Alexander Korzhakov

File:1991 coup yeltsin.jpg

Being the President's bodygard, Korzhakov (second from left) stands with Boris Yeltsin on a tank to defy the August coup on August 18, 1991.

Alexander Vasilyevich Korzhakov (‹See Tfd›Russian: Александр Васильевич Коржаков) (born january 31 1950 in Moscow), was a KGB general who served as Boris Yeltsin's bodyguard, confidant, and adviser for 11 years. He was the head of the Presidential Security Service (PSB) in 1993-1996, State Duma deputy, and retired Lieutenant-general. Korzhakov had been Yeltsin bodyguard since 1985, and on August 18, 1991, he stood next to his boss on top of a tank during Yeltsin's historic speech.

Being the Chief of the Security Service, Karzhakov was widely criticized for interfering in Government business. In 1996, he was finally sacked after losing a power struggel with the Prime Minister. He then successfully ran for a seat in the State Duma where he received immunity from prosecution. In 1997, Korzhakov published his book, a cynical biography based on his experience in the very top of Russian politics. In the biography he contends that he and the Security Service "governed the country for three years".

Early life

Alexander Korzhakov was born in Moscow to a worker family. After graduating at secondary school, he worked as an assembly worker. In 1969–1970 he served as a private in the Kremlin Regiment. In 1970–1989 he served in the KGB 9th Chief Directorate, "Protection of Higher Party and Government Officials". As a KGB official, he became a member of the Communist Party in 1971, being a member of the Party bureau of subdivisions and member of the committee of the Komsomol for the 9th administration.

In 1978 he was transferred into a KGB subdivision, which dealt with personal protection. In 1980 he graduated "by Correspondence" from a Moscow Law Institute (‹See Tfd›Russian: Всесоюзный юридический заочный институт Moskovskiy Yuridichesky Institut, Zaochny fakultet). Following service in Afganistan in 1981–1982, he was one of president Yuri Andropov's personal bodyguards in 1983–1984. In 1985 he became one of three personal bodyguards of Boris Yeltsin, who at the time was the leader of the Communist Party organization in Moscow. When, in 1987, Yeltsin was removed from his party position, Korzhakov kept the friendship and in 1989 was retired from KGB for his support of Yeltsin - officially, Korzhakov was discharged from the KGB due to "health and age reasons". After his retirement he became a private body guard of Yeltsin, albeit officially worked as the Chief of Security of a co-operative named "Plastic".

After the incident on September 28, 1989, when Boris Yeltsin fell from a bridge, Korzhakov set up a unit of former KGB agents to protect Yeltsin. Following the election of Yeltsin in June 1991 as President of the RSFSR, Korzhakov became the Chief of Yeltsin's Security Service, which was later transformed into the Presidental Security Service when the Soviet union was disolved. He was responsible for the protection of Yeltsin during the August coup attempt in 1991 and on October 4, 1993, when the White House of Russia was stormed.

Head of the Security Service

File:October1993crisis.jpg

The storming of the White House of Russia. During the October crisis in 1993, Korzhakov was responsible for the personal protection of Boris Yeltsin

Being the head of the Presidential Security Service, Korzhakov was frequently accused of interfering in governmental affairs, as the Service gathered evidence on high government officials engaged in corruption, bribe-taking, and squandering money. He was regarded as one of the hard-liners opposed to market reform, a strong backer of the war in Chechnya, and an opponent to holding the presidential election in 1996.

In December 1994, Korzhakov organized an armed raid on the Moscow headquarters of Most Bank headed by Vladimir Gusinsky, an ally with Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov, who was a potential rival to Yeltsin in the 1996 presidential elections. Soon after the raid, Luzhkov denied he had any desire to run for president - and Gusinsky quickly moved with his family to London.

Running up to the 1996 Presidental election, there were serious doubts that President Boris Yeltsin would allow elections to take place. On May 5, 1996, Korzhakov explicitly called for postponing the elections. However, the elections took place as planned and Yeltsin finished first in the June 16, 1996, initial round of the Presidential elections with about 35% of the vote, scheduled to compete with Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov in the runoff on July 3, 1996.

During Korzhakov's reign, it is believed that the Presidential Security Service acquired documents which implicated first deputy prime minister Anatoly Chubais in illegal financial transactions during the privatization period that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union. On June 19, 1996 Sergei Lisovsky (a wealthy advertising and showbusiness magnate) and Arkady Yevstafyev (a close aide to former first deputy prime minister Anatoly Chubais) were arrested while leaving the White House of Russia, allegedly carrying a case containing 500 thousand dollars. After being questioned for 11 hours by Presidential Security Service, Lisovsky and Yevstafyev were released. Tipped off by Chubais, television networks started to broadcast updates on the unfolding scandal through the night, portraying the arrests as a coup attempt by Korzhakov. The next day, June 20, 1996, Korzhakov was abruptly dismissed by Yeltsin at the urging of Chubais.

According to one view, the firings of Korzhakov were the result of a battle between factions within the President's inner circle - between a group that wanted to take power by force and a group that wanted to win the election "legitimately." Others saw the events in the context of an ongoing struggle between three groups: the former heads of the power ministries, representatives of the energy complex, and representatives from financial circles.

The biography

In his biography, Boris Yeltsin : From Dawn to Dusk (1997), Korzhakov describes how the Russian Political elite views democracy - an overwhelmingly negative evaluation of Russian politics. Naturally, the book has been severely critizised, however, only few people have accused the author of inventing or distorting the major facts. Even Korzhakov's most furious critics have not come forward to accuse the author of publishing libelous falsehoods. Therefore, future historians might very well consider Korzhakov's book an outstanding source of information about the Boris Yeltsin era.

The 1993 storming of the Parliament

An important contribution of the biography is its description of the anti-democratic mentality inside the Kremlin. Korzhakov explains the severely negative outlook of Yeltsin, and the ruling elite as a whole, towards the democratic institutions. Korzhakov recounts certain developments in March, 1993, when the Russian parliament was only inches away from impeaching the president. Aware of this danger, Yeltsin ordered Korzhakov to prepare the arrest of all deputies in the case of impeachment. Refering to documents never published before, Korzhakov asserts that Yeltsin had even planned to use chemical gases in order to "smoke" the deputies from the building. Fortunately for the deputies, impeachment did not occur - and Yeltsin was satisfied with using tankfire to get the deputies out of the Parliament building.

The 1996 Presidential Election

As regards to the presidential election in 1996, as well as in 1993, Yeltsin had - according to Korzhakov - no intention of leaving the Kremlin and was prepared to take any actions to insure his continued stay. Yeltsin felt free to express his contempt toward democratic principles in Korzhakov's presence. Some episodes the author relates are almost resonant of the Nixon years and the published Watergate tapes. According to Korzhakov, in the summer of 1996, Yeltsin and his premier minister, Victor Chernomyrdin debated the very serious possibility of canceling the presidential election. Korzhakov adds several significant details which possible confirm the view that the Kremlin violated many democratic rules during the presidential election campaign in 1996. He also fully explains, with much elaboration, the story about how Anatoly Chubais' people tried to illegally take 500 thousand dollars from the Kremlin.

The Yeltsin family

Democratic institutions such as the Parliament and the courts played an extremely limited role in the life of the Kremlin and had no influence over the decision making process. Instead, Yeltsin's family emerges, according to Korzhakov, as a leading political institution in Russia. Korzhakov concludes, "when it came to making decisions, Yeltsin was motivated not by the interest of the state, but by his own family clan".

The people around Yeltsin

Korzhakov contends that the Kremlin was run by various unconventional leaders such as body guards like Korzhakov, himself. In the book, Korzhakov confessed that he and Barsukov, another member of Yeltsin's guard, "governed the country for three years".

Korzhakov also paints an interesting portrait of the people around Yeltsin, few - of course - of which are more elevated in moral virtue and intellect than the author. Korzhakov describes the atmosphere surrounding Yeltsin as thick with unbridled favoritism, a fertile ground for intrigues among those struggling for the president's ear.

Even the idea of murder hangs over the Kremlin. The requests and promises of people in the Kremlin to murder their political rivals are interspersed throughout the book. For example, Boris Berezovsky, the financial mogul, asked Korzhakov to murder Vladimir Gusinsky, another financial tycoon. Meanwhile, Korzhakov, himself, had vowed to kill Berezovsky. At the same time, General Alexander Lebed threatened to shoot Korzhakov who only reversed the same threat upon Lebed.

Korzhakov also contends that during his State Duma election campaign in the aftermath of his ousting from the Kremlin in June 1996, his political adversaries wanted to kill his main rival in the parliamentary election in Tula in order to deem the election invalid.

Legacy

Following the replacement of Korzhakov, the Presidential Security Service was reorganized under Anatoly Kuznetsov, a professional without any political ambitions or interests, effectively depriving the Service its unique political influence.

In January 1997, Korzhakov won, as an independent candidate, a by-election over 10 other candidates with 26.86 percent of the vote in Tula, south of Moscow, filling a vacancy left by Alexander Lebed. In the State Duma he quickly became a member of the defence committee. The same year, he worked as a consultant of the artistic motion picture Schizophrenia by director Victor Sergey. Korzhakov is today a member of the Putin-loyal United Russia.

References

Aleksander Zhilin, Corruption Keeps Generals In Line, in The Jamestown Foundation Prism, 22 September, 1995
Susan J. Cavan Russian Federation : Executive Bransch, in The ISCIP Analyst, Volume II, No. 15, August 20, 1997.
Laura Belin and Robert W. Orttung, Electing a Fragile Political Stability, in the OMRI Transition Vol 3, No 2, 7 February 1997
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