Anastas Mikoyan
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| Anastas Mikoyan | |
| Born | November 25, 1895 Sanahin, Russian Armenia |
|---|---|
Anastas Hovhannesi Mikoyan (Armenian Անաստաս Հովհաննեսի Միկոյան; (November 25 1895 [O.S. November 13] - October 21, 1978) was an Armenian Old Bolshevik and Soviet statesman during the Stalin and Khrushchev years. Due to russification in the Soviet Union he is primarily known as Anastas Ivanovich Mikoyan (Russian Анаста́с Ива́нович Микоя́н) among people who do not speak Armenian.
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[edit] Early life
Anastas Mikoyan was born in the Armenian village of Sanahin (now part of Alaverdi). His father, Hovannes, was a carpenter while his mother was a rug weaver. Mikoyan was educated and graduated from the Nerseesyan Theological seminary in Tbilisi, Georgia.<ref name="SovArmenian">(Armenian) Hambartsumyan, Viktor et. al., Anastas Hovhannesi Mikoyan (Անաստաս Հովհաննեսի Միկոյան), Soviet Armenian Encyclopedia, Vol. 7, Yerevan 1981 p. 542</ref> He would later remark that his continued studies in theology drew him closer to atheism, I had a very clear feeling that I didn't believe in God and that I had in fact received a certificate in materialist uncertainty; the more I studied religious subjects, the less I believed in God.<ref name="Timemag"/> In school, he had taken several courses on liberal and socialist principles.
[edit] Political beginnings
At the age of twenty, he formed a workers soviet in Ejmiatsin. In 1915, Mikoyan formally joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (later known as the Bolshevik Party) and became a leader of the revolutionary movement in the Caucasus.<ref name="SovArmenian"/> His interaction with Soviet revolutionaries led him to Baku, Azerbaijan where he was a co-editor for the Armenian language newspaper Social-Democrat (Սոցիալ-Դեմոկրատ) and later on for the Russian-language paper Izvestia Bakeenskogo Soveta (Известия Бакинскогo Сoвeтa).<ref name="SovArmenian"/> After the February 1917 revolution which toppled the Tsarist government, Mikoyan and other Bolsheviks in the Caucasus fought in Azerbaijan and along with twenty-six other commissars, was captured and put in prison. Known as the "Baku 26", all twenty-six commissars were executed with exception of Mikoyan, with the circumstances of his survival shrouded in mystery.<ref>MacCauley, Martin. Who's Who in Russia Since 1900. London: Routledge, 1997 p. 144 ISBN 0-4151-3898-1</ref>
With the advent of the Russian Revolution of 1917, Mikoyan was made a commissar in the newly formed Red Army and continued to fight in Baku against anti-Bolshevik forces where he was wounded and was noted for saving the life of fellow future Party member, Sergo Ordzhonikidze. In the same year, he was arrested by interventionist British troops in Baku but escaped. After his release, he continued his Party work, and was one of the co-founders of the Baku soviet in 1919.
[edit] Party Apparatchik
He supported Stalin in the power struggle that followed Lenin's death and was appointed to the Central Committee in 1923. He went on to become People's Commissar for External and Internal Trade in 1926, and imported ideas from the West, such as the manufacture of canned goods.<ref name="SovArmenian"/> In 1935 he was elected to the Politburo, and was among one of the first Soviet leaders to pay goodwill trips to the United States in order to boost economic cooperation.<ref>Khrushchev, Nikita. Khrushchev Remembers. Little Brown & Company, 1970 ISBN 0-316-83140-9</ref> He was responsible for organizing the transport of food and supplies during the Second World War. His son, a pilot in the Red Air Force, was killed in combat when he was shot down by German fighers near Stalingrad. In 1942 he became a member of the State Defense Committee and for his war efforts, was decorated with a Hero of Socialist Labor in 1943.<ref name="GreatSov"> (Russian)The Great Soviet Encyclopedia Online edition</ref> In 1946, Mikoyan became the vice chairman of the Council of Ministers.
Shortly before Stalin's death, Mikoyan, Georgy Malenkov, along with several other Party leaders, were being considered be done away with a second purge by Stalin however this never came to fruition as Stalin died in 1953.<ref name="Timemag"/> Mikoyan originally argued in favor of keeping Stalin's right hand man, Lavrenty Beria from punishment but later curtailed to popular support among Party members of his arrest. He remained in the government after Stalin's death, in the post of minister of trade under Malenkov. He supported Khrushchev in the power struggle to succeed Stalin, and was made First Deputy Premier of the Soviet Union in recognition of his services.
In 1956, Mikoyan was one of the main organizers of Khrushchev's Secret Speech delivered to the 20th Party Congress, denouncing the personality cult held by Stalin.<ref>Time Incorporated. Milestones. Time Magazine. Nov. 6, 1978</ref> Mikoyan was sent to Hungary in October 1956 to resolve the crisis caused by the revolution against the communist government there. He strongly opposed the decision by Khrushchev and the Politburo to use Soviet troops believing it would destroy the Soviet Union's international reputation, instead arguing for "military intimidation" and economic pressure to be applied towards Hungary's government.<ref>Békés, Csaba, Malcolm Byrne, M. János Rainer. The 1956 Hungarian Revolution: A History in Documents. Budapest, Central European University Press, 2003 p. xv ISBN 9-6392-4166-0</ref> The crushing of the revolution by Soviet forces nearly led to Mikoyan's resignation.<ref>Taubman, William. Khrushchev: The Man and His Era. New York: W. W. Norton & Company p. 312 ISBN 0-393-32484-2</ref>
[edit] Foreign Diplomat
In 1957, Mikoyan refused to back the attempt to remove Khrushchev led by Malenkov and Molotov and he became Khrushchev's closest ally. His motivation for backing Khrushchev was because of his strong support for de-Stalinization and his belief that a triumph by the plotters might presage a return to the murderous purges of the 1930s. He continued to hold numerous other posts in the field of trade, and made a number of state visits to the U.S., Japan, and Mexico as well as retaining the title of First Deputy Premier. Mikoyan continued to hold moderate views on the Cold War and was unhappy with Khrushchev's brinkmanship over Berlin in the Checkpoint Charlie Crisis of 1961 and over Khrushchev's walk out from the 1960 Paris Summit over the U-2 Crisis of 1960, which he believed kept tension in the cold war high for another fifteen years. However, throughout this time, he remained Khrushchev's closest ally in the upper echelons of the Soviet leadership.
[edit] Relations with Cuba
The Soviet government welcomed the 1959 overthrow of Cuban president Fulgencio Batista by Fidel Castro's pro-communist rebels. Khrushchev realized the potential of a Soviet ally in the Caribbean and dispatched Mikoyan as one of the top diplomats in the region. He was the first Soviet official to visit the island country after the revolution, securing important trade agreements with the government including the export of oil from the Soviet Union in exchange for Cuban sugar.<ref>PBS. American Experience: Fidel Castro. Castro and the Cold War, p. 8</ref>
[edit] The United States
Khrushchev's liberalization of hard liner polices led to an improvement in relations with the United States during the late 1950s. As Khrushchev's primary ambassador, Mikoyan visited the United States several times, inspecting the country's capitalist-based economic system in contrast to the Soviet Union's. Despite the volatility of the Cold War between the two superpowers, Mikoyan was received amiably amongst Americans, including Minnesota Democrat, Hubert Humphrey who characterized him as someone who showed a "flexibility of attitude" and New York governor Averell Harriman who described him as a "less rigid" Soviet politician.<ref name="Timemag2">Time Incorporated. Down to Hard Cases Time Magazine. January 26, 1959. Retrieved on October 12, 2006</ref> His visits in the United States also included luncheons with Senators from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and with United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower.<ref name="Timemag2"/>
His importance and stature was gauged from his attendance at the funeral of U.S. President John F. Kennedy in 1963, representing the Soviet Union, reassuring President Lyndon Johnson that the Soviet Union had nothing to do with the assassination despite the involvement of Lee Harvey Oswald. Oswald had briefly defected to the Soviet Union prior to his involvement in the assassination of Kennedy.
[edit] Coup involvement
It is claimed by some that by 1964 he had become convinced that Khrushchev had turned into a liability to the Party, and he masterminded the November 1964 coup that brought Leonid Brezhnev to power. However, Taubman disputes this and Mikoyan was the only member of the Presidium (the name for the Politburo at this time) to defend Khrushchev. Mikoyan, however, did vote to force Khrushchev's retirement (so as in traditional soviet style to make the vote unanimous). He was the only one of Khrushchev's colleagues to wish him well in his retirement though he never spoke to him again. It is possible to speculate that this was because it would have been politically unwise to do so or because his patience for Khrushchev had gone by then. His decision to send flowers to his funeral in 1971, was perhaps due to guilt, some retained affection for Khrushchev or both.
His influence was retained under Brezhnev, Mikoyan served as Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet from 1964 until 1965 and then retired. He wrote his memoirs in 1970. He and future Premier of the Soviet Union Alexey Kosygin, were the only two senior officials in the Soviet government whom stepped down from office voluntarily.
He died on October 21, 1978, at the age of 82 from natural causes and was buried at Novodevichy Cemetery in Russia.<ref name="GreatSov"/>
[edit] Trivia
- Mikoyan was a talented cook and was said to prepare gifts for party comrades during New Year's Eve with great zeal: to Joseph Stalin, a boot made of chocolate, for former Soviet premier Georgy Malenkov, a table made of chocolate, to Nikita Khrushchev, a bottle made of chocolate and to Lavrenty Beria, a chocolate pistol.
- While being invited to Mikoyan's kitchen, Beria, remarking on Mikoyan's cooked Shish-Kebab, hailed him as "Comrade Culinary Master." To which Mikoyan replied "Yes, yes, but my dear Lavrenty Pavlovich, in my kitchen you don't find a single damn piece of human meat."<ref name="Timemag"/>
- The Havana-based newspaper, Diario de la Marina, addressed him as "Señor Mikoyan" while Time Magazine repeatedly referred to him as the Soviet Union's "travelling salesman."
- He received a total of six commendations of the Order of Lenin.<ref name="SovArmenian"/>
- His brother, Artem Ivanovich Mikoyan, was the co-founder and one of the primary designers of the Soviet MiG military aircraft.
[edit] Footnotes
<references/>
[edit] Further reading
- Memoirs of Anastas Mikoyan: The Path of Struggle, Vol 1, 1988, Sphinx Press, by Anastas Ivanovich Mikoyan (Sergo Mikoyan, ed.), ISBN 0-943071-04-6
His son, a test pilot, has written about both Artem Ivanovich and Anastas Mikoyan:
- Memoirs Of Military Test-Flying And Life With The Kremlin's Elite, 1999, Airlife Publishing Ltd., by Stepan Anastasovich Mikoyan, ISBN 1-85310-916-9
bg:Анастас Микоян de:Anastas Hovhannessi Mikojan es:Anastas Mikoyan fr:Anastase Mikoyan ja:アナスタス・ミコヤン hu:Anasztasz Ivánovics Mikojan no:Anastas Mikojan pl:Anastas Mikojan ru:Микоян, Анастас Иванович sl:Anastas Mikojan fi:Anastas Mikojan
