Russian Secret Police

The Tsar of all the Russias had secret police called the Okhrana who seem to have been quite benevolent compared with their successors under the Bolsheviks. The Wiki tells us that they were hated passionately; that they made things worse not better. At all events, the people found out the hard way that the next lot were worse when they suffered the Red Terror.

Name changes were part of it all. Policy was constant; terror was the reality. They started with the Cheka, which was short for the Extraordinary Commission & set up by Felix Dzerzhinsky.

The Cheka was followed by:-

OGPU 1917 to 1937
Followed by:-

NKVD - 1937 to
Then the:-

KGB
Which departed leaving us with the:-

Federal Security Service

KGB