Dmitry Stepanovich Polyansky

Polyansky, who had fervently defended Khrushchev during the 1957 'Anti-Party Group' crisis, played a decisive role in bringing down that same Khrushchev just seven years later. In the summer of 1964, Brezhnev and other party leaders conspired to oust Khrushchev, and Polyansky was secretly tasked with drafting a prosecutorial-style indictment. Known as the 'Polyansky Report,' the document systematically attacked Khrushchev across 29 points: economic mismanagement, agricultural policy failures, autocratic leadership, and the promotion of a personality cult. According to historian Rudolf Pikhoya's research and the testimony of KGB Chairman Vladimir Semichastny, the report was actually prepared by KGB economic analysts and clandestinely typed on two old typewriters. On October 14, 1964, Khrushchev was summoned from his vacation in Pitsunda to face the Presidium of the Central Committee. Polyansky opened with a blistering critique that set the tone; other colleagues piled on. The full prepared text, meant to be read aloud to the Central Committee plenum if Khrushchev refused to resign, proved unnecessary: Khrushchev capitulated without resistance. Orders were given to destroy the report, but it survived, becoming a vivid documentary record of Soviet power struggles at their most naked. That Polyansky, once Khrushchev's loyal ally, became the architect of his political demise starkly illuminates the brutal nature of Soviet elite politics.