Nikolai Bulganin

Born May 30 (June 11), 1895, in Nizhny Novgorod. Soviet state and Party figure. Member of the CPSU since 1917. Born into the family of an office worker; studied at a Realschule.

From 1918 to 1922, Bulganin worked in the All-Russian Cheka and from 1922 to 1927 in the Supreme Council of the National Economy. In 1927 he became director of the Moscow Electrical Plant. He was chairman of the Moscow Soviet from 1931 to 1937. In July 1937 he became chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars (CPC) of the RSFSR. He was vice-chairman of the CPC of the USSR from 1938 to 1941. From 1941 to 1943 he was a member of the military councils of several fronts. In 1944 he became a member of the State Defense Committee and deputy people’s commissar of defense, and in 1947, minister of the armed forces of the USSR and vice-chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR. In March 1949 he became vice-chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR. He was chairman of the Council of Ministers from 1955 to 1958. From 1958 to 1960 he was chairman of the Stavropol’ Economic Council. He had the military rank of colonel general. (He held the title of marshal of the Soviet Union from 1947 to 1958.) He was elected to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR in the first, second, and third convocations. He has been awarded the Order of Lenin, six other orders, and medals. He was a member of the Party Central Committee from 1934 to 1961. Between 1948 and 1958, Bulganin was a member of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the ACP (Bolshevik) and then of the Presidium of the Central Committee of the CPSU. He was removed from the Presidium of the Party Central Committee for participation in an anti-Party group. He retired in February 1960.