Cold War Profile: Mikhail Suslov - Михаила Суслова Биография

A brief series of video footage featuring a look at one of the most influential, but least known Soviet political figures of the Cold War era; Mikhail Suslov.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Биография
• Суслов
• Политбюро
• Президиума
• ЦК
• КПСС
• Михаил Суслов
• Холодная война
• Речь
• Коммунизм
• Ленин
• Социализм
• Совет
• СССР
• Россия
• Политика
• История
• Suslov
• Mikhail Suslov
• USSR
• Soviet
• Communism
• Socialism
• Lenin
• Speech
• Politics
• Analysis
• Politburo
• CPSU
• Russia
• Cold War
• History
• Biography

[dsindc]

Interesting. Khrushchev in his memoirs spent a significant amount of his book on Suslov. He was enormously rigid politically, and personally very austere. From what I recall from Khrushchev's book, RedSamurai84 is spot on. Even Politburo members had their speeches checked for doctrinal correctness. He was very important.

[RedSamurai84]

@dsindc Yes indeed, if Communism ever had a priest, Suslov was that man. He was well known for his conservative views (and he was perhaps the most conservative member of the CPSU CC Politburo), and was extremely passionate about his belief in the Communist ideal. He had an obsession with maintaining the "ideological purity" of Communism. By the 1970s, (and while a collective leadership) he exerted so much influence in the Politburo, one could not make a big decision without his passing.

[RedSamurai84]

@dsindc Oh, also worth mentioning is Suslov and Khrushchev had a rather grim relationship. In fact, you can somewhat see this at Suslov's speech at time index 1:57 Khrushchev is burying his face a little deeper in his hands than his contemporaries.

[declaration963]

I never heard of him, because if people talking about soviet leader in cold war, most of them always talking about Stalin, Khrushchev, Brezhnev, and Gorbachev (Andropov and Chernenko lead soviet union for short time, so they didn't have major rule on cold war)

[RedSamurai84]

@declaration963 Suslov exerted a great amount of influence in the Soviet government during the Cold War. He was the "man behind the scenes" so to speak, but his power was quite evident in the day-to-day runnings of the Politburo. He set a lot of Party agenda, policy, and decision making. In fact, had he outlived Brezhnev, Suslov would have most likely been the most influencing figure in choosing the next Soviet leader.

[Lenin502]

Very nice and interesting video, there is very little information about Suslov on the internet, good job!

[RedSamurai84]

@Lenin502 Yes, its very hard to find any video footage of this man giving speeches, although he gave a lot of them, and was one of the most powerful men in the Soviet Politburo, theres still very little information about him when compared to other Soviet figures.

[Bercelius1]

Забавный говор у Суслова! "совремЁнность", оканье, яканье.

[rog197236]

Sounds like to me Suslov should of been a soviet leader and not just a member of the politburo.The only other video footage i found of him was a short clip of his funeral and there is some interesting info on him in Wikipedia as well.

[dsindc]

@RedSamurai84 Excellent point, and it makes a lot of sense. Nearly all biographies of Khrushchev note his insecurity about his lack of a formal education. Of course in his memoirs, he never came out and said so much, but he would drop hints about this insecurity. I agree with his son Sergei Khrushchev that N.S. Khrushchev was a fascinating man, and a great reformer. We can only wonder what would have happened had he retained his position a while longer. Brezhnev ushed in an era of sclerosis.