The general secretaries of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union were Joseph Stalin, Leonid Brezhnev, Yuri Andropov, Konstantin Chernenko and Mikhail Gorbachev. Nikita Khrushchev worked as First Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. The founder of the communist party, Vladimir Lenin, did not hold official leadership positions in the party structure.
From a simple secretary to a country leader
The Secretary General of the CPSU Central Committee is the highest position in the hierarchy of the Communist Party and, by and large, synonymous with the leader of the Soviet Union. In the history of the party, there were four more posts of the head of its central apparatus: Technical Secretary (1917-1918), Chairman of the Secretariat (1918-1919), Executive Secretary (1919-1922) and First Secretary (1953-1966).
Persons who occupied the first two posts were mainly engaged in paper secretarial work. The position of Executive Secretary was introduced in 1919 for administrative activities. The post of Secretary General, established in 1922, was also created purely for administrative and personnel internal party work. However, the first Secretary General Joseph Stalin, using the principles of democratic centralism, managed to become not only the leader of the party, but the entire Soviet Union.
At the 17th Congress, the Stalin parties were not formally re-elected to the post of Secretary General. However, his influence was already enough to maintain leadership in the party and the country as a whole. After Stalin's death in 1953, George Malenkov was considered the most influential member of the Secretariat. After being appointed Chairman of the Council of Ministers, he left the Secretariat and Nikita Khrushchev, who was soon elected First Secretary of the Central Committee, took the leading positions in the party.
