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Definition: KGB from Philip's Encyclopedia

(Komitet Gosudarstvennoye Bezhopaznosti, Rus. Committee for State Security) Soviet secret police. In the 1980s, it employed an estimated 500,000 people and controlled all police, security, and intelligence operations in the Soviet Union. It also gathered military and political information about other countries. Opposing liberalization under Gorbachev, its chief was a leader of the attempted coup against him in 1991. After the collapse of communism and the break-up of the Soviet Union, it underwent extensive reform.


KGB

From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia with Atlas and Weather Guide
Secret police of the USSR, the Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti (Committee of State Security), which was in control of frontier and general security and the forced-labour system. KGB officers held key appointments in all fields of daily life, reporting to administration offices in every major town. Since the demise of the USSR in 1991, the KGB has been superseded in Russia by the Federal Security Service (FSB) as the main domestic state security agency, and the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), the primary external intelligence agency. The KGB had at least 220,000 border guards, with reinforcements of 80,000 volunteer militia members. Many KGB officers were also said to hold diplomatic posts in embassies abroad. Headed by General Vladimir Kryuchkov 1988–91, the KGB coordinated the military crackdown on Azerbaijan 1990 and on the Baltic states 1991. After the attempted anti-Gorbachev coup of 1991, reforms intended to curb the political activities of the KGB were introduced: its…
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Full text Article KGB

From Encyclopedia of Intelligence & Counterintelligence
Komitet Gosudarstvennoi Bezopasnosti (Committee for State Security), better known as the KGB, was the name of the main Soviet external security and intelligence agency, as well as the main secret police agency, from 1954 to 1991. The KGB was the Soviet equivalent to the American CIA and the…
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Full text Article KGB

From Brewer's Dictionary of Modern Phrase and Fable
The secret police of the USSR, the initials standing for Komitet gosudarstvennoy bezopasnosti ('Committee of State Security'). Russia's original secret police was set up in 1917 as the Cheka, Chrezvychaynaya komissiya ('Extraordinary Commission' i.e. to combat counter-revolution). In 1922 this…
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Full text Article KGB

From The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia with Atlas and Weather Guide
Secret police of the USSR, the Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti (Committee of State Security), which was in control of frontier and general security and the forced-labour system. KGB officers held key appointments in all fields of daily life, reporting to administration offices in every major…
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Full text Article KGB

From The Encyclopedia of Conspiracies and Conspiracy Theories
Every dictatorship requires some form of SECRET police to maintain its power, and Soviet Russia was no exception. Beginning as the Cheka under Vladimir lenin , Moscow's chief intelligence agency later became the Government Political Administration (GPU) and then was renamed the Peoples Commissariat…
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Full text Article KGB

From Historical Dictionary of International Intelligence
Created in March 1954 under Ivan Serov following the execution of Lavrenti Beria, the Committee for State Security was the direct successor of various intelligence agencies, including the OGPU and NKVD , that had replaced the czar's feared Okhrana in 1917. As well as being an instrument of…
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Full text Article KGB

From Britannica Concise Encyclopedia
(“Committee for State Security”) Soviet agency responsible for intelligence, counterintelligence, and internal security. It was the descendant of earlier agencies. The Cheka was established in 1917 to investigate counterrevolution and sabotage. Its successor, the GPU (later OGPU), was the new Soviet…
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Full text Article KGB

From Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable
The best-known name for the secret political police of the former USSR. The organization was set up in 1917 as the Cheka, Chrezvychaynaya komissiya (‘Extraordinary Commission’ i.e. to combat counter-revolution). In 1922 this became the GPU, Gosudarstvennoye politicheskoye upravleniye (‘State…
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Full text Article KGB ORGANIZATION

From Historical Dictionary of Russian and Soviet Intelligence
The KGB —like its predecessors—was managed by a collegium composed of the organization's most important leaders. In the 1970s, the collegium was chaired by the KGB chair and included two first deputy chairs, the heads of the First and Second Chief Directorates , and the chiefs of the Moscow and…
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Full text Article KGB (KOMITET GOSUDARSTVENNOI BEZOPASTNOSTI)

From Historical Dictionary of Russian and Soviet Intelligence
The KGB was created on 7 March 1954 as one of Nikita Khrushchev 's major reforms of the Stalinist system. The complete title of the organization, Komitet gosudarstvennoi bezopastnosti pri sovete ministrov , “Committee of State Security under the Council of Ministers,” suggested that the security…
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Full text Article KGB

From The American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language
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