Sergei Khrushchev is the son of Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev. A senior visiting scholar at Brown University, Khrushchev has written and lectured on Soviet-U.S. relations and on his father's life and career. He served as editor of his father's memoirs and is author of "Khrushchev on Khrushchev: An Inside Account of the Man and His Era, by His Son." The COLD WAR production team interviewed him in June 1996.

On Khrushchev and Stalin:

My father was close to Stalin from 1930, maybe 1932, until 1953. ... In the beginning he was very strong supporter of Stalin, because he thought that Stalin is the best choice of the Soviet Union [for] fighting against Trotsky and against all other politicians. But after the purges and all the cruelties, he began to change this. ... I think that after the war, he really accepted [that] Stalin [was a] disaster, who killed many people -- many my father's own friends. But he never spoke about this. So he was prepared for his so-called secret speech at the 20th Party Congress. ...

When we talk about the secret speech [denouncing Stalin], we must first of all understand that my father was [a] strong believer in communism. ... For him it was the best life [for] the people, just like heaven [on] earth. And he many times repeated that it is impossible to live in heaven surrounded by barbed wires; so he tried to introduce what later we named the "Socialism [with a] Human Face." ... And as a politician he thought [there] was only one choice: to do this [at] the first Party Congress after Stalin's death. ...

He understood that it [was a] very difficult decision and it [would] bring the country [through] hard times, [through] the explanations [of] what had happened [under Stalin]. But he thought it was ... impossible [for] us to go forward without [addressing] this.

On the Kremlin power struggle following Stalin's death:

After Stalin's death, there was a short time where the nature of [Khrushchev's] relations [with Soviet Premier Georgy Malenkov] became worse. Just after Stalin's death my father spoke with [Deputy Premier Nikolay] Bulganin and they thought that they must prevent [secret police chief Lavrenty] Beria [from] climbing to power. And he began to speak [about this to] Malenkov, and Malenkov [said], "No, no, no, we have nothing to speak with you. [At] the meeting of the Presidium Central Committee, we will speak." So my father thought ... that he decided that he would support Beria.

[To the] outside it was looked that it was three close people: my father, Lavrenty Beria and Malenkov. But from the other side, my father thought that especially after Stalin's death, that if they will not take Beria out of power ... it will be a threat [to the] life of all of the others, because they will be arrested and eliminated. So, until the last days, he [acted] very friendly himself to Beria [but on] the other side, he plotted against him and he plotted successfully. ...

[Beria had begun] to try to establish support from the republics by using their nationalistic feelings to strengthen the KGB forces. Then he thought he [would] free some of the prisoners, and after that, blame their colleagues for something -- arrest them, and then establish [a] new period of purges and all the cruelty which was [present] during Stalin's [time]. And [my father said] that he knew Beria: he knew that ... nothing [could] stop him from trying to achieve the highest power. So my father was really scared about this and he thought that it [was a] real threat to the [lives of] the most of the leadership. ...

But in a short time, in months, Malenkov understood first of all that Beria was alone, isolated in the Presidium -- and Malenkov [always] supported the majority. So he shifted to my father. The nature of Malenkov was [to] support somebody; he was not the leader, he was the person who was looking for the consensus, who joined the majority.

On Khrushchev's attitude toward Eastern Europe:

His feeling [toward] all the East European countries and Poland and Hungary [was] not [that they should be] satellites. ... His idea was even to withdraw the Soviet troops from Poland, from Hungary; and he spoke [about] this with [Polish reform leader Wladyslaw] Gomulka and the party secretary of Poland, and he received the answer: No. So he wanted to do as much as he can [for] these countries, but on other side, not to pay too much, because he [thought] that we needed the resources [for] our own economy.

On the Soviet invasion of Hungary in November 1956:

Well, you know, at that time, the United States invaded in Guatemala, because it was [in] their [sphere] of influence. [Hungary] was [in] our [sphere] of influence. To my father, and to me also, we never [could allow] Hungary, [or] Poland, [or] any other countries to leave our [sphere] of influence and to go to the West. ...

But when my father went to Poland, he saw this [was the] last frontier, the last line. He very strongly ordered to the Soviet troops to move to Warsaw. It was a tank division. The Polish leadership began to arm the Polish workers in Warsaw. They saw that they [would] fight, and then when they [each] understood both of them [would fight], they began to negotiate. And it was the first assurance of Gomulka [that], "No, we didn't want to break our relations with Soviet Union; we will work for communism, but in our understanding [of it].

But ... what happened in Hungary? Imre Nagy was weak, so the circumstances pushed him further and further. The Soviet representatives who were sent there ... didn't understand the realities. ... So all of them lost control, step-by-step ... and then they began fighting. ...

After that [there were] only two possibilities. [One was] to raise your hands and [say], "You may go" -- you will agree with me that [this] was impossible in 1956, especially with Hungary, who fought against the Soviet Union on the German side and was much more cruel in the war than even fascists. [Also], they were part of our society, our part of the [world], and we couldn't do this. So, [another] possibility [was] to use force. It was a very complicated decision [for] my father. He thought for three or four days, he talked with the Chinese, with other representatives, and one time they decided not to use force; [but] they [weren't sure]. "We have to use force -- yes, no, yes, no." At last it was the decision, yes, to use it.

On Eisenhower:

[My father] thought that the president was a very nice person [who] tried to achieve real goals to save the peace. ... But on the other side, he thought that he is a very weak politician, because he thought that he was manipulated by the people behind him -- especially by John Foster Dulles. ... I remember when I sat in Geneva in 1955, just next to the president, and when it was time to speak to Americans, John Foster Dulles gave [Eisenhower] a piece of paper and the president read this. And [my father later said], "I never knew with whom I negotiate, with the president or somebody else." ...

When they [spoke] as human beings, [people] who went through the two wars, their understanding with each other was very good. And they had the same understanding on how to deal with the military. But when they sat [at] the table of the negotiations, they could not solve any problem. But in reality, they really built the foundations of future peace relations. We sometimes think that it was only crisis, it was scandals, it was strong conversation, but in reality, they built this [foundation], and President Eisenhower made the biggest part of this dirty work of going from the Cold War [to] some [better] relations.

On Khrushchev's attitude toward the United States:

He was pragmatic, and for him, the United States was the example of success. It was not so much the ideological opposite side, the ideological rival. His dream was to learn from the United States how to work better, and then go forward and pass the United States at detente and then say goodbye to them. It was his main idea. If we will look at his time, what was his main slogan? To produce more milk and meat than the United States [per] person. It was not nuclear weapons ... it was agriculture.

The West thought that they defended democracy, freedom, their way of life, and they wanted to spread it all over the world. The Soviet Union thought that they defended their freedom, their democracy, their way of life, and it would spread all over the world. So [they had] the same policy: [if] one more country will join us, it will be one more victory [for us].