Oswald's Tale

by Norman Mailer

  Lee Harvey did not leave his house until 23:00. Observation was stopped at this point.

  The interviewers did obtain one service report, filed by Tanya, of Minsk Intourist, on July 8, 1960.

  SERVICE REPORT

  July 8, 1960

  As a result of their meetings, source has established good relations with Lee Harvey. He sees source as someone with whom he can spend his time pleasantly. Has not exhibited any interest in source’s biography, with exception of her age. Lee Harvey is quite happy with his apartment and conveniences which it contains. It is still undecorated, but entirely suitable for a bachelor. While she was at Lee Harvey’s place, he managed to ask her in conversation, “Why aren’t you interested in my impressions of Soviet Union?” Source replied: “I think you will share those impressions with me . . .” And Lee Harvey’s answer followed. He began to share his impressions. His narrative was composed of enthusiastic responses to Soviet reality. Having paid attention to two pairs of boots that he had acquired, source asked with surprise: “What do you need boots for?” He said, “I love everything Russian; I want to look like a Russian.”

  While sharing impressions of his acquaintances, he showed source several photographs, in which he was photographed in company of friends, an Argentinian and his wife. At same time, he informed her that he had yet another friend, who was also an engineer, a Russian fellow, who worked at radio factory. Lee Harvey’s general development, his range of interest, seems rather limited to our source. He has a poor conception of art, music, painting, to say nothing of Marxist-Leninist theory. He is trying to enroll in Foreign Languages Institute and intends, in addition to English, to study German on an independent basis.

  In Lee Harvey’s behavior, a striving to become acquainted with girls, primarily blondes who have a command of English, has been noted, as well as a kind of calculatedness which borders on stinginess. For instance, he is capable of going on a date with a girl, but then going to a restaurant alone, considering that it is cheaper to go alone. He has arranged many meetings with source, since he can go to source’s place of work, or call. Source is inclined to think that Lee Harvey has recently cooled down in his courting of her, since his demands that “he deserves a kiss after six months of dating” have not been satisfied. He pretended to be hurt or offended and after that began to visit source less frequently.

  That summer, Oswald made improvements in his apartment. Small ones, bit by bit. For example, he got a cheap case for his records and he bought a turntable.

  When he learned that Pavel knew a lot about shortwave radios, he asked if Pavel could make him one. With local radios, you only received Soviet news. Pavel told him he could put together such an apparatus, but it wouldn’t look nice—all of its parts would be exposed—so Oswald then laid out his money and bought himself a shortwave radio that looked as pretty as a lady’s purse. It had only two frequencies, high and medium, but on MF, 257 meters, the Voice of America was transmitted. Since it was all in English, they didn’t even bother to jam it.

  People talked about Oswald as if he might be a spy, but Pavel remembers Lee Oswald coming to him with a simple Soviet camera and he wasn’t able to put film into it. Pavel had to show him how. Once, Oswald bought a radio set and tried to insert its batteries, but even in trying to do that much, he ripped a few wires loose. To take another example, Oswald liked to listen to the Voice of America, but he didn’t know how to make adjustments for it on his radio set so it came in clearer. Pavel, using a penknife, had to play with one part and move it a little in order for Lee to be able to listen. Pavel assumed that if Oswald were James Bond, he would have arrived in the Soviet Union able to take care of such small details.

  FROM KGB CHRONOLOGY

  4.IX.60

  Oswald saw The Wind in Letny movie house.

  4.IX.60

  Oswald visited a party for youth in Officers’ House.

  6.IX.60

  Oswald saw Babetta Is Going to War in Mir movie house.

  7.IX.60

  Oswald saw A Partisan’s Spark in Pobeda movie house.

  8.IX.60

  Oswald saw Babetta Is Going to War for second time in Mir movie house.

  9.IX.60

  Oswald saw The Commander of the Detachment in Letny movie house.

  From September 4 to September 9 he saw five movies, one of them twice, and all but one were war movies. He had bought a single-barrel shotgun in August, and joined a hunting club organized by Horizon. But it was not until September 10, filled by now, one may assume, with images of himself as a participant in war movies, that he finally went out with a hunting club.

  By now, Stepan had given his team of observers a code name for Oswald. It was Likhoi. That sounded like Lee Harvey, but the word meant valiant, or dashing. It was KGB humor. Likhoi never seemed to do anything but go to work, walk around, and shop.

  FROM KGB OBSERVATION

  FROM 13:00 TILL 15:20 ON SEPTEMBER 10, 1960

  At 14:30 Likhoi left work and walked quickly home.

  At 14:55 he left home carrying hunting rifle in cover, and grocery bag partly filled, and came back to entrance of radio factory.

  There Likhoi came to group of 7 men, some of them also having rifles, and started talking with them.

  After about 15 minutes, Likhoi and other men got into parked car no. BO 18–89 and at 15:20 left city via Storozhevskaya St. and Dolginovsky Trakt.

  Upon agreement with head of department, surveillance of Likhoi is canceled at this point until September 17, 1960.

  Leonid Stepanovich Tzagiko, a lathe operator all his life, became interested in hunting around 1955. Each year, after August 15, they could go out for fowl, then in September, ducks, partridge, waterfowl. By October, they started looking for fox. Wolves you could hunt all year round, but wild boar only with a special license, since such game was usually reserved for high Communist Party members.

  At that time, maybe there were fifty people in his hunting club. There was a chairman, who collected dues and obtained licenses for elk and, on occasion, even wild boar, although you had to pay a lot for that, about 150 rubles.

  In early 1960, when Lee Oswald came to work at the experimental shop, Tzagiko met him on the first day. It was almost a celebration. Everybody came up to the American immediately to get to know him. Then, at breaks, Oswald would often sit with his feet on a table, and once one of them said, “Why are you sitting like that?” and he said, “I am on strike. I am striking.” He was just joking. They decided that Americans put their feet up on a table. That’s what they do.

  Now, at Horizon, they had what they called sections—people played basketball, soccer, volleyball, and on Sundays, some would go on hunting trips. It wasn’t that important whether they’d kill; it was to get out into nature. So when Oswald asked one of the metalworkers if they would take him along, he said, “Of course.” They didn’t bring much to eat and didn’t carry any vodka or brandy, because they were reasonably serious about coming back with something. They walked a lot on foot, passed through collective farms, fields, and villages, sparsely forested areas.

  They were hunting for rabbit that day. There was no snow as yet, so they had to flush the rabbits with their feet. Walking single file, Oswald was next to last, Tzagiko was last, and Oswald was holding his gun crooked in his arm. Then, a rabbit practically jumped out from under his foot, and he went, “Aooaoh!” and shot into the air. Tzagiko said, “God, Oswald, you’re going to kill me with that gun!” And Oswald said, “Your rabbit scared me.” Later, he had another try, and missed again.

  The fact that he was a bad shot and could not fix his radio tended to alert Igor and Stepan. How was it that a former Marine with a Sharpshooter rating back in his U.S. Marine Corps—yes, KGB had information that he was not a bad shot—could miss his targets so?

  Certainly, when the Organs were informed that Oswald had bought a gun for hunting, and so would have opportunities to travel as part of a hunting party to an area where there were also military objects, th
ey were on guard. Hunters were prohibited from walking into forbidden areas in specified regions; they weren’t even allowed to approach certain fences. If Oswald was an agent, he might have special equipment and use it to record nuclear activities or military broadcasts—with the right technology, you could collect a lot of information.

  Reports came in, but were puzzling. He had been such a bad shot. If they had had any inkling that he would later be suspected of carrying out a crime of high magnitude—of highest magnitude!—they would have studied his marksmanship in a more detailed manner. As it was, however, what with everything else involving him, they made no special attempt to find out whether he was an excellent shot trying to create the impression he was a bad shot or had been naturally incompetent that day.

  August–September

  As my Russian improves, I become increasingly conscious of just what sort of society I live in. Mass gymnastics, compulsory after-work meet ing, usually political information meeting. Compulsory attendance at lectures, and the sending of the entire shop collective (except me) to pick potatoes on Sunday in a state collective farm. “A patriotic duty” to bring in the harvest. The opinions of the workers (unvoiced) is that it’s a great pain in the neck. They don’t seem to be especially enthusiastic about any of the “collective” duties, a natural feeling . . .

  October

  The coming of fall, my dread of a new Russian winter, mellowed in splendid golds and reds of fall in Byelorussia. Plums, peaches, apricots and cherries abound for these last fall weeks. I have a healthy brown color and am stuffed with fresh fruit, at other times of the year unob tainable.

  October 18

  My twenty-first birthday sees Tanya, Pavel, Ella and a small party at my place. Ella [is] a very attractive Russian Jew I’ve been going walking with lately. [She] works at the radio factory also. Tanya and Ella are jealous of each other. It brings a warm feeling to me. Both are at my place for the first time. Ella and Pavel both give ashtrays (I don’t smoke). We have a laugh.

  9

  Ella and Lee

  After Ella had known him for a half year, he actually invited her to his apartment, and Pavel was there with a girl named Tanya from Intourist. Then a girl named Inna Tachina arrived. Pavel had disappeared for a short period of time, and when he came back, this girl was with him. And he said, “Okay, Lee, dance! Look who I’ve brought for you. Inna!”

  Ella was shocked. At her factory all these months, Lee had never dated anyone but herself. So, she didn’t know he was seeing other women. She assumed he did—she understood that—but then, by the manner in which Inna’s arrival was announced, it was clear that Lee dated her in another way. That hurt Ella. By October, Lee was already hinting that they were going to have a serious relationship, but if it was so serious, what was he doing with this girl?

  It started a quarrel. Ella was very emotional, very angry, and when she left the party, Lee had to walk out with her. She told him, “Listen, if you wanted to have a nice time with Inna, I was not needed. I would have felt more comfortable staying home.” He said, “Inna was brought by Pavel. You saw I was with you all evening, and now I’m leaving Inna and Pavel behind.” He persuaded her. He said, “Look, I left all my guests. I’m walking you to work at the plant.” She was on night shift then and had come to his party before going to her job. “That ought to prove you are a most special person to me.”

  Afterward, Inna was often mentioned by Ella. She would tease him: “So there’s another woman in your life?” and he would answer, “Don’t you understand that you are my true love? She’s just passion.” Ella’s attitude was, “Well, if I don’t want to, this young man still needs some kind of physiology. If he gets it elsewhere, that’s normal.” She certainly had never loved anyone so much as to be possessive about everything they did, including their physical relationship. That was not as important as real love to her.

  On the other hand, it had been Pavel who had brought over Inna Tachina, and Ella didn’t really like Pavel. There had been a little trouble at Horizon, which left Pavel with a bad reputation. He had been in a tuning process in another part of their factory along with several girls doing an equal job. Occasionally, workers who tuned radios would come across one that was very difficult to adjust; it didn’t receive well and sometimes was dead. Such an inert radio was called a “coffin,” and it took a good deal of time to get one to sound better. When your salary and your bonus depended on how many radios you could tune in a day, substandard sets pulled your level down. One evening, a girl working at Pavel’s station realized that she had left a set on her table at quitting time that was almost ready, yet now it was dead. And all the while Pavel kept delivering a good number of well-adjusted radios. So they suspected that Pavel, when he came to work on the day shift, might exchange his device, a complete coffin, for hers. He wouldn’t do it to another man, these girls felt, because men are more precise. A man would remember what he had tuned yesterday. But girls forget. Their minds were not really on such a subject. So it was easier to fool girls, Ella felt.

  This got to be a bad story. There was a big meeting, and a group came to check Pavel’s behavior. His father, the General, was even present, and with tears in his eyes said at this meeting, “Please, forgive him. Please, people, don’t spoil his biography. He will never do it again.”

  So, of course, after this, Ella’s estimate of Pavel was not high. If he had had a large family and had been really poor, she could understand—you could justify such an act for your children; but Pavel was robbing poor girls who made less than him. So he was not, in her opinion, a decent man, and now he had come with Inna, and said, “It’s a girl for you, Lee.” Ella also had some feeling that maybe Pavel didn’t approve of her because she was Jewish. She had been told that in his private circle, among military people in Russia, there was more anti-Semitism than among civilian people.

  November finds the approach of winter now. A growing loneliness over takes me. In spite of my conquest of Inna Tachina,1 a girl from Riga, studying at the Music Conservatory in Minsk. After an affair which lasts a few weeks, we part.

  EXTRA PAGE (not included in formal diary)

  Inna Tachina . . . I met her in 1960 at the Zigers’, her family (who sent her to Minsk) apparently well off. Inna likes fancy clothes, well-made shoes and underthings. In October 1960 we begin to get very close cul minating in intercourse on October 21. She was a virgin and very interesting. We met in such fashion on 4 or 5 occasions ending November 4, 1960. Upon completion of her last year at Minsk Conservatory she left Minsk for Riga.

  10

  Zdradstvy

  Sometime that fall, Albina realized that a problem had developed for the Zigers. They suddenly became very suspicious of everybody. They even acted as if somebody were reporting on them. Here is how it began. They had a cousin in Vilnius, in Lithuania, who wanted to visit them in Byelorussia, but Ziger’s cousin didn’t have permission to go to Minsk. So the Zigers took their car, a Moskvich, and drove to Vilnius in order to bring their cousin back to Minsk. But on this return trip, some highway police demanded their documents, and their cousin did not have the necessary papers. So, they lost a day at a provincial police office taking care of that. Not to mention how much worse it could have been. It left the Zigers very angry. How did these police know to stop them? Somebody among their friends had probably told somebody else that they were going to Vilnius to get their cousin. Albina noticed that they stopped inviting Ernst to their place, and after a while stopped inviting a good many other people, too. Ernst was not even surprised at what had happened, but then, he was not much interested in the Zigers. To be introduced to Alik had been his goal, and that had certainly been achieved, Albina could see, exactly because she was not seeing much of either of them now.

  Their first need in this Oswald case, Igor remarked, was, of course, to find people who knew English. “While Oswald had some increasing capacity in Russian, we had to connect him to people who could exchange intimate conversations with him in English
. After all, how can you develop a person under suspicion without knowing his language? So people were taken on who could speak to Oswald in his native tongue.”

  There had been a need to find a person who knew English well enough to go out with Oswald socially, be friends with him, and have insight into some of his thoughts. “And we also were ready to look for people at our Minsk Institute of Foreign Languages.” So, those students who were studying English attracted Service attention. “You would have to assume,” said Igor, “that Foreign Institute girls were in a position to inform us how Oswald was behaving. Counterintelligence monitored this entire process and was kept informed.” Titovets, of course, had helped Lee make and widen his contacts with women there and had also recorded tapes while the two men were alone, in order, as he told Oswald, to be able to study his accent in English and so improve his own colloquial abilities.

  TRANSCRIPT FROM TELEVISION PROGRAM:

  Frontline, “Who Was Lee Harvey Oswald?” broadcast on PBS stations, November 1993

  NARRATOR: (VO)

  He became fast friends with Ernst Titovets . . . Titovets made tape recordings of Oswald to study his Southern accent.