SOVIET ARCHIVES
MEMORANDUM
DATE: April 27, 1999
FROM: Mario Corti, Savië Shuster, Ruslan Gelischanov, Serge Iourienen, Peter
Vail
TO: Jeff Trimble
COPY:
SUBJECT: Russian News
On September, 1998, we presented a plan designed to improve our programming including our news output.
With your explicit approval, we since then reduced all Monday through Saturday newscast from 10 to 6,5 minutes, added to our popular topical newsblocks another one on social issues, and reformed our main Liberty Live hour to include correspondents' reports in its news block. We initiated the extention of the latter approach to other prime time newscasts: we began to upgrade our news announcers into announcers/producers to process and include live on air the audio for these casts; we have applied for the installation in our newsbooth of the necessary digital equipment that will enable us to proceed in this direction. We have started a rotation program that will give Prague news editors necessary field experience in our target area and, at the same time, increase timeliness of domestic news. A responsible news editor is regularly attending NCA planning meetings, we are working on a style manual with the purpose to preserve and further develop an easily identifiable Radio Liberty syntax and to exclude post-soviet lingo typical of Russian media today. This is what we have done so far.
Now, we would like to draw your attention to some simple measurable facts.
According to a reliable polling service, during the period between August, 1998, and February, 1999~i.e. before the Kosovo crisis—our audience in Moscow has doubled. Furthermore, our modest estimates show that in a competitive English-speaking market, namely the USA, if our Russian language news on the Internet are visited 43,870 times (number of pages read in a month's period), a similar NCA/RFE-RL product in English (Magazine) is visited 4,333 times, the ratio being 10:1. (For your information, this undoubtable success has lead some of us to suggest a new product for the Internet consisting of our exclusive news and information materials translated into English.)
Furthermore, we have unambiguous indications that our news (C-wire) continue to be used heavily by other departments in the preparation of their casts despite statements to the contrary by their respective directors.
No doubt we made substantial progress in a very short period of time.
Imagine our bewilderment when you presented your intention to eliminate Russian News and integrate it into NCA. To us it meant nothing less than changing horses in midstream and at the same time annihilating a project approved by you only a few months ago and carried out professionally.
One of the two reasons in support of your initiative was that our news are too similar to other Russian news products and that they rely too heavily on Russian official sources. We are open to further discuss this criticism with regard to a hypothetical situation in the past. What is hard to understand, however, is that you made it in the midst of the Kosovo conflict, at a time when it couldn't be more obvious to anyone that our news output and the news coverage by Russian media differ like heaven and hell.
Moreover, our discussions sofar have left us with the impression that your reorganization plan is still too vague and confusing. How do you intend to implement it? What are the ramifications and implications? For Russian news, for the Russian Service, for RFE/RL as a whole? Where is the guarantee that under NCA Russian news will improve?
Our first reaction was to appeal to you not to traumatize the Russian broadcasting effort before the end of the NATO action in the Balkans and the elections in Russia: chances are that it may be counterproductive and might lead to unpredictable consequences.
Your answer was no.
Before any further discussion, the Russian Service's current management would like to state its firm position with regard to your projected move:
The elimination of the present Russian news operation and its integration into NCA is a strategic decision. It thoroughly affects RL's Russian Service as a whole because our news are not the isolated operation like NCA : they are the core of Russian broadcasting and its framework. It is a decision which by its nature might require the involvement of a higher and/or independent authority, particularly in view of past negative experiences.
We ask you to carefully re-consider our preliminary (first) reaction. Before we discuss any further the merits of your proposal, we want to repeat. It's the wrong timing: with the Kosovo crisis and two impending elections in Russia, with the Russian service acting under a temporary, unconfirmed management.
On May 4, 1999, Jeff Trimble, the Director of Broadcasting, came to the Russian Service together with his assistant Michele DuBach, who per Jeff’s instructions had conducted a study on the Service’s news operation. Trimble’s first words to the management of the service were: “I am going to close your news operation”. When asked for the reasons behind his decision Jeff’s reply was: “I don’t like your news”. From now on, according to Jeff, the news would be produced by Russian service program editors who would take daily turns, each day a different editor, as it was the case in the smaller services of RFE/RL. Just some time later, a study that had been previously requested by the BBG to the Annenberg School of Journalism covering a period from July 15, 1998, to July 3, 1999, highly praised the Russian Service news. Moreover, according to the study, the news were the best product of RFE-RL Russian broadcasting. Jeff did not produce anything in writing nor did he explain orally how the daily changing editor in charge of the news would produce a 7 minute newscast 24 times a day at the top of the hour. Below follows the Russian Service management reaction to Trimble’s plans. No one in the service ever saw DuBach’s report on Russian news. Jeff Trimble never again returned to this particular subject.
MEMORANDUM
DATE: May 5, 1999
FROM: Mario Corti, Savik Shuster, Ruslan Gelischanow, Serge Iourienen,
Peter Vail
TO: Jeff Trimble
SUBJECT: Russian News
1. We have given serious consideration to your plans concerning Russian News and, after lengthy discussions have come to the conclusion that this is NOT the time for the radical, hazardous reform you envisage .
2. Russian News are an extremely complex operation: With a daily total of four live hours, 365 days a year, it is closely interwoven with the entire information effort of our Service and requires a considerable amount of interrelated logistics like shifts, backup, e.a.
3. Nothing in the proposed reform indicates to any advantage in terms of productivity or quality.
4. The Russian News operation in its present form has been shaped by former Service Director Yuri Handler and Moscow Bureau Chief Savik Shuster in the course of two full years of planning and in collaboration with two RFE/RL Presidents (Eugene Pell and Kevin Klose), one Vice-President for Policy and Programming (William Marsh), and one Director of Broadcasting (Robert Gillette), all of them renowned journalists, most of them experienced international broadcasters themselves. Bill Marsh, a newsman’s newsman, has been giving continuous attention to the interrelation and interdependence between Russian and Central News since assuming office and had reasoned out and accepted a special, autonomous position of a Russian unit as the only workeable solution when competing with other international broadcasters.
5. External indicators seem to support the functionality of the present set-up: According to a reliable Moscow polling service, our audience has doubled in the arguably most demanding of all Russian broadcast environments between August, 1998, and February, 1999 - i.e. before the Kosovo crisis. In another competitive market, this time the overwhelmingly English-speaking US Internet, our Russian language news are visited 43,870 times (number of pages read in a month’s period), while, in comparison, the NCA/RFE-RL product in English (Magazine) is visited 4,333 times - a dazzling ratio of 10:1. These are conservative figures of a success story which has left some of us pondering the question whether or not to suggest to RFE-RL management a new Internet product, consisting of exclusive Russian Service news and reports translated into English.
6. We believe that the sensible thing to do at this point in time is to purify the Russian News product along the lines laid out by the Russian Service under your chairmanship in September, 1998. We are now half-way through that process.
7. After the elections in Russia, a changed political or a new broadcast environment would automatically warrant a fresh look at news and make them a priority for reforms. Since any organizational change of the present set-up would inadvertently bring about a new product being beamed to Russia, we would like to suggest that any future body discussing such reforms, like the Russian Service, NCA, and you, would also include independent outside counsel from both sides of the Atlantic.
BROADCASTING TO THE NORTH CAUCASUS
Office of the Director, Russian BD
FROM: Mario Corti, Savik Shuster
TO: Jeffrey Trimble
COPY: Thomas Dine
DATE: February 12, 2001
SUBJECT: Broadcasting to the North Caucasus (2)
Following Thomas A. Dine’s declaration on the planning process for broadcasting to the North Caucasus, this Memorandum is a sum up of the Russian service arguments, which we have extensively developed during our meetings.
First, let me emphasize that we have no doubt that RFE/RL will seek the highest journalistic standards for this new service, broadcasting in Avar, Chechen, and Circassian, as it is the case for all RFE/RL services. This means guaranteeing the delivery of objective and double-checked information, pluralism of opinions, and a necessary distance with local politics, as required by our professional code. The Russian Service entirely stands for what Thomas Dine recently announced, i.e. that "having access to information is the foundation for building a free and democratic society."
The Russian Service’s reservation about the creation of a separate North-Caucasus Broadcast Service concerns only the means involved in the pursuing of the goal reiterated by Tom Dine. Following is a summary of our arguments, consisting of three important issues:
• Audience Outreach;
• RFE/RL’s Role and Message in the Region;
• Recruitment.
We conclude this Memorandum with a proposal.
1. Audience Outreach
a. The choice of three languages
As Thomas Dine underlined in his statements, many of the Northern Caucasian peoples are already familiar with RFE/RL because of its broadcasts in the Russian language. However, like the other nations to whom the station broadcasts, many of them prefer to receive news and information in their own languages.
We understand this respect towards the Northern Caucasian languages. We also understand a need to broadcast in Chechen language to restore a cultural fabric destroyed by the war. Nevertheless, it is quite unclear how - and why - Circassian and Avar have been chosen as languages for broadcasting to the North Caucasus. In the Republic of Karachaevo-Cherkessia the Karachai will not be able to understand what is being broadcast to their co-citizens who speak Circassian. The same will be true in Kabardino-Balkaria. In Daghestan the programs in Avar will not be understood by the Kumyks, as well as by the over forty peoples inhabiting that region.
The ethnic situation in Northern Caucasus is already extremely complicated and explosive. Why build additional fences between peoples? Centuries ago the lingua franca in that region was Kumyk. As a result of colonization, Russian eventually became the lingua franca. However, this does not prevent the peoples of the Northern Caucasus to speak Russian when meeting to discuss problems of common interest. Following British colonization, English also became the most widespread language. Nevertheless, this did not prevent people in India, Pakistan and Ireland to communicate in English.
b. The need for a larger audience
If we were a private broadcasting corporation, a natural decision would have been to broadcast in a language understandable by the highest possible number of listeners. One would want to strive for higher ratings and, consequently, attract more ads. You do not sell refrigerators to Avars only.
We sincerely consider that Russian should be the only vernacular language to broadcast in the Northern Caucasus in order to help RFE/RL develop its unique mission in the region.
2. RFE/RL’s Role and Message in the Region
a. Transparency
The Congress records, as well as various statements issued by RFE/RL, acknowledge that some peoples have a need for information and that they prefer to receive this information in their own languages. This, however, does not say enough about the strategy that prompted the creation of a North-Caucasus Broadcast Service. This lack of transparency provides ground for legitimate fears and suspicions in Russia. It is our duty to emphasize that some Russian authorities (at least two Ministers and several MPs) have already expressed their fears and concerns. Many of them have underlined that, by launching a North-Caucasus Broadcast Service, RFE/RL chooses to develop a strategy of confrontation, which reminds them of the Cold War period.
b. Terminology
There is another extremely important issue pertaining to the suggested languages. The works representing the Western political debate during many centuries have hardly been translated into those languages if ever. In other words, the very language of Western democracy, including political and legal terminology, simply does not exist in those languages. Here again, we are back to the need to develop democratic values in a language that can explain them, i.e. in Russian.
3. Recruitment
Given the original plan, it is obvious enough that RFE/RL will have to search for professional journalists with excellent knowledge of Avar, Chechen and Circassian. If possible, they should be radio-journalists, preferably with Western journalistic training and experience. Their level of proficiency in English will have to be sufficient in order to process the information provided by Western agencies. Moreover, it would be desirable if they had some idea of what the mission of Radio Liberty is in order for them to integrate in the well-established journalistic tradition of our Radios. Their political persuasions must be democratic and, in order to avoid conflicts of interest, they should not belong to any political party, clan, “teip,” or other interest groups.
Considering both the wars launched by the Kremlin in the Northern Caucasus and the profile of the needed broadcasters, there is also a substantial risk that journalists close to the Kremlin and unfair to RFE/RL could be recruited.
PROPOSAL
We have no doubt that the decision to broadcast to the North Caucasus in the indicated three languages was based on qualified expert opinion. However, for the above reasons we suggest that a North Caucasus Service broadcasting in Russian would better serve the mission of RFE/RL. We additionally suggest organizing the North Caucasus Service within the Russian Service for the following reasons:
• The Russian Service would provide an existing structure, expertise, and an established tradition of independent journalism.
• This solution would be a more transparent one and it would facilitate editorial control.
• RFE/RL would reach a much larger audience;
• The recruiting of staff would present fewer difficulties and would be safer;
• Economic costs would obviously be less prohibitive.
We respectfully ask the Director of Broadcasting to pass urgently this proposal on to the members of the BBG.
COVERAGE OF THE HOSTAGE SITUATION (DUBROVKA), 25/26.10.2002
From: "Michele DuBach"
Subject: Coverage of the hostage situation (Nord Ost)
Date: Fri, 25 Oct 2002 13:48
To: BroadcastDirectors@RFERL
Thanks for a lively discussion today.
Here's our editorial policy on the Moscow hostage story.
We are not using the word "terrorist" in our news coverage of the hostage situation. It is a "politicized" term and the facts and events are murky. Therefore, for now...we are not using the term "terrorist". We should refer to the Chechens as hostage-takers or armed Chechen militants. Please follow NCA's lead on this.
If someone, such as Putin or others, calls them "terrorists" we should quote them accurately and make clear that the person quoted considers them terrorists.
Also, we will not provide the hostage-takers with an "open mike" or platform for unchallenged statements. Statements need to be put into context. Any questions or doubts on coverage...please call DuBach, Pejic or Traycey.
From: "Mario Corti"
Subject:
Date: Sat, 26 Oct 2002 03:53
To: Michele DuBach
Now that the events are behind us I would like to express my opinion concerning your e-mail on coverage of the hostage situation. Anything can be discussed, and I don't question here whether your guidance was right or wrong. We were aware that CNN and BBC were using such euphemisms as "rebels" and "guerrillas", as we were aware that the resolution unanimously approved by the UN Security Council defined the perpetrators as terrorists as did American Ambassador Vershbow and many others. But this is not the point.
The point is that we are "Radio Liberty".
I must confess I disposed that the content of your memo be not brought to the attention of my colleagues, news writers and editors as well. They are all Russians, coming from a totalitarian environment, and some of them came to work for us from the Russian media, and they are under the impression that similar "editorial" attitudes do not occur at RFE/RL, an institution with a reputation of being a model for "free journalism" and of respect for the independence and professionalism of journalists. Unortunately, despite my explicit orders to the contrary, someone brought to their attention that "the American management had proscribed the use of the word "terrorists." I was in Moscow, and I could witness the indignation of my colleagues. They are professionals and as professionals they expect to be treated. Understanding words and meanings and calling things their own names, particularly if expressed in their own language, is their journalists' daily bread. And in the realm of words and meanings ultimately our authority can only be the dictionary.
Last but not least. We have are own troubles in Russia. If the word "terrorist" is politically loaded, as you say, then your e-mail can be interpreted as politically loaded as well. Imagine Russian newspapers carrying big titles such as "RFE/RL management proscribed the term "terrorists" to define the hostage-takers." Imagine the blow on our reputation. How are we going to explain to our listeners that there is a difference between Lesin's prescriptions and yours'?
Mario Corti
Director
Russian Broadcast Department RFE/RL, Inc.
TO THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF RADIO FREE EUROPE - RADIO LIBERTY
To: Thomas Dine
President
Radio Free Europe - Radio Liberty
June 6, 2003
Dear Mr Dine,
Thank you for the invitation to participate in the 50th anniversary conference "About Liberty" conducted by the RFE/RL. Unfortunately, at the moment I am unable to leave Moscow owing to developments here I would like to take this opportunity to stress once again that RFE/RL in its current form adds considerable value to political life in Russia. The RFE/RL played an exceptional role in the period leading up to 1991 that everybody has recognized. However, few understand the role it has played over the past 12 years. It would not be an overstatement to say that RFE/RL is the most reliable source of objective political information about world events and, even more importantly, Russian politics. Without RFE/RL, some of these topics would not have been covered at all.
The intellectual political programmes of RFE/RL are marked by their professional and objective approach, which is widely recognised as a hallmark of Western journalism.
The directors of The Russian Service of RFE/RL, Juri Gendler and Mario Corti have managed to understand the essence of modern Russia's political life and occupy a unique information niche, whose importance shall be highly valued in future. The preservation and development of this experience, which is new and unique to Russia, in the modern intellectual political journalism that emerged over the past decade, will undoubtedly be much needed and reclaimed in the coming years.
Let me thank you again for your invitation and assure you that I am always glad to see you in Moscow, Prague or Washington.
Yours sincerely,
Grigory Yavlinsky
www.yabloko.ru
[DATE: July 21, 2003]
TO: Michele DuBach
COPY: Thomas Dine
Nenad Pejic
Liz Hallin
SUBJECT: Mario Corti
Dear Mr. Dine:
We recognize management's exclusive right to establish directors in office or remove them as seen fit. At the same time we believe in our right to express our views with regard to changes thoroughly affecting our immediate professional environment. The work atmosphere in our service is a distinctively creative one. Our audience is growing, our ratings have gone beyond five percent - an undisputable accomplishment for a radio with an American brand, funded by the American taxpayer.
Mr. Corti's role in this success story is evident. Our team's plans for the future are no less ambitious. We look for and we find contemporary and highly competitive forms of presenting our message, a new sound.
Mario Corti has been the initiating and the driving force behind these plans. We believe that his continued leading role in our efforts is in the interest of RFE/RL, our service and, last but not least, our listeners.
Russian Service editorial staff, Prague:
Andrei Babitski
Anrdei Chariy
Ruslan Gelischanow
Tengis Gudava
Serge Iourienen
Elena Kolomijcenko
Arkadi Pildes
Igor Pomeranzev
Lev Roitman
Ivan Tolstoi
Alexei Tsvetkov
Peter Vail
Dmitri Voltchek
RADIO FREE EUROPE-RADIO LIBERTY
M E M O R A N D U M
RFE/RL RESEARCH INSTITUTE
Date: 21 October 1991
To: A. Ross Johnson, Iain Elliot, Jeffrey Gardner, Stephen Bryen, Joseph Dwyer, James Britt, Ramon Marks
From: Mario Corti
Subject: Trip to Moscow of Stephen Bryen (AEI), Joseph Dwyer (Hoover Institute), Mario Corti (RFE/RL Research Institute), James Britt and Ramon Marks to discuss conversion of Communist Party records to electronic format
The following is by no means a complete report on the talks we had with Mr. Pikhoia, Chairman of the Committee on Archival Matters under the Council of Ministers of the Russian Federation (ROSKOMARKHIV), and his assistants, nor an exhaustive description of what we heard and saw during our trip to Moscow. It is more a sample of impressions and comments expounded in a fragmentary fashion.
During our stay in Moscow the following meetings and visits to some of the Communist Party archives placed under the control of the ROSKOMARKHIV were scheduled: October 8, Tuesday
11.00 a.m. Meeting with Rudolf Germanovich Pikhoia, Chairman of the ROSKOMARKHIV, now located in Kuibyshev street, in one the the CC CPSU buildings containing the Central Committee archives.
The Soviet side was also represented by:
Anatolii Stefanovich Prokopenko, Deputy Chairman of the ROSKOMARKHIV;
Rem Andreevich Usikov, Director of the former Central Committee Archives;
Vladimir Petrovich Kozlov, Center for the study of documents relating to contemporary History;
Valeri Ivanovich Abramov, responsible for the preservation of archival documents;
Oleg Vladimirovich Naumov, Acting Director of the Institute of History and Theory of Socialism (former Institute of Marx-Leninism, Central Party Archives);
Viacheslav Dmitrievich Simakov, Director of the Computer Center;
Aleklsandr Vladimirovich Krivenko, Department of Foreign Relations (Mr. Krivenko acted as interpreter of our delegation during the whole period of our stay in Moscow);
Morozov, Department of Foreign Relations
12.00 a.m. Visit to the Central Committee Archives;
15.00 p.m. Meeting with Viacheslav Dmitrievich Simakov, Director of the Computer Center;
17.00 p.m. Meeting of our delegation to discuss our impressions and decide on further steps.
October 9, Wednesday
10.00 a.m. Visit to the former Central Party Archives
3 p.m. Meeting with Mr. Pikhoia and his assistants (Mr. Porkopenko, Mr. Naumov, Mr. Morozov and Mr. Krivenko).
October 10, Thursday
10.30 a.m. Visit to the Moscow Party Archives at the Scholarly and Information Center on the Political History of Moscow
October 11, Friday
10.00 a.m. Meeting with Mr. Prokopenko
* * *
BRIEF REMARKS ON OUR MEETINGS WITH MR. PIKHOIA AND HIS ASSISTANTS.
Introduction
Our first impression was that Mr. Pikhoia was rather evasive and reluctant to address the main purpose of our visit, i.e. the conversion of the Central Committee archives into electronic format. We felt that Mr. Pikhoia's assistants, particularly those directly involved with the archives' management matters, thought that Mr.Pikhoia had gone too far in signing the Protocol... with Mr. Bukovsky and in committing himself to engaging in concrete talks with us, and that they were trying to cool down his enthusiasm. In particular, we suspected he had been confronted with the archivists' fears that computerizing their archives and adopting Western techniques would involve their having to change their traditional archival techniques and procedures as well as their working habits.
This opinion was reinforced during the next day when we were confronted with the reluctancy of the Soviet side to talk about microfilming or converting to optical media whole documents. The Soviet view of the matter was that we should, in the short run, have a more modest task. Transforming the Party archives into a full text electronic database, according to Pikhoia and his assistants, should be regarded rather as a long term objective.
The suggestion that we could start converting selected files -- made by me during our second meeting with Pikhoia after having mentioned it in a private conversation with Mr. Naumov -- was not given serious consideration. It became clear that the Soviets really wanted to put into electronic format in the first place their master inventories or opisi. The reason for this approach, I suspect, is a conservative one: it will allow the Soviets to continue their archival management methods, which they think to be the best in the world, practically unchanged (for a brief description of an opis' see below; see also an opis' sample in Appendix 5). According to Pikhoia the opisi describing the holdings of the Central Committee Archives consist of 30.000.000 pages. This must be checked once again, for the figure given by Mr. Naumov for the former Central Party Archives is 250.000 pages. However, Mr. Pikhoia insisted that the figure given by him was correct.
RLIN
The ROSKOMARKHIV has identified RLIN as the American on-line database which best suits their needs, the structure of an RLIN record being the most similar to an opis' record it could find among Western on-line databases. It would be an illusion, however, to think that the Soviets will easily agree to modify the structure of their opis' records to fit an RLIN record. They would rather try to have RLIN adapted to their opis' system. This is, presumably, what Mr. Pikhoia means when he speaks of the interest of the ROSKOMARKHIV in "introducing American information standards in Russia and creating a common archival network".
During our first meeting it emerged that it was the Hoover Institute which introduced the ROSKOMARKHIV to RLIN and promised to help them make the first steps towards the transfer of the Party Archives' records to this on-line database.
The structure of archival management
The archival structure, which is based on a system developed way back in the past, is subdivided into collections, inventories, files, and leafs or folios -- Fond - opis'- edinitsa khraneniia or delo - list.
A Collection (Fond) consists of documents reflecting the activity of an institution or an organization. Also, papers accumulated by an individual or a family are referred to as fondy. Collections are listed in a directory according to well established rules (see, for example, Pravila raboty partiinykh arkhivov obkomov, kraikomov partii, Institutov istorii partii - filialov IML pri TsK KPSS, Moskva, 1980 -- Appendix 4).
An inventory or opis' is basically a list of the storage units (edinitsy khranenia) contained in a collection. In the party archives each collection has more than one master inventory and the term opis' is sometimes used as a synonym of a collection's subgroup or a series division. Also items contained in a file (edinitsa khranenia or delo) are listed in an opis'. Normally, archives would not go as deep as the leaf or folio level.
The reference system (card catalogs organized by names, titles, subject, etc. [several access points], inventories [opisi], etc.) is common to all Party archives except for the former Central Party Archives and the Central Committee Archives which have different specifics. There is also a general catalog covering the whole system of Party archives.
Current level of automation
The Central Committee archives are partially computerized. They have an old IBM compatible RYAD mainframe in which the records of the collections, the files and the documents of the last 10 years are stored, as well as the whole card catalog.
Automation has been started at the Moscow Party Archives (5 work stations -- PCs) based on a program (written in Clarion) which has been jointly developed by a company of the Ministry of the Radio Industry and the "Soviet Computer Initiative Ltd." (see Appendix 8). At first glance this program appears to be impressive. However, it basically reproduces almost literally the Russian traditional manual methods of archival management.
In addition the ROSKOMARKHIV has started 4 pilot projects respectively in Omsk (2 PCs with 386 CPU + 1 with a 286 CPU), Nizhnii Novgorod, KomiASSR and Moscow (each of them have 2 PCs with 286 CPU). The software is being written in Clipper, "C" and Fox-Base) and has three main functions: registration of documents, card catalog and master inventory (opis')
The International Commission
During the meeting on October 8, Mr. Pikhoia did not want to elaborate on the International Commission presented in the Protocol Concerning the International Commission to Study the Party and State Security Structures in the Soviet Union (Appendix 1) signed by himself for the ROSKOMARKHIV and by Vladimir Bukovsky for the Western Institutions willing to join the agreement. This, according to Pikhoia, was a matter of the competence of the Parliament of the Russian Federation. The Parliament will eventually decide on the composition of the International Commission, its scope, functions and the duration of its activity.
The Technical Committee
Independently of whatever decisions the Parliament of the Russian Federation will make on the International Commission, the ROSKOARKHIV seems to be interested in cooperating with American public and private institutions. In view of Stephen Bryen's imminent departure (he was planning to leave on Thursday, 10th of October), our delegation worked out a Technical Proposal on Conversion of Archival Records to Electronic Media and Usage which was presented to Mr. Pikhoia on Wednesday. According to the Proposal AEI, the RFE/RL Research Institute and the Hoover Institute will act as a Technical Committee for the project. The Proposal was immediately accepted by the ROSKOMARKHIV with one only change, and signed by Mr. Pikhoia (see Appendix 2).
Access
During our first meeting with Mr. Pikhoia and his assistants it became obvious that free access to the Party archives -- at least as far as foreign scholars is concerned -- has not yet been resolved in a clear-cut way. According to Pikhoia, the current policy of the Committee on Archival Matters of the RSFSR on access is ruled by the principle of non-discrimination between foreign and Soviet researchers. The new law on archives, which according to Pikhoia should have been approved by the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR during the week between 14th-18th October, has not yet been passed. and I do not think there is any chance that the law will be passed soon. Although Mr. Pikhoia mentioned that according to the law Soviet and foreign researchers will have equal access opportunities, I was not able to find such a provision in the draft law (Appendix 3) which was passed on to us by one of Mr. Pikhoia's assistants.
Access to the KGB archives is being discussed by competent Soviet bodies, and a final decision will be made, according to Pikhoia, within the next three months.
My attempt to have a point providing for access to the Central Committee Archives for the analysts of RFE/RL and the Hoover Institute inserted into the Technical proposal... (Appendix 2) presented to Pikhoia by Stephen Bryen before his departure was not successful.
My impression was, and is, that if we could obtain a commitment on free access for our people, this would be a sign of good will on the Soviet side.
Meeting with Mr. Pikhoia's Deputy, Mr. Prokopenko, on October 11th, I announced that A.Ross Johnson, Director of the RFE/RL Research Institute, will raise this issue in a letter to Mr. Pikhoia . In particular, he will ask him to grant access to the analysts of the RFE/RL Research Institute to the Central Committee Archives for.
The Smolensk Records
During our final meeting Mr. Prokopenko, the Deputy Chairman of the ROSKOMARKHIV, expressed his deep regret that in times of openness the original of the Smolensk records, currently deposited in the National Archives, have not yet been returned to the Soviet Union. Ramon Marks promised to use his influence to have this question cleared up.
Conclusions
While agreeing that making the opisi electronically available to scholars will provide them with a guide to the treasures contained in the Party archives, it must be clear that this is only a first step towards full automation. Basically, it will depend on us whether we will be in a position to address the greater challenge of converting the Party archives partially or entirely into a full-text database. If we can present a working project and raise the necessary funds to get the project started in a reasonably short period, this would facilatate our involvement in any further stage.
I suggest that we try to involve RLIN already in this first stage. We must identify as soon as possible the technical requirements which would enable to convert the opisi into the RLIN format. To speed up this process, it would be advisable to form a small working group consisting of specialists representing the Technical Committee, RLIN and the ROSKOMARKHIV.
I suspect that one of the reasons why an agreement for converting selected materials of particular interest could not be reached, is that the ROSKOMARKHIV is convinced that split, ad hoc research and publication projects with various Western institutions would be more to its advantage.
This, of course, does not mean that one or the other party of the Technical Committee, for example the RFE/RL Research Institute, should not try to engage in such an ad hoc project with the ROSKOMARKHIV.
A BRIEF SURVEY OF THE ARCHIVES VISITED
Introduction
In addition to the Central Committee Archives the former Central Party Archives, the Moscow Obkom and Gorkom Party Archives as well as all other Party archives have been placed under the Committee on Archival Matters of the USSR Council of Ministers. There are 164 Party Archives in the USSR and there is a Union catalog for all Party archives.
The CC CPSU Central Archives
Most of the documents contained in these archives are labeled either "secret" or "top secret". Also there was no system to reply to users' queries. However these archives should soon be transferred to a State Commission on Archives, declassified and made available to researchers. In the last two years 2.000.000 documents have already been declassified.
The term of custody of the materials is 15 years. After this period they are supposed to be passed on to the Central Party Archives (currently the Institute of History and Theory of Socialism). However this term is not respected and practically only materials up to 1955 have been passed over to the former Central Party Archives and only those considered to be of "scientific interest". These materials have been microfilmed or microfiched and the duplicates are kept in the Central Committee Archives.
The CC CPSU Central Archives are basically divided into two main archives:
1) the Party Leadership Archives (Arkhiv rukovodiashchikh kadrov KPSS)
and
2) the Current Affairs Archives (Tekushchii arkhiv KPSS) or The Leading Bodies' Archives (Arkhiv rukovodiashchikh organov)
In addition there is a third archival complex called The Party Membership Archives (Arkhiv edinogo partbileta) containing the registration data of all Party members.
The Current Affairs Archives (General department of the CPSU)
The Party Leading Bodies' Archives or Current Affairs Archives contain up to 200.000 files covering the period 1952-7.9.91. The materials covering 1919-1952 were passed on to the Central Party Archives of the Institut of Marx-Leninism (Currently the Institute of History and Theory of Socialism). The documents contained in these files were processed (registered, indexed, etc.) as they entered the Archives. The only users of these archives were the CC leaders. Researchers were not allowed access.
The materials between 1919-1952 which were transferred to the Central Party Archives are on microfilm. The materials covering 1952 to present time are on microfiche.
There is a certain degree of automation. Materials covering the last ten years (consisting of abstracts and indexes) are stored on an IBM compatible mainframe computer.The card catalog is also on computer.
We visited depository No. 9 containing the documents of the CC secretariat (basically the originals of the CC resolutions and the protocols of the Secretariat sessions).
I also saw a few filing cabinets (starting No. 245-) labeled "Information materials of the KGB" ("Informatsionnye materialy KGB SSSR").
Depository No. 8 which we also visited contains the card catalog of the Current Affairs Archives with ca. 4.000.000 cards.
All depositories in these archives as well as in the former Central Party Archives are air conditioned and fire protected.
The Party Leadership Archives
These archives contain the personal files of all party leaders (members of the Central Committee) from 1917-18 up to date, ca. 60.000 files. The archives also issues directories of party leaders. We were shown a few files, including those of Kosygin, Kosmachev and Bucharin.
The letters' collection (Secret department of the CPSU)
There is also a collection containing the letters of Soviet citizens to the Party Leaders. Practically each letter was retyped in order to make it readable to the addressees. Each of them was registered in a card catalog. After registration some letters were sent to other Soviet institutions (for example the KGB). These archives contain letters from ca. 2.500.000 people.
The Institute of History and Theory of Socialism
Meeting with:
Oleg Vladimirovich Naumov, Acting Director of the Institute of History and Theory of Socialism (former Institute of Marx-Leninism, Central Party Archives)
and
Anatolii Stefanovich Prokopenko, Deputy Chairman of the Committee for archival matters of the RSFSR
The former Central Party Archives were opened to researchers and scholars about 35 years ago. They are visited by approximately 1000 scholars yearly. In recent years ca. 50-60 foreign scholars visit the archives. The historical part of these archives is the most easily accessible for external scholars.
In addition ca. 10.000 photographs as well as 9.000 meters of film on Lenin are kept in these archives.
The archives are divided into four main sections:
1. Documents on the history of the Communist Party of the USSR (including the archives of the original Institute of the History of the Party and of the October Revolution -- Istpart)
2. The holdings from the original Marx-Engels Institute
3. The Lenin Archives
4. The documents on the history of the international communist movement (including the Comintern collection )
In addition there is a Reference section, a Photolaboratory, a Laboratory for the restoration and the preservation of documents and a Reading room.
The documents are normally kept in stacks with the exception of the original manuscripts of Lenin and Marx and Engels which are kept in vaults.
As in the Central Committee Archives all repositories are air-conditioned and fire protected.
1. The section covering the activity of the Communist Party contains 326 collections divided into 1.500.000 files (dela). There are also 34.000.000 Party registration cards covering 1926, 1936 and 1954. From 1974 onwards there are 5.000.000 cards of dead or expelled Party members. The other 18.000.000 are still kept in loco (obkoms, etc.) but will soon be passed on to the Institute.
The section contains materials from the Leading Party Bodies including the Politburo, and the Secretariat of the Central Committee, materials from the various Departments of the Central Committee until 1953 as well as materials of the Party congresses, conferences and Plenums until 1940.
Of the Party Plenums, Conferences and Congresses three minutes are kept in these section: the draft minutes, the minutes deciphered and the so-called stenotchet.
Documents on the BUND (the Jewish social-democratic movement) and the Social Revolutionary Party are also kept in this section.
Recently this section started establishing contacts with relatives of Party members repressed under Stalin with the purpose of acquiring documents which might be integrated into the existing records.
2. The Marx-Engels section contains 182 collections, most of them acquired thanks to the efforts of Boris Moiseevich Riazanov, first director of the original Marx-Engels Institute. Most of the documents are in German and French.
These holdings basically consist of:
documents of Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels (including a small collection of manuscript originals);
documents of the German social-democratic movement (Liebknecht, Rosa Luxemburg, Bernstein, Karl and Nina Kautzky);
documents on the history of the French Revolution, the Paris Commune and the French Socialist movement in general (Proudhon, Fourier, Babeuf, Saint Simon, Blanqui);
dispatches of the Russian Embassy in Paris on the activities of Russian emigres, in particular the files of Herzen, Bakunin and Kropotkin .
...
3. In this third section we could see the vault containing the manuscripts of V.I. Lenin.
4. The section on the History of the international communist and workers' movement was formed in 1950. It contains 62 collections divided into 90.920 files, including the records of the Comintern as well as materials of international organizations which were emanations of the Comintern, such as the Communist international of youth, the Profintern, the Interworkers' Aid, the Sportintern, etc.
The Scholarly and Information Center for the Political History of Moscow
Meeting with:
Vladimir Nikolaevich Chernous, Director of the Moscow Obkom and Gorkom Party Archives and Deputy Director of the Scholarly and Information Center for the Political History of Moscow.
Aleksei Samsonovich Kiselev, chief of the Union of Archives of the City of Moscow
Prof. Anatolii Nikolaevich Ponomarev, a specialist on the history of Moscow and its Party organization
The Scholarly and Information Center for the Political History of Moscow is where the Moscow Obkom and Gorkom Party Archives are physically located. The archives are contained in one of the two buildings of the Institute. There are 16 floors of compact shelving which contain ca 3.500.000 files.
40% of these files consist of protocols, minutes and other documents reflecting the activity of both the Party Committees covering the period 1917-1991. They also include speeches, leaders' statements, analyses, reference materials and other information produced by the local Party leaders as well as documents from the primary Party organizations (enterprises and other institutions, state and administrative bodies located in the city of Moscow).
The rest of the archives contain personal files of the Party "nomenklatura" including those Party members accused of violations against the Party discipline.
These archives also include a collection of Soviet informal periodical publications. Mr. Chernous gave me a copy of 5 numbers of Kovcheg, a journal on Soviet informal publications issued by the Scientific, Research and Informative Center of Political History of Moscow
In the last two years researchers from the USA, Great Britain (many from Oxford) and France have visited these archives. Chernous mentioned in particular Alexander Nekrich from Harvard and Harry Shukman from Oxford.
Mr. Chernous was probably the most helpful person we met during our trip. He gave us some more insights into the Soviet system of Party archives and allowed us to have a copy of the "Working procedures for the Obkom and Kraikom Party Archives..." (Appendix 4) He also expressed deep interest in joint ad hoc research and publications projects with Western institutions.
APPENDIXES
1. Protocol concerning the International Commission to Study the Party and State Security Structure in the Soviet Union (in Russian and in Rough English translation).
2. Technical Proposal on Conversion of Archival Records to Electronic Media and Usage.
3. Draft Law of the RSFSR on Archives.
4. Pravila raboty partiinykh arkhivov obkomov, kraikomov Partii, Institutov istorii Partii - Filialov IML pri TSK KPSS ("Working procedures for the Obkom and Kraikom Party Archives..."
5. Sample inventory (opis').
6. Copy of the first page of CC document.
7. Structure of the (planned) Database of the Central collection's catalog of the RSFSR.
8. Ministry of the Radio Industry, Soviet Computer Initiative Ltd. Automated Archives Information System
