The Thaw: the USSR under Khrushchev (1953-1964)

Khrushchev and the first thaw in politics

Stalin died on 5 March 1953. A group of leaders ruled together for a short time. The secret police chief Beria was arrested in June 1953. In September Nikita Khrushchev became First Secretary of the Party.

• The Secret Speech (25 February 1956): at the 20th Party Congress Khrushchev told delegates that Stalin had abused his power, with arrests and terror and a "cult of personality" (too much praise of one leader).
• Results: many prisoners from the Gulag came home, and names of those wrongly shot were cleared (this is "rehabilitation"). The camp system shrank a lot. Secret police were put under the Party.
• Limits: the Party stayed the only party, there were no free elections, and criticism of Lenin or the system was still banned.
• Power struggle: in 1957 some leaders tried to remove Khrushchev but failed. In 1961 Stalin's body was taken out of the Mausoleum on Red Square.

Economy and daily life

Khrushchev wanted to give people more food and better homes, and show that socialism could win the race with the West.

• Virgin Lands (from 1954): millions of young volunteers ploughed new land in Kazakhstan and Siberia. Harvests were large in some years, and dust storms and bad years hurt others.
• Industry: in 1957 many ministries were replaced by regional economic councils (sovnarkhozy). The idea was to give regions more say, but it caused confusion and was undone in 1965.
• Housing: a huge programme built cheap five-storey blocks, nicknamed khrushchyovki. Millions moved out of shared flats.
• Living conditions: a pension law (1956), a shorter working day, more fridges, radios and TVs. Early 1960s brought food shortages and price rises, and in 1963 the USSR bought grain abroad.
• Plan: a Seven-Year Plan (1959-65) and a promise of "communism by 1980".

Science, technology and the space programme

Science got money and respect. The first nuclear power station at Obninsk started in 1954. The jet airliner Tu-104 flew from 1956. A science town, Akademgorodok, was built in Siberia in 1957.

• 4 October 1957: Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, orbited Earth. A month later the dog Laika flew.
• 1959: Luna 2 reached the Moon, and Luna 3 took the first photos of its far side.
• 12 April 1961: Yuri Gagarin flew once around the Earth in Vostok 1 (108 minutes). He became the first human in space.
• 16 June 1963: Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space.

The chief designer was Sergei Korolev, whose name was kept secret then. The USA answered with its own programme: this is the space race, a part of the Cold War.

Culture in the Thaw

The name "Thaw" comes from a 1954 novel by Ilya Ehrenburg. Writers, film-makers and poets tried to speak more honestly.

• Poets such as Yevtushenko and Voznesensky read to crowds in squares and halls.
• Films: The Cranes Are Flying (1957) won the top prize at Cannes in 1958.
• Books: in 1962 Solzhenitsyn's One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich was printed, the first story about a camp from the inside. Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago was published abroad, and he had to refuse the 1958 Nobel Prize.
• Limits: in 1962 Khrushchev angrily criticised modern art at an exhibition. Culture was freer, but the Party still decided the borders.
• Opening to the world: the 1957 World Festival of Youth in Moscow brought many foreign guests.

Foreign policy: coexistence and crises

Khrushchev spoke of peaceful coexistence: the two systems can live side by side without war, and compete in peace.

• 1955: the Warsaw Pact military alliance was formed; the USSR also made peace with Yugoslavia and signed a treaty on Austria.
• 1956: in Hungary a revolt began and Soviet tanks crushed it in November. Reform had clear limits in the Eastern bloc.
• 1959: Khrushchev visited the USA, the first Soviet leader to do so. In 1960 a spy plane (U-2) was shot down and a summit failed.
• 1961: the Berlin Wall was built in August.
• 1962: Cuban Missile Crisis. Soviet missiles sent to Cuba, an American blockade, and 13 tense days. It ended when the USSR removed the missiles and the USA promised not to invade Cuba.
• 1963: a telephone hotline between the leaders and a partial nuclear test-ban treaty.
• Others: support for newly free countries such as India (steel mills, loans) and a growing quarrel with China from about 1960.

In October 1964 the Party leaders removed Khrushchev, saying he took risky decisions. Leonid Brezhnev took over.

Try it

In the free-play step slide to 1961 and 1962. Predict: will the pointer be higher at 1961 or 1962? Then to 1963: why does it fall? At home, find the date 12 April 1961 on a calendar and say how many years ago that was.

Key formulas and definitions

• Stalin dies 5 March 1953; Khrushchev First Secretary September 1953
• Secret Speech: 25 February 1956, 20th Party Congress
• Virgin Lands campaign from 1954; Seven-Year Plan 1959-65
• Sputnik: 4 October 1957; Gagarin: 12 April 1961 (108 minutes); Tereshkova: 16 June 1963
• Hungary 1956; Berlin Wall August 1961; Cuban Missile Crisis October 1962 (13 days)
• Test-ban treaty 1963; Khrushchev removed October 1964
• Key words: thaw, de-Stalinisation, rehabilitation, peaceful coexistence, space race

Worked examples

Common mistakes

• Thinking the Thaw meant democracy. The Party stayed in sole control.
• Mixing Sputnik (a satellite, 1957) with Gagarin (a person, 1961).
• Saying Khrushchev started the Cold War. It began earlier; he ran the USSR through two of its biggest crises, Berlin and Cuba.
• Believing Khrushchev lost power in a revolt. He was removed by Party leaders in October 1964 without violence.