Lavrentiy Beria
1899 – 1953 Soviet chief of the Soviet secret police
Stalin's secret police chief, who ran the Gulag and mass repression and was shot in the struggle after Stalin's death.
- Affiliations
- NKVD, Communist Party of the Soviet Union
Lavrentiy Beria became head of the NKVD in 1938 and served as Stalin's chief of the secret police for the rest of the dictator's life. He oversaw the Gulag labor camp system, mass deportations of whole peoples, the execution of Polish officers at Katyn, and the wider machinery of terror, as well as the Soviet atomic bomb project. A predator who abused his power over his victims, he was one of the most feared men in the country. After Stalin died he moved to expand his power, but rivals led by Khrushchev had him arrested and shot in 1953.
Connections
- influenced Felix Dzerzhinsky — Later secret-police chiefs claimed his mantle.
- associate of Joseph Stalin — His feared enforcer in the final years of terror.
- associate of Joseph Stalin — His secret-police chief and executor of the terror.
- rival of Nikita Khrushchev — Khrushchev led the coalition that had him shot.
- rival of Nikita Khrushchev — Organized the plot to remove and execute Beria.
In the timeline
- 1936 – 1938 The Great Terror the secret police chief who took over the NKVD
- 1949 First Soviet Atomic Bomb Test the administrator of the bomb project
- 1953 Death of Stalin the contender arrested and executed
- 1954 The KGB is established mentioned