Committee for State Security

We all know the KGB.

Nice men, happy folks, silent, cool, Committee for State Security.

That currently would represent the rigid vertical top-down hierarchy of the Russian state.

That's a system built on total paranoia, absolute centralized control, and the complete suppression of individual initiative.

For 30 hours, the home is divided on every level.

The Central Intelligence Agency and the Committee for State Security split the basement, taping down a white line to divide their workspaces.

On the top floor, the leaders' respective staffs sit across the table from one another, tasked with hammering out the nature of possible deals and concessions.

On the ground floor, the U.S. and Soviet military aides responsible for the nuclear football, or the briefcase containing the nuclear codes, stare stone-faced at one another outside of closed conference doors.

The FSB.

KGB, the KGB was Committee for State Security.

Komitet gosudarstvyennoy bezopasnosti, which succeeded the NKVD, which is the Narodnyy komissariat vnutrennikh del, which is the National Commissariat for Internal Affairs.

And I could give you more Russian acronyms if you wanted, but that's probably enough.