The KGB Campaign against Corruption in Moscow, 1982–1987

Chapter 1: A Force That Eluded Control: The Rise of the Moscow Trade Organizations

RUNNING HEAD RECTO  A Force That Eluded Control The Rise of the Moscow Trade Organizations ■ In the Soviet Union, from the era of Lenin to that of Chernenko, the Communist Party never lost its power to another political force. Nevertheless, its authority was challenged, and some specialists argue that it occasionally lost its grip on Russian society. To support their argument, scholars have pointed to the 1930s and to the period from 1947 to 1953, when the KGB, by creating a climate of terror, accumulated so much power in the Soviet system that it even supplanted the Party. In his memoirs, Khrushchev affirms the validity of this argument.1 Other authors assert that the Communist Party lost its power in certain southern republics during the Brezhnev period.2 Threats to the Party differed in nature depending on the circumstance; for example, during the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan in the late 1970s and the early 1980s, the army and military-industrial complex undermined the Party’s domination.3 Due to the pervasiveness of corruption in the 1970s, Soviet trade organizations , which were responsible for the internal distribution of goods, acquired increasing influence, particularly in Moscow. This growth in their influence became a primary concern at the Kremlin, with Gorbachev declaring at the Twenty-fifth Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union that the Soviet system was being seriously challenged in some regions of the country.4 Gorbachev’s concern about the situation had much to do with the fact that Andropov had succeeded Brezhnev as leader in 1982, and Andropov and his protégé, Gorbachev, progressed to the top of the Party hierarchy as champions of law and order. As head of the KGB during the Brezhnev era, Andropov had collected a large amount of evidence pointing to low moral standards among the nomenklatura. 1   Glavtorg Chief administration of trade Administration of food products trade Glavmosplodovoshprom Moscow Administration of Fruit and Vegetable Offices Public catering complexes Grocery trade organizations Cafeteria complexes Universam trade organizations Hotel food complexes District fruit and vegetable office Fish and meat trade organizations Figure 1.1. Structure of the Moscow Trade Administration (TORG) (5,000 stores– 300,000 employees) This study of the Soviet internal trade bureaucracy from the Brezhnev era to perestroika focuses on the Moscow trade network’s status and influence. Two key organizations in this bureaucracy were the Moscow branch of Glavtorg (the Moscow Trade Association, which was the central administration for the distribution and retailing of consumer goods) and Glavka (Administration of the Moscow Fruit and Vegetable Offices, or kontoras) (see fig. 1.1). Whereas Glavtorg attained the status of a ministry in the Russian Republic, Glavka was not directly involved in commerce because its function was to warehouse and distribute fruits and vegetables to grocery stores. The essential characteristic of these two organizations was that they had been created by the Soviet system under Stalin, meaning that their objectives were determined by the Communist Party and that retail stores belonged to the state. Prices were also state controlled and kept low so that goods would be accessible to all. Centralized decision making in the internal trade organizations was supposed to guarantee adequate supply and fair distribution to the population, but corruption and shortages became widespread. Stalin reacted by initiating campaigns of repression. The Gosplan, a government committee that produced the nation’s near-term economic plan, officially orchestrated distribution, but in reality, it was bribery A FORCE THAT ELUDED CONTROL  A FORCE THAT ELUDED CONTROL that largely determined the allocation of goods. Employees in the goods distribution organizations were thus engaged in unofficial trade, like their colleagues in Glavtorg. Both Glavtorg and Glavka built up unofficial networks that clandestinely provided them with considerable resources. The power of the Glavtorg and Glavka leaders derived from the fact that they could allocate the goods as they liked. The focus here is on one category of resources in the goods distribution system—food—which the executives of Glavtorg and Glavka were able to transform into political power mainly through personal networks that allowed them to amass considerable sums of money. Politics can be defined as the battle for the distribution of resources among groups, organizations, or individuals. The more resources a group, an organization , or an individual acquires, the more influential it becomes in the political system. Dennis Mueller proposes that there are three conditions that aid in the acquisition...