State Committee on the State of Emergency
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Press conference of the "State Committee on the State of Emergency USSR", in the building of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the USSR (August 19, 1991).
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| Formation | 19 August 1991 |
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| Extinction | 22 August 1991 |
| Type | Self-declared provisional government |
| Legal status | Dissolved by the Russian SFSR and Soviet Union |
| Purpose | Prevention of the New Union Treaty signing, governance for planned six-month state of emergency |
| Headquarters | Moscow Kremlin, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union |
| Location |
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Region served
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Soviet Union
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Official language
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Russian |
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Chairman
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Gennady Yanayev |
| Affiliations |
KGB Soviet Army Soviet Ministry of Internal Affairs |
Soviet Union
The State Committee on the State of Emergency (Russian: Государственный комитет по чрезвычайному положению, ГКЧП, Gosudarstvennyi Komitet po Chrezvechainomu Polozheniyu, GKChP), also known as the "Gang of Eight", was a group of eight high-level officials within the Soviet government, the Communist Party, and the KGB, who attempted a coup against Mikhail Gorbachev on 19 August 1991. The coup ultimately failed, with the provisional government collapsing by 22 August 1991 and several of the conspirators being prosecuted by the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation.
The eight members were:
Pugo shot himself to avoid arrest, while the other seven members were arrested.
The 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt, occurring between 19–21 August 1991, was an attempt by the Gang of Eight to take control of the country from then President of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev. The Gang of Eight were hard-line members of the Communist Party (CPSU) who were opposed to Gorbachev's reform program and the new union treaty he had negotiated, which dispersed much of the central government's power to the republics. The coup collapsed after only two days, and although Gorbachev was restored as President, his authority was irreparably damaged and he became less influential outside of Moscow. The event destabilized the Soviet Union and many speculate that it played a role in both the demise of the CPSU and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. After the coup failed, the seven living members of the Gang of Eight were arrested.
On December 15, 1992, over a year after the attempted coup, the Prosecutor General sent the criminal case against the Gang of Eight to the Military Collegiate of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation. Anatoliy Ukolov, a deputy chairman of the Collegiate, was charged with reviewing the case, and the hearing was scheduled for 26 January 1993. The defendants included the aforementioned seven living member of the group plus Oleg Shenin (1937–2009), Politbureau and secretariat member; Anatoly Lukyanov (b. 1930), Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union; and Valentin Varennikov (1923–2009), General of the Army, Deputy Minister of Defense, and Commander of Land Forces.
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