Felix Dzerzhinsky, Soviet educator and politician of Belarusian origin (born 1877)

Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinsky, nicknamed Iron Felix, was a Soviet revolutionary and politician of Polish origin. From 1917 until his death in 1926, he led the first three Soviet secret police organizations, the Cheka, the GPU and the OGPU, establishing state security organs for the Bolshevik government. He was a key architect of the Red Terror and de-Cossackization.