Voshchenkov started his lecture at exactly 1:00 p.m. He cited a glowing report by the Russian news agency TASS about a meeting, held from January 1 to 4, of the communist leaders of the Soviet Union, Bulgaria, Romania, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary on the “Hungarian situation.” This summit meeting was proof, he said, that “good relations” existed among “all” socialist countries. Yugoslavia, East Germany, and Poland did not attend; no reason was offered as to why.
Voshchenkov spoke of a world divided into two camps: the “black forces of fascism” marked by “open American connivance” in the Hungarian rebellion, and the “peace-loving forces of socialism,” which have given a “vigorous and decisive rebuff to the imperialist camp.” He repeatedly referred to Lenin as the source of all wisdom. Stalin was not mentioned.
He asserted that the United States was “ugly,” “evil,” “responsible for insidious plots and conspiracies to bring capitalism back to Hungary…. They wish to destroy the great achievements of the socialist system in the Soviet Union and in Hungary…. They wish to establish military bases in Eastern Europe for use against the peace-loving Soviet Union. They are planning a Third World War.” I later noted in my diary that Voshchenkov “castigated America in the most vicious terms I have ever heard since I came to the Soviet Union.” And, reading the Soviet press every day, I thought I had heard quite a few.
Voshchenkov spoke with passion. He had a strong voice and a commanding presence. No one interrupted him. Hungary was clearly at the center of his concerns. “Many say that the events in Hungary have weakened the camp of socialism,” he argued. “This is false. They have weakened the camp of capitalism. They have dealt a crushing blow to American monopolists. The camp of socialism, on the contrary, has been considerably strengthened by these events.” But, he continued, “we have learned an important lesson.” He paused, stared menacingly at his audience, glanced down at his papers, then again at his audience, suggesting that if they hadn’t listened carefully before, they should now. “We thought we could get along with the capitalists, but we have erred.” He again paused. “It is impossible to get along with capitalists.” This seemed more the language of Molotov than of Khrushchev, more the language of hard-liners, who evinced no interest in “peaceful coexistence”—Khrushchev’s policy—with the capitalist West. Were Molotov and his followers gaining so much power that they could press their line in public in Leningrad? I wondered what was going on.
“They will stop at nothing,” Voshchenkov continued, pressing his argument. “They wish to restore capitalism in Hungary. But the putsch did not have a broad base. Only the fascists supported the revolt. [Admiral Miklos] Horthy and his men, equipped with American arms, took part in the revolt—not the honest workers. The Americans wanted to create a military base in Hungary, bring war very close, but we have stopped these vicious intrigues, and we will continue to crush these attempts. With the failure of the events in Hungary, the American monopolists have changed their tactics, but their aim remains the same.”
A second theme pushed by Voshchenkov that day was the recent Anglo-French-Israeli attack on Egypt, which opened the door to aggressive Russian moves into the Middle East. Here was additional proof that the “imperialists” were seeking to roll back the “peaceful progress of the socialist camp.” He painted a picture of the “capitalist encirclement” of the Soviet Union, a line out of Stalin’s handbook and one that the 20th Party Congress was supposed to have supplanted with “peaceful coexistence.” This was what he said about events in the Middle East (I took notes throughout Voshchenkov’s talk): “The attack and aggression against Egypt is just another link in a major imperialist conspiracy against all peace-loving countries, against the Soviet Union, and the [neutralist] Bandung countries. Even in Indonesia, the Americans are trying to convert the country into an American military base. Churchill, who takes an active, backstage role in instigating the West against Russia, is just as bad as Hitler, and you all know what happened to Hitler! The Dulles-Eisenhower doctrine is nothing more than another American attempt to convert the Middle East into an American stronghold, taking advantage of the weakened position of the British and the French. There is a constant threat against the Soviet Union, and its purpose is a Third World War.”
While in the Soviet Union that year I always had to remind myself that World War II had ended only eleven years before. Many cities, including Moscow and Leningrad, still showed scars of the Nazi assault. Many Russians still felt the pain of wartime losses—husbands, sons, children who died at the front. They did not want war; indeed, I thought they would instinctively oppose any policy that moved the world toward war. That was why the Kremlin always blamed the United States for any dangerous confrontation between the two rivals. The fault was never to be the USSR’s.
When he finished, Voshchenkov was greeted with a tidal wave of applause that boomed off the walls of a lecture hall that had once been noted for aristocratic elegance, Viennese waltzes, and Pushkin’s poetry. Because he was speaking in a lecture hall and not at a university, the questions were polite but still reflected the uneasy mood of the populace.
“Why weren’t Poland and Yugoslavia invited to the summit?”
“How come UN observers were not allowed into Hungary? Did the Soviet Union veto such a move?”
“Was Nagy a counterrevolutionary?”
“Is Tito a good Marxist?”
“Why are the Jews such a warlike people?”
“Why did you allow some people to read newspapers while you were speaking?”
Voshchenkov’s answers were rarely elucidating. He seemed eager to pack his papers and leave. His audience seemed content with his presentation; they accepted both his reliance on orthodox Marxist formulas to resolve complicated problems and his obvious unwillingness to provide honest answers. In his lecture I caught a glimpse of the real Soviet Union—among ordinary people a stunning lack of political sophistication, a shortage of reliable information, a willingness to live with obvious mendacity and mediocrity, and, despite the 20th Party Congress and the thaw it sparked, an underlying fear among many that a wrong word, a look of disapproval, could get anyone, even a member of the party, into serious trouble. Once again I felt sorry for the Russian people. They deserved better.
My first “official” visit to the Saltykov-Shchedrin Library was acutely disappointing. I had been led to believe that the head of the manuscript division would be both friendly and cooperative. He was neither. In a brief meeting, chilly though his office was overheated, he told me that the library had Uvarov’s archives but he needed prior approval from his superiors before he could open them to my perusal. He was really hoping that I would just go away. “Perhaps it would be more convenient if you returned tomorrow. I might have word then,” he suggested.
I answered that I would return later in the day, at about three.
“Tomorrow,” he repeated.
“Three this afternoon,” I insisted, stressing I had only a limited amount of time in Leningrad.
“More likely tomorrow,” he said, sighing, and looked down at his papers. Our meeting adjourned on this sorry note of stalemate.