Andrei Gromyko

For more information on Andrey Andreyevich Gromyko, visit Britannica.com.

(b. Old Gromyki near Minsk, 18 July 1909; d. Moscow, 2 July 1989) Russian; Minister of Foreign Affairs 1957 – 85 Gromyko was born in Belorussia, the son of Russian peasants. He studied economics and agronomy in Minsk and at the Institute of Economics in Moscow and joined the Communist Party in 1931. Gromyko worked first as an agrarian economist, writing for the journal Voprosy ekonomiki from 1936 to 1939 and joined the diplomatic service which Stalin had just purged and was aided by the patronage of Molotov. After serving for four years as counsellor at the Soviet Embassy in Washington he became ambassador to the United States in 1943. He led the Soviet delegation at the Dumbarton Oaks conference in 1944 which paved the way to the foundation of the United Nations, and in 1945 was present at the Yalta and Potsdam conferences. From 1946 to 1948 he was a permanent Soviet Representative at the UN Security Council. In 1949 he returned to Moscow as First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs but three years later became Soviet Ambassador to London; this was a demotion, reflecting Stalin's ill-will. Returning to Moscow following Stalin's death, he survived Molotov's disgrace to become Foreign Minister in 1957. He prospered under Brezhnev after 1964 and became a full member of the Politburo in 1973.

Gromyko's influence on foreign affairs increased even further under Andropov and Chernenko in the years 1982 to 1985. He gave Gorbachev vital backing in his bid to become General Secretary of the CPSU in March 1985 but soon ceased to be Minister of Foreign Affairs and was replaced by Shevardnadze. He was promoted to the largely honorific post of chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet — the USSR's head of state. In 1988 he retired and in April 1989 was removed from the Central Committee.

Andrei Andreevich Gromyko (1909-1989) represented the Soviet Union for many years in major international conferences after World War II, first as minister of foreign affairs and then as president of the USSR.

Andrei Gromyko was born on July 18, 1909, in a village in Belorussia, then a province in the western region of the Russian Empire. His parents were peasant farmers. After the Revolution of 1917 the Communist state helped young people from working families to obtain a higher education and encouraged them to join the Communist Party. Gromyko took advantage of these opportunities.

Despite the hardships which the collectivization of agriculture imposed on the peasant population, he became a loyal supporter of Stalin's regime. He joined the Communist Party in 1931 and attended an agricultural technical school in his province, graduating in 1936. He then went to Moscow to work in the Institute of Economics of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, where he completed his doctoral thesis on the mechanization of agriculture in the United States. For several years he occupied the position of senior researcher in the institute, where he specialized in the American economy.

A Career in Diplomacy

He began a new career in 1939 in the Soviet Diplomatic Service. Many older diplomats had disappeared during the late 1930s in Stalin's police terror. The new recruits who took their place received quick promotion to important diplomatic positions. Gromyko had the necessary qualifications for advancement. Son of working peasants, well educated, and a member of the party since the beginning of the Stalin take-over, he belonged to the new generation of Stalinists. He had no experience or previous training in international relations. He learned his leadership skills on the job. Until 1985 his entire career was devoted to Soviet foreign affairs.

Gromyko began his work at the Soviet embassy in Washington, D.C., one of the Soviet Union's most important diplomatic posts. In 1943 at age 34 he was made Soviet ambassador to the United States. While serving in Washington he learned to speak fluent English. In World War II the Soviet Union and the United States were allies against Nazi Germany and Japan. Gromyko attended the major Allied conferences at Yalta and Potsdam in 1945, assisting Stalin in his negotiations with US leaders. The Soviet Union that year joined in the founding of the United Nations. Gromyko participated in the writing of the U.N. Charter, which made the Soviet Union a member of the Security Council with the right to veto any U.N. policy. In 1946 he became the permanent representative from the USSR to the Security Council.

In the two years that followed, the beginning of the Cold War produced serious diplomatic conflicts in the United Nations between the Soviet Union and the West. Gromyko faithfully carried out the new Soviet policy, casting 26 vetoes to prevent the United Nations from adopting resolutions of which Stalin disapproved. His unsmiling public appearances earned him the title among Western diplomats of "Old Stone Face." His work satisfied Stalin and Molotov, minister of foreign affairs, and in 1949 he was promoted to first deputy minister, becoming Molotov's direct assistant. In ten years he had risen from the position of research scholar in agriculture to one of the most important posts in Soviet foreign relations.

After Stalin's death in 1953 Gromyko continued to serve the new leaders competently and loyally. When Khrushchev came to power in 1955 he introduced a policy of "peaceful coexistence" to improve relations with the West. New conferences were held between East and West. Gromyko collaborated in these meetings. His influence grew when in 1956 he was appointed a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. His career advanced again in 1957 when the minister of foreign affairs joined a group of other leading Communists opposing Khrushchev's policies in an attempt to remove him from power. They failed and were themselves removed from their leadership positions (Molotov left Moscow to become Soviet ambassador to the Mongolian People's Republic). Gromyko's reward for loyal service and for taking no part in the plot to depose Khrushchev was promotion to minister of foreign affairs.

Minister of Foreign Affairs

In his years as minister he distinguished himself by his ability to implement effectively the policies of the Soviet leadership. He was adept at accommodating every Soviet leader from Stalin to Gorbachev, and in dealing with nine US presidents during his career. He participated actively in all international meetings and negotiated with leaders of important countries. In 1962 Khrushchev secretly ordered the installation of Soviet intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Cuba. Gromyko went to Washington at that time to talk with President Kennedy, who warned him of the danger of a US-Soviet war if the Soviet missiles were actually placed in Cuba. Gromyko never admitted that his country was involved in this dangerous action; later he claimed that he had not concealed the move since the US president had never put the question of the missiles directly to him.

In the mid-1960s the Soviet Union began major industrial projects with the aid of Western corporations, including the Fiat automobile company in Italy. In 1966 Gromyko led the Soviet delegation to Rome to conclude the Fiat agreement. There he asked for and received an audience with the Pope. He was the first Soviet statesman publicly to recognize the importance of the Papacy. He appeared to have felt a deep satisfaction at the growing power and influence of his country in world affairs, asserting in 1971 that "today there is no question of any significance (in international relations) which can be resolved without the Soviet Union or in opposition to her."

Gromyko belonged to the Soviet political elite who enjoyed special comforts and privileges. He took personal pleasure in fine clothes, having his business suits specially made by Western tailors. He was probably instrumental in the successful career of his son, who became director of the Institute of African Affairs and wrote many authoritative articles on Soviet foreign policy (one consisting of a rare interview with his father discussing the Cuban missile crisis).

A Power in the Politburo

In the early 1970s the Soviet Union concluded with the United States an important treaty for the limitation of nuclear armaments, the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT). Gromyko helped to negotiate the final agreement. He acquired extensive knowledge of ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons. When negotiating, noted one observer, Gromyko "never took a note, never looked at a folder or turned to his assistants for advice." His service in these negotiations and support for the Soviet leader, Brezhnev, earned him in 1973 a position in the Communist Party's ruling committee, the Politburo. In addition, he received during his years as foreign minister many honors, including the Order of Lenin and Hero of Socialist Labor.

Relations with the United States gradually worsened during the 1970s. Gromyko sought in international meetings to strengthen the global influence of the Soviet Union. He promoted close ties with African states regardless of their type of government or economic system, declaring that "we do not consider ideological differences in social systems." When in the early 1980s Brezhnev became ill and could not make major foreign policy statements, Gromyko took his place. In the campaign to prevent the United States from placing new nuclear missiles in Europe, he declared in 1982 in the United Nations that the Soviet Union, "the world's foremost peace loving nation, " promised never to be the first state in any international conflict to use nuclear weapons. This "no first use" pledge did not represent a new policy, for the Soviet Union had built its nuclear weapons arsenal to match that of the United States and to prevent a nuclear attack. In making the speech Gromyko established that he had begun to play a major part in decisions on Soviet foreign policy. His decades of experience in international relations had by then earned him a new title - "Dean of World Diplomacy."

The Rise of Gorbachev and the Demise of

Gromyko

After Brezhnev's death in late 1982 Gromyko became one of the small circle of Soviet Communists in the Politburo to choose the new Soviet leader. Two successors died soon after their appointments. In 1985 the Politburo picked their youngest member, Mikhail Gorbachev, to be general secretary. Gromyko made the formal announcement of this choice. He occupied by then the informal position among his colleagues as senior member of the Politburo. Gorbachev elevated Gromyko's position to that of President, (the official title being Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, thus replacing Chernenko, who had died in March, 1985. This position, though prestigious, lacked an effective degree of power, and essentially brought Gromyko's political career to an end after 28 years. Gromyko was replaced as Minister of Foreign Affairs by Eduard Shevardnadze, former party boss of the Soviet Republic of Georgia. In 1989, the Politburo voted Gromyko out as president. He was hospitalized for vascular problems shortly thereafter, and died in July 1989, at the age of 80. Only one Politburo member attended his funeral.

Gromyko's autobiography Memoirs was begun in 1979, published in the Moscow in 1988 and in the US in 1990. There are countless discrepancies between events, not only in the nine years it took Gromyko to write the book, but also in the later English translation. In his autobiography, Gromyko recounts meetings with everyone from Marilyn Monroe to Yasar Arafat to Pope John Paul II. Although he reveals little, Gromyko remained a loyal Stalinist to the end. Despite recent reassessment of Stalin's career and methodologies, Gromyko stubbornly defends him. With regard to the Cold War, Gromyko blames the US and holds Stalin himself blameless.

Further Reading

Summary biographies are included in Who's Who in the Soviet Union (1984) and in The International Who's Who 1984-85 (1984); brief biographical accounts of his life are provided in "A Diplomat for All Seasons, " TIME (June 25, 1984); "Winds of Kremlin Change, " TIME (July 15, 1985); in various book reviews of Memories:see New Republic (May 14, 1990); and National Review (April 30, 1990); and in "An Enduring Russian Face, " New York Times (July 3, 1985); scattered references to his activity as minister of foreign affairs are found in Robin Edmunds, Soviet Foreign Policy:The Brezhnev Years (1983); Gromyko's memoirs, titled Memories, were published in 1990.

(1909 - 1989), Soviet foreign minister and president.

Andrei Gromyko was born into a peasant family in the village of Starye Gromyki in Belorussia. He joined the Communist Party in 1931. He completed study at the Minsk Agricultural Institute in 1932 and gained a Candidate of Economics degree from the All-Union Scientific Research Institute of Agronomy in 1936. From 1936 to 1939 he was a senior researcher in the Institute of Economics of the Academy of Sciences and the executive editorial secretary of the journal Problemy ekonomiki; he later gained a doctorate of Economics in 1956. In 1939 Gromyko switched to diplomatic work and became section head for the Americas in the People's Commissariat of Foreign Affairs. Later that year he became counselor in the Soviet Embassy in Washington. Between 1943 and 1946 he was Soviet ambassador to the United States and Cuba. During this time, he was involved in the Dumbarton Oaks Conference (1944) called to produce the UN Charter and the 1945 San Francisco conference establishing the United Nations. He also played an organizational role in the Big Three wartime conferences. From 1946 to 1948 he was the permanent representative in the UN Security Council as well as deputy (from 1949 First Deputy) minister of foreign affairs. Except for the period 1952 - 1953 when he was ambassador to Great Britain, he held the First Deputy post until he was promoted to foreign minister following the anti-party group affair of 1957. Gromyko remained foreign minister until July 1985, when he became chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet, effectively Soviet president.

Throughout his career, Gromyko was neither highly ambitious nor a major political actor on the domestic scene. Although a full member of the Central Committee from 1956, he did not become a full member of the Politburo until 1973. He developed his diplomatic skills and became the public face of Soviet foreign policy, gaining a reputation as a tough negotiator who never showed his hand. He was influential in the shaping of foreign policy, in particular détente, but he was never unchallenged as the source of that policy; successive leaders

Nikita Khrushchev and Leonid Brezhnev both sought to place their personal stamp upon foreign policy, while there was always competition from the International Department of the Party Central Committee and the KGB. Gromyko formally nominated Mikhail Gorbachev as General Secretary in March 1985, and three months later was moved from the Foreign Ministry to the presidency. The foreign policy for which he was spokesperson during the Brezhnev period now came under attack as Gorbachev and his Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze embarked on a new course. Gromyko's most important task while he was president was to chair a commission that recommended the removal of restrictions on the ability of Crimean Tatars to return to Crimea. Gromyko was forced to step down from the Politburo in September 1988, and from the presidency in October 1988, and was retired from the Central Committee in April 1989. He was the author of many speeches and articles on foreign affairs.

Bibliography

Edmonds, Robin. (1983). Soviet Foreign Policy: The Brezhnev Years. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Gromyko, Andrei. (1989). Memories, tr. Harold Shukman. London: Arrow Books.

The Tauris Soviet Directory. The Elite of the USSR Today. (1989). London: I. B. Tauris.

—GRAEME GILL

"Gromyko" redirects here. For various fictional Russian associates of Dr. Yuri Zhivago, see Gromeko family.

Andrei Gromyko
Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet
In office July 27, 1985 – October 1, 1988
Preceded by	Konstantin Chernenko Vasily Kuznetsov (acting)
Succeeded by	Mikhail Gorbachev
Foreign Minister of the Soviet Union
In office February 14, 1957 – July 27, 1985
Preceded by	Dmitri Shepilov
Succeeded by	Eduard Shevardnadze
First vice President of the Council of Ministers of the USSR
In office March 24, 1983 – July 2, 1985
Born	July 18 [O.S. July 5] 1909 Staryja Hramyki, now in Sviatsilavitski Sielsaviet, Vietkauski Rajon, Homiel Voblast, Belarus
Died	July 2, 1989 (aged 79) Moscow, Soviet Union
Nationality	Belarusian
Political party	CPSU

Andrei Andreyevich Gromyko (Russian: Андре́й Андре́евич Громы́ко; Belarusian Андрэ́й Андрэ́евіч Грамы́ка; July 18 [O.S. July 5] 1909 – July 2, 1989) was a Soviet politician and diplomat. He served as Minister for Foreign Affairs for the Soviet Union (1957–1985) and Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet (1985–1988).

Biography

Andrei Gromyko was born to a Belarussian peasant^[1] family in the Belarusian village of Staryja Hramyki/ Gramyki, near Gomel. He studied agriculture at the Minsk School of Agricultural Technology and graduated in 1932. Later he worked as an economist at the Institute of Economics in Moscow 1936-1939.

Gromyko entered the department of the foreign affairs in 1939 after Joseph Stalin's purges in the section responsible for the Americas. He was soon sent to the United States and worked in the Soviet embassy there until 1943, when he was appointed the Soviet ambassador to the United States. He played an important role in coordinating the wartime alliance between the two nations and was prominent at events such as the Yalta Conference. He became known as an expert negotiator. In the West, Gromyko received a nickname "Mr. Nyet" (Mr. No) or "Comrade Nyet" or "Grim Grom" for his obstinate negotiating style. He was removed from his Washington post on April 10, 1946 in order to be able to devote his full attention to UN matters.

In 1946 he became the Soviet Union's representative on the United Nations Security Council. He served briefly as the ambassador to the United Kingdom in 1952-1953 and then returned to the Soviet Union, where he served as foreign minister for 28 years. As Soviet foreign minister, Gromyko played a direct role in the Cuban Missile Crisis and met with U.S. President Kennedy during the crisis.

Gromyko also helped negotiate arms limitations treaties, specifically the ABM Treaty, the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, SALT I and II, and the INF and START agreements. During the Brezhnev years, he helped construct the policy of détente between the superpowers and was active in drawing up the non-aggression pact with West Germany.

Statue of Andrei Gromyko in Gomel

In 1966, he engaged in a dialogue with Pope Paul VI as part of the pontiff's ostpolitik, which resulted in greater openness for the Roman Catholic Church in Eastern Europe.

Gromyko always believed in the superpower status of the Soviet Union and always promoted an idea that no important international agreement could be reached without its involvement.

Gromyko was minister of foreign affairs from 1957 until 1985, when he was replaced as foreign minister by Eduard Shevardnadze. Gromyko nominated Gorbachev for the Communist Party general secretary's post at 11.03.1985 Politburo meeting. Gromyko entered the Politburo in 1973, eventually becoming chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet (i.e. head of state of the Soviet Union) in 1985. However, the position was largely ceremonial, and he was forced out three years later because of his conservative views during the Gorbachev era. Gromyko died in Moscow one year later.

Gromyko's dour demeanor, evidenced during his first term in Washington, echoed throughout his tenure as Soviet foreign minister. There is a story that has Gromyko exiting a Washington hotel one morning and being asked by a reporter, "Minister Gromyko, did you enjoy your breakfast today?" His response was "Perhaps." ^[2]

He had a wife named Lidiya (died 2004), a son named Anatoli (born 1932) and a daughter named Emiliya (born 1938).

Notes

1. ^ Gromyko, Andrei. Memoirs, p. 2. Doubleday, New York, 1990.
2. ^ "Postcard from Budapest". BBC. 2002-12-10. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2559747.stm. 

External links

• Interview about the Cold War for the WGBH series, War and Peace in the Nuclear Age
• Annotated bibliography for Andrei Gromyko from the Alsos Digital Library for Nuclear Issues

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Preceded by Vasily Kuznetsov	Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet 1985–1988	Succeeded by Mikhail Gorbachev
Preceded by Dmitri Shepilov	Foreign Minister of the Soviet Union 1957–1985	Succeeded by Eduard Shevardnadze

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