Bombshell

by Allan, Barbara

  But why hadn’t they simply re-organized themselves—peacefully—as had their Polish brothers? Instead, communist party members were made examples of, brutally murdered, and strung up in the vandalized town square, and then outrageous demands had been made—not just freedom, but neutrality!—which had made it impossible for Moscow to look the other way.

  In handling the crisis, Nikita fell back on a tactic he had learned long ago—a tactic that had saved his life more than once… like the time Stalin had sent for him in February of 1939….

  To be summoned in the middle of the night to the dictator’s dacha just outside the capital—which the insulated Stalin rarely left—could mean many things, most of them bad, many involving death, often the death of the one summoned. The young Khrushchev, then First Secretary of Moscow City, had survived more of these invitations than just about anyone in the Party… but with each new summons, Nikita’s odds worsened.

  Without so much as a greeting, the burly, big-headed head of the Communist party came directly to the point. In his bedclothes, his eyes wilder than usual, thick black hair unkempt, massive mustache in need of a trim, Stalin had the look of a madman. This was largely because, as Nikita well knew, the dictator was indeed mad.

  “Comrade,” Stalin said, with an intensity worthy of reporting the infidelity of his mate, “someone is poisoning the horses in the Ukraine.”

  “Oh?” was all Nikita said. With Stalin it was always better to listen than to be heard. To be heard was to have an opinion, and to have an opinion was to risk much too much.

  Pacing, Stalin flailed his arms like a drowning man. “All over the countryside, the peasants are reporting their horses falling like dead flies.”

  “I see.”

  Clearly vexed, Stalin asked, “Do you know what this means to our country? The dire ramifications?”

  Nikita did. Horses were needed not only for farming, but for the military, as this was before American trucks had arrived.

  Stalin’s eyes narrowed and he leaned close to the smaller, younger man. “An enemy is under my nose.”

  Nikita nodded thoughtfully, twitched his own nose, but said nothing.

  Now Stalin paced again, shouting, “It is an enemy of the people doing this!” He pointed a thick finger right at Nikita.

  But Nikita—his mind filling with images of his wife, his children—merely waited.

  Stalin continued: “I want them found, and I want them punished!”

  “All right then,” Nikita said calmly.

  Folding his arms, apparently reassured by his trusted associate’s composed reaction, Stalin said, “I have already had a professor at the Kharkov Veterinary Institute look into this matter. Nothing! Then I enlisted the minister of the Institute of Animal Husbandry—he too failed miserably.”

  “Just the same,” Nikita responded, with a small shrug, “I would like to speak with them… before I conduct my own investigation. They may have insights.”

  Stalin shook his head dismissively. “Impossible,” he said. He threw his nose in the air and snorted—one of his favorite mannerisms. “They’ve been shot.”

  Nikita somehow managed to conceal his horror, asking casually, “But why?”

  “Because it turned out they were involved in the poisoning conspiracy—you can read their confessions to the NKVD, if you like.”

  “Ah,” Nikita said, nodding, understanding. If someone couldn’t solve a problem for Stalin, they conveniently became part of said problem. And the secret police could convert God to the Devil, and vice versa.

  “You will put a stop to these poisonings?” Stalin had posed this as a question, but clearly it was an order.

  “I will do my best,” Nikita responded with a curt nod, and as much confidence as he could muster; but all the while wondering how he could do any better than the minister of Animal Husbandry.

  “My good friend,” Stalin said with a smile that would have curdled milk, “I knew I could count on you,” and the dictator placed a fatherly hand on Nikita’s shoulder—the same hand that would sign his death warrant, should Khrushchev fail this mission.

  Before leaving for the Ukraine, Nikita called upon the president of the Academy of Sciences, and with his help put together not one, but two teams of top Soviet scientists to study the problem of the dying horses, theorizing that, should this brain trust also fail, Stalin surely wouldn’t have them all shot.

  Would he?

  After months of careful study, both teams—operating separately—came to an identical conclusion: the horses were dying from ingesting a fungus that grew in wet hay.

  When Nikita presented his findings to Stalin, the dictator’s eyebrows first grew together in a frown, then shot up with surprise.

  “Really?” the dictator commented. “Wet hay?”

  “Yes, Comrade Stalin,” Nikita replied, with cool confidence that masked terror. He knew that his contradiction of the dictator’s theory of an enemy “poisoning conspiracy” was perilous.

  Stalin thought about this for endless moments; finally he shrugged. “Well, then—there must be no more wet hay…. You will see to it?”

  Again a curt nod for his dictator. “I will see to it, Comrade.”

  Nikita was dismissed.

  There was no mention by Stalin (and certainly not by Khrushchev!) of the poor professor from Kharkov Veterinary Institute or the minister of Animal Husbandry… or a number of others involved in the nonexistent conspiracy, about whom Nikita learned later… all of whom, prior to Nikita solving the mystery of the horse sickness, had been eliminated as “enemies of the people.”

  This strategy—obtaining a consensus before making a decision—Nikita had also brought to the unpleasantness in Hungary, flying to neighboring Czechoslovakia and Romania, then on to Yugoslavia. To do this in the necessary timely manner, he had braved a fierce thunderstorm, his life spared only by the wit of the pilot—their reconnaissance plane had not been so lucky.

  Surprisingly, the leaders of the satellite countries unanimously felt Soviet troops should be sent in to restore order in Hungary—as did the entire Presidium of the Central Committee in Moscow, to whom Nikita had returned with his report.

  But before sealing Hungary’s fate—and to cover his backside—Nikita sought one final opinion… from Chinese leader Mao Tse-tung, chairman of the world’s second most powerful communist party, and Russia’s chief ally.

  Over a staticky phone line, through an interpreter, Nikita told Mao of the revolt, and asked the chairman for his opinion, his counsel. After a moment, Mao said that whatever decision Nikita made would be a wise one—a typically sly reply.

  Shrimp would learn to whistle before Mao Tse-tung said what was really on his mind. Nikita was glad he’d sought this “counsel” over the phone, and saved the airplane petrol. In truth, Nikita despised the Chinaman, who was shrewd, not smart, that big balding head home to a small brain, reflected in close-set eyes that told nothing, and a smile as meaningful as a porcelain doll’s. But it had taken Nikita a number of years to realize this grinning panda was a treacherous “ally,” never to be trusted.

  Once, at a meeting between the two leaders, Nikita had proposed, “With all the trade going on between us, it would be helpful to have a road to China through Kazakhstan.”

  Mao’s tiny eyes had brightened; he seemed immediately taken with the notion. And the chairman announced, “Then I will allow you to build it!”

  “Now, just one moment,” Nikita responded. He pointed out to the chairman that China’s border was rugged; creating such a road would mean cutting through mountains and building bridges. “We couldn’t possibly afford that, alone,” he said. “No, my friend—we should each take care of our own side of the road.”

  “All right then,” Mao agreed cheerfully.

  So the Russians had begun their share of the work. But well into the extensive construction, Mao again requested that the Russians build the Chinese span of the road, and Nikita reminded him of their original agreement.


  “All right then,” Mao agreed. Cheerfully.

  And when the Russians finally reached the border of China, they found no road under construction, no builders, nothing even in the planning stages; now Kazakhstan had a lovely new road—leading to nowhere.

  Nikita especially hated Mao’s stupid slogans. The panda kept trying to foist these idiotic aphorisms on the entire communist party, using the press to publicize the likes of “Imperialism Is a Paper Tiger.” Hardly! Only a fool would think such a thing. Capitalism was, if nothing else, a deadly predator—the only thing “paper” about it was their money.

  More recently Mao had set the Chinese to chanting, “Let a hundred flowers bloom!” What in hell did that mean? Perhaps this held significance to the Chinese, but not to any Russian. If it meant—as Nikita guessed—to encourage new and different ideas, to allow art and culture to “flower” in their own way… well, what sort of dangerous nonsense was that, for a true communist to spout?

  Soon, however, it became clear that Nikita’s interpretation was exactly what Mao’s slogan meant; but its sinister purpose was not to allow tolerance in new thinking, rather to draw out these “different” flowers… the better for Mao to cut down, and trample in the dirt.

  Clever, Nikita would have to admit; but how could he trust so ruthless a man? Hadn’t one Stalin been enough for one lifetime?

  In recent years, the fissure between the two communist leaders had widened to a chasm. Intelligence indicated the Chinese dictator was furious about Khrushchev’s conciliatory trip to the United States, and Nikita in turn was becoming increasingly aggravated by Mao’s incessant pestering for the plans to the A-bomb.

  Even the thought of it—China with the bomb! Mao with a button to put his pudgy finger on! Ahstahrohzhnuh! Comrades or not, the notion chilled Nikita. If he were ever foolish enough to comply with Mao’s request, it would be like the old Russian saying: “The fox kissed the hen—right down to her tail-feathers.”

  When Nikita warned Mao of the responsibility of having such a weapon, and the retaliatory destruction waging such a war would bring, the Chinaman had only laughed.

  “Even so,” the panda had said, “there would still be three hundred million Chinese left!”

  A more dangerous man, Nikita had never met—Stalin included.

  Rather than this deadly ally, the premier would far rather deal with his enemy, Eisenhower, any day of any year. The colorless American president, at least, said exactly what was on his mind—that is, once something had been placed there by that pompous bastard John Foster Dulles, who was always passing the president schoolgirl notes and whispering in his ear.

  Last week, in Washington, Eisenhower had seemed tired to Nikita—almost ill of health; perhaps that was why the president hadn’t accompanied the premier on the cross-country tour. Whereas the war with Hitler had strengthened Nikita, it appeared to have taken a toll on the former warrior, “Ike.” Russian intelligence—not always reliable, but worth considering—had passed along information of a serious heart condition, which now appeared to be true.

  If so, a healthy Nikita might be able to take advantage of a weakened Eisenhower at week’s end, when they were to meet at the fabled Camp David. No Russian had ever been invited to this “camp” before, and it struck the premier as a strange custom for world leaders to indulge in… maybe it was this American pioneer heritage they trumpeted so—Davy Crockett, Daniel Boone. Should they have brought their own sleeping cots, he wondered?

  Nonetheless, despite their opposing positions, Nikita sensed the president was a genuine, decent man. At the close of World War II, as Berlin had been about to fall, the Americans—under the orders of General Eisenhower—halted their offensive, allowing the Russians to step forward and take the city. This was in recognition of the rivers of Soviet blood spilled at the hands of the Germans.

  This show of generosity Nikita would never forget. Nor could he be sure he would have done so magnanimous a thing for the Americans, had their roles been reversed. And it gnawed at the back of Nikita’s brain, this incongruity—that these selfish decadent Americans could be possessed of such a large heart.

  The limousine bearing Nikita and his family cruised along through a commercial section, where some storefronts looked shabby (even the Americans couldn’t hide everything) and pedestrians—women in cotton dresses and men in lightweight suits—occasionally glanced at the passing sedan, their faces perking expectantly.

  “They think we must be movie stars,” Sergei said to his father with a little smile.

  “And when they find we are not,” Nikita said, “you see their disappointment?”

  Nikita folded his arms and snorted. Even if they were too ignorant to recognize the most powerful leader of the world—their precious “Ike” had fallen to second place behind him, since the launching of Sputnik, and recent rocket to the moon—the premier certainly must have looked like someone important in his expensive, tailored clothes (the best his government could buy from the Western world, for this trip—no Moscow haberdasher could have managed them).

  A self-made man, born poor in Kalinovka, Nikita took care not to repeat a naive blunder he’d made six years ago when he attended the Geneva Summit—the first time he met with the leaders of the so-called “free” world: the United States, England, and France.

  While the head men of the other three world powers each arrived in impressive new four-engine planes, he putt-putted in, in a beat-up two-engine Ilyushin, making himself look like the peasant he at heart still was—and putting the Russian contingent at an immediate psychological disadvantage.

  When Nikita and then-Prime Minister Nikolai Bulganin disembarked in their saggy, baggy summer cotton suits—Bulganin looking like a Model-T motorist in his long coat and goggles—and on the tarmac joined Eisenhower, Eden, and Faure (in their impeccable, expensive, tailored woolen suits), Nikita had felt a shame of station that he had never before experienced. He could see the veiled contempt in the eyes of the other world leaders—except perhaps the kind-visaged Eisenhower—and could almost read their minds: “Why should serious sophisticated men like ourselves pay any attention to such clownish country bumpkins?”

  In his political life, Nikita had made his share of mistakes, but he never made the same one twice.

  The limousine had been stopped at a red light and was beginning to slide on through the intersection when a tremendous thump shook Nikita’s side of the vehicle. Startled, everyone in the back of the sedan jumped, as a man—where had he come from?—threw himself against the car, plastering his face against the rear window, a dirty, hawkish countenance, long-haired, bearded, an American echo of the insane Rasputin, pressing and distorting his features against the thick glass, smearing it with saliva, banging on it with grimy hands, his shouts muffled.

  Nikita, leaning protectively over his wife, was jolted again as the sedan screeched to a stop.

  Within seconds, the State Department man, Harrigan—having leapt from the car following them—wrestled the man quickly to the pavement. And within a few more seconds, the limo windows revealed that Nikita and his family were surrounded by more security men, both American Secret Service and the premier’s own uniformed KGB agents.

  With the danger now past, Nikita ascertained that his family members had not been injured by the sudden stop; then he peered out the vehicle’s window at the beggar-like man in tattered clothes, who was being dragged away by two of the plainclothes agents at Harrigan’s direction.

  The State Department agent opened the back door of the limousine and poked his head inside.

  “Everyone all right?” Harrigan asked. His voice sounded calm, but Nikita could see excitement dancing in the man’s hazel eyes.

  Oleg Troyanovsky translated.

  Everyone nodded numbly.

  “That was just an indigent,” Harrigan explained with a shrug that did not entirely conceal his chagrin. “You know, a poor homeless wretch. California has more than its share, because of the warm weather.”
/>   Troyanovsky reported what the agent had said.

  Surprised and pleased by the agent’s candor, Nikita grunted and spoke to the translator, and Troyanovsky turned to Harrigan.

  “The premier said we have the homeless too… only in Moscow they freeze.”

  Nikita watched closely for the agent’s reaction. He wanted to know if the man understood Russian humor.

  And perhaps he did: Nikita thought he caught a tiny smile… or was that just a twitch?

  Nikita again spoke to his personal translator.

  “Mr. Khrushchev,” Oleg said, “saw something very interesting in Washington last week…. Men running alongside President Eisenhower’s limousine.”

  There was a pause as Harrigan considered this, the eyes widening, the excitement gone now.

  “Yes,” Harrigan said, with a nod. “The Secret Service does that to provide the president with extra protection.”

  This was translated for Nikita, who replied (and Oleg conveyed this to Harrigan): “Would this extra protection be, for example, to keep a homeless man from assaulting the president’s rear window? Upsetting the president’s family, perhaps?”

  Harrigan paused again—and he smiled… that tiny smile again, lingering past the twitch stage into unmistakable if gentle amusement.

  The agent asked, “Would the premier feel more comfortable if we did that?”

  Oleg spoke to Nikita.

  Nikita nodded.

  “Tell the premier it will be our pleasure,” Harrigan said, and backed out of the sedan and closed the door. As the agent began to organize the other plainclothes security around the car, Oleg rolled down the window.

  “Please use some of our own men, as well, Mr. Harrigan,” Oleg called out. “Mr. Khrushchev thinks they are getting too fat on your rich American food.”

  Harrigan chuckled, and grinned; he nodded to Khrushchev, who smiled and nodded back.

  Soon—as the procession of limousines, surrounded by trotting American and Russian agents, moved slowly on toward the movie studio—the sidewalks began to fill up with people. They ran out of the shops and houses, to point and gawk. A V.I.P. was passing!