Nick and Jake
Page 3
Gilchrist:
(starting to cry) It was Girl Scout camp!
Cohn:
Mr. Chairman, the witness is being unresponsive.
McCarthy:
Witness is directed to answer the question.
Gilchrist:
What ...
McCarthy:
I’ll repeat the question, since you appear to have one of those convenient memory lapses that happen so often to Communists and fellow travelers. You tell the committee you do know the words to this Commie filth? Recite them for us. You ... heh-heh ... you don’t have to sing ...
(Appreciative ripple of laughter from the gallery. The guy can work a crowd!)
Gilchrist:
Well, it starts “I was with George Washington ... “
McCarthy:
I want it noted in the record that these Commies will stop at nothing to infiltrate our great American patriotic heritage. Miss Gilbert ...
Gilchrist:
(in a squeaky whisper) Gilchrist.
McCarthy:
Miss Gilbert, what are the names of your pals in this so-called singing group, the Weavers?
Gilchrist:
Their names?
(Committee Counsel Roy Cohn whispers to Sen. McCarthy. I don’t know about that Cohn--smart as hell, but a weasel.)
McCarthy:
Is there some reason why you don’t want to tell us their names?
Gilchrist:
No, of course not. I want to help the committee. But I’m not ...
McCarthy:
You say you want to help the Committee. But you refuse to give us their names?
Gilchrist:
No ... I ... let’s see ... there’s Pete Seeger ...
(Cohn whispers. )
McCarthy:
The well-known Communist.
Gilchrist:
And Lee Hays ...
(And Cohn again.)
McCarthy:
The well-known Communist.
Gilchrist:
And Ronnie Gilbert ... and I can’t remember the other.
McCarthy:
Come on now, Ronnie.
Gilchrist:
(sobbing) I ...
McCarthy:
Come on. You’re doing fine. This Committee wants to believe you. This Committee is here to help you and all patriotic Americans. We know there are a lot of fellow travelers like you who’ve seen the light, and are now ready to defend America. What about you, Ronnie? Do you want to help defend America?
Gilchrist:
Yes ... oh, yes !
McCarthy:
Yes, what?
Gilchrist:
I want to help defend America.
McCarthy:
Okay, then. You’ve given us this Seeger. Good. You’ve given us this Hays. Good. Why do you continue to refuse to give us the other name?
Gilchrist:
(still sobbing) I can’t ... I can’t remember!
(Cohn again.)
(And again.)
McCarthy:
Well, don’t worry, sister. We’ll get to the bottom of this. I have no more questions of this witness, Mr. Chairman. I think it’s pretty clear where she stands.
Gilchrist:
No! No! I’m a good American! I hate the Communists! I ... I ... I know somebody in President Eisenhower’s administration !
McCarthy:
And who would this be, Miss Gilbert?
Gilchrist: the
Mr. Nicholas Carraway--he’s in State Department!
(Silence in the room. A long whispered conference between Cohn and McCarthy. Notes are written down.)
McCarthy:
Request a subpoena be issued in the name of Mr. Nicholas Carraway.
(ENCRYPTED AND DECODED)
(2/10)
FROM: IRVING KRISTOL
TO: ALLEN DULLES
BARNES MAKING NOISES ABOUT NOSING INTO IRAN. I’VE LAUGHED HIM OFF IT, BUT HE COULD MAKE TROUBLE.
--KRISTOL
(ENCRYPTED AND DECODED)
(2/11)
FROM: ALLEN DULLES
TO: IRVING KRISTOL
TOP SECRET
BE CAREFUL WITH BARNES. HE SMELLS SOMETHING, AND I’M NOT READY TO TAKE A CHANCE ON BRINGING HIM INTO THIS YET. HE’S SMART, SO WATCH YOUR STEP. ENCOUNTER IS A KEY PART OF OPERATION ELBA. WE HAVE THE NATIONAL STUDENT ASSOCIATION COVERED, AND BETWEEN THAT AND ENCOUNTER WE CAN STIR UP TROUBLE, AND KEEP MONITORING IT AT THE SAME TIME.
IF WE KEEP ENOUGH LEFTIST AGITATION GOING IN FRANCE, THAT’LL KEEP THE RIGHT CHASING THEIR TAILS, WHICH MEANS NO CHANCE OF A
STABLE GOVERNMENT. WHICH MEANS NO ONE TOKEEP A HANDLE ON THE WAR IN INDO-CHINA. THE COMMUNIST THREAT WILL START TO MAKEAMERICANS NERVOUS, BUT IT WON’T REALLYHAPPEN UNTIL AFTER IKE’S WOUND UP TWO TERMS, AND A DEMOCRAT GETS IN.
THE DEMOCRATS INHERIT A QUAGMIRE, AND BY1964, YOUR NEOCONSERVATIVE COUNTERREVOLUTIONSHOULD HAVE ALL ITS DUCKS LINED UP, AND WECAN SWEEP INTO POWER BEHIND NIXON. IF NIXONSELF-DESTRUCTS, WE MIGHT LOOK AT THAT GUYFROM ARIZONA, GOLDWATER.
IT’S A FOOLPROOF PLAN. AND IF THE DEMOCRATICPRESIDENT TURNS OUT TO BE TOO POPULAR (BUT I FIGURE IT’LL BE HARRIMAN, SO THAT’S NOT TOOLIKELY) ... WELL, THERE ARE WAYS OF DEALINGWITH THAT, TOO.
SO, FOR NOW, STAY IN PLACE. AS FOR THEPOSITION YOU SHOULD BE TAKING ON IRAN, PROMOSSADEGH, ALL THE WAY. WE DON’T WANT TO TIPOUR HAND THAT WE’RE EVEN CONSIDERING ANOTHEROPTION. SO DON’T WORRY ABOUT PUBLISHINGWOOLLY HEADED YOUNG LEFTIES--THAT WORKSPERFECTLY. REMEMBER, WE’RE BUILDING A WORLDIN WHICH OUR KIDS WILL CALL THE SHOTS.
DULLES
Jacob Barnes
Paris Herald Tribune
38, rue de Berri
Paris 16, France
Feb. 13
Carraway--
I knew a Jimmy Gatz, back in Kansas City when I was a cub reporter. He was collecting for a loan shark. I used him as a source a few times. He talked more than he should have, and I thought he was too much of a dreamer to make it in the rackets. I wondered what had happened to him. You got some things wrong about him, but I recognized the Jimmy I knew in your Gatsby character.
So what do you want to know about the International Red Menace?
Barnes
FROM THE DESK OF:
ALLEN DULLES
By special courier
Feb. 15, 1953
Carraway--
So--Barnes is nibbling. Good work. Good work. For the time being, just play out the line. Concentrate on strengthening your ties with the man. Get into his confidence. We can reel him in later.
Dulles
Nicholas Carraway
Assistant Undersecretary of State for
European Affairs
Department of State
Washington, DC.
February 17, 1953
Dear Mr. Barnes,
So you knew Gatz? I don’t wonder you feel I got some things wrong about him. I no longer remember what was Gatz and what was Gatsby and what was just my youthful romantic imagination.
Don’t worry about the libraries. As I said, I’m just learning this job, and I’ve been sending out a lot of letters inherited from my predecessors. But Lord knows the Red Menace is real enough, as you should know, being cheek to jowl over there with the countries that have been closed off by the Iron Curtain.
I’ve been called to testify this week at the McCarthy hearings. A friendly witness, they assure me. As I have every intention of being. My cordial invitation bears the personal signature of Roy Cohn, the Chairman’s right hand. While I wouldn’t deny that the senator has a touch of the bull in the china shop to him at times, I’m sure his intentions are patriotic. Liberals like to paint him as a fanatical clown, but there are Communists, Barnes, and they are a threat to the security of this country. One of these days I hope I can try to convince you of that over a martini on the Champs Elysees.
Meanwhile, I’ll wander over to the Hill on Thursday and see what the committee wants to talk to me about, and be what help I can.
Yours T
ruly,
Nick Carraway
New York Herald Tribune
Paris Edition, February 17, 1953
THE BARNES DOOR
PARIS--When Dr. Mohammed Mossadegh was elected Premier of Iran, the first thing he did was nationalize his country’s oil industry. There may be easier ways of sorting out your friends from your enemies, but this one did the job.
The Iranians thought it was a fine idea. The oil, after all, was Iranian. But the British cried foul. The oil companies, after all, were British. The oil fields might belong to Iran, but the drills and the pumps had John Bull’s name tags on them. His Majesty’s government sued. The Brits took the matter to the United Nations. Dr. Mossadegh went to New York and won his case before the Security Council. Then he went to The Hague to defend the takeover, and he won again in the World Court.
Dr. Mossadegh stopped in Paris on his way home from the Netherlands, and he sat down for a few minutes with this newspaper. He is a quiet, frail man, who projects the aggrieved air of a beagle hound shut up in a hot car. But when he talks about his country, his eyes light up, and he leans forward like a preacher in his pulpit.
“Democracy is possible in the Middle East,” he said. “It is as your Mr. Jefferson put it so eloquently, there comes a time in the course of human events when it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another ... ”
Nobody likes to lose something they think of as their own. From time to time whispers reach us of plans for a British invasion of Iran, which seems unlikely. We’ve also heard rumors of a coup sponsored by Britain. That sounds more plausible. But Dr. Mossadegh enjoys the backing of something like 98 percent of the people of his country, so a popular uprising against him may be a hard story to sell.
Where did Dr. Mossadegh get a crazy idea like nationalizing the oil industry? He says he got it from the British.
“They are nationalizing their steel industry,” he pointed out, “and their railroads. They tell us it is different for them, that they are an advanced civilization. My ancestors were civilized when Winston Churchill’s ancestors wore skins and lived in caves. My only crime is that I removed from this land the network of colonialism and the political and economic influence of the greatest empire on earth.”
Some of the whispers that have reached us have the British looking to America for help with their problem. What business is it of ours? It isn’t. If anybody tells you it is, tell him to look up what America stands for. We stand up for the little guy. We stand up for the poor, the downtrodden, the huddled masses yearning to breathe free. Undercutting democracy is not America’s style. Never has been, and please God, never will be. We leave empire to the empire-builders, and colonialism to the colonialists.
ENCOUNTER
New York, NY
Irving Kristol
February 20
Well, Barnes, I just read through the latest transcripts from the McCarthy hearings, and your friend Carraway seems to have run into a Mack truck at the committee. Enclosed is the truck. You’ll enjoy this exchange with the junior senator from Wisconsin.
McCarthy:
Mr. Carraway, I, uh ... Mr. Carraway, will you tell this committee how you were employed before you came to the State Department?
Carraway:
Certainly, Senator. I am a partner in the advertising firm of Taylor and Carraway, based in Chicago. We’ve got an office up in your neck of the woods, too--Milwaukee. I’m on leave from that outfit right now, and I hope they won’t change the locks on me while I spend a little time working for the government.
McCarthy:
(laughs) I’m sure they won’t. Mr. Carraway ... do you employ any known Communists at your advertising firm?
Carraway:
No sir, I do not.
McCarthy:
None at all, Mr. Carraway? Are you quite sure of that?
Carraway:
Of course I am. Do you have evidence that I am mistaken?
McCarthy:
We’ll have no more of that, Mr. Carraway. You will answer the question.
Carraway:
Senator, I’m here at the committee’s invitation, and I mean to help in any way I can.
McCarthy:
I, uh ... I think it might be better for you, Carraway, if you just came out with it yourself. That is, if you don’t have anything to hide ...
Carraway:
With all due respect, Senator, I am being as responsive as I possibly can.
McCarthy:
In other words, Carraway, you refuse to tell this committee about the Reds you do business with in this little advertising game of yours?
Carraway:
Damn it, Senator, stop your insinuations! If you have something to say, say it!
Cohn:
(whispering) He’s covering up, like they all do. Hit him with the testimony.
(Roy Cohn hands a document to Sen. McCarthy.)
McCarthy:
I show you the testimony of a young woman in the entertainment business, a well-known Communist named Ronnie Gilbert, who names you as a close associate ...
Carraway:
Ronnie Gil ... oh, you mean Ronnie Gilchrist. Sure, she’s a good kid. She does a children’s show for us. A Communist? Senator, I don’t know who does your investigating, but if it’s Mr. Cohn, I suggest you take away his Junior G-Man kit.
(Cohn turns a lovely shade of red, something on the order of a ‘47 Margaux.)
Cohn:
Look here, Carraway ...
McCarthy:
Mr. Carraway, Mr. Cohn is our chief counsel, and he is entitled to normal courtesy.
Caraway:
My apologies, Mr. Cohn.
McCarthy:
What about this little Red thrush, Nick? Did you ever ask her if she was a Communist?
Carraway:
No.
McCarthy:
Weren’t you curious? If somebody told me an associate of mine was a Communist, I’d get on the phone and say, ‘What about this? Is this true?’
Carraway:
Nobody ever told me she was a Communist! Senator, that little girl hasn’t got a political bone in her body. She’s about as subversive as Snow White!
McCarthy:
Nick, we’re going to give you a chance to redeem yourself here. Can you tell us, of your own knowledge, about anyone else, in or out of government, who may have had trysts with this little Red thrush, from whom she may have extracted information that could be useful to the enemies of our country?
Carraway:
No! Damn it, McCarthy ...
McCarthy:
Let me shift to another line of questioning, Nickie. Would you like to tell this committee about your associations with known gangsters?
Carraway:
I ... what?
McCarthy:
Oh, come on, Carraway. Meyer Wolfsheim? Does that name ring any bells? James Gatz?
Well, those are the highlights. The Daily Mirror ran a story under the headline, TOP IKE MAN IN LOVE NEST WITH “LITTLE RED THRUSH.” I don’t know about the thrush, but where there’s smoke, there’s fire. You can forget Carraway. He won’t be playing you the National Anthem any more. He’s as washed up as last week’s laundry.
Kristol
From the desk of:
JOHN FOSTER DULLES
February 20, 1953
Mr. Carraway,
As you know, we expect those in whom President Eisenhower places his trust to be completely forthcoming about their associations. Senator McCarthy has raised serious questions about yours. The State Department wishes to be fair, but we will need to see a much fuller explanation from you.
Yours truly,
John Foster Dulles
Secretary of State
Mrs. Nicholas Carraway
40125 Oak Park Drive
Oak Park, Illinois
February 21, 1953
Nicholas,
I’ve always had my suspicions about you
and your little Red thrush. I’m only amazed that you thought you could pull the wool over the eyes of a man like Senator McCarthy.
A woman has a right to expect a man who’ll take care of her and put her on a pedestal, just the way our country has a right to expect people to honor her values and our American way of life. Well, I’m keeping the house, and the car, and all our possessions. I deserve them.
A locksmith is here today, changing the locks on all of the doors, and installing an alarm system. It used to be safe to leave your door unlocked in this town. No more. Children used to respect their elders. You used to be able to walk down the street, and every kid you saw, you knew who their family was, and they’d tip their caps or give a little curtsey, just as if the whole village was part of bringing them up. But that’s another thing the damn Communists have taken away from us.
I knew when I married you that you had “artistic” tendencies--that silly book-but I let myself believe you had put it all behind you. I suppose love is blind. I should have seen it all along. The way our son has turned into a wild-eyed Bohemian just breaks my heart. Certainly Alden didn’t take after my side of the family. The Pyles are decent stock.
I don’t understand how General Eisenhower could have appointed a man like you to a position of influence. Senator Taft never would have done it. I never trusted Eisenhower. You do know how cozy he was with the Russians during the war. Well, I believe the country is coming to its senses, and Senator McCarthy will be our next president. From now on, you may direct all contact with me to my lawyers, Quayle and Quayle.