The return of millions of people from the camps and exile must have stunned the millions of other Soviet citizens they encouraged upon their arrival. The reappearance of people long considered dead brought home the message of Khrushchev’s speech of change in a far more direct way, Stalin’s rule had been one of secret torture and hidden violence.Under Khrushchev, younger comrades rose in the party and state bureaucracy, people who combined war experience and good education. The late 1950s and early 1960s were relatively good times for young Communist intellectuals and people in general. Reform-minded Communists hoped his apparatus could be repopulated with enlighten cadres and transformed from within. Still, the biggest obstacle in their eyes was the rigid bureaucratic apparatus that held the country in bondage and blocked innovation and change.

Khrushchev speech stated: “Comrades! So as not to repeat errors of the past, the Central Committee has declared itself resolutely against the cult of the individual. We consider that Stalin was extolled to excess. However, in the past Stalin undoubtedly performed great services to the Party, to the working class and to the international workers’ movement…We are absolutely certain that our Party, armed with the historical resolutions of the 20th Congress, will lead the Soviet people along the Leninist path to new successes, to new victories. Long live the victorious banner of our Party – Leninism!”

The 1950s represented a peak in Soviet power as well. They now possessed much of Eastern Europe which they successfully stopped people from fleeing by the early 1950s (after more they 15 million people had left). The Hungarian Revolution of 1956, which began as a student revolution before attracting popular support and pushing out the local government was defeated as the Soviets quickly moved in and crushed the rebellion. They enjoyed strong relations with China. The Americans were partly defeated in the Korean War. Many leftists throughout Europe were positively responding to Soviet campaigns calling for world peace and social equality. Colonized peoples were increasingly looking towards the Soviet Union for guidance and support in fighting for their independence and the Soviets responded with increased aid, educational opportunities and military assistance.

Khrushchev continued to push the technological development of the USSR. In the space race, Sputnik 1 was launched in October, 1957, becoming the first man-made object in space. The Soviets also sent men into space. Khrushchev developed a policy of brinkmanship with the West, leveraging his technological parity if not superiority. Starting in 1961, the East Germans cut off all traffic and limited movement between East Berlin and the rest of the city. The Soviets also attempted to put nuclear missiles in newly communist Cuba, sparking the Cuban missile crisis. The issue was resolved through compromise as the United States agreed to remove its missiles in Turkey in exchange for the Soviets taking theirs out of Cuba.

People began enjoying access to more consumer goods and better living conditions. TV channels broadcast for four hours a day to almost three million television sets. Many new movies were developed that focused on Soviet achievements. New items such as refrigerators, television sets, washing machines, radios and vacuum cleaners were also available to the select few with access to foreign currency. The same few could purchase a partial ownership of an apartment. For others, the state heavily subsidized the rent of state-owned private apartments and people paid only 3-5% of their monthly income for housing. In rural areas, an above-average peasant with a family of four could enjoy a brick house with two bedrooms, a kitchen and a living room, all heated by a stove.

Under Leonid Brezhnev, in power from 1964 to 1982, enterprises and organizations were made to rely on economic methods of profitable production, rather than follow orders from the state administration. No longer were enemies of the state imprisoned but simply denied party membership and jobs, leaving them destitute. Still, only one in fifteen citizens were members of the communist party, a perk that included access to better stores, less restricted reading material, improved medical care and the potential to travel abroad.

Thus, the Brezhnev period was marked by conservative actions and stability as its World War Two-generation leaders aged but the economy largely failed to improve. As production failed to improve, the black market continued to thrive, consumer goods remained scarce and housing problematic. The continuation of over-planning by the central state, a bureaucracy resistant to change, corruption, theft, chronic absences and alcoholism by workers and massive military spending all contributed to a period of limited economic growth. The country struggled to complete with the United States in technical measures-for example, it fell behind in the production of electricity and nuclear energy. In an attempt to quickly catch up with the West, in 1970 the state embarked on the building of a nuclear reactor at Chernobyl but encounters problems as knowledge and experience were regarded as less important than loyalty, construction equipment failed to arrive and needed materials were often unavailable. Still the first reactor of the plant was finally completed in 1977 with three more completed by 1984 and were producing about 10% of Ukraine’s electricity at the time of the disaster. The building of the plant itself highlights a number of problems that plagued the Soviet system which continued to survive until 1991.

Figure 11: GDP of the Soviet Union compared to other countries