Two years after the Soviet Union’s humiliating defeat in the Cuban Missile Crisis, Chairman Leonid I. Brezhnev, of the Presidium of the U.S.S.R., and Alexei N. Kosygin, First Deputy Premier of the U.S.S.R., depose Nikita Khrushchev as First Secretary of the Communist Party and as Premier.  Brezhnev assumes the office of First Secretary and Kosygin is promoted to replace Khrushchev as Premier.

       NOTE: Khrushchev was the only Soviet head of state not to die in office.

       [added 6/13/2025]