Three New Bosses

The week also brought the biggest Soviet command shuffle since Khrushchev threw Molotov and Malenkov out of the top leadership three years ago. Handsome, wavy-haired Frol Kozlov, 51, whose flying trip to Washington paved the way for Khrushchev's visit to the U.S. last year, gave up his post as First Deputy Premier to become one of Khrushchev's top party aides. Early last year Khrushchev told Averell Harriman in Moscow that he regarded Kozlov as his successor. But Aleksei Kosygin, 56, named First Deputy Premier last week in Kozlov's place, has since won equal apostolic blessing for his work as head of Khrushchev's seven-year-plan. On tour in France last month, Khrushchev several times pointed to Planner Kosygin as "my successor."

In the shakeup, a famous Old Bolshevik faded away. Pleading ill health, Marshal Kliment Voroshilov, 79, resigned as head of state at the Supreme Soviet's closing session. Premier Khrushchev praised and decorated Stalin's old companion-in-arms, then kissed him on both cheeks. But the aged President had been on the wrong side of the 1957 leadership fight, and Khrushchev had not forgotten.

As new President of the Soviet Union, he nominated (and the Supreme Soviet promptly approved) swarthy, bushy-browed, dynamic Leonid Brezhnev, 53. Like Kozlov and Kosygin, Brezhnev belongs to the new generation of Soviet men, reared among machines rather than revolution, trained in industry, agriculture and politics. He got his start working under Khrushchev in the Ukraine, moved to Kazakhstan to launch Khrushchev's pet "virgin lands" scheme, and only this year made his first trip beyond the Iron Curtain to speak at a Finnish Communist Party Congress. Since he still is a top Party Secretary, Brezhnev may fill the hitherto largely ceremonial office of President with greater power and authority.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.