Andropov’s Suppression of Dissidents (Edexcel A Level History): Revision Note

Summary

• This note will examine how the control of citizens developed after Stalin

• Yuri Andropov, head of the KGB (1967–1982), used new and more subtle ways to control opposition

• He avoided the mass killings of the Stalin era

  • Instead using surveillance, intimidation, and punishment to silence critics

• People accused of opposing the regime were called 'dissidents'

  • They included writers, scientists, religious believers, and nationalists

• By the early 1980s, the USSR seemed calm on the surface

  • However, many citizens no longer trusted or believed in the Soviet system

• Historians disagree on whether Andropov’s methods kept control effectively, or simply hid growing problems within Soviet society

Who was considered a dissident under Andropov?

• 'Dissidents' were people who spoke out, even peacefully, against Communist Party control

• They had different reasons for their objections to Soviet rule:

Intellectuals

• Criticised censorship and wanted more freedom of speech

Andrei Sakharov

• Sakharov was a nuclear physicist who demanded respect for human rights

• He criticised Soviet actions in Eastern Europe and the arms race

• He was placed under internal exile in Gorky (1980) and kept under KGB surveillance

Artists and authors

• Exposed problems in Soviet life through books and poems

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

• Solzhenitsyn revealed the horrors of Stalin’s labour camps in The Gulag Archipelago (1973)

• He was expelled from the Writers’ Union and later exiled to the West in 1974

Religious groups

• Orthodox Christians, Jews, and Baptists faced restrictions on worship

National minorities

• People in Ukraine, the Baltic States, and Poland who wanted independence

Workers

• The invasion of Afghanistan (1979) and worsening living standards led to growing frustration among the working classes

• Social malaise increased, resulting in poor labour discipline and low productivity

Actions against dissidents under Andropov

Order No. 0051 (1968)

• Issued soon after the Prague Spring

• The order required the KGB to increase monitoring of “ideological sabotage” and Western influence

• It ordered more control over students, writers, and scientists

• The order marked the start of a new era of preventive surveillance

Discipline within the KGB

• Andropov wanted the KGB to be disciplined, loyal, and uncorrupted

  • He believed the security service should set an example for the rest of society

• KGB officers were:

  • Banned from accepting gifts or bribes

  • Expected to live modestly

  • Dismissed for misconduct, carelessness, or showing political unreliability

Warnings

• The KGB focused on prevention by issuing warnings to stop undesirable behaviour

  • In the 1970s, around 70,000 citizens received warnings

Surveillance and spying

• The KGB expanded its network of informants and monitored phone calls and letters

• Many people were watched closely, even if they had done nothing illegal

Job loss and social pressure

• Dissidents were often fired, blacklisted, or moved to less desirable jobs

• Families could lose their homes or be denied university places

Abuse of psychiatry

• Some dissidents were declared mentally ill and sent to psychiatric hospitals (psikhushki)

  • They were diagnosed with “sluggish schizophrenia”

    • This was a fake illness used to justify their imprisonment

• Repressive psychiatry did not have an end term, unlike prison sentences

  • As a result, people could be held indefinitely

Trials and exile

• The government placed famous artists on public trials between 1964 to 1966

• In the USSR, citizens needed exit visas to leave the country

  • For most of the Brezhnev era, Jewish citizens faced strong restrictions on leaving for Israel or the West

  • Many became known as “refuseniks”, denied permission but punished for applying

• Under Andropov, the policy shifted slightly:

  • Small numbers of Jewish people were granted exit visas, particularly those with family abroad

  • Andropov argued that this pragmatically removed potential dissidents in the USSR

    • Many Jewish citizens were working as journalists, scientists, and intellectuals and more likely to disagree with the regime

“Law-and-order” campaign

• To combat social malaise, Andropov introduced:

  • An anti-corruption campaign

  • Operation Trawl

Impact of Andropov's policies

Short-term effects

• The KGB became highly efficient at stopping organised opposition

• Open protest almost disappeared, and fear of punishment discouraged people from speaking out

• However, the Helsinki Accords (1975) promised to respect human rights

  • This gave dissidents a legal basis to criticise the government

Long-term effects

• Dissent went underground rather than disappearing

• Secret publications (samizdat) continued to circulate

• Many citizens became cynical

  • They obeyed publicly but mocked the regime privately

• The USSR was stable, but this stability was built on fear, not loyalty

Reasons for the continued monitoring of popular discontent

Could opposition be controlled by 1985?

• Historians disagree on whether Andropov’s methods truly kept control or just covered up deeper problems

Andropov's methods kept control

• The KGB was professional and efficient

• Dissent was small-scale, and society remained stable

Key historians

"By the time Brezhnev died two weeks later on November 10, the succession was a foregone conclusion. Andropov was "unanimously" elected general secretary. Though the Party leadership was unwilling to contemplate major reforms, it was eager to have done with the stagnation and corruption of the Brezhnev era... At this juncture in the Party's history Andropov seemed both a reassuring and an encouraging figure. His treatment of dissidents as chairman of the KGB made it clear that he would have no truck with "ideological subversion"... Andropov's distinguishing characteristic, however, was not sympathy with dissent but greater sophistication in suppressing it." - Christopher Andrew and Oleg Gordievsky, KGB: The Inside Story of its Foreign Operations From Lenin to Gorbachev (1990)

"The Soviet Union was not in turmoil. Nationalist separatism existed, but it did not remotely threaten the Soviet order. The KGB crushed the small dissident movement. The enormous intelligentsia griped incessantly, but it enjoyed massive state subsidies manipulated to promote overall loyalty. Respect for the army was extremely high. Soviet patriotism was very strong. Soviet nuclear forces could have annihilated the world many times over. Only the unravelling of the socialist system in Poland constituted an immediate danger, but even that was put off by the successful 1981 Polish crackdown." - Stephen Kotkin, Armageddon Averted: The Soviet Collapse, 1970-2000 (2008)

Andropov's methods covered up deeper problems

• Although open protest was rare, many citizens had stopped believing in the system

• Repression silenced critics

  • However, it didn’t solve the causes of discontent which were corruption and stagnation

Key historians

"KGB harassment and surveillance kept the dissidents from drawing more supporters from the intelligentsia who sympathized with them... There comes a moment in every old regime where people start to say: 'We cannot go on living like this anymore.' That feeling started in the 1970s. But there was no social force to bring about change. The people were too cowed, too passive and conformist to do anything about their woes. They were more inclined to take to the bottle than the streets. The dissidents had little influence either on the people or on the leadership, but some of their ideas were taken up by reformers in the party, including Gorbachev, who would cite Medvedev's words in justification of his policies of perestroika in glasnost after 1985." - Orlando Figes, Revolutionary Russia, 1891-1991 (2014)

"Dissidence arose among Soviet intellectuals in the 1960s and expanded in the early 1970s. Challenging official policies became possible as Khrushchev loosened state controls, but the practice continued to grown when the boundaries of permissible expression contracted under the Brezhnev administration. It reflected the contradiction between an increasingly articulate and mobile society on the one hand and an increasingly sclerotic political order on the other. While never including more than a few thousand individuals, dissidents exercised a moral and even political weight far exceeding their numbers, and paralleled the self-proclaimed role of the nineteenth-century Russian intelligentsia as the “conscience of society”... But Roy Medvedev’s observation that “There is now a very widespread feeling that the way we live and work has become untenable,” eventually would be repeated by Mikhail Gorbachev as justification for his policies of glasnost and perestroika." - James von Geldern and Lewis Siegelbaum, Seventeen Moments in Soviet History (2015)