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On the Rise. Attached to the victorious army of Marshal Konstantin Rokossovsky (now National Defense Minister of Red Poland) Commissar Bulganin coldbloodedly prevented any help from reaching the "premature" Polish patriots when they rose against the Nazis in Warsaw. Bulganin came out of the war loaded down with decorations, and liked to clank around in them. Not Hero Zhukov, of whom Stalin was jealous, but Commissar Bulganin became Minister of the Armed Forces.
By 1948, Bulganin had arrived. Stalin made him a full-fledged member of the Politburo. While Malenkov, Zhdanov and Beria jockeyed to succeed the failing dictator, Bulganin bided his time. His sister Nadezhda was a confidante of Stalin's wife, Roza Kaganovich, and through their "women's letters," says a Red army officer who defected recently, Bulganin was always apprised on which way the struggle was going. He stayed out of the way.
On his fiery charger, Bulganin would review Red army parades and make the customary we-are-peace-loving-but-we-are-strong speech. Once, when the High Command expressed its irritation at the performance of the Minister of Military Aviation, Bulganin packed him off to Siberia. Bulganin's control of the military machinery paid off handsomely soon after Stalin died. The party, in the person of Malenkov, pounced on Lavrenty Beria, but it was.Bulganin who called out the tanks of the Red army garrison to disarm Beria's MVD battalions.
Not long afterwards, Malenkov lost his job too, and who should be there to take it but Nikolai Alexandrovich Bulganin. To a visiting U.S. journalist, he described himself, with mock humility, as "a young Prime Minister" who feels "just like anybody else does when picked for a job like this."
Cocktail-Party Premier. Bulganin, as Premier, has laid aside his marshal's uniforms and taken to soft, dark suits, silk socks and cambric shirts. His office is in the Kremlin, but he lives in a spacious dacha outside Moscow. His plump, 55-year-old wife, Elena Mikhailovna, teaches English at one of Moscow's high schools. They have a son and daughter, both married. Interviewed by a Danish journalist, who asked about the Premier's private life, Elena Bulganin said that she and Nikolai Alexandrovich discuss their work with one another "like all married couples do." She added: "We have Sundays and the holidays together, and many evenings when we visit the theater or cinema."
Nowadays Bulganin spends many afternoons and evenings appearing with other Soviet leaders at diplomatic gatherings, showing off their capacity for good fellowship. Sometimes, if Khrushchev gets a little too liquored up, Bulganin pulls him away, usually with a phrase such as, "Come, Nikita. It is time for you to go."