random shooting of hostages, and the use of physical torture was
commonly practiced by the Cheka. The rank and file of the Cheka
was largely drawn from the lumpenprolitariat. Most of the new re-
cruits were in their 20s or late teens. Few had more than a village ed-
ucation, and many had no formal education at all. According to recent
academic studies, many came from the Red Guards that had been or-
ganized in 1917, while others came from the underworld. Given au-
thority by the Bolshevik Party to arrest, torture, and execute, they did
so with gusto. Part of the cruelty of the Cheka can be explained by
the revolutionary times, but part of the explanation lies in the raw ma-
terial of the new staff.
The Bolsheviks could not have won the civil war without the
Cheka, but an issue for the Leninist leadership was how to control
the secret police after victory. In late 1921, the Cheka lost much of
the power of carrying out executions. Between 1921 and 1922, exe-
cutions for political offenses dropped from 9,701 to 1,962. In 1922
the number dropped even further to 414. The Cheka also lost some of
its bureaucratic clout when it was folded into the GPUin February- The decision to reduce the terror was a tactical one as the So-
viet leadership began its New Economic Policyto help the country
recover from the ravages of war and famine.
The Cheka was originally devised by Lenin and Dzerzhinsky as a
domestic counterintelligence service. Its foreign operations were an
extension of its domestic security and counterintelligence missions.
The Cheka did not establish a foreign intelligence component, the In-
ostranniy otdel, until December 1920, three years after the organiza-
tion’s founding. Since its primary responsibility was rooting out sub-
version, foreign intelligence operations were directed against émigré
White Russian organizations and the Western states that supported
them. During this period, most Cheka foreign intelligence operations
were directed by non-Russians because of their extensive revolution-
ary experience outside the Russian empire.
Under Dzerzhinsky, the Cheka became a major player in Soviet
politics. The security service became the prime source of information
about developments within and outside the country for the political
leadership. Moreover, beginning with Lenin, Soviet leaders used the
service to intimidate and silence enemies of the revolution and the
state. These years were portrayed as a period of heroic revolutionary
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