Bulgarian State Security – Political Police (530 pages) [CRYPTOME]

Part of the Bulgarian State Security in Communist Era Files collection.

INTRODUCTION

The collection “The State Security – Political Police“ is the fifth documentary publication of the Commission for disclosing the documents and announcing affiliation of Bulgarian citizens to the State security and intelligence services of the Bulgarian People’s Army. It is a significant part of the activities of the Commission aimed at the implementation of the legal requirement to provide access to archival files that throw light on the nature and actions of the former secret services in Bulgaria in the period 1944-1989.

Researchers have found huge opportunities for research activities after the adoption of the Access and Disclosure of Documents and Announcing Affiliation of Bulgarian Citizens to the State Security and the Intelligence Services of the Bulgarian National Armed Services Act. This has motivated us to publish these basic documents.

The documents stored in the archives of the State Security contain data that expand the existing public perception of ideologically motivated repression of Bulgarian citizens during the communist regime. The choice of the theme of the present collection is dictated by the fact that our society knows relatively little about the forms and scope of political repressions characteristic of the activities of the State Security. In most cases persecutions for political reasons are associated with the activities of Division VI of the State Security for combating ideological subversion. To some extent this is logical because the Division started its activities in the late 60s, i.e. in the second half of the communist regime in Bulgaria.

Division VI of the State Security was the object of intense public anger immediately after 10 November 1989 and it was associated with the political police in the public discourse. Division VI of the State Security was the first structure of the State Security, whose repressive activities were condemned immediately after the fall of communism by representatives of different social spheres, including members of the BCP. This was the first division to be formally disbanded; the proposal for disbanding it was made in the very first days after 10 November 1989 by Petar Mladenov, the new Secretary General of the Central Committee of the BCP.

However, Division VI did not exhaust the main structures in the State Security, which in different periods were assigned one single task - the persecution of dissidents, and only for political reasons. In the history of the State Security after 9 September 1944 there was always (except for the short period between 1963 and 1967) a clearly defined structure, to which repressive functions were assigned by the BCP. The purpose of this collection is to present these very structures. They were: Section “A“ of the Department of State Security (1944–1947); Department I of the State Security Directorate (1947–1952); Secret Political Department III of the State Security to combat counter-revolution (1952–1961), Department III of the State Security – Economic (1961-1963), where the line of activities against counter-revolutionary elements remained, and Division VI of the State Security to combat ideological subversion (1967–1989).

The period under survey is from 9 September 1944 to 10 November 1989. However, it should be noted that the archival fund of Division VI contains documents for the period from 1945 to 1985. This archival fund does not contain archival units created after 1985 as such archival units have not been submitted to the archives. Most of the archival units, including the official operational archives of Division VI in the period 1986-1989, were destroyed in the different sub-units of the ideological division according to a top secret order of crucial significance issued by General Atanas Semerdgiev, Minister of the Interior, at the end of January 1990 for the purpose of cleaning the files of the State Security. This is why the collection contains documents relating to the period 1945–1985.

To compile the collection, the research team has examined two main archival funds, Fund 13 and Fund 22, of the former archive of the Ministry of the Interior. The first fund contains the documents relating to the structures, which were assigned the task of implementing specific political repressions in the period 1944–1963. The second one contains archival documents of Division VI of the State Security (1967–1985). The two funds altogether contain over 2,200 archival units, most of which have been examined. In the initial selection of the most important documents over 150 archival units were included. Their volume on electronic media occupies more than 130 gigabytes. In the secondary selection of documents for this collection 61 documents were included covering about 472 pages in the publication. The examined materials will be published in full in an expanded electronic format of the collection (DVD). The documents are divided into separate sections according to the relevant structures of the State Security, and arranged in chronological order.

The selected documents have been checked to avoid duplication of some of them, which were published by the Commission in collection No 4 “The State Security and the Changes in Bulgaria“ (1944 – December 1947). The collection includes important archival materials related to the operation of Section “A“ of the Department of State Security and Department I of the Directorate for State Security in the period 1944–1947.

Another important requirement of the team of researchers was to select documents of better quality, so that their users could read them without any difficulty. In the selection of materials the team was led by the principle to include a bigger number of diverse archival documents in the collection, that can illustrate the widest possible scope of the repressive structures, which are the object of this study, and to cover almost all years in the period 1945–1985. Thus the collection contains a selection of written references, reports, information, personal handwritten instructions of the Minister of the Interior, handwritten notes of his deputies, applications, status reports, a map and an agent report.

These documents are products of different units in the structures of the State Security listed above, charged with monitoring, persecution and control of various political opponents. The variety of documents gives an idea of the comprehensive coverage of the areas that were in the sphere of interest of the political police of the State Security during the years of totalitarian rule of the BCP.

Dr. Orhan ISMAILOV