early Soviet secret police, 1921, from Russian initials of Chrezvychainaya Komissiya "Extraordinary Commission (for Combating Counter-Revolution);" set up 1917, superseded 1922 by G.P.U. (dictionary.com)
"By the late Soviet period, though, K.G.B. officers like Putin were nearly as dismissive of Communist ideology as the dissidents were. 'The Chekists in his time laughed at official Soviet ideology,' Gleb Pavlovksy, a former adviser to Putin, told me. 'They thought it was a joke.'"
- David Remnick, "Watching the eclipse: Ambassador Michael McFaul was there when the promise of democracy came to Russia - and when it began to fade", 11 & 18 August 2014 The New Yorker
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