Putin renames Russia’s spy academy after founder of Soviet secret police
The Academy of the Federal Security Service (FSB) in Moscow, which trains Russian intelligence personnel, has been renamed in honour of the first Soviet secret police chief Felix Dzerzhinsky, according to a decree issued by Vladimir Putin on Wednesday. The move restores a name carried by the institution from 1962 until 1992, when it was known as the “F. E. Dzerzhinsky Higher School of the KGB” in honour of the ruthless revolutionary who led the Soviet secret police organisations until his death in 1926.
Novaya Gazeta Europe — The Academy of the Federal Security Service (FSB) in Moscow, which trains Russian intelligence personnel, has been renamed in honour of the first Soviet secret police chief Felix Dzerzhinsky, according to a decree issued by Vladimir Putin on Wednesday. The move restores a name carried by the institution from 1962 until 1992, when it was known as the “F. E.
Dzerzhinsky Higher School of the KGB” in honour of the ruthless revolutionary who led the Soviet secret police organisations until his death in 1926. Lauding Dzerzhinsky’s “outstanding contribution to ensuring the security of the state”, the Kremlin wrote that the honorary title was being awarded to the FSB Academy “in recognition of the merits of its staff”. Dzerzhinsky, commonly known as “Iron Felix”, was appointed by Vladimir Lenin in 1917 to head the Cheka, the first secret police agency in post-revolutionary Russia.
One of the architects of the “Red Terror” which saw tens of thousands executed between 1918–1922, Dzerzhinsky’s brutal approach meant he was one of the key Soviet historical figures whose legacies were reassessed in a wave of de-communisation in the 1990s. Independent Russian journalist Dmitry Kolezev said that the latest decision to honour Dzerzhinsky was a “sign” of the Kremlin’s intentions, coming after recent decisions to “ close the Gulag museum and tear down memorials to victims of repression”. Journalist Farida Rustamova added that the renaming was “highly symbolic”, saying that it was “likely the first time” that Putin had publicly evaluated Dzerzhinsky’s legacy.
The toppling of a statue of Dzerzhinsky in Lubyanka Square in 1991, which had stood outside the KGB’s Moscow headquarters since the late 1950s, marked a key turning point in the collapse of the Soviet Union. In recent years, however, his image has been rehabilitated by the Russian authorities, and a facsimile of the original statue was erected outside the headquarters of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service in 2023. Russia’s foreign intelligence chief Sergey Naryshkin said at the time that Dzerzhinsky was an “example of honesty, selflessness and duty”, and that his “ideals of decency and justice” had made him a "moral compass” for future generations working in national security.