Anatoly Gavrilowitsch Kowaljow

Anatoly Gavrilowitsch Kowaljow

Anatoli Gawrilowitsch Kowaljow ( Russian Анатолий Гаврилович Ковалёв ; born May 18, 1923 in Gnilowskaja, Rostov Oblast ; † January 17, 2002 in Moscow ) was a Soviet diplomat and poet .

Career

In his diplomatic career, he developed strategies for the Soviet Union that were to lead from the nuclear East-West confrontation of the Cold War into confidence-building measures with the West in order to avoid a nuclear confrontation. These efforts resulted in détente strategies with various Western countries on the one hand and in the CSCE and OSCE negotiations with the West on the other, with Kovalev occupying a central position in the Soviet delegation. In 1948 Kovalyov graduated from one of the first years of the Moscow Institute for International Relations MGIMO . He was also a student of Ilya Selwinsky at the Maxim Gorki Literature Institute . He then quickly made a career as a top diplomatic figure, but always remained one step below the rank of minister . From this sheltered position, as an advisor to the Soviet Foreign Ministers and General Secretaries , he was able to advance his personal conviction of a policy of détente with the West. His memoirs are considered to be a first-hand source of insight into the motivation behind the Soviet policy of detente and into the decision-making mechanisms of the Soviet foreign policy apparatus.

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1948–1949 he was a consultant in the Soviet Foreign Ministry. 1949–1953 he was a consultant in Germany with the Political Secretary of the Soviet Military Administration in Germany . 1953–1955 he worked in the apparatus of the Soviet Control Commission and the Soviet Embassy in the GDR and experienced the period of the Cold War , which was decisive in divided post-war Germany .

1955-1965 he worked at the third European department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs as assistant to the Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko and head of the expert commission at the minister's office.

From 1965 to 1971 he was chairman of the first department responsible for France , Spain , Italy , Belgium and Switzerland and in 1966 he became a member of the College of Foreign Affairs. In 1966 he was appointed Envoy Extraordinary, Deputy Minister in 1971 and First Deputy Foreign Minister in 1986.

1971–1985 he was chairman of the Foreign Ministry's planning staff. At the first stage of the CSCE negotiations in Geneva and at the CSCE follow-up meeting in Madrid , he chaired the Soviet delegation. In 1991 he retired.

Development of détente strategies

At the instigation of the Foreign Minister of the USSR, Andrei Gromyko, who was still supporting the detente at the time, he developed negotiation strategies for the individual European countries in the 1960s and 1970s. In 1970 he drafted a peace program on behalf of Leonid Brezhnev , which was primarily intended to secure the Stalinist conquests in Europe and would result in the CSCE. He pushed the CSCE negotiations forward even after the détente policy lost its initial momentum in the second half of the 1970s and first half of the 1980s. Within the Soviet apparatus, under Brezhnev, he strengthened the position of the “pigeons” against repeated attacks by the “hawks” so decisively that he got on Mikhail Suslov's black list. Out of conviction, he co-designed and implemented the foreign policy under Mikhail Gorbachev and Eduard Shevardnadze . Towards the end of the East-West conflict , his strategy from the Brezhnev period had proven its worth: as one of the few Soviet officials, he accepted the fact that Soviet domination would fall apart because he saw no alternative. In recognition of this, he was entrusted with accepting the Nobel Prize intended for Gorbachev on December 10, 1990 , as Gorbachev did not want to leave the country due to domestic political difficulties. He also played a crucial role in the liberation of political conscience prisoners .

Kovalyov was recognized as a thought leader and trainer of diplomats. Throughout his life he wrote poetry in which he processed current experiences of his career and promoted perestroika . This resulted in a number of published volumes of poetry, of which there are also German translations. His poems have been set to music by Raimonds Pauls , among others .

Awards

Kowaljow was u. a. with the Order of Lenin ( 1983 ), twice ( 1971 and 1977 ) with the Order of the October Revolution and three times ( 1966 , 1973 , 1975 ) with the Order of the Red Banner of Labor awarded. He has won several awards in the Song of the Year competition in the lyricist category.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Anatoli Gawrilowitsch Kowaljow, The Art of the Possible. Memoirs, edited by Max Gutbrod. The manuscript of the German translation is available as a PDF from the editor, Max Gutbrod.
2. ^ Jacques Andreani, Le piège: Helsinki et la chute du communisme, Paris, 2005, pp. 98ff.
3. ↑ Mikhail Gorbatschow, Recollections, Berlin, 1995, p. 755.
4. ↑ Anatoly Adamishin and Richard Shifter, Human Rights, perestroika and the End of the Cold War, 2009, p 168ff.
5. ↑ See his textbook: Anatoli Kowaljow, ABC der Diplomatie, Berlin (East), Staatsverlag der DDR, 1980.
6. ↑ Cf. Mikhail Gorbatschow, Quellen, Berlin, 1995, p. 302, where Kowaljow is mentioned as one of the “poets of relaxation”.