Andrei Andreyevitch Gromyko (Андре́й Андре́евич Громы́ко) (July 18 (July 5, Old Style), 1909 – July 2, 1989) was foreign minister and chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union.
He was born in the village of Staryja Hramyki, Rechyca Raion, Minsk Guberniya (Imperial Russia) - (now Homyel voblast, Belarus)-, into a peasant family. He studied agriculture at the Minsk School of Agricultural Technology and graduated in 1936. Later he worked as an economist at the Institute of Economics in Moscow.
Gromyko entered the foreign department in 1939 after Stalin's purges in the section responsible for the Americas. He was soon sent to the United States and worked in the Soviet embassy there until 1943, when he was appointed the Soviet ambassador to the United States. He played an important role in coordinating the wartime alliance between the two nations and was prominent at events such as the Yalta Conference. He became known as an expert negotiator. In the West, Mr. Gromyko received a very appropriate nickname - Mr. Nyet (Mr. No) or Comrade Nyet for his obstinate negotiating style.
In 1946 he became the USSR's representative on the United Nations Security Council. He served briefly as the ambassador to the United Kingdom in 1952-1953 and then returned to the Soviet Union, where he served as foreign minister for 28 years. As Soviet foreign minister, Gromyko played a direct role in the Cuban Missile Crisis and met with US President Kennedy during the crisis. Gromyko also helped negotiate arms limitations treaties, specifically the ABM Treaty, the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, SALT I and II, and the INF and START agreements. During the Brezhnev years, he helped construct the policy of détente between the superpowers and was active in drawing up the non-aggression pact with West Germany.
Gromyko always believed in the superpower status of the USSR and always promoted an idea that no important international agreement could be reached without its involvement.
Gromyko was minister of foreign affairs from 1957 until 1985, when he was replaced as foreign minister by Eduard Shevardnadze. Gromyko entered the Politburo in 1973, eventually becoming chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet in 1985. However, the position was largely ceremonial, and he was forced out three years later because of his conservative views during Gorbachev's period of reform. Gromyko died in Moscow a year later.
