One of its most important functions was the security of revolutionary order, and the fight against counterrevolutionary activity (see: Anti-Soviet agitation). On December 1, 1917, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee (VTsIK or TsIK) reviewed a proposed reorganization of the VRK, and possible replacement of it.
Trifonov. On December 7, 1917, all invited except Zhydelev and Vasilevsky gathered in the Smolny Institute to discuss the competence and structure of the commission to combat counterrevolution and sabotage.
The commission was created not under the VTsIK as was previously anticipated, but rather under the Council of the People's Commissars. On December 8, 1917, some of the original members of the VCheka were replaced.
Through the winter of 1917–1918, all activities of VCheKa were centralized mainly in the city of Petrograd.
Although the VCheKa was officially an independent organization from the NKVD, its chief members such as Dzerzhinsky, Latsis, Unszlicht, and Uritsky (all main chekists), since November 1917 composed the collegiate of NKVD headed by Petrovsky.
Historian James Ryan gives a modest estimate of 28,000 executions per year from December 1917 to February 1922. Lenin himself seemed unfazed by the killings.
On December 11, Fomin was ordered to organize a section to suppress "speculation." And in the same day, VCheKa offered Shchukin to conduct arrests of counterfeiters. In January 1918, a subsection of the anti-counterrevolutionary effort was created to police bank officials.
By March 1918, when the organization came to Moscow, it contained the following sections: against counterrevolution, speculation, non-residents, and information gathering.
By the end of 1918–1919, some new units were created: secretly operative, investigatory, of transportation, military (special), operative, and instructional.
On January 14, 1918, Sovnarkom ordered Dzerzhinsky to organize teams of "energetic and ideological" sailors to combat speculation.
By the spring of 1918, the commission had several teams: in addition to the Sveaborge team, it had an intelligence team, a team of sailors, and a strike team.
In November 1918, Petrovsky was appointed as head of the All-Ukrainian Central Military Revolutionary Committee during VCheKa's expansion to provinces and front-lines.
At the time of political competition between Bolsheviks and SRs (January 1918), Left SRs attempted to curb the rights of VCheKa and establish through the Narkomiust their control over its work.
However, Sovnarkom, in which the majority belonged to the representatives of RSDLP(b) retained the right to approve members of the collegium of the VCheKa. Originally, members of the Cheka were exclusively Bolshevik; however, in January 1918, Left SRs also joined the organization.
The Left SRs were expelled or arrested later in 1918, following the attempted assassination of Lenin by an SR, Fanni Kaplan. === Consolidation of VCheKa and National Establishment === By the end of January 1918, the Investigatory Commission of Petrograd Soviet (probably same as of Revtribunal) petitioned Sovnarkom to delineate the role of detection and judicial-investigatory organs.
On January 31, 1918, Sovnarkom ordered to relieve VCheKa of the investigative functions, leaving for the commission only the functions of detection, suppression, and prevention of anti revolutionary crimes.
At the meeting of the Council of People's Commissars on January 31, 1918, a merger of VCheKa and the Commission of Bonch-Bruyevich was proposed.
A decision followed two weeks later. On February 23, 1918, VCheKa sent a radio telegram to all Soviets with a petition to immediately organize emergency commissions to combat counter-revolution, sabotage and speculation, if such commissions had not been yet organized.
February 1918 saw the creation of local Extraordinary Commissions.
On February 25, 1918, as the counterrevolutionary organization Union of Front-liners was making advances, the executive committee of the Saratov Soviet formed a counter-revolutionary section.
On March 7, 1918, because of the move from Petrograd to Moscow, the Petrograd Cheka was created.
Establishment of provincial Extraordinary Commissions was largely completed by August 1918.
In the Soviet Republic, there were 38 gubernatorial Chekas (Gubcheks) by this time. On June 12, 1918, the All-Russian Conference of Cheka adopted the Basic Provisions on the Organization of Extraordinary Commissions.
In August 1918, in the Soviet Republic had accounted for some 75 Uyezd-level Extraordinary Commissions.
In 1918, the All-Russia Extraordinary Commission and the Soviets managed to establish a local Cheka apparatus.
In addition, border security Chekas were included in the system of local Cheka bodies. In the autumn of 1918, as consolidation of the political situation of the republic continued, a move toward elimination of Uyezd-, Raion-, and Volost-level Chekas, as well as the institution of Extraordinary Commissions was considered.
On August 7, 1918, Sovnarkom adopted a decree on the organization of the railway section at VCheKa.
In August 1918, railway sections were formed under the Gubcheks.
The gubernatorial and oblast-type Chekas retained in relation to the transportation sections only control and investigative functions. The beginning of a systematic work of organs of VCheKa in RKKA refers to July 1918, the period of extreme tension of the civil war and class struggle in the country.
On July 16, 1918, the Council of People's Commissars formed the Extraordinary Commission for combating counterrevolution at the Czechoslovak (Eastern) Front, led by M.
In the fall of 1918, Extraordinary Commissions to combat counterrevolution on the Southern (Ukraine) Front were formed.
On December 9, 1918, the collegiate (or presidium) of VCheKa had decided to form a military section, headed by M.
In this, the Cheka said that they targeted "class enemies" such as the bourgeoisie, and members of the clergy; the first organized mass repression began against the libertarians and socialists of Petrograd in April 1918.
On April 11/12, 1918, some 26 anarchist political centres in Moscow were attacked.
The Red Terror, implemented by Dzerzhinsky on September 5, 1918, was vividly described by the Red Army journal Krasnaya Gazeta: Without mercy, without sparing, we will kill our enemies in scores of hundreds.
Throughout the course of the civil war, several thousand deserters were shot – a number comparable to that of belligerents during World War I. In September 1918, according to The Black Book of Communism, in only twelve provinces of Russia, 48,735 deserters and 7,325 "bandits" were arrested, 1,826 were killed and 2,230 were executed.
On January 20, 1919, VTsIK adopted a resolution prepared by VCheKa, On the abolition of Uyezd Extraordinary Commissions.
In early 1919, the military control and the military section of VCheKa were merged into one body, the Special Section of the Republic, with Kedrov as head.
In May 1919, two Cheka agents sent to assassinate Makhno were caught and executed. Many victims of Cheka repression were "bourgeois hostages" rounded up and held in readiness for summary execution in reprisal for any alleged counter-revolutionary act.
This had become the standard method used later by the NKVD to liquidate Joseph Stalin's purge victims and others. === Persecution of deserters === It is believed that there were more than three million deserters from the Red Army in 1919 and 1920.
Approximately 500,000 deserters were arrested in 1919 and close to 800,000 in 1920, by troops of the 'Special Punitive Department' of the Cheka, created to punish desertions.
This decision was approved by the Conference of the Extraordinary Commission IV, held in early February 1920. === Other types of Cheka === On August 3, a VCheKa section for combating counterrevolution, speculation and sabotage on railways was created.
The order instructed agencies everywhere to unite the Military control and the military sections of Chekas and to form special sections of frontlines, armies, military districts, and guberniyas. In November 1920 the Soviet of Labor and Defense created a Special Section of VCheKa for the security of the state border.
This had become the standard method used later by the NKVD to liquidate Joseph Stalin's purge victims and others. === Persecution of deserters === It is believed that there were more than three million deserters from the Red Army in 1919 and 1920.
Approximately 500,000 deserters were arrested in 1919 and close to 800,000 in 1920, by troops of the 'Special Punitive Department' of the Cheka, created to punish desertions.
On 12 January 1920, while addressing trade union leaders, he said: "We did not hesitate to shoot thousands of people, and we shall not hesitate, and we shall save the .
The Chekists also often carried with them Greek-style worry beads made of amber, which had become "fashionable among high officials during the time of the 'cleansing'". == History == In 1921, the Troops for the Internal Defense of the Republic (a branch of the Cheka) numbered at least 200,000.
By 1921, it changed once again, forming the following sections: directory of affairs, administrative-organizational, secretly operative, economical, and foreign affairs. === First months === In the first months of its existence, VCheKa consisted of only 40 officials.
On 14 May 1921, the Politburo, chaired by Lenin, passed a motion "broadening the rights of the [Cheka] in relation to the use of the [death penalty]." == Atrocities == The Cheka engaged in the widespread practice of torture.
On February 6, 1922, after the Ninth All-Russian Soviet Congress, the Cheka was dissolved by VTsIK, "with expressions of gratitude for heroic work." It was replaced by the State Political Administration or OGPU, a section of the NKVD of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR).
Historian James Ryan gives a modest estimate of 28,000 executions per year from December 1917 to February 1922. Lenin himself seemed unfazed by the killings.
Films featuring the Cheka include Ostern's Miles of Fire, Nikita Mikhalkov's At Home among Strangers, the miniseries The Adjutant of His Excellency, and also Dead Season (starring Donatas Banionis), and the 1992 Russian drama film The Chekist. In Spain, during the Spanish Civil War, the detention and torture centers operated by the Republicans were named "checas" after the Soviet organization.
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