Chapter 384
Yuri walked past Poskrebyshev and entered Comrade Stalin's office.
The light in the office was a little dim. The large chandelier on the ceiling was not turned on. Only the table lamp on Comrade Stalin's desk was on. The dark gray lampshade blocked the light of the table lamp. Therefore, when looking from the door, one could only see the area below Comrade Stalin's chest, while his face and the expression on his face were hidden in the vague shadows and could not be seen clearly.
"Come and sit down," Comrade Stalin said when he saw Yuri walk in. He put the pipe in his hand on the table, picked up a document on the table, shook it in front of him, and said.
Yuri took off his heavy coat and was about to hang it on the hanger by the door, but Poskrebyshev took it away first.
Without any unnecessary politeness, he nodded to Poskrebyshev, then walked to Comrade Stalin's desk and sat down in the chair next to the desk.
"Are Anjelia and the child okay?" Comrade Stalin asked in a soothing tone, his face still hidden in the shadows.
"Everything is fine," Yuri said, looking at the table. "Antelija wants to let the child stay with her for a few more days and then send him back to Moscow."
Comrade Stalin seemed to nod. He passed the document across the table. When Yuri reached out to take it, he picked up the pipe he had just put down and said, "You're back just in time. It saves me the trouble of issuing another notice. Now, take a look at this proposal. As a secretary of the Secretariat, you have the right to express your own views on this issue."
Yuri took the document and first glanced at Comrade Stalin who was hiding in the shadow of the light, then he cast his eyes on the document in his hand.
This is a handwritten document in Comrade Stalin's own handwriting, and the content of the document is a proposal submitted to the Standing Committee of the Central Presidium.
Yuri looked at Comrade Stalin in surprise, but he couldn't see the expression on his face clearly.
In the past, Comrade Stalin seldom made any decisions through the Standing Committee of the Central Presidium. Any measures or decisions would not be reported to the Standing Committee of the Central Presidium in the form of proposals. He liked to issue orders directly or make decisions through small meetings of members of the Central Presidium.
Now, what happened to this proposal in my hand? Did Comrade Stalin, who had a will of steel, suddenly change his character?
With a hint of doubt, Yuri began to look through the several-page document in his hand.
It can be seen that Comrade Stalin put a lot of thought into drafting this document. Although the handwriting is illegible and the content lacks organization, as if he just wrote down whatever he thought of, the content is extremely rich.
In general, Comrade Stalin's manuscript is actually an overall conception of the 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
That’s right. Since the closing of the 18th National Congress in 1939, the Soviet Union has not held a national party congress for more than ten years. The previous one held in 1947 was not nationwide either. It could only be regarded as a representative meeting of the 18th National Congress.
It is not easy to convene a national party congress, especially a new party congress. It involves many aspects of the issues. The most basic one is the selection of new party representatives, which requires elections and consumes a lot of manpower, material and financial resources.
If we look at it from this perspective, in Yuri's previous life, many people regarded the long period between the 18th and 19th Congresses of the Soviet Union as Comrade Stalin's dictatorship and the destruction of the Soviet Union's inner-party democracy. This view is actually incorrect. The fundamental reason is that the Soviet Union did not have enough energy to do this during the war and post-war recovery stage.
Now, after a five-year post-war construction plan, the Soviet Union's overall national strength has been fully restored and achieved rapid growth, so Comrade Stalin finally had plans to convene a new All-Soviet Party Congress.
In the document in Yuri's hand, Comrade Stalin was not only planning this National Congress, but had even begun planning several important topics. Judging from this proposal, the issue he was most concerned about was the reorganization of the Central Presidium.
It is not known whether it was for the purpose of making a gesture or whether Comrade Stalin had really thought of establishing a collective leadership system. In this proposal, he planned to expand the Central Presidium, which originally had only 9 people, and in fact only had 6 or 7 people, to 25 people. In other words, he intended to expand the core leadership of the Bolshevik Party to 25 people. Any major policies related to the country and the Bolshevik Party would need to be voted on by these 25 people, and the principle of collective leadership of the minority obeying the majority would be firmly implemented.
To Yuri's great surprise, he saw his own name on the list of new members of the Central Presidium proposed by Comrade Stalin. Of course, he also saw Suslov's name, and in addition, there was Chernov's name.
Yuri Nikolayevich Chernov is the current Chairman of the Council of Ministers of Russia. His predecessor, Rodionov, has been arrested by the State Security Committee and is still in prison. Previously, when Chernov was questioned by the State Security Committee, he provided some very unfavorable testimony to Rodionov, which made Yuri have a very bad impression of him. But it is obvious that he left a good impression on Comrade Stalin, otherwise he would not be on this list.
In the proposal, Comrade Stalin not only planned to expand the number of members of the Central Presidium to 25, but also planned to select 11 alternate members from these 25 people. In this way, the total number of full members of the Central Presidium plus alternate members would actually be as many as 36.
Most importantly, in the official list of 25 members, Yuri found that he was ranked 7th. Kaganovich, who had actually lost his status, Molotov, who was no longer trusted, and Voroshilov, who was too old, were all removed and their names disappeared from the list of members of the Central Presidium.
As a result, the only members of the original Presidium left were Stalin, Malenkov, Beria, Andreyev, Bulganin and Khrushchev, while Yuri ranked just after Khrushchev, followed by the senior members Shcherbatov and Mikoyan. Kosygin was implicated in the "Leningrad case", so his name was not included in the list of Presidium members.
From this list alone, we can see many problems. For example, Malenkov and Beria, who have returned to the attention of Comrade Stalin, are ranked too high. What does this mean? Undoubtedly, this shows that their performance during this period catered to Comrade Stalin's preferences. Furthermore, in the process of handling the "Leningrad Case", Comrade Stalin was satisfied.
From this, I think more deeply. Kosygin was kicked out of the list of members of the Presidium because of his involvement in the Leningrad case, while Malenkov and Beria, because they presided over the "Leningrad case", were at the forefront of the list of the Central Presidium. Now, I just rushed back to Moscow from Sochi and met Comrade Stalin, and he showed me this list. What does this mean?
Yuri glanced at Comrade Stalin hiding in the shadow of the light with the corner of his eye, and naturally had a glimmer of understanding in his heart. This leader with an iron will might be warning himself in this way not to sympathize with those "anti-party elements" without principles and positions. Otherwise, the price he would have to pay might very well be his own future.
Of course, this was not the only item in the proposal drafted by Comrade Stalin himself. Another item that Yuri was more concerned about was the proposal to merge the State Security Committee with the Ministry of Internal Affairs to form a new Ministry of Internal Affairs. Comrade Beria would continue to serve the chairman of the new department and complete the reconstruction of the new department.
In this way, the new Ministry of Internal Affairs seems to have greatly improved its powers, but the problem is that according to Comrade Stalin's proposal, this new Ministry of Internal Affairs will be transferred to the jurisdiction of the Council of Ministers. It will not only be under the jurisdiction of the Council of Ministers, but also under the supervision of the Central Supervisory Committee.
What is the difference from before? If I explain it in detail, it will be a bit troublesome. Let me give you a simple example: In the past, the National Security Council and the Ministry of Internal Affairs both had a deputy minister or vice chairman who served as a supervisory member of the Central Supervisory Committee. After the new Ministry of Internal Affairs is established, there will be a vice chairman in the Council of Ministers who will be responsible for managing the Ministry of Internal Affairs. At the same time, this vice chairman will be a supervisory member of the Central Supervisory Committee. The Ministry of Internal Affairs is two levels lower than the Central Supervisory Committee and is no longer qualified to serve as a supervisory member of the Supervisory Committee.
Moreover, after the reorganization of the new Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Kremlin Security Bureau will also be separated from this department and become a military agency directly under the leadership of Comrade Stalin. This means that the Ministry of Internal Affairs will lose the right to monitor state leaders above the Council of Ministers, and as a result, Beria's personal power and prestige will also be greatly reduced.
As for Yuri, the chairman of the Central Supervisory Committee, although he could coordinate the investigation work of the National Security Committee and the Ministry of Internal Affairs in the past, he had no power to issue orders to these two departments. But once the reorganization was completed, the situation was different, and it was very different.
