Andrei Gromyko
Andrei Gromyko | |
|---|---|
Андрей Громыко | |
Gromyko in 1972 | |
| Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union | |
| In office 27 July 1985 – 1 October 1988 | |
| Deputy | Vasily Kuznetsov Pyotr Demichev |
| Preceded by | Konstantin Chernenko Vasily Kuznetsov (acting) |
| Succeeded by | Mikhail Gorbachev |
| First Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union | |
| In office 24 March 1983 – 2 July 1985 | |
| Premier | Nikolai Tikhonov |
| Preceded by | Heydar Aliyev |
| Succeeded by | Nikolai Talyzin |
| Full member of the 24th, 25th, 26th, 27th Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union | |
| In office 27 April 1973 – 30 September 1988 | |
| Minister of Foreign Affairs | |
| In office 15 February 1957 – 2 July 1985 | |
| Premier | Nikolai Bulganin Nikita Khrushchev Alexei Kosygin Nikolai Tikhonov |
| Preceded by | Dmitri Shepilov |
| Succeeded by | Eduard Shevardnadze |
| Permanent Representative of the Soviet Union to the United Nations | |
| In office April 1946 – May 1948 | |
| Premier | Joseph Stalin |
| Preceded by | Post created |
| Succeeded by | Yakov Malik |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Andrei Andreyevich Gromyko 18 July [O.S. 5 July] 1909 Staryye Gromyki, Mogilev Governorate, Russian Empire (now Gomel, Belarus) |
| Died | 2 July 1989 (aged 79) Moscow, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union |
| Resting place | Novodevichy Cemetery, Moscow |
| Political party | Communist Party of the Soviet Union (1931–1989) |
| Spouse |
Lydia Grinevich (m. 1931) |
| Children | 2, including Anatoly |
| Profession | |
Andrei Andreyevich Gromyko[a] (18 July [O.S. 5 July] 1909 – 2 July 1989)[2] was a Soviet politician and diplomat during the Cold War. He served as Minister of Foreign Affairs (1957–1985) and as Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet (1985–1988). Gromyko was responsible for many top decisions on Soviet foreign policy until he retired in 1988. In the 1940s, Western pundits called him Mr. Nyet ("Mr. No"), or Grim Grom, because of his frequent use of the Soviet veto in the United Nations Security Council.[3]
Gromyko's political career started in 1939 in the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs (renamed Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1946). He became the Soviet ambassador to the United States in 1943, leaving that position in 1946 to become the Soviet Permanent Representative to the United Nations in New York. Upon his return to Moscow he became a Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and later First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and eventually Foreign Minister. He went on to become the Soviet ambassador to the United Kingdom in 1952.
As Foreign Minister of the Soviet Union, Gromyko was directly involved in deliberations with the Americans during the Cuban Missile Crisis and helped broker a peace treaty ending the 1965 Indo-Pakistani War. Under the leadership of Leonid Brezhnev, he played a central role in the establishment of détente with the United States by negotiating the ABM Treaty, the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty and the SALT I & II, among others. As Brezhnev's health deteriorated from the mid-1970s onward, Gromyko began to increasingly dictate Soviet policy alongside Defense Minister Dmitry Ustinov and KGB Chairman Yuri Andropov.[4][5][6] Even after Brezhnev's death in 1982, Gromyko's rigid conservatism and distrust of the West continued to underlie the Soviet Union's foreign policy until Mikhail Gorbachev's rise to power in 1985.
Upon Konstantin Chernenko's selection as General Secretary on 13 February 1984, Andrei Gromyko formed an unofficial triumvirate alongside Ustinov and Chernenko that governed the Soviet Union through the end of the year.[7][8] However, following Gorbachev's election as General Secretary in March 1985, Gromyko was removed from office as foreign minister and appointed to the largely ceremonial post of Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. He ultimately retired from political life in 1988, and died the following year in Moscow.
- ^ Соседи по парте (in Russian). RPP. Archived from the original on 10 March 2010. Retrieved 11 September 2010.
- ^ Frankel, Benjamin (1992). "Andrei Gromyko". The Cold War, 1945-1991: Leaders and other important figures in the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, China, and the Third World. Gale Research. ISBN 9780810389267.
- ^ Schmemann, Serge (4 October 1982). "Russians Come and Go, but Not Gromyko". The New York Times.
- ^ Figes, Orlando (2014). Revolutionary Russia 1891-1991: A History. Henry Holt & Company. p. 266. ISBN 978-0-8050-9131-1.
As Brezhnev's health deteriorated following a major stroke in 1975, real power passed into the hands of Yuri Andropov, Gromyko and Dmitry Ustinov, the new hawkish Defence Minister, who pushed for an even bolder policy abroad.
- ^ Haslam, Jonathan (2011). Russia's Cold War: From the October Revolution to the Fall of the Wall. Yale University Press. pp. 299–300. ISBN 978-0-300-15997-4.
"Brezhnev's sickness created a further problem….He collapsed in mid-August 1968, the eve of the invasion of Czechoslovakia. A further seizure occurred—which proved a turning point—immediately after the negotiations at Okeanskaya, Vladivostok, 23–24 November 1974. Brezhnev was then said to be working only a three-day week….Thereafter Brezhnev's capacity to concentrate diminished with progressive arteriosclerosis leading to onset of senile dementia, doubtless hastened by beta-blockers taken to lower blood pressure for relief of the heart. Growing dependence on sleeping pills made matters worse…Although decisions still required Brezhnev's assent, the substance of power tacitly passed to a troika: Andropov, Gromyko, and Ustinov, who met in the orekhovaya room (paneled in walnut) where the entire Politburo foregathered on Thursdays."
- ^ McCauley, Martin. The Cold War 1949-2016. Routledge. p. 189. ISBN 9781138999015.
Brezhnev's health was a cause of concern, and there were many cruel Soviet jokes about his incompetence. By the mid-1970s, he was only able to work for short periods, and a troika took over: Yuri Andropov, head of the KGB; Andrei Gromyko, foreign minister; and Marshal Dmitry Ustinov, the minister of defence.
- ^ Saxon, Wolfgang (12 March 1984). "Succession In Moscow: Siberian Peasant Who Won Power; Konstantin Chernenko, A Brezhnev Protege, Led Brief Regime". The New York Times.
- ^ Thatcher, Gary (24 December 1984). "Moscow's 'Safe Choice' Kremlin Reaffirms Preference for Seasoned Officials by Naming Sokolov to Top Soviet Defense Post". The Christian Science Monitor.
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