Soviet Union 1991

On the third floor of the Kremlin Senate, there is a conference room dedicated to the members of the Political Bureau. In the Gorbachev era, this was a conference room used exclusively for the Political Bureau meetings. Now Yanayev has turned the conference room into a special place for private meetings. Although in the eyes of some people, this does not conform to the so-called traditional regulations. But no one objects, because the CPSU is such a strange place, and the leaders have absolute say in some harmless aspects.

This time, the participants in this secret meeting are the Chairman of the Council of Ministers Rezhkov, Prime Minister Pavlov, the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Russia Polozkov, and the First Secretary of the Moscow City Committee Prokofiev. Two of the secretaries were re-elected from the 28th Congress and served as the new members of the ******. Even Pavlov, Rezhkov, and even Yanayev himself, are new members elected at the 29th Congress.

Sitting in the conference room are either the real power figures in Russia or the important leaders of the government departments of the entire CPSU. Although Ryzhkov took away half of Pavlov's power, he was able to better balance the power between the two people, avoiding the danger of a single leader and avoiding the emergence of an ambitious Chairman of the Council of Ministers in 1953.

Checks and balances and centralization are always important and eternal in the Soviet political system.

Yanayev did not gather these people together on a whim. He wanted to know what kind of results his reforms would have. After August 1991, Ryzhkov, who served as Minister of Economy, began to exert his own policy means. Compared with Gorbachev's unrealistic chaos, Ryzhkov seemed to be more steady. First, stabilize the fluctuations of the semi-open market, the government regained control of prices, and had absolute say in important materials, instead of leaving all adjustments to the so-called invisible hands. After stabilizing the market, Ryzhkov began to slowly loosen the policy, leaving a small number of commodities to the market for management, and then slowly expand this scope.

"In 1992, we got rid of the nightmare of negative economic growth. The economic growth rate for that year was 1.1%. Compared with the economic recession of 1.3% in 1990 and 1991, such an achievement is not easy. A lot of credit goes to President Yanaev's general principles and policies." Ryzhkov read the recent data reports seriously. He once served as the Minister of Economy and has a paranoid sensitivity to numbers.

"What about the social aspect? Comrades Prokofiev and Polozkov, I want to hear your opinions." The ultimate result of political instability is that it will affect social instability. So Yanaev, who lives behind high walls, needs to learn about the outside situation through others.

"In 1991, the number of public security incidents in Moscow reached its highest peak in history. There were 456 public security incidents in just one year, not counting political demonstrations such as parades. After 1992, there was a decline, with only 389 incidents. This year, the number of public security incidents has dropped again. There were only 311 public security incidents."

After hearing Prokofiev's answer, Yanayev was finally in a better mood than before. Thinking of the ignorant people standing in the square on August 19, he had a headache. After the iron-blooded suppression and the disclosure of the truth, Yeltsin's supporters almost disappeared in Moscow. Now freedom and democracy have become synonymous with dirty foot binding in the Soviet Union. Most people no longer agree with these dirty ideas mixed with peaceful evolution policies.

"Russia's economic environment is also much better than before, mainly because economic growth has shown a good trend. In 1993, the economic growth rate increased by 150% compared with the previous year. From the original negative growth to the current 1.4% economic growth rate." Polozkov replied.

"Then Comrades Pavlov and Rezhikov. The economic work of the Soviet Union still needs to be handed over to you. The Soviet economy has recovered but is still far from reaching its peak." Yanayev tactfully expressed his hope that they could do their best to improve the Soviet economy.

"I also know that there are still many difficulties now, and I hope that everyone here can understand us, because we have tried our best." At this point, Yanayev also looked at Polozkov. Russia was the first internal force to start the split. Now he hopes that Polozkov can curb the political disaster that spread from Russia itself to the entire member states.

Everyone nodded in agreement, saying that they would respect the decision of General Secretary Yanayev. But only Yanayev himself knew how difficult it was to make the Soviet economy move forward. Almost every step is like walking on a tightrope on a cliff, and if you are not careful, you will be wiped out.

After this small secret meeting, Yanayev asked Pavlov to stay for a while, and he still had some things to explain to Pavlov. Yanaev drew the heavy curtains in the conference room. In the room, the light of the crystal chandelier shone, and there were only two silent men.

"I want to know what you think recently, Comrade Pavlov." Yanaev didn't like to beat around the bush, so he said directly. "Especially after Rezhkov became the Chairman of the Council of Ministers, I want to know how your work is going?"

Yanayev was also asking in disguise whether you were dissatisfied with Rezhkov's seizure of your rights? In fact, Yanayev's independent position as Chairman of the Council of Ministers was much smaller than before. Its power only covered the scope of economy and people's livelihood, and other powers were still tightly held in Pavlov's hands.

"Thank you for the General Secretary's concern. My work is going smoothly. Comrade Rezhkov is worthy of being the Chairman of the Council of Ministers before. His experience in this area is obviously much better than mine. Of course, if you ask me whether I agree with the General Secretary's approach. I can say that I agree and respect the General Secretary's decision."

Hearing Pavlov's answer, Yanayev's heart finally settled down. Regardless of whether Pavlov's words were sincere or against his will, he heard an explanation. Even if the other party pretended to obey and tried to seize power, he could kick him out of the list of members of the Political Bureau. After all, Yanayev was the one who held absolute power.

"Very good, Comrade Pavlov, you go and get busy first." Yanayev said.

Pavlov nodded and replied, "If there is nothing else, I will leave first, General Secretary Yanayev."

"Goodbye, Comrade Pavlov." Yanayev waved goodbye, watching the other person's figure slowly disappear from his sight. At this time, he picked up the recent work schedule list, circled the original itinerary of visiting the republics, and added another work arrangement information.

Inspect military enterprises across the country and give corresponding instructions for their projects.

After the Soviet Union disbanded a large number of troops and sealed a part of the arms, the rest were sold to third world countries. At this time, Soviet arms were in a period of shortage. The old batch had been retired, but the new batch had not yet formed the corresponding combat effectiveness.

Yanayev's move was nothing more than telling others that although the Soviet Union gave up the arms race and space race with the United States, it did not mean that the Soviet military industry had been stagnant. What he had to do was to tell others with practical actions that the general secretary respected the Soviet military projects very much.

After writing this line, Yanaev wrote another sentence on the other side of the memo. Although it was only a few short letters, the information revealed in it shocked at least half of the Soviet government. After writing it, Yanaev felt that something was wrong, so he crumpled it up and threw it into the trash can. To avoid his deepest thoughts being discovered.

The note lying in the wastepaper basket had a sentence written on it: Reduce the number of people in the Ministry of Internal Affairs and cut the power of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. (To be continued.)