485 years ago, a Florentine politician, fresh from prison where he had been tortured on suspicion of involvement in a conspiracy against the Medici, recorded:

“A conspiracy is the most dangerous and risky enterprise, where difficulties and dangers are encountered at every step. So, of the many conspiracies that are started, very few succeed.”

Four and a half centuries later, after Nicole Machiavelli began expounding his conspiracy theories, one of them succeeded: in the Soviet Union.

Vladimir Alexandrov:

“If we look at the Soviet period, we will see that in reality we had only one conspiracy during the Soviet period - this was the conspiracy of 1964.”

Vladimir Tolts:

I don’t agree with history professor Vladimir Georgievich Alexandrov: there were others.

But our topic today is precisely the conspiracy of 1964.

...Together with the professor of the New Humanitarian University, Vladimir Georgievich Alexandrov, who I have already introduced, the leading employee of the Institute of Russian History, Yuri Nikolaevich Zhukov, is participating in the program. In addition, you will hear the voices and memories of direct participants and witnesses of the 1964 conspiracy , recorded 30 years later by Hungarian documentary filmmakers.

But first of all, what is a conspiracy, a political mechanism known to us since before biblical times?

Russian jurists of the beginning of our century meant by this “a secret agreement between several persons, aimed at encroaching on the life of the emperor and heir, or overthrowing and limiting the rights of the monarch, the bearer of supreme power.”

Discussing the causes of conspiracies, Machiavelli, already quoted by us, highlighted, first of all, general hatred of the ruler, the conspirators’ thirst for power and the motive of revenge:

“These reasons are numerous, but there is one main one - namely, general hatred. If the sovereign is able to protect himself from the general hatred of the people, the anger of a private individual will no longer be so dangerous to him.”

There are countless examples of successful and unsuccessful conspiracies in history. But the question is: what makes these secret political mechanics effective? Why are there only a few examples of these in the modern history of developed democratic states, but in other state systems there are countless examples of them?

Yuri Zhukov:

I believe that conspiracy, as a way to seize power, can only be effective in a system that is authoritarian, when the conduct of foreign and domestic policy really depends on 2-3 specific individuals.

Vladimir Tolts:

But let us return, however, to the conspiracy of 1964. What caused it?

Nikolai Ivanovich Ryzhkov, a Duma deputy and former chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers, who worked at Uralmash in the 60s and who once greeted Khrushchev’s rise to power with delight, recalls the general atmosphere in the country.

Nikolay Ryzhkov:

What was impressive about Khrushchev was that he very boldly went to expose the cult, that he boldly began to reveal, that he showed what was actually happening in the country, there were still very big changes in the village.

And then, somewhere in the late 50s, even the early 60s, of course, everything began to change dramatically. And I, too, was among those who began to not understand much about Khrushchev, and a kind of apathy set in among us.

Vladimir Tolts:

Today's historians are inclined to see one of the main reasons for the fall of Khrushchev as his dissatisfaction with the inner-party nomenklatura, which had been accumulating since the late 50s.

Professor Vladimir Georgievich Alexandrov tells me:

Vladimir Alexandrov:

The main thing is that the party nomenklatura, the highest, felt some danger emanating from Khrushchev’s immoderate reformist energy. In 1962, Khrushchev, in search of mechanisms for creating efficient production, divided the party organization into two parts. And it seems to me that this decision of his, basically, gave rise to anxiety and fear.

Vladimir Tolts:

Yuri Nikolaevich Zhukov, who participated in our conversation, adds:

Yuri Zhukov:

Everything was like that, and much more complicated.

Firstly, we should not forget the most important thing: over the past 7 years, approximately from 1956, the rate of growth of production in the country decreased by 3 times, the standard of living decreased by 3 times. We annually helped the “third” world in the amount of approximately 400-500 million dollars. Therefore, the population as a whole began to have a negative attitude towards Khrushchev. Remember, there have never been more jokes about anyone than about Khrushchev in our entire history, they openly laughed at him, he discredited himself in the eyes of the people as a politician, as a person, as a leader.

Secondly, everyone felt the situation, even with food. The fall of 1962, when plates with free bread suddenly disappeared in canteens, restaurants, and so on - this was the first sign, clear to everyone. The division of party bodies into urban and rural played a huge role.

In addition, local national leaders. Remember, since 1954, the rights of the union republics were expanded almost every year, and only the party, as a power structure that would restrain the republics that were ready to spread apart, could balance the power of the republics.

When Khrushchev encroached on the party and divided it, thereby weakening the bonds of the country, it became clear and understandable - in a year, two, three, what happened in 1991 will happen.

Vladimir Tolts:

This is what 30 years later one of the conspirators, Alexander Shelepin, recalled about him, who is now no longer alive; in 1964 he was secretary of the Central Committee, deputy chairman of the Council of Ministers and head of party control.

Alexander Shelepin:

They report to me that Khrushchev is leaving for Kalinovka the day after tomorrow. I then checked the time and arrived in Kalinovka two hours earlier. There's a rest house nearby. Khrushchev arrived and got off the car: “How are you here?” I say: “You allowed me to come, so I’m in Maryino, it’s nearby, so I came.” “Well, come on, let’s go have a snack now while the gathering gets ready.” Let's go, sit down, have a snack.

Gathering - the entire collective farm was gathered. Khrushchev, as usual, spoke for two hours, he could not speak any less, one and a half to two hours is a guarantee. And at the end he says: “Compatriots, you supported me, support me this time too. All these private plots must be liquidated, the cattle must be handed over, and the collective farm will give you milk and meat at cost.” Immediately there was a noise, one guy was standing there in the middle, shouting: “Nikita, have you gone crazy?”

And you know, they began to disperse, and, in general, a small group of people remained, the active members of the collective farm remained: “Nikita Sergeevich, let’s go and have some tea.” He cursed, "Let's go!"

Vladimir Tolts:

But people's discontent is not a conspiracy. Almost 5 centuries ago, the still unsurpassed authority in this field, Nicola Machiavelli, wrote:

“History shows that all conspiracies are conceived by noble people close to the sovereign, others cannot form such conspiracies - this would be reckless, because people who are not close to the king and occupy a modest position in society have neither hope nor the opportunity to carry out such a plan. Firstly, people who do not have power cannot find faithful accomplices, they cannot present to the persons whom they involve in their plan any hopes for the sake of which they would agree to undergo " Thus, as soon as they trust two or three persons, one of the latter will be a traitor who will destroy them. However, even if, fortunately, there was no traitor, the enterprise still presents an insurmountable difficulty for them, because they do not have access to the sovereign under such conditions, it always ends in the death of the conspirators."

Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev’s daughter Rada Adzhubey remembers.

Her husband, Alexey Adzhubey, was at that time the editor-in-chief of Izvestia and, of course, a person especially close to Khrushchev. Rada Nikitichna speaks about her father and the people who decided to throw him off:

Rada Adzhubey:

He, of course, was a politician, and although, of course, he was quite cunning in his arrangement, having lived his entire political life under Stalin. He, of course, understood all this. But, nevertheless, what Mikoyan said (we were just standing when the Plenum of the 64th year, October) was going on, he said that Khrushchev forgot that even under socialism there is a struggle for power.

This, of course, was a political conspiracy, at the head of which was Podgorny, and the second such person who died under rather strange circumstances, very quickly after the coup was Ignatov, he was then the chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR. Both Podgorny and Ignatov were masters of intrigue, and they relied on Brezhnev.

As for the group, relatively young, headed by Shelepin, and to which, if you like, my husband, who at that time was the editor of Izvestia, very closely belonged - it was some kind of shock, because I was convinced, and I am still convinced of this, that Khrushchev was banking on Shelepin. He has spoken recently, he himself said, that it is time to leave, we are already old, we need to make way for the young. And I think that his main bet was precisely on Shelepin.

Vladimir Tolts:

Well, how can we not recall Machiavelli again:

“People exalted by the sovereign have all the conveniences to carry out their plans. While those humiliated by him do not have such an opportunity. And they have the same desire for conspiracies, because they desire power as strongly or even more strongly than others desire revenge.”

Let me remind you who these people were favored by Khrushchev, whom his daughter mentions.

Nikolai Grigorievich Ignatov, who died in 1966, was Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR from 1962. Judging by the memoirs of Alexei Adzhubey, Khrushchev knew that Ignatov, traveling around the regions, directly stated: “We must remove Khrushchev.” Flying to Pitsunda, the First Secretary said to Podgorny, who was accompanying him: “Call Ignatov, what is he talking about? What kind of intrigue is this? When I return, I will have to find out everything.” But the trouble is, a member of the Presidium of the Central Committee and one of its secretaries, Nikolai Viktorovich Podgorny, was himself one of the main conspirators. In one of the Radio Liberty programs, Leonid Zamyatin told me that he had repeatedly heard from Podgorny: “I want to be the head of state.”

And here’s what another one of the most important people in the conspiracy, the then head of the KGB Vladimir Efimovich Semichastny, recalls.

Vladimir Semichastny:

The initiators were, of course, Brezhnev, Podgorny - the old guard.

Shelepin and I came from the Komsomol, in Komsomol pants, and joined this guard, and we, as some are now trying to show, “led” a conspiracy against Khrushchev and so on. Yes, we have not yet exercised the right to vote in this cohort: Podgorny, Mikoyan, Kosygin, Suslov, Shelest... - and Shelepin and I... They kept us in the wings, yes, we participated, we agreed, and there was such a conversation with me in advance, probably 4-5 months before, and with others.

And this was started, as I understand it, by Brezhnev, Podgorny, they didn’t show all their cards: who was first, who was last... But gradually I felt that the entire Politburo was inclined to this.

After all, Kosygin was one of the last people to talk to, and Kosygin’s first questions were: how would the army react, and how would the KGB react? When they told him that they were positive, he said: “Then I will support it.”

He [Brezhnev - V.T. ] was cowardly, yes, but two such moments were fighting in him: one thing was cowardly, he was afraid of Khrushchev, and another thing was to become the head of the party, his pride spoke. So it’s hard to say what’s outdone here.

It seems that we walked through corpses, through murders - nothing like that, we didn’t even give a pin prick to anyone, not a drop of blood fell during the preparation of this Plenum. There was not a single murder, not a single corpse, not a single victim. Tanks were not brought into the city, the Kremlin was open to tourists, even foreign ones, and a meeting of the Presidium and Plenum took place in 2 days.

Vladimir Tolts:

It is this external calm and the absence of human casualties, so contrasting with the events of 91 and 93 that are vivid in our memory, that allow some to talk today about a certain party “legitimacy” of the conspiracy of 64.

Yuri Zhukov:

I would not call this a direct conspiracy - everything happened according to the letter of the law: the Plenum met, at the Plenum they brought charges against Khrushchev, voted and removed him as required by the Charter, since, in general, he was elected in September 53 at the Plenum and it was the Plenum that could remove him.

Another thing is that Khrushchev did not participate in those meetings of the Presidium of the Central Committee at which the agenda of the upcoming Plenum was discussed, and what would happen there and how - there is an element of conspiracy in this, I would say.

Vladimir Tolts:

Alexander Shelepin, who was the chief of the KGB before Semichastny (it was then that Solzhenitsyn wrote about him: “Iron Shurik is sneaking to power”), recalling the events of 1964, did not dispute the presence of a conspiracy in them, but regarded his role, like Semichastny’s, more modestly.

Alexander Shelepin:

Under Khrushchev, I was not a member of the Presidium, I was only a secretary, at the same time deputy chairman and chairman, at the same time, of the committee of party and state control of the CPSU Central Committee and the Council of Ministers, three positions - three cabinets. Semichastny was not a member of the Central Committee, he was a candidate member of the Central Committee.

The initiators were Brezhnev and Podgorny, they held negotiations with members of the Presidium and secretaries of the Central Committee, and invited me. And when Brezhnev said: “Well, do you see what the situation is?” - the economy is going down, the first year they began to buy bread for gold abroad in 1963, this was after the development of 42 million virgin lands, he does not meet with members of the Presidium, he is on a business trip for six months, issues cannot be resolved without him. For example, in front of everyone at the meeting, he scolded Kosygin for accepting some ambassador without the consent of Khrushchev, I don’t remember now, and in front of everyone he forbade Kosygin from engaging in agriculture. How so? De jure, Khrushchev was the head of the Council of Ministers, but de facto it was Kosygin, he led the meetings, Kosygin was the most prepared person among the leaders of that time, he knew economics brilliantly, he knew finances brilliantly. He was a modest, intelligent, quiet, but very experienced man.

And when Brezhnev asked: “What do you think?”, I said: “I agree.”

Vladimir Tolts:

What kind of ruler was he, whom his closest nobles decided to depose?

Recalls Oleg Aleksandrovich Troyanovsky, from 1958 Khrushchev’s assistant on foreign policy issues, and later the USSR representative to the UN and ambassador to China and Japan.

Oleg Troyanovsky:

He was a very simple person, you could deal with him. I had a very good relationship with him. He was also, of course, an actor, and those times when he shook his fists and spoke with rather rude expressions - to a certain extent it was an act.

Although, there were cases when this went beyond the boundaries of the game. He really was quite rude even with the top management (they later remembered this very strongly when they filmed it), but with his inner circle, he had 4 assistants in total, the apparatus was very small compared to modern times, he had 3 assistants in the Central Committee and one (me) was in the Council of Ministers. He completely ruined his relations with the intelligentsia as a result of these meetings in Manege and other places, when he spoke out in a very rude and unqualified manner, I would say. Then he began to spoil his relations with the party apparatus.

If his popularity in the country had remained at a high level, it is unlikely that those around him would have decided to remove him. A couple of times, maybe a month or two before the October Plenum, Andropov, with whom we already had very good relations even then, turned to me and said: “Oleg Alexandrovich, we need to somehow suggest to Nikita Sergeevich that it is necessary for the comrades in the leadership to have the opportunity to speak out,” but somehow I did not pay much attention to this. The second time he repeated approximately the same thing. In general, this whole story was a surprise to me.

Vladimir Tolts:

After ten years of Khrushchev's rule, it turned out that even among his associates, close to him both by origin and culture, and some by age, Khrushchev turned out to be a “black sheep.”

Duma deputy Anatoly Ivanovich Lukyanov, a referent of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in the 60s, recalls.

Anatoly Lukyanov:

He was very different from the leaders of that period. This was already the decline of Budyonny and Voroshilov, it was already very difficult for them to work, they could work at their age for 3-4 hours, Mikoyan was more lively, but it was also difficult - age affected. And Khrushchev was a man who, the older he got, the more active and mobile he became - there are such old people. And he grabbed every new idea, not always correctly. He went to places a lot, saw there, say, a fresh person who was not fixated on dogma, he picked up his initiative and began to promote him throughout the country.

Vladimir Tolts:

Four and a half centuries before Khrushchev and his sworn friends and comrades were forced to sign a renunciation of power, the wise Machiavelli warned the future conspirators of all times and peoples:

“The dangers surrounding the participants in the conspiracy are all the more terrible because they are constantly threatened. Everything here is dangerous: conducting the business, and executing it, and even in execution.”

Back in the summer of 1964, Ignatov’s former security chief Vasily Ivanovich Galyukov informed Khrushchev’s son about his boss’s participation in the conspiracy, the implementation of which was scheduled for October. The KGB conspirator Semichastny was in the know.

Vladimir Semichastny:

We learned about a leak of information that this Galyukov reported to Sergei that, they say, some events are being prepared for the removal of Khrushchev. But this only had such an effect on us that I called Brezhnev and said that either we must decide what we had in mind or we must refuse, and he could call me tomorrow and order you to be arrested as an anti-party group. This accelerated the holding of the October Plenum, that’s all.

Khrushchev, in my opinion, was in Sweden on a visit with his whole family, and he went there by ship, sailed, and returned from there by train. And a question arose in the conversation (I was with Brezhnev) that perhaps he should be arrested along the way, the train on the way coming from Leningrad should be detained somewhere at a stop, and he should be isolated and the Plenum held without him. I told him: “I don’t understand, what will this give, why? Apart from additional complications within the country and in the world, this will not give anything, we must go into the open.” Well, you know, this is his cowardice [Brezhnev - V.T. ] and fear of Khrushchev, and then he said, maybe remove him altogether? What does "remove" mean? Well, poison or something... I say: “Leonid Ilyich, you understand, I won’t do this myself, that means I have to look for people, that means I have to attract my ordinary employees or from his service personnel who have worked with him for decades, I have to find people who will go to commit such an act.” “No, I just wanted to think about not messing around, not exaggerating things, etc...” I said: “No, except openly, at the Plenum, the KGB will not agree to this.” And he never returned to it.

Vladimir Tolts:

In the summer of 1964, it might have seemed to the few conspirators initiated into the conspiracy that what Machiavelli, revered by Lenin and Stalin, had warned about was coming true:

“Extraordinary prudence, extraordinary caution and rare happiness are required so that the conspiracy does not come out. It can open by betrayal or by guesswork, a conspiracy opens when the people initiated into it are treacherous or reckless, treason is very possible here, because friends are initiated into the conspiracy, ready to risk their lives out of friendship or dissatisfied with the government. There are no more than 2-3 such faithful people, so if more are needed accomplices have to be trusted not by friends, and rare friendship will withstand the fear of punishment and death. So it is unreasonable to expect such devotion from friends. Finally, people often make mistakes in their friends, and in order to have the right to count positively on a friend, he must prove his friendship through experience, but making such an experiment in such a matter is very risky, or rather, the only thing is to not give the conspirators time to reveal the secret. before execution, not before. But the main thing is to beware of written evidence, against which there are no excuses. The denunciation of one person has little meaning if it is not confirmed by written evidence, therefore, dangerous correspondence must be avoided as carefully as possible.”

There was no written evidence, but the secret of the conspiracy no longer existed. But Khrushchev, who had not read Machiavelli, could not draw the correct conclusions from the instructions of the great Florentine.

Rada Adzhubey:

He went on vacation to Pitsunda at that moment, and then at some point he returned for a few days, because at that time there was very active work on the new Constitution of the USSR, and this Constitution was supposed to be very progressive. Now, if this were accepted, it would be more difficult, you know, already more difficult. And I think that this moment, to some extent, also pushed me, not to mention the fact that such a situation happened here that a man came to my brother and told everything, one of the KGB men who knew it all, and my brother had already told his father.

That is, father, can you imagine, my father is a man who went through such a political school, after all, what did he do: returning briefly to Moscow to take documents, do some other work in the Central Committee to do a little work on the Constitution, and with that he went to Pitsunda and at the airport, when Podgorny saw him off, at the plane’s steps he said: “Here Sergei told me that some kind of conspiracy was being woven here (and as it turned out, Podgorny was the main one in this conspiracy), you will figure it out." Can you imagine? How is it: “You’ll figure it out”? And with that he flew to Pitsunda.

Vladimir Tolts:

Meanwhile, the date of the planned action was approaching.

Vladimir Semichastny reports.

Vladimir Semichastny:

When the evening before in October 12th, members of the Politburo gathered at Brezhnev’s place, and I was there, and they began to persuade him: go ahead, call, call Khrushchev. He resisted for a long time, they dragged him by force to the HF, they called Pitsunda, and he began a conversation with him. It’s not true what Suslov said - only Brezhnev spoke. And he began to explain that you need to come tomorrow, the Presidium of the Central Committee will discuss the issue of your note on agriculture, as well as adjustments to the 7-year plan. But he answers him that, they say, nothing, wait, I’ll come, what’s the rush? “No, the Presidium has already decided and that’s it, you need to be there.” But he answered him: “Okay, we’ll think about it here with Mikoyan.”

And until 12, until half past midnight, there were no signals. And this was a conversation at 6 or 7 o’clock. Brezhnev called me almost every hour: “Well, what? How’s it going?” And then they called me from the 9th department, this is the security department, the chief, and they said that they had just called from Pitsunda and ordered a plane for 6 o’clock in the morning. This was the first such signal that he decided to fly. I called Brezhnev: just like that, he says: “Okay.” I say: “Who will meet him?”, usually members of the Politburo went and saw him off, and met him. He says: “No, you meet yourself.”

So myself, I arrived at the Vnukovo-2 airfield, where government planes are received, Georgadze also happened to be there (Georgadze was then the Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, in view of the fact that Mikoyan also flew with Khrushchev), he came to meet him. Well, of course, I had people from the 9th Directorate, from the KGB, several dozen people, all in civilian clothes, no one was visible at the airfield, as usual they were greeted by those who were supposed to: from the airport service and us.

When the plane landed, he got out with Mikoyan, and we didn’t know how many guards he would take, but he took only 5 people with him, although he could have had 50 or 60 people, there were about 60 guards with him on Pitsunda, both him and Mikoyan. And he came out frowning, saw that the airfield was empty, there was no one there, frowning and a little angry. They shook hands, “Where are the others?” - “In my opinion, they are expecting you in the Kremlin. Where will you have lunch?” He says: “Have they had lunch yet?” (members of the Politburo, and it was already about one o’clock in the afternoon) I say: “No, in my opinion, they are expecting you.” He talked with Mikoyan and said: “We will go to the Kremlin.” I say: "Okay." And they got into the same car with Mikoyan and drove to the Kremlin.

Vladimir Tolts:

The ending of this trip is known.

Oleg Troyanovsky remembers.

Oleg Troyanovsky:

When the meetings of the Presidium of the Central Committee had already ended, everything was decided, Khrushchev went to his office and called me. And as I told you, I was the only assistant who was there in the Kremlin constantly. I went into the office and saw that he was in a very upset position, and he turned to me and said: “Well, my political career is over, now the main thing (as he put it) is to go through all this with dignity.” I say: “Nikita Sergeevich, don’t you think that at a meeting of the Central Committee things could turn out differently?” As it was in 1957, when they tried to remove it. He says: “No, no, that’s completely out of the question. Yes, you know, I don’t particularly cling to this chair.” And then, quite unexpectedly for me, he said: “Kaganovich once told me that it is necessary to meet with two or three secretaries of regional and regional committees within a week in order to maintain contact with peripheral party bosses. Well, I haven’t done this lately and, apparently, this is one of the results.”

Vladimir Tolts:

The conspirators were well prepared...

Vladimir Semichastny:

The chief of security was not there, he was on vacation, I let him go, Litovchenko, the colonel was the head of Khrushchev’s security, and there was his deputy, a major, I don’t remember his last name now, but in general, I saw him in the corridor when they came to the meeting of the Presidium, I met him and said that: “Keep in mind, do not interfere, now the security in Khrushchev’s office, at the dacha, will be changed apartment and here, in the reception room, where the Politburo is going. You don’t interfere in these matters.”

When the meeting began, members of the Central Committee began to arrive on the first day. They were all at the meeting, I was alone in my office, calls began, there were 1-2 calls in defense of Khrushchev, and the majority already on the second day, especially that they had to go, save, Khrushchev takes over, wins. The analogy was the same as with the anti-party group in 1957. those who called to defend Khrushchev, that he is being removed, need to be saved, why are you sitting in prison? Don’t interfere, there is a meeting of the Presidium of the Central Committee and why interfere, why send military units there?

Then, around lunchtime, I decided that it was necessary to take action, because such statements could get out of control and they could personally go to meetings and come there and only interfere there. So I called the reception desk, where the meeting was going on, and asked Brezhnev to call me. Brezhnev called, I told him that the issue must be resolved, the meeting of the Presidium must be ended and the Plenum must be convened, otherwise I cannot guarantee that I will be able to maintain a normal situation that night. He says: “Okay, we’ll consult.” And half an hour later I called that they had consulted, those who did not have time to speak from the members of the Presidium, and the members of the Presidium almost all spoke, the secretaries of the Central Committee - we will give them 5 minutes each so that they can say their attitude to this matter and at 6 o’clock there will be a Plenum of the Central Committee." I say: "That suits me."

And at 6 o’clock the Plenum of the Central Committee was convened in the Sverdlovsk Hall in the Kremlin, at which Suslov made a report. They decided not to open the debate, and the audience supported this; Khrushchev asked that he not be allowed to speak. I was in the hall observing the behavior of the hall, and there were only members of the Central Committee, candidates and members of the revolutionary commission. But I’ll tell you, if so, schematically: most of the people shouted from the audience, “Exclude from the party! Put on trial!” - such voices were heard. It was precisely the biggest sycophants who shouted, who under Khrushchev sycophantized the most.

Vladimir Tolts:

The conspiracy of sycophants shocked Khrushchev...

Rada Adzhubey:

After this, for some two or three days he was in a state of complete nervous stress. And his doctor told me more about this (there was such a Toothless, Vladimir Grigorievich), who walked with him along the paths (there is a small courtyard in this mansion), and Nikita Sergeevich said that this is such a betrayal that it is difficult to survive, despite the fact that he said at the plenum that I believe that I did something once, it goes away in this version, and not just arrested and that’s it, but nevertheless, he even talked about suicide.

Vladimir Tolts:

But what about the silent people, according to the original Russian tradition?

Yuri Zhukov:

I remember, I was working at the APN at that time, in the afternoon we received all the materials, they were still secret, no one knew that the Plenum was going on, that Khrushchev had been removed. In the evening I went out late, somewhere around 11-11.30, I walked into the restaurant, there was a crowd, a queue was waiting for a free seat, and I thought: “Well, you don’t know anything, but will you find out how you will react?”

The next evening it was the same thing, when they announced to the whole country that Khrushchev had been removed, well, at least someone would have spoken out against this decision or for Khrushchev - nothing happened. No one cared about Khrushchev...