The head of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has offered a defense of his agency's controversial predecessors, who were involved in organizing mass purges and the Gulag prison system. Dec. 20 marks the 100-year anniversary of the founding of the Cheka, the notorious predecessor of the Soviet-era KGB and today's FSB.

Alexander Bortnikov gave a lengthy interview to the Rossiiskaya Gazeta government daily in commemoration of the event. Here are some of the highlights.

On traitors within Russia: “Our Fatherland was a constant target for foreign states. The enemy either tried to defeat us in open combat or by using traitors inside our country to sow discord, divide the nation, and paralyze the ability of the government to effectively respond to threats. The destruction of Russia is still an obsession for many.”

On the purges of the 1930s:

“Although many associate this period with the mass fabrication of charges, archive materials show a significant number of criminal cases were based on factual evidence.” On the U.S. plan for nuclear war with the Soviet Union: “The U.S. intended to use the atomic weapons tested in Hiroshima and Nagasaki against our country. They picked out tens of bombing targets [...] The ‘Dropshot’ plan, approved in 1949, envisioned the outbreak of NATO aggression, starting with the bombardment of 100 Soviet cities with 300 nuclear warheads.”