Historical Dictionary of Russian and Soviet Intelligence

information for almost a decade. In August 1948, Chambers testi-

fied before the House Un-American Activities Committee and then

before several federal grand juries about the scope of Soviet intel-

ligence in the United States. In his testimony, he identified Hiss and

others as Soviet agents. Hiss denied the charges before the same

committee and was later tried and convicted of perjury.

In the last 25 years of his life, Chambers wrote in detail about his

life as a Soviet agent and a communist. To many on the left, he was

seen as a false witness and a despicable person who had sent an in-

nocent man to jail. Soviet archives and intercepted NKVDintelli-

gence messages suggest that Chambers was an accurate witness, and

that his portrayal of Hiss and Soviet subversion in Washington in the

1930s and 1940s was accurate. His autobiography is now seen as one

of the best books on American society and politics in the 1930s.

CHEBRIKOV, VIKTOR MIKHAILOVICH (1923–1999). Che-

brikov, an old political ally of Leonid Brezhnev, was promoted from

a position as a director of an industrial institute in Dneprepropetrovsk

to KGBdeputy chair for personnel in 1967. The move was an effort

by Brezhnev to ensure his control of the KGB. Following Semyon

Tsvygun’s death in January 1982, Chebrikov was made first deputy

chair of the KGB. Apparently well thought of by Yuri Andropov, he

was made KGB chair that December and continued the prosecution

of religious and political dissidentsin 1982–1985. Mikhail Gor-

bachev, following his promotion to lead the Communist Party,

brought Chebrikov into the Communist Party Politburo in 1985.

Chebrikov never fully supported Gorbachev’s policies of glasnost

and perestroika. In 1987 he took issue with public disclosure of the

historic and present abuses of the KGB and began quietly to sabotage

Gorbachev’s policies. In his 1987 and 1988 top secret reports to the

Politburo, Chebrikov blamed Western agents and Trotskyitesabo-

teurs for the growing level of civil disobedience in the Soviet Union.

Chebrikov reportedly believed the Soviet Union was the victim of a

CIA plot.

In 1988 Gorbachev replaced Chebrikov with Vladimir Kryuchkov,

shuffling Chebrikov into the Communist Party bureaucracy, where he

continued to oppose Gorbachev. In 1989 Gorbachev forced his retire-

ment, apparently concerned about his ability to effect policies in the

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