9 thousand people. The division commander was Colonel A. Saraev, he was the head of the Stalingrad garrison and fortified area. On August 23, 1942, the division's regiments held defenses on a front of 35 kilometers. The division repulsed attempts by the advanced units of the German 6th Army to take Stalingrad on the move. The most fierce battles were noted on the approaches to Mamayev Kurgan, in the area of the tractor plant and in the city center. Before the withdrawal of the bloodless units of the division to the left bank of the Volga (after 56 days of fighting), the NKVD fighters inflicted significant damage on the enemy: 113 tanks were knocked out or burned, more than 15 thousand Wehrmacht soldiers and officers were liquidated. The 10th Division received the honorary name "Stalingrad" and was awarded the Order of Lenin. In addition, other units of the NKVD took part in the defense of Stalingrad: the 2nd, 79th, 9th and 98th border regiments of the rear security forces.
In the winter of 1942-1943. The People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs formed a separate army consisting of 6 divisions. At the beginning of February 1943, the Separate Army of the NKVD was transferred to the front, receiving the name 70th Army. The army became part of the Central Front, and then the 2nd and 1st Belorussian Fronts. The soldiers of the 70th Army showed courage in the Battle of Kursk, along with other forces of the Central Front, stopping the Nazi strike group, which was trying to break through to Kursk. The NKVD army distinguished itself in the Oryol, Polesie, Lublin-Brest, East Prussian, East Pomeranian and Berlin offensive operations. In total, during the Great War, the NKVD troops trained and transferred 29 divisions from their composition to the Red Army. During the war, 100 thousand soldiers and officers of the NKVD troops were awarded medals and orders. More than two hundred people were awarded the title of Hero of the USSR. In addition, the internal troops of the People's Commissariat during the Great Patriotic War carried out 9,292 operations to combat bandit groups, as a result of which 47,451 were eliminated and 99,732 bandits were captured, and a total of 147,183 criminals were neutralized. Border guards in 1944-1945. destroyed 828 gangs, with a total number of about 48 thousand criminals.
Many have heard about the exploits of Soviet snipers during the Great Patriotic War, but few know that most of them were from the ranks of the NKVD. Even before the start of the war, NKVD units (units for the protection of important facilities and escort troops) received sniper squads. According to some reports, NKVD snipers killed up to 200 thousand enemy soldiers and officers during the war.
The banner of the 132nd battalion of NKVD convoy troops captured by the Germans. Photo from the personal album of one of the Wehrmacht soldiers. In the Brest Fortress, the border guards and the 132nd separate battalion of escort troops of the NKVD of the USSR held the defense for two months. In Soviet times, everyone remembered the inscription of one of the defenders of the Brest Fortress: “I’m dying, but I’m not giving up!” Goodbye Motherland! 20.VII.41,” but few people knew that it was made on the wall of the barracks of the 132nd separate battalion of escort troops of the NKVD of the USSR.”
Personal dossier (material development) for a direct participant murders KARAGODINA Stepan Ivanovich - GORBENKO Georgy Ivanovich, 3rd department of the Tomsk GO UNKVD for the NSO ZSK USSR.
ATTENTION!
GORBENKO IS TAKEN 100% (there is a lot of information),
the entire data set is available. Processing and publication in progress. The information below is being edited.(upon completion this inscription will be deleted)
GORBENKO Georgy Ivanovich – detective officer of the 3rd department of the Tomsk GO UNKVD for the NSO ZSK USSR, ml. Lieutenant of State Security of the USSR.
GORBENKO Georgy Ivanovich
Member of the CPSU (b) / CPSU, party card No. 00974013.
Personal signature:
In stock [added]
Personal signature – Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO 
Personal signature - Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO - detective officer of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR. 
Personal signature - Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO - detective officer of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR. 
Personal signature - Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO - detective officer of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR. 
Personal signature - Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO - detective officer of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR. 
Personal signature - Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO - detective officer of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR. 
Personal signature - Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO - detective officer of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR. 
Personal signature - Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO - detective officer of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR. 
Personal signature - Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO - detective officer of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR.
Handwriting sample:
In stock [to be added]
Photos:
Diploma of the Tomsk Municipal Construction College of Anatoly M. Karagodin (the grandson of S.I. KARAGODINA) signed by the director of the technical school Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO (operator of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR, junior lieutenant of state security of the USSR).
Awarded a saber (while working in the authorities). The saber was kept at home; in addition to the saber, there was also a carbine in the house, which stood behind the closet.
DEATH
Burial place : Tomsk, cemetery "Tomsk-2"; exact date of burial : August 6, 1972, i.e. at the age of 69; cemetery address : Russia, Tomsk, st. Molodezhnaya, 2/1; registration of the fact of burial : Data on the fact of burial are registered in the accounting book of the Municipal government institution of the City of Tomsk "City Cemetery Service"; grave (exact GPS coordinates) : (is installed) [There is no burial map in the register, a search expedition is required ]
Death certificate for the detective of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD Jr. State Security Lieutenant Gennady Ivanovich GORBENKO. Cause of death: myocardial infarction. [cm. act of transferring a copy of the certificate]
HOME ADDRESS
Home address (as of 1938): Tomsk, st. Istochnaya, 5, apt. 1. (as in the document).
Additionally, the exact place of residence of GORBENKO in the city of Tomsk before his death in 1972 has been established: st. Tatarskaya, 5.
Place of residence of the detective of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD Jr. State Security Lieutenant G. I. GORBENKO until his death in 1972. Comrade GORBENKO occupied the entire second floor. 
Place of residence of the detective of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD Jr. State Security Lieutenant G.I. GORBENKO until his death in 1972. Comrade GORBENKO occupied the entire second floor. Porch (entrance through the left door).
Plan of the apartment of the detective of the 3rd Department of the Tomsk GO NKVD NSO USSR Jr. Lieutenant of State Security of the USSR Georgy Ivanovich GORBENKO. Date: for the period of Gorbenko’s life in it. Place: Zaistok, Tomsk, Russia.
Currently [as of July 2012] the living space in the GORBENKO house is a communal apartment.
The location of GORBENKO’s personal photo archive has been established (not exact, but reliable) [divided into 2 places at least and this is 100%]: 1) in one of the private apartments in the city of Seversk (Tomsk-7); 2) in one of the closed rooms of a rented apartment in the city of Novosibirsk (near the railway station).
Additional data
From the book: "Machine of Terror. OGPU-NKVD of Siberia in 1929-1941." A. G. Teplyakov, 2008:
“Sometimes informal relations with an agent served as a reason for the dismissal of one or another politically compromised security officer, which, for example, happened with the operative of the KRO UNKVD NSO G.I. walked with agent "Violet", which contributed to the deconspiracy of the agents." As a result, Gorbenko, accused of a variety of sins, was fired from the NKVD.; In the 30s, the situation changed radically and retirees had somewhere to go. For example, when expelled from NKVD terrorist activist in Tomsk G.I. Gorbenko sent a letter for help to the regional committee, declaring that he had no specialty, the response was to send 36-year-old Gorbenko to study at the troika institute."
From the book by L. Karokhin "Sergei Yesenin and Nikolai Klyuev". Ryazan: Attorney, 2002. [From the memoirs of Igor Konstantinovich Morozov (about the place of death and burial of N. Klyuev.)]:
“In 1956, Morozov, then a student at the Tomsk Communal Construction College, was on a summer internship and, together with other students, was digging a foundation pit for a new technical school building. The construction site was located next to an abandoned cemetery and a prison. The pit was dug quite deep when one unexpectedly collapsed from its walls, and this is what Morozov saw:
“The wall of the pit collapsed and revealed a pile of randomly lying human bodies. The tissues of the faces had decayed, only cartilage remained. Liquid was oozing from the skulls... Some were wearing winter hats. Clothes had decayed and were easily falling apart. The corpses lay in complete disarray, mixed with duffel bags and knots. Visible was the corner of a black varnished wooden suitcase. I tried to calm the students down and asked everyone to leave, stopping work. From the foreman’s booth, I called the director of the technical school Gorbenko and told him about the terrible find. He ordered not to touch anything and wait for his arrival. Through a couple of hours later the gray Pobeda arrived, three respectable men got out of it and our director, seeing a black suitcase sticking out among the corpses, ordered to get it out. Two desperate ones, Tomka Kruzova and Vitka Frantsev, took out the suitcase, it easily fell apart: the wood had rotted under the varnish The suitcase contained a randomly crumpled black and cheviot suit, underwear, a book wrapped in oilcloth, a photograph and two bottles of vodka. The fact that these people were from a neighboring prison was completely clear to me, since how could a person smuggle a book and vodka into prison - it was incomprehensible!.. The book was made of bad yellow paper. Poems by a poet unknown to me. In the photo there were two people in coats and winter hats, young and old. Next to the suitcase was a head in a winter hat...
Shocked by everything I saw, I photographically remembered their faces. The management sent us home until the issue was resolved and, taking the documents with us, left. We didn't work for several days, and when we returned again, everything was clean...
In 1959, on the first anniversary of graduating from the technical school, I was at a meeting and learned that the director of the technical school, Gorbenko, had been expelled from the party and removed from his job as a former NKVD major, a member of the troika. He was accused of backdating the sentences on people who had already been executed,
In the early 70s, I was lucky enough to buy a three-volume work by S. A. Yesenin, and I saw exactly the same photograph as in the grave. On it are S. Yesenin and N. Klyuev.""
On July 10, 1934, by resolution of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR, the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs - the NKVD of the USSR was formed, within which the Main Directorate of State Security (GUGB) was created. The main functions of the OGPU were transferred to this department.
The foreign department became the 5th department of the Main Directorate of State Security of the NKVD of the USSR.
Management
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Artuzov A.Kh. – 07/10/1934 – 03/27/1935 |
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Slutsky A.A. – 05/21/1935 – 02/17/1938 |
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Passov Z.I. – 03/28/1938 – 10/22/1938 |
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Shpigelglas S.M. — 1939 |
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Dekanozov V.G. – 12/02/1938 – 05/13/1939 |
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Fitin P.M. – 05/13/1939 – 1946 |
Tasks of the Foreign Department (5th Department of the GUGB NKVD USSR)
The government defined the tasks of the Foreign Department as follows:
- identification of conspiracies and activities of foreign states, their intelligence services and general staffs, as well as anti-Soviet political organizations directed against the USSR;
- uncovering sabotage, terrorist and espionage activities on the territory of the USSR by foreign intelligence agencies, white emigrant centers and other organizations;
— management of the activities of overseas residencies;
— control over the work of the visa bureau, the entry of foreigners abroad, management of the work on registration and registration of foreigners in the USSR.” This was a state regulation that gave the right to the 5th department of the GUGB, that is, foreign intelligence, to conduct intelligence work in foreign countries in order to obtain information on security issues of the Soviet state.
In 1938, the leadership of the USSR once again returned to the issue of improving intelligence activities abroad. The work of the 5th department of the GUGB NKVD of the USSR was subjected to a thorough and comprehensive analysis, proposals for its improvement were considered in such a way, the adopted document stated, “so that the department could launch extensive intelligence work abroad along the lines of political, scientific and technical intelligence, identifying intrigues foreign intelligence services and white emigrant centers on the territory of the Soviet Union."
Thus, the main areas of foreign intelligence activity were preserved: political, scientific and technical, and external counterintelligence.
Staff and structure of the 5th department of the GUGB NKVD of the USSR
The staff of the department was approved at 210 people, 13 divisions were created in its structure, 7 of which were involved in the management of foreign residencies on a geographical basis.
Other units performed various functions necessary for conducting intelligence work. They, among other things, supervised scientific and technical intelligence, work on Russian emigration, “development” of Trotskyist and right-wing organizations, operational records, and much more. The 5th Department, although small in number, thus acquired, on the eve of the war, a fairly extensive structure aimed at working on a large scale.
In mid-1940, its central office employed 695 people. By 1941, thanks to the dedicated work of its employees, Soviet foreign intelligence was able to restore a functioning intelligence apparatus in Germany, Italy, England, France, the USA, and China. The largest residencies were in the USA - 18 people, Finland - 17 people, Germany - 13 people. In total, by this time foreign intelligence had 40 residencies. They employed 242 intelligence officers, who were in touch with a total of about 600 different sources of information.
Financing of the 5th department of the GUGB NKVD of the USSR
The SVR archive has preserved financial statistics of the OGPU and foreign intelligence for 1930. INO then received 300 thousand rubles for its maintenance and foreign operations.
On the eve of the Great Patriotic War, the budget of Soviet foreign intelligence for the first time reached the figure of 1 million rubles.
Period of repression
By 1938, almost all illegal stations were liquidated, and connections with the most valuable sources of information were lost. Subsequently, great efforts were required to restore them.
In a report sent to the leadership of the NKGB on the work of foreign intelligence from 1939 to 1941, intelligence chief P.M. Fitin wrote:
“By the beginning of 1939, as a result of the exposure of the enemy leadership of the Foreign Department at that time, almost all residents behind the cordon were recalled and suspended from work. Most of them were then arrested, and the rest were subject to verification.
There could be no talk of any reconnaissance work behind the cordon in this situation. The task was to create, along with the creation of the apparatus of the Department itself, the apparatus of residencies behind the cordon.”
The losses of personnel were so great that in 1938, for 127 days in a row, the country's leadership received no information at all from foreign intelligence.
Reorganization
On February 3, 1941, a meeting of the Politburo was held, at which a resolution was adopted to divide the NKVD of the USSR into two people's commissariats: the NKVD of the USSR and the NKGB of the USSR with the allocation of all operational security units from the NKVD to the NKGB, and locally - from the NKVD / UNKVD of the republics, territories and regions in the NKGB/UNKGB.
Intelligence and counterintelligence were now within the structure of the NKGB. As for foreign intelligence (5th department of the GUGB NKVD of the USSR), it was reorganized into the 1st department (foreign intelligence) of the NKGB of the USSR. On February 26, 1941, Pavel Mikhailovich Fitin was appointed head of the department.
Information sources:
1. Primakov “History of Russian foreign intelligence in 6 volumes” volume 3
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