Vyacheslav Molotov

Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov (Russian: ????????? ??????????? ????????) (February 25, 1890 (O.S.) (March 9, 1890 (N.S.))–November 8, 1986), Soviet politician and diplomat, was a leading figure in the Soviet government from the 1920s, when he rose to power as a protege of Joseph Stalin, to the 1950s, when he was dismissed from office by Nikita Khrushchev. He was the principal Soviet signatory of the Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact of 1939.

Postwar career

In the postwar period Molotov's position began to decline. In 1949 he was replaced as Foreign Minister by Andrei Vishinsky, retaining his position as Deputy Prime Minister and membership of the Politburo. Following the death of Andrei Zhdanov, who had come to be seen as Stalin's most likely successor, Stalin and Beria began to plan a new purge, which would have removed most of the older party leaders, such as Molotov and Voroshilov, from their positions. New leaders, such as Georgii Malenkov and Nikita Khrushchev, enjoyed Stalin's patronage.

Related Topics:
1949 - Andrei Vishinsky - Andrei Zhdanov - Georgii Malenkov - Nikita Khrushchev

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A clear sign of Molotov's precarious position was the arrest of his Jewish wife, Polina Zhemchuzhina, in December 1948 for "treason" (she had been a supporter of the wartime Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee and a friend of the purged dramatist Solomon Mikhoels and of Golda Meir, the first Israeli ambassador to the Soviet Union). This was part of the anti-Semitic campaign, orchestrated by Beria, which broke out in 1947 and culminated in the Doctors Plot of 1952. At the 19th Party Congress in 1952, Molotov was elected to the new, expanded Presidium of the Communist Party, but was excluded from the smaller standing committee of the Presidium, although this was not made public. It seems likely that Stalin's death in March 1953 saved Molotov from being purged as part of a "clean out" of the Soviet leadership.

Related Topics:
Polina Zhemchuzhina - 1948 - Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee - Solomon Mikhoels - Golda Meir - Israeli - Anti-Semitic - 1947 - Doctors Plot - 1952 - 19th Party Congress - Presidium - 1953

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Following Stalin's death there was a realignment of the leadership, in the course of which Molotov's position was strengthened. Beria was purged and executed, and Molotov regained the Foreign Ministry, under Malenkov as Prime Minister. But the new Party Secretary, Khrushchev, soon emerged as the real power in the regime. He presided over a gradual domestic liberalisation and a "thaw" in foreign policy, shown by the reconciliation with Tito's government in Yugoslavia, which Stalin had expelled from the communist movement. Molotov, as an old-guard Stalinist, seemed increasingly out of place in this new environment, but he represented the Soviet Union with his usual tenacity at the Geneva Conference of 1955, which discussed European security, German reunification, and disarmament.

Related Topics:
Tito - Yugoslavia - Geneva Conference - 1955

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The events which led to Molotov's downfall began in February 1956, when Khrushchev launched an unexpected denunciation of Stalin at the 20th Congress of the Communist Party. Khrushchev attacked Stalin both over the purges of the 1930s and the defeats of the early years of World War II, which he blamed on Stalin's over-trusting attitude to Hitler and the purges of the Red Army. Since Molotov was most senior of Stalin's collaborators still alive, and had played a leading role in the purges, it was obvious that Khrushchev's new line must result in an examination of his past and probably in his fall from power. He thus became the leader of the "old guard" in its resistance to Khrushchev, although whether he actually plotted to overthrow Khrushchev, as was later alleged, is not clear.

Related Topics:
1956 - 20th Congress

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In June 1956 Molotov was removed as Foreign Minister, and in July 1957 Khrushchev denounced him, along with Malenkov, Kaganovich and Voroshilov, as part of an "Anti-Party Group" which had plotted to restore Stalinist methods. Molotov was expelled from the Politburo and the Central Committee, and banished as ambassador to Mongolia. In 1960 he was appointed Soviet representative to the International Atomic Energy Agency, which was seen as a partial rehabilitation. But after the 22nd Party Congress in 1961, at which Khrushchev carried his anti-Stalin campaign to a new level, Molotov was removed from all his positions and expelled from the Communist Party. In March 1962 it was announced that Molotov had retired from public life.

Related Topics:
1956 - 1957 - Mongolia - 1960 - International Atomic Energy Agency - 22nd Party Congress - 1961 - 1962

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In retirement Molotov remained totally unrepentant about his role during Stalin's period of rule. After the Sino-Soviet split it was reported that he agreed with the criticisms made by Mao Zedong of the supposed "revisionism" of Khrushchev's policies. According to Roy Medvedev, Stalin's daughter Svetlana Stalin recalled Molotov and his wife telling her: "Your father was a genius. There's no revolutionary spirit around nowadays, just opportunism everywhere. China's our only hope! Only they have kept alive the revolutionary spirit." In 1976 he said: "the fact that atomic war may break out, isn't that class struggle? There is no alternative to class struggle. This is a very serious question. The be-all and end-all is not peaceful coexistence. After all, we have been holding on for some time, and under Stalin we held on to the point where the imperialists felt able to demand point-blank: either surrender such and such positions, or it means war. So far the imperialists haven't renounced that."

Related Topics:
Sino-Soviet split - Mao Zedong - Revisionism - Roy Medvedev - Svetlana Stalin - 1976

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Molotov was partly rehabilitated during the Leonid Brezhnev years, and was allowed to rejoin the Communist Party in 1984. He died at the age of 96 in Moscow on 8 November 1986, only five years before the dissolution of the Soviet Union. He was buried at the Novodevichy Cemetery, Moscow. A collection of interviews with Molotov, Molotov Remembers: Inside Kremlin Politics, was published posthumously by Felix Chuev. In 1990, shortly before the final collapse of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev's government formally denounced the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, acknowledging that the annexation of the Baltic States and the partition of Poland had been illegal.

Related Topics:
Leonid Brezhnev - 1984 - Moscow - 8 November - 1986 - Novodevichy Cemetery - Felix Chuev - 1990 - Mikhail Gorbachev

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