Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev

Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev, General Secretary of the Party and Chairman of the Presidium (President), died November 10, 1982, at the age of 75.

Following the fall of Khrushchev in October 1964, Brezhnev began his drive for power which culminated in his holding the highest offices in the USSR. In 1968, as justification for the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, he formulated the “Brezhnev doctrine” stating that the USSR could intervene in the domestic affairs of any Soviet bloc nation if Communist rule was threatened. Starting in 1972, Brezhnev was instrumental in the development of the policy of détente with the U.S., leading to the signing of the SALT II treaty June 18, 1979.

Sources

Pearls of Wisdom, vol. 25, no. 65.