On April 23, 1946, the former commander-in-chief of the Soviet Air Force, Novikov, was arrested on charges of accepting a batch of low-quality aircraft, resulting in a major accident that led to the destruction of the aircraft and the death of people.

Also arrested were the Minister of Aviation Industry of the Soviet Union Shahulin, Air Force Military Commissar Air Force General Smanov, Air Force Deputy Commander General Legpin, Air Force General Seleznev, Director of the Air Force General Directorate of Equipment Procurement, and Directors of the Cadre Bureau of the Central Committee Budennikov and Grigoriyan.

After Novikov's arrest, Admiral Abakumov, then the head of the counterintelligence special operations agency, used torture to extract confessions, induce confessions, and use drugs and narcotics to force Novikov and others to confess all the charges.

Under severe torture, Novikov, who was in despair and had a nervous breakdown, finally did not endure this cruel torture, and had to confess all the accusations and write some written materials that were detrimental to Malenkov and Zhukov according to Abakumov's prompts.

Novikov was eventually sentenced to five years in prison for "dereliction of duty and abuse of power" and sent to a gulag in Akhmolinsk (present-day Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan).

He was deprived of all his military ranks, honors, medals and other awards, all benefits enjoyed by his family, including housing benefits, were canceled and forcibly moved to residence in Akhmolinsk, all activities were restricted, and he was constantly monitored by the personnel of the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

Originally, Novikov, as a prisoner in a labor camp, was to serve hard labor in Gulagli, but after he arrived in Akmolinsk, Chernenko, then the first secretary of the Kazakh Party Committee, under Manturov's instructions, ordered the Gulag commander to leave a more comfortable single room for Novikov's family and arrange better jobs for Novikov's family.

As for Novikov himself, as a prisoner of the Gulag, he naturally needed to do some undignified work like other prisoners, but under the care of Manturov and Chernenko, he worked less time than others every day, and the nature of the work was relatively relaxed, and he even had the time and energy to write his memoirs after the work was completed.

Novikov's arrest was only the beginning of a series of highlights, and after he wrote written material against Malenkov and Zhukov, a "conspiracy" against Zhukov and Malenkov began.

On May 6, 1945, Malenkov, then secretary of the Secretariat of the Central Committee of the CPSU, was relieved of all his duties for "neglecting his duties and conniving at the shoddy manufacture of aircraft while he was a member of the National Defense Committee" and was "assigned" to Uzbekistan to preside over the construction of a dam.

All his functions and powers in the Secretariat of the Central Committee were taken over by Manturov, and the Personnel Department of the Central Committee of the CPSU, which he headed, was also divided into seven different departments, which were responsible for the establishment of cadres in the administrative organs, light industry, heavy industry, machine building, trade and finance, agriculture, and communications, and were unified under the leadership of Manturov, the third secretary of the CPSU Central Committee.

After Malenkov's dismissal, his political ally Beria was also transferred to the post of member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU, and was to be by-elected as a full member of the Politburo at the next plenary session of the Central Committee of the CPSU, while his post as head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was taken over by the head of the special counterintelligence agency, Abakumov, from which Beria lost control of the state security services and became a member of the Politburo in name only.

In this "liquidation", the "Georgian gang" headed by Beria was undoubtedly the faction that suffered the biggest blow in the top echelons of the CPSU, as the "gang boss", Beria lost control of the state security department and the anti-counter department (although there were still many loyal people in the department), and the "second gangster" Malenkov was demoted to Uzbekistan to build a dam.

With the boss and the second boss severely attacked, some members of this "gang" have begun to look for new "backers," and the "Leningrad faction" headed by Zhdanov, the second secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, the "Siberian faction" headed by Manturov, the third secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, and the "Old Guard" composed of Molotov, Voroshilov, Kaganovich, and others have become the choice of these people.

There is no doubt that the faction that has benefited the most from this "liquidation" is undoubtedly the "Siberian faction" headed by Manturov, and therefore the most popular target of the "defectors". But most of these people are speculators who are left and right, see the wind and steer the rudder, and even careerists.

For Manturov, these people are not trustworthy at all, and if Manturov loses power that day, these speculators and careerists who have taken refuge in him will not hesitate to switch to other camps, and even expose their weaknesses and stains to others and step on their own chest.

In addition to the "Georgian gangsters", Marshal of the Soviet Union Zhukov was also the focus of this liquidation.

During the Soviet-German War, Zhukov, as the chief of the General Staff of the Soviet Army and the commander of the Front, commanded many battles and made great achievements, becoming a hero of the Soviet Union who attracted much attention and was well known throughout the country.

In the Soviet Union, there were many people who opposed Stalin, but there were not many people who opposed Zhukov. Because Zhukov is the national hero of the people of the Soviet Union, and his only well-known achievement is the defeat of the invaders from the East Asian island countries and Central European Germany, and not many people know about his shortcomings and mistakes, so the vast majority of people have a positive impression of him, and the only people who have negative thoughts about him are Stalin and some soldiers around him who have a little bit of a holiday with him.

It was precisely because of Zhukov's fame and respect by the people of the Soviet Union that Stalin, the supreme leader, felt a hint of threat. He could not tolerate the emergence of a person in the Soviet Union who shone higher than him, let alone allow such a person to have military power or even party power.

Therefore, he took this opportunity to order Abakumov to interrogate Novikov and by the way force Novikov to write some written materials that were unfavorable to Zhukov.

According to these written materials, "Marshal Zhukov intends to attribute to himself the decisive role in the victory of all major battles, in exchange for better fame and greater influence." He is so ambitious that he is even prepared to recruit some frustrated and dismissed commanders to engage in activities against the government and the High Command."

When Stalin received these materials from Abakumov, he pretended to be "furious", but in reality, he was not in a bad mood at all.

Less than a month later, Stalin personally drafted an investigation order, asking Abakumov, who had just become Minister of Internal Affairs, to take people to Zhukov's house and office to conduct a surprise investigation, and found that his house stored a lot of belongings obtained from Germany, including some expensive clocks, as well as fur coats, leather shoes, etc., so that Stalin found a new reason to deal with Zhukov.

Zhukov personally wrote a review of the problem of German possessions in his family, admitting his mistake of being "obsessed with wealth and being seduced by abundant materialism", but he insisted on denying that he had formed gangs, snagged the frustrated, and exaggerated his personal merits.

Stalin, of course, would not have "believed" Zhukov's rhetoric, but since Marshal Konev, Marshal Rokossovsky and Marshal Vasilevsky upheld justice and resolutely refuted the claim that Marshal Zhukov had a conspiracy attempt, Stalin did not decide to arrest Zhukov, but dismissed him from the Central Committee of the Party and demoted him to the post of commander of the Odessa Military District, which dealt a considerable blow to Zhukov's position.

Browse and read the address: