Talk:Cheka

liquidated

This may sound somewhat flagrant, but I think the euphemism of "liquidated" political opponents should just be changed to "murdered". 'Cause really, who are you trying to protect from the lies? I love liquid. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.155.111.148 (talk) 20:01, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Atrocities

I cited Ernst Nolte in the atrocities section for the previously un-cited assertion about the Cheka's infamous rat-cage torture. I also included a note to the effect that the rat-cage stories are not totally reliable. The notes were taken from the page on Ernst Nolte.Potashnik (talk) 01:34, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

The Royal Imperial Family

Should more, perhaps, be made of the Cheka's involvement with the death of the Tsar and his family be made on this page. Or is it something too trivial for want of a better word to have on the page? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.160.180.208 (talk) 20:36, 26 February 2008 (UTC)

Criticism of the Cheka?

This article reads like something out of the Soviet-era Pravda. How about incorporating criticism and descriptions of Cheka's totalitarian tactics instead of reproducing the official party line on this instrument of repression and violence? Porfyrios 20:40, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

See Natasha? the Cheka were really good guys after all! Wetman 17:56, 29 Feb 2004 (UTC) (awaiting further information)

No one likes much FBI, SIS, Siguranca, KGB, but don't forget, it is a necessary tool of the state, so better refrain from trivial good/bad black/white evaluations. No one likes hangman, and hangmen are not the prime of mankind. So if you are avaiting further information about cruelty of cheka, please pour it here only in reasonable amounts. Mikkalai 18:10, 29 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Even so, some criticism is needed. The page is seemingly devoid of any criticism at the moment. --Flask 16:11, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

• Interestingly, I believe it was Lenin who created the Cheka; he considered the suppression of opposition a critical step in transferring Russia through totalinarianism-socialism-communism (utopia) - this being part of the socialist element. However, he did not wish to keep the Cheka active, and would likely have dissolved them had he lived a few years longer. Failing to do so might well have been one of his reasons for stating (albeit in different words) "for god's sake don't pick Stalin" in his Testament. Rob Church 00:16, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

• Cheka purposes ware not to matain Bolshevik as party on power, or only party, nor destroy any ideological opposition. That's manipulating historical events. It was just intended to defend people from that older people classes that had lost their old privileges and seeked any chance for sabotage, attack and counter-revolution, and I mean in violent totalitarian fashions, never in intellectual or ideological peaceful criticisement of revolution. SFSR was a good thing, from the perspective it supposed liberation and democratical power of worker class and peasants in an underdevelopped wild capitalist country domained by Tsar and burgeoise oligarchy, that lead to endless wars, to lack of ideologic freedom, to exploitation of workers and peasants, to poorness or unfair minoritary distribution of richness and development, education system unaccessible for poorer or humbler people, etc.; and SFSR supposed a conquest by majoritary and popular classes through assumption of auto-gestionary power and establishment of a new institutional system from the basis, democratically lead by soviets, with freedom of militation and ideas, and different political organizations (not only Bolseviks, though it just was the majoritary one for it got the one that represented ideas of most of politized workers that freely joined) of just all opposite, development, equal distribution of richness and land for who cultivated it, an extraordinary implementation and investion on educational system and libraries, made accessible for everybody, organisms of democratical organization and power of people, that were soviets, as a way of democratically acting on power, adoption of legal measures that meant progress, advance and more freedom for human relationships among citizens, like adoption of consensuated divorce, equalitary laws for women and men, and right and access to work and politics and public life to women, abolishment of anti-semitic laws, implementation of salaries, etc. Much of all was wasted and critically ended or transformed with access of Stalin to central power, and transformation of it on a fashion of burocratical totalitarian power, and all the subsequent ideological manipulation, derivation and propaganda for turning socialist ideas, purposes and furtherly institutions into totalitarian Estate, militarist, doctrinary, sectary and repressive ideas and purposes, using the name and rethoric of first to fake and achieve purposes or implications of second; he was a disordered and manipulative, very dangerous and smart guy seeking for power, and he got it, couriously coinciding with the merging of SFSR anti-imperialist socialist republic into imperialist burocratic and totalitarian sigle-partyist USSR (that was a process, but too of a sudden, suspiciously, that deserves to be analysed). Such a process obviously and dangerously had to include Cheka. Of course, the fact many people participating in SRSF Cheka's committees and democratical leadership were unprepared people, for such responsabilities, lead to some unfairnesses, and the fact some innoccent people unfairly payed, but this is one thing, and what is said in the article is other very different, that doesn't analyses context and causes in an objective, non-biased way. I'd like to seek for a less propagandist and biased, more objective and neutral article, more just with history. I'll soon start making my propositions in order to achieve, and support them with sources. signed DeepQuasar

how do you create a redirect?

if the name is supposed to be "vechecka" how do i make the link from "vechecka" to "checka"? shb5ut sluod folkintould it just be a piped link? the content of vechecka should be:

#redirect [[Cheka]]

But "vechecka" is not used IMO, unlike "vecheka".Mikkalai 03:03, 19 Dec 2004 (UTC)

date of 1922 redesignation/merge

I modified the date or renaming to GPU from Feb 8 to Feb 6 1922, which corresponds with articles GPU and chronology), and verifies against the MVD's official website: http://www.mvdinform.ru/index.php?docid=367 (in Russian) --Martyr 21:00, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

also supported on the FSB's website (also in russian)--Martyr 22:33, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

Name

Personally (I am a native russian speaker) I beleive the translation of the name is way too literal, to the point that it is even comic I think a much better sounding translation would be "The Special National comitee against counter-revolutionaries and saboutage", but of course a literal translation may be of more use to people 71.139.63.68 22:14, 20 December 2005 (UTC)

YouTube clip from the Russian film "Chekist"

I was going to add the link to the article, but thought I better post it here and see if it is appropriate. It contains nudity and brutal depictions of mass executions:

"Chekist" film clip

--C.J. Griffin 19:56, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

New article for "Cheka" abbreviation ("may mean any one of these")?

As some of you may be aware, there were several other "extraordinary commissions" in existence during the Bolshevik era (notably Krupskaya's Extraordinary Commission for the Abolition of Illiteracy). Should a "Trivia" section be added to the main article to reflect this? Darth Sidious 01:09, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

See WP:Trivia. Trivia sections are discouraged. Maybe we could add this information directly into the text. S♦s♦e♦b♦a♦l♦l♦o♦s ^{(Merry Christmas!)} 01:59, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Commie Atrocities

This section reads like the typical "Communists fry babies in oil and send them in cans to the USSR" story.

The other sourced are at least scholarly - though partly biased - but the citation of Denikin is just ridiculous and should be deleted in my opinion. He was a rabid anti-Semite whose armies carried out massive pogroms in the Ukraine and buried revolutionary workers and peasants in mass graves. What's next, citing Nazi "investigations" of "Bolshevist atrocities"? Have mercy on our poor readers, who can find this tabloid crap elsewhere on the internet. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 04:24, 4 July 2008 (UTC)

10 % of Jews

I know this is controversial, but in the article Jewish Bolshevism, it says that were perhaps a total of 5 000 Jews in the Cheka out of 50 000 revolutionary agents. This could perhaps be mentioned in the article, since there have been numerous authors who have made allegations that the persecutions against the Christian clergy and the Christian bourgeoisie were actually motivated by religious or ethnic hatred on the part of members of the Cheka. ADM (talk) 23:55, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

What "numerous authors"? What "allegations"? And what's up with the 10% as some kind of magic threshold? If it had been 2500, would a "5% of Jews" (sic - "of Cheka") make it different? And even, where does this 5,000 supposedly come from?radek (talk) 00:19, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

"According to Belerosov, at first (fall and winter of 1918-1919)

    the Kiev Cheka went on a 'continuous spree' of looting, extortion,
    and rape. Three-quarters of the staff were Jews, many of them
    riffraff incapable of any other work, cut off from the Jewish
    community although careful to spare fellow Jews." [PIPES, R.,
    1990, p. 823-824]" - Richard Pipes - The Russian Revolution

There are several other mainstream authors as well. It's no secret that there was a large Jewish presence in the Cheka. I know that sort of information is off limits here, though. 72.73.112.61 (talk) 01:54, 30 January 2015 (UTC)

Needs complete rewrite.

The article is incredibly biased and the sources are completely unreputable. This needs a complete rewrite; it's unsalvageable at this point. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.193.122.200 (talk) 17:44, 23 January 2011 (UTC)

"Atrocities" section

Melgunov's work is a primary source written by a participant in Russian politics in 1917-21. It does not meet the criteria of a scholarly, specialized work. Prof A. Litvin writes in his book The Red and White Terror in Russia that Melgunov was biased in his writings and by his personal experiences, while the historian P. Golub showed that Melgunov made no mention of Kolchak's crimes: "He knew of course, but persistently told the big lie about the White regimes not practicing systematic terror." None of the sources cited in this article purporting to show "Cheka atrocities" actually state that they happened, but only cite the allegations of Denikin's agitprop organs. Historians do not uncritically accept the lurid claims made by OSVAG and the like, but find them "questionable...can not qualify as a scientific publication." Based on this, the "atrocities" section will be removed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.54.173.15 (talk) 23:12, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Sources

Those authors who have not done specific, scientific research on the Russian Revolution in general and the activities of the Cheka in particular do not have a place in the relevant sections of this article. Professor Ratkovsky of Leningrad/Petersburg University supersedes all of the other sources cited in this article, as he has done original research on the Cheka and violence during the Civil War, with publications such as "Individual Terrror in Russia during the Civil War", "The First Year of the Petrograd Cheka", "Red Terror and the Activities of the Cheka in 1918". Nothing in the English language is comparable to this scholar's work. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.54.173.15 (talk) 23:48, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Cheka leather fashion influence?

The cited source for "Western communists" copying the all-black leather look of the Cheka says nothing about this. In fact, it doesn't say the Cheka "dressed in leather from head to toe", only that Dzerzhinsky diverted the shipment of coats so that his men would be less likely to contract typhus. I have tagged it as failing verification. Daniel Case (talk) 04:12, 7 July 2011 (UTC)

You are correct. I have deleted the "head to toe". The leather coat, is of course, famous. George Orwell, Victor Serge, Ayn Rand, Trotsky all mentioned it in their writings.Capitalismojo (talk) 03:20, 28 July 2011 (UTC)

Fixed

I fixed this changes made by banned User:Jacob Peters. My very best wishes (talk) 20:59, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Cheka badge as it was in 1922

The photo in the cheka article 'Cheka badge as it was in 1922 WHAT DOES IT MEAN? Because that is not a Cheka badge, It is honorary badge of the 5th anniversary of the Cheka-GPU and the establishment of GPU NKVD RSFSR — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hermanbruner (talk • contribs) 18:42, 12 October 2013 (UTC)

Large section of claims without a source/POV

"As its name implied, the Extraordinary Commission had virtually unlimited powers and could interpret them in any way it wished. No standard procedures were ever set up, except that the Commission was supposed to send the arrested to the Military-Revolutionary tribunals if outside of a war zone. This left an opportunity for a wide range of interpretations, as the whole country was in total chaos. At the direction of Lenin, the Cheka performed mass arrests, imprisonments, and executions of "enemies of the people". In this, the Cheka said that they targeted "class enemies" such as the bourgeoisie, and members of the clergy; the first organized mass repression began against the libertarians and socialists of Petrograd in April 1918. Over the next few months, 800 were arrested and shot without trial. However, within a month, the Cheka had extended its repression to all political opponents of the communist government, including anarchists and others on the left. On April 11/12, 1918, some 26 anarchist political centres in Moscow were attacked. There 40 anarchists were killed by Cheka forces, and about 500 were arrested and jailed after a pitched battle took place between the two groups. (P. Avrich. G. Maximoff) In response to the anarchists' resistance, the Cheka orchestrated a massive retaliatory campaign of repression, executions, and arrests against all opponents of the Bolshevik government, in what came to be known as "Red Terror". The Red Terror, implemented by Dzerzhinsky on September 5, 1918, was vividly described by the Red Army journal Krasnaya Gazeta"

This whole section exists without a single relevant source. This should be cleaned up and sourced properly. — Preceding unsigned comment added by ComradeBiologist (talk • contribs) 06:33, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

Latvian Riflemen

In his book The Big Show in Bololand (p. 347) Bertrand M. Patenaude mentioned the "so-called Latvian Riflemen" who became the "nucleus" of the Red Army during its formation in summer 1918 and what in the end led to "a position of prominence and numerical predominance" of Letts in the Cheka. So maybe the history of the Cheka should start with the "Latvian Riflemen". ----130.83.23.163 (talk) 13:48, 6 July 2014 (UTC)

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Anton Denikin not an unbiased authority on Cheka torture

The article cites "Anton Denikin's investigation" of the use of torture by the Cheka, as if Anton Denikin was a neutral source and not a military opponent of the Bolsheviks. Denikin himself allowed his forces to engage in counter-revolutionary terror during the Civil War, especially against the Jewish population, which goes unmentioned with the Denikin citation. If Denikin's claims are going to be included in this article, it would be wise to also include his affiliation, rather than giving the appearance of Denikin as a neutral investigator. Situwannabe (talk) 18:08, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Dangling Antecedant

Hey guys, look at the following sentence near the end: "Dzerzhinsky, who rarely drank, is said to have told Lenin – on an occasion in which he did so excessively – ". I assume "he" is referring to Dzerzhinsky, but I'm not quite sure and it was a little confusing at first. Might want to fix it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:645:8201:E3E0:992E:C39F:4689:EBAF (talk) 05:55, 27 April 2020 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:

• Vladimir Bonch-Bruyevich 1919.jpg

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 18:52, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Atrocities

The part about torture and acts of violence against women and children are not sourced. These claims might be true but they are presented in a way that undermines the impartiality. I think the section should be reduced to stating that: the cheka conducted acts of rape and torture. At least until proper sourcing can be conducted. NadjaNoja-blippBlong (talk) 12:00, 22 February 2024 (UTC)

I just saw that the source was further down in the section, why isn’t it done through citations? NadjaNoja-blippBlong (talk) 12:03, 22 February 2024 (UTC)