Francis Powers - Operation Overflight

The Moscow embassy personnel had been very helpful, Barbara said. Although they had failed in all their attempts to see me, they had collected over fifty paperback books for me from their private libraries. And they would handle arrangements for my monthly package.

Under Soviet law, each prisoner could receive one seventeenpound package from home each month. On receiving the money and being informed what I needed, the Embassy would purchase the items and see that I received them. Although not sure what was and wasn’t permitted, we made up a list of items I most wanted: American cigarettes, shaving gear, instant coffee, sugar, canned milk (to go over the boiled oats sometimes served for breakfast), news magazines, books, and more books. Asking the interpreter what I would need in the way of clothes—he suggested heavy shoes, work clothes, a warm topcoat, winter underwear, a fur cap with earflaps—Barbara promised to obtain them before leaving Moscow. She intended to stay until Friday, hoping to see Khrushchev on his return.

Thoughtfully, Barbara’s mother then left, so we could be alone. As alone as you can be with an interpreter and two guards.

Through the use of guarded phrases, I was able to piece together a number of things. Arrangements had been made by the “U.S. government,” by which I assumed she meant the agency, for her to receive five hundred dollars from my pay each month, the balance to be banked pending my return. My “employers” had also paid her way to Russia and arranged for two lawyers, members of the Virginia Bar Association, to accompany her. Their major task, I gathered from her remarks, was to interview me for the agency, but they had been refused permission to see me.

My father has arranged with Life to pay his and mother’s expenses. And this, apparently, was what had caused the schism between my wife and my parents. The agency had offered to pay their fares also, but my father had refused, wanting to remain a free agent. Barbara, quite bitterly, declared that she wasn’t. She couldn’t speak to the press without permission. Everywhere she went, she was followed.

Time was up, the interpreter said.

After Barbara had been escorted out, the interpreter returned and said, “There’s an American here who would like to see you.”

Though I had dreamed for months of just such words, actually hearing them startled me.

“An American? Who?”

I thought perhaps it was someone from the embassy.

“An American tourist who has been given permission to visit you. Do you wish to see him?”

“Of course.”

While I was waiting, another thought occurred to me. Maybe the agency had managed to get someone in.

Although his clothing obviously marked him as an American, the man wasn’t familiar. Middle-aged, florid faced, he seemed very nervous. Pumping my hand, he told me his name and said, “Perhaps you’ve heard of me?”

I had to admit I hadn’t.

This seemed to deflate him somewhat; reaching inside his wallet, he extracted a sheaf of clippings. “These are all about me,” he said, “when I was a candidate for the Presidency of the United States, in 1956.”

Looking at the clippings, I saw that he had run as the candidate of the Progressive party. But the name, Vincent Hallinan, still meant nothing to me.

He was an attorney, he explained, and had attended the trial as a guest of the Soviet government. The trial, in his opinion, was absolutely fair—

I was more than tempted to interject a dissenting opinion, but he gave me no chance.

—and my sentence very lenient. Now, as for ways of spending my time, I should start by learning the language.

I agreed with that. In fact, this had been one of my intentions, although I was put off a bit by having a stranger tell me what to do.

Then I should spend my time studying the Communist form of government. It was a remarkable system. If I approached it with an open mind, realizing that the American system had grave flaws, I would learn a great deal.

Pausing only to light one cigarette after another, he gave me no time to reply, but after listening to him for a few minutes I had no inclination to do so.

If the Soviet Union had a Chamber of Commerce, I decided, Mr. Hallinan could easily win its presidency.

When he finished his spiel, he pumped my hand again and asked if there were any messages he could take to the United States for me.

There were a number of things I was anxious to tell the CIA. But I didn’t think Mr. Hallinan was the man to serve as courier. Thanking him, I declined his offer.

It was only after he left that the full irony of it hit me.

During all the time I had been in the Soviet Union only one person had tried to indoctrinate me in the Communist form of government.

And he was an American.

I had thought my visits were over. On Wednesday, August 24, I had a surprise.

My parents and sister were leaving for the US today; Barbara would be leaving Friday. I was on the roof, having my afternoon walk, thinking about their going, when the interpreter arrived with two guards.

This was the first time I had seen the interpreter here, and it surprised me.

“Would you like to see your wife again?” He paused, waited a moment, and added, “Without guards?”

“You know the answer to that!”

“Come with us.”

I was driven across town to another prison and taken to a cell. Although there were bars on the windows, it was arranged like a sitting room, with an easy chair, a table with fruit and soda on it, and a couch. On the end of the couch, neatly folded, were blankets and sheets.

Left alone, I inspected the room, looking for hidden microphones or peepholes, but could find none.

Barbara was ushered in a few minutes later. She hadn’t expected the meeting either. Two Soviet officials had arrived at her hotel only a few minutes before and brought her here.

Seeing her up close, I was shocked at how much she had changed. Somehow I had missed it in our earlier meetings. She was drinking heavily, I was sure. Her speech was slurred, the strong smell of alcohol on her breath. I was extremely worried about her, but this was neither the time nor the place for a lecture or an argument.

We were left alone three hours.

The last time I saw her, she was walking down a long hall with the interpreter and a major. She didn’t look back.

I didn’t realize it then, but, in her own way, she was walking out of my life.

Diary, August 26, 1960: “I was told that Barbara and her mother left this morning. Feel all alone once more.”

Letter to Barbara, September 5, 1960:

“So far my life has not changed much. I am still in the same cell, but I have more time on my hands, since there is no interrogation and no preparation for a trial. I am glad all that is over. I hope I never have anything like that to go through again.

“I am very despondent today. I don’t know why so today more than any other day, but that is the way it is. Just the thought of spending ten years in prison is getting to me…. The way I feel now, I would much rather have stayed with the airplane and died there than spend any time in a prison.

“I can’t help wondering if there will be a pardon of some kind or an exchange of prisoners, or maybe something will happen through diplomatic channels to set me free. I realize that any of these things could happen, but I cannot count on them. There is only one thing that is sure, and that is—my sentence is for ten years.

“I doubt if I will ever be able to go to a zoo again—that is, if I ever get out of here—without having the desire to set all the animals free. I have never, before this, thought very much on the subject, but I think all men and animals were born to be free. To take away one’s freedom is worse than to take one’s life.”