Just as the Red Army was smashing into Budapest in early November, British, French, and Israeli forces rolled into Egypt, creating a Middle East crisis that forced the suppression of the Hungarian Revolution to share the front page of world newspapers. What happened was that, in an effort to dethrone the Egyptian leader, Gamal Abdel Nasser, and reopen the Suez Canal to international traffic, Israel joined forces with Britain and France in invading the Suez peninsula in a daring operation timed to allow Britain and France to take control of the canal. But before they could complete this controversial and complicated operation, the United States, which had been kept in the dark by its allies, angrily interceded and forced the three invading armies to withdraw immediately, which they did, their plan an embarrassing flop.
Nevertheless, on November 6 the Kremlin plunged into a form of brinksmanship, sending sharply worded warnings to Guy Mollet of France, Anthony Eden of Britain, and David Ben-Gurion of Israel that Russia was prepared to intervene militarily in the Middle East, with or without a UN mandate, hinting at one point that unless the “aggressors” withdrew promptly, which they were starting to do anyway, the Russians would send an untold number of “volunteers” to Egypt. Bulganin then shot off a personal letter to Eisenhower proposing a joint U.S.-Soviet force to accelerate the process, again threatening to demolish the “aggressors” if no action were taken. Foreign Minister Dmitri Shepilov urged the UN Security Council to take immediate action against France and Britain, adding that the Soviet Union would be willing to deploy its forces in such a UN endeavor.
Interestingly, the Kremlin agenda featured another, more immediate but not acknowledged objective—deepening this mood of gloom and doom about a possible big war in the Middle East in order to distract people’s attention from the bloody slaughter of the Hungarian rebels. Russians were much more concerned about the rising casualty rates in Hungary than they were about “Zionist aggression” in Egypt. Moreover, deep down, they did not really believe that Khrushchev was going to send “volunteers” to Egypt. It was not a credible threat, not after their dismal experience in Hungary. No one at JPRS or the embassy thought the Russians would send troops or “volunteers” to Egypt.
But to drum up street-corner enthusiasm for a threat no one seemed to take seriously, the Kremlin resorted to another old propaganda ploy: it staged popular demonstrations in front of the Moscow embassies of the “invaders,” the “aggressors,” the “interventionists”—namely, the Israelis, the British, and the French—demanding an end to their “blatant aggression” in the Middle East. These demonstrations were intended to convey the impression both at home and abroad that the Soviet government was truly angry about the invasion of Egypt and would take drastic action against the “aggressors.” For example, at the Anglo-American School children were sent home early, just to be cautious, even though everyone knew that the demonstrations were phony displays of popular anger. On the day of the demonstrations American embassy personnel were restricted to the compound for three hours, except for those on urgent business, and they needed to be driven in and out of the compound in embassy cars with diplomatic plates.
Pravda described the demonstrations as “spontaneous expressions of public anger,” but in fact they were highly organized and coordinated to begin and end at a certain time. The demonstrators were bused to the embassies and then bused back to their factories, all as part of their day’s work. They carried signs and posters, all painted and prepared on government time. MVD troops stood guard over the demonstrators, the troops and the demonstrators getting tipsy drinking vodka. Few were genuinely antagonistic, and they were mostly gathered at the Israeli embassy, where a door was smashed.
At one point a French journalist walked into the mob of demonstrators in front of his embassy.
A burly Russian demonstrator grabbed his arm. “Who are you?” he asked in belligerent tones.
“A French journalist,” was the answer.
Suddenly the belligerence melted into a smile. “Good,” the Russian said, releasing his arm and patting him on the back.
At the British embassy, where the demonstrating mob actually pushed open the garden door, the distinguished British ambassador, Sir William Hayter, walked up to the MVD colonel, who was “in charge of” the screaming, presumably angry demonstrators, and in a beautiful expression of British understatement asked, “Could you tell me please when these demonstrations will end?”
The colonel, apparently not thinking, glanced at his wristwatch and replied simply, “In half an hour.”
On November 7 the Russians celebrated the thirty-ninth anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution with the usual parade through Red Square. Standing atop the Lenin Mausoleum were Khrushchev, Zhukov, and other Soviet leaders, bundled up against the cold. I had opposed the goals of the Bolshevik Revolution for many years, but on this day there was another reason for resentment. To those members of the diplomatic corps wishing to observe the parade from privileged positions near the mausoleum, the Foreign Ministry made it clear that they had to be there by 6:00 a.m., before the troops, tanks, missiles, and other armor, needed for the parade, blocked access to Red Square. Needless to say I objected furiously—but only to myself in my otherwise empty room. I got to my place near the Kremlin wall well before the 6:00 a.m. deadline.
The parade itself started at 10:00 a.m., at the exact moment when the Kremlin clocks sounded the hour. The military marched through Red Square, followed by the heavy armor, none of which, I was later told by the military attachés, was especially new or interesting. The “popular” part of the parade lasted until 12:30 p.m. Many Russians carried signs denouncing “Western” and “Zionist” aggression against Egypt. Zhukov spoke, and, consistent with the theme of the day, warned that Soviet troops were “available” to smash “Western aggression” against Egypt. By this time I was freezing but managed to jot down in my notebook his “warning” that Soviet troops were also “available” to “crush the Hungarian counterrevolution.” Had they not already done that on November 4?
That evening I noted in my diary: “It snowed for the rest of the day, but this did not disturb the Russians who flocked into Revolution and Red Squares by the thousands, most of them drunk, dancing, delighted, and not in the least concerned about Suez or Hungary. This was their holiday. They did not have to work tomorrow, and the band played catchy tunes from an open bandstand opposite the Kremlin…. Many extra platoons of militia patrolled the streets. They were very severe with the drunkards, and there were many of them.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
“Dark, Frightening, and Tragic Days”
Quite often on Sunday mornings I did a little extracurricular work for Dan Schorr and Irv Levine, the CBS and NBC correspondents in Moscow, translating articles from the Soviet press for them. Monday through Saturday they employed official translators, Russians who knew both English and Russian, either because they were superb linguists, which many were, or because they were born and raised in Britain or the United States and had been brought to Moscow by communist parents who wanted to live in the land of Lenin. They brought their fluency in English with them, too. For my Sunday immersion in Pravda and Izvestia and a few of the other Soviet dailies, I was paid $25 by each of the correspondents. Not bad, I thought.