/THE ZHUKOV BREAKTHROUGH

EXCEPT for Khrushchev himself, no -- Russian leader has a more fascinating future to watch than Marshal Georgy Konstantinomch Zhukov, newest member of the Communist Presidium, the only man in the top leadership to have made the Red army his full career, and his country's most authentic popular hero.

Born: Dec. 2, 1896, in the peasant village of Strelkovka, near Moscow.

Appearance: Stocky (5 ft. 6 in., about 200 Ibs.), trim, with an old cavalryman's stiff yet colorful swagger, a hard face that creases into an Ike-size smile. "A man of the earth," says the U.S.'s Paratrooper General James Gavin. "Short, pudgy fingers and a lot of brains."

Family: The marshal and his wife Alexandra have two daughters--Era, married to the son of Marshal Vasilevsky, and Ella, wife of Marshal Kliment Voroshilov's grandson.

Military Career: At 19 served as enlisted man with the czar's dashing Novgorod Dragoons, then joined the revolution's Red irregulars, became a party member in 1919. Educated at Moscow's Frunze military academy, got final professional polish in Germany under famed monocle-wearing General von Seeckt, who taught him the tactics and strategy of the "breakthrough." One of a dozen or so professionals to survive Stalin's pre-World War II army purges (in which 374 generals were killed), rose rapidly in battle command. When Stalin panicked at the German advance on Moscow in 1941, Zhukov brought in fresh Siberian troops and saved the capital. Thereafter, as a troubleshooter who ranged wherever the battle went hardest, Zhukov won the Soviet's greatest victories--at Stalingrad, Leningrad, the Dnieper. He took Berlin with 22,000 cannons, 1,000,000 casualties (he employed the standard Russian tactics: massed attacks, artillery concentrations, heavy casualties).

Fall & Comeback: After Zhukov had basked beside Dwight Eisenhower for six months as Allied joint commander in Berlin, Stalin moved to strip him of his war-won glory. In his secret speech to the 20th Congress, Khrushchev told how the jealous Stalin spread stories that "before each operation at the front Zhukov used to take a handful of earth, smell it and say: 'We can begin the attack,' or the opposite: 'The planned operation cannot be carried out.' " Zhukov was banished for six years, to Odessa, then to the Urals. But within 24 hours of Stalin's death, he was back in high command.

Appraisal: Washington experts warn against any suggestion that Zhukov's elevation means that the Russian revolution has entered its Napoleonic phase. In Berlin, Eisenhower found the marshal slavishly loyal to the party; his opposition to the power of political commissars in World War II was more on technical grounds of military efficiency than a desire to downgrade the party. Zhukov was fully behind the ruthless Red army crackdown in Hungary, which he called "liquidating fascism." The marshal's advance to the Presidium does not necessarily mean that the Red army is closing in on the leadership: so far as is known, no other Red army representative moved up with or behind him. But among the lesser men who now pack the Presidium, Zhukov undoubtedly looms as a very large figure. He brings to the Khrushchev command prestige, assurance of army backing, and a "high and ready appreciation of military strength" that the Pentagon believes will make him a conservative force in any nuclear debates in Kremlin councils.

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