At the end of December 1945, at a meeting of the Politburo, the decision was made to dismiss A.I. Shakhurin of the People's Commissar of the Aviation Industry. At the end of April 1946, he was arrested together with the Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force, Chief Marshal of Aviation, twice Hero of the Soviet Union A. A. Novikov. The development of the "aviation case" began, giving rise to the withdrawal of Malenkov's Central Committee from the secretariat. On April 30, 1946, “confession” was received from Novikov, in which he confirmed that he was “the direct culprit of the use of aircraft parts of poor-quality aircraft and engines”. In addition, he pleaded guilty to "acquiring various property from the front" for his "personal well-being." Novikov was forced to give incriminating testimony on G. K. Zhukov, accusing the latter of striving to “diminish the leading role in the war of the High Command”, i.e. Stalin,

In the late 40s - early 50s. cleansing in the Armed Forces. Zhukov turned out to be in disgrace, forced to command first the Odessa and then the Urals Military District. In 1948, in connection with the celebration of the three-year anniversary of the capture of Berlin, the Soviet press did not even mention his name. During these years, Admiral I. Yu. Yumashev, Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, Air Force Marshal K.A. Vershinin, Commander of the Air Force (after Novikov), Marshal I.I.Bogdanov, Commander of Armor and Tank Forces, Marshal I.N. Voronov, Commander of the Air Force, were deprived of their posts. , Chief of the Main Political Directorate of the Armed Forces, Colonel-General I. V. Shikin and other military leaders.

After the death of A. Zhdanov, which followed in August 1948, the situation of people close to him became especially vulnerable. G. Malenkov, using Stalin's pathological suspicion of any manifestations of independence and initiative, was one of the main organizers of the "Leningrad Affair". He sought to prove that in Leningrad there was an organized group of leaders who had embarked on the path of backstage combinations directed against the central leadership. Already on February 15, 1949, the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU (b) decided to remove A. A. Kuznetsov, M. I. Rodionov (Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR) and P. S. Popkov (First Secretary of the Leningrad Regional Committee and the City Committee of the CPSU) from their posts. b)). In 1949-1951 in Leningrad and the region, over 2,000 responsible workers were repressed.

Popkov and other Leningrad leaders were charged with the desire to create, according to the sample of other union republics, the Russian Communist Party with headquarters in Leningrad, and also to transfer the government of the RSFSR to the city on the Neva. One of the peculiarities of the "Leningrad case" was that not only party functionaries, but also Soviet, Komsomol, trade union leaders and members of their families were persecuted. Were cleared in the universities of the city, during which many famous scientists lost their jobs. Hundreds of titles of books and brochures were banned and removed from libraries.

From September 29 to October 1, 1950, in the building of the Leningrad district House of Officers, the trial of the first group of accused in this “case” took place. On October 1, the sentence was announced, and on the same day A. A. Kuznetsov, M. I. Rodionov, N. A. Voznesensky, P. S. Popkov, Ya. F. Kapustin and P. G. Lazutin were executed . The list of victims of the "Leningrad case" continued to increase. At the end of October 1950, A. A. Voznesensky, the Minister of Education of the RSFSR, and the former rector of Leningrad State University during the war years were shot; M.A. Voznesenskaya - First Secretary of the Kuibyshev District Committee of the CPSU (b) of Leningrad; N. Soloviev - First Secretary of the Crimean Regional Committee of the CPSU (b), previously the chairman of the executive committee of the Leningrad Regional Council; G. F. Badayev - Second Secretary of the Leningrad Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks); A. A. Bubnov - Secretary of the Leningrad Executive Committee and other leaders. Arrests and lawsuits continued in 1951-1952. The total death toll in the "Leningrad case" was about 30 people. Rehabilitation of convicts began after the death of Stalin.

The "Leningrad Affair" became a kind of rehearsal before the planned series of new pro-Cess. At the beginning of July 1951, the Central Committee of the CPSU (b) received a statement from the senior investigator for particularly important cases of the MGB of the USSR, Lieutenant Colonel M. D. Ryumin, in which he "signaled" about the unfavorable state of affairs in the Ministry and accused him of his immediate superior Security V.S. Abakumov. This circumstance suited Beria and Malenkov, who in the summer of 1951 headed the special commission of the Central Committee to investigate the activities of Abakumov and did everything possible to remove him from his post. The former head of the MGB was expelled from the party and taken into custody. A new campaign has been launched to identify "enemies".

At the end of 1951 - the beginning of 1952, Stalin inspired the “exposure” of the so-called Mingrelian nationalist organization in Georgia. Even in these conditions, Beria could not help but feel the threat to his position, having reason to believe that he himself could become the next victim of a dictator.

In the autumn of 1952, the entire color of the then elite medicine turned out to be at Lubyanka: professors V.N. Vinogradov, M.S. Vovsi, B. B. Kogan, A. M. Grinstein, A.I. Feldman, and others. Stalin allowed ru- MGB apply physical therapy methods to doctors. On January 13, 1953, a TASS report was published under the heading "Arrest of a group of pest doctors". It noted that the doctors, taking advantage of Zhdanov's disease, had incorrectly diagnosed his disease, prescribed a contraindicated regimen for the patient, and thereby killed him. In treating a candidate member to the Political Bureau of the Central Committee, A. S. Shcherbakov, the doctors allegedly "misused potent drugs, established a destructive regime, and brought him to death in this way."

The TASS report contained a statement that the doctors tried first of all to undermine the health of the Soviet leading military cadres, disable them and thereby weaken the country's defense. It was pointed out that the actions of physicians were aimed primarily at the deterioration of the health of marshals A. M. Vasilevsky, L. A. Govorov, I. S. Konev, Army General S. M. Shtemenko, Admiral G. I. Levchenko, and others. Doctors were accused that they were hired foreign agents, most of whom were associated with the international Jewish bourgeois-nationalist organization "Joint", created by American intelligence for espionage and terrorist activities.

The total number of those arrested in the "case of doctors" by February 1953 reached 37 people. The investigation of the case acquired a distinct anti-Semitic character. At the same time, the arrested were forced to testify on anything objectionable leaders of the party and military oligarchy - members of the Presidium of the Central Committee and representatives of the generals of the Soviet Army.