Third Troika (PJW)

The Third Troika is the name given to the collective leadership that ruled the Soviet Union following the overthrow of First Secretary Nikita Khrushchev in December 1961. They were primarily Stalinists and sought to end Khrushchev's policies.

The three members of the Troika were Chairman of the Presidium Leonid Brezhnev, Chairman of the Committee of Party and State Control Alexander Shelepin, and First Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers Alexei Kosygin. Other important members of the transitional leadership were Presidium opposition leader Mikhail Suslov, Chairman of the Military Industrial Commission Dmitry Ustinov, and Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrei Gromyko. The members reflected the alliance of KGB, military, and bureaucrats that overthrew Khrushchev: Shelepin for the KGB, Ustinov and Gromyko for the military, and the rest for the bureaucrats.

It quickly became clear that the Troika could not last as all three of the major figures desired different outlooks for the Soviet Union. Shelepin favored a renewed push against the United States; Brezhnev favored detente; Kosygin hoped for liberal reforms. Shelepin was the most ambitious and was the major figure behind the coup, and began working to remove the other figures from power.

A bomb, likely planted by the KGB themselves, killed Gromyko in January; investigative work by the KGB revealed that Brezhnev, through the various cronies he had appointed to office positions, had killed Gromkyo, and he was arrested and executed. Kosygin and Suslov banded together in response. The KGB, while nominally under the control of Shelepin, was actually under the direct control of Vladimir Semichastny and senior leaders; fearing a potential purge by Shelepin, Semichastny allied himself with Kosygin and Suslov. Shelepin was assassinated when returning to Moscow following his successful orchestration of the Portuguese revolution.

Alexei Kosygin, the only remaining Troika member, was declared First Secretary in June 1962. However, his turn away from Stalinism and the failures of his reforms later in the decade caused his own overthrow by Suslov, Ustinov, and Semichastny.