1940 in the Soviet Union

Incumbents

• General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union – Joseph Stalin
• Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union – Mikhail Kalinin
• Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the Soviet Union – Vyacheslav Molotov

  Births

• May 24 – Joseph Brodsky

  Deaths

• January 27 – Isaac Babel
• February 2
• * Vsevolod Meyerhold
• * Robert Eikhe
• * Mikhail Koltsov
• February 4
• * Nikolai Yezhov
• * Mikhail Frinovsky
• 10 March – Mikhail Bulgakov