Francis Powers - Operation Overflight

January 31: “Last day of my ninth month. This has been a month full of expectations and disappointments. The world situation has improved, and as a result I am sure my situation has also improved, but it isn’t noticeable yet. Seems I should have heard something by now….”

I finished a letter to Barbara, to be mailed the following day, since I had exhausted my quota of letters for January. It was an angry letter. While I had heard a brief summary of Kennedy’s first press conference, which appeared most encouraging, some of the reaction to the release of the RB-47 pilots disturbed me greatly.

“Two of the people, who made statements should be shot as far as I am concerned. You probably read about them in the papers on the twenty-sixth and twenty-seventh. They are Representative William Avery and Senator Aiken. Aiken said: The nation might gain the impression that the President is thankful to Russia for releasing the two pilots.’

“I personally hope that not only the President but the whole nation is thankful. As far as I am concerned, it is no disgrace to be thankful for something that means so much to so many people. I am proud of Kennedy for being thankful, and if I ever have the opportunity, I will tell the two men what I think of people who would rather have the two RB-47 boys stay in prison because their being free places the United States ‘in an embarrassing position,’ as Avery said.

“What would they have said if it had been their sons or relatives? Would they have said the same thing? If not, then they had no right to say it in this situation. I am perfectly willing to let one or both of them come and spend the remainder of my sentence in my place if they think someone should remain in a Russian prison, although the treatment I am receiving is much better than they deserve.”

In the back of my mind was the sickening realization that if Kennedy was under political pressure for this, my chances were suddenly less than bright.

In closing, I gave way to my real feelings:

“Barbara, I don’t know what to think. I have tried to figure out what is in store for me, but I am completely baffled. Everything looks good, but I am still here. Has the Soviet Union decided that two people are enough? If so, it looks as if their gesture was a half-gesture, and they are keeping an ace in the hole (me).

“Oh, well, they didn’t invite me to come, and I don’t suppose I have any reason to complain. But they didn’t invite the other boys either. I am quite dizzy from trying to reason out what is going on. It would have been best if I had heard nothing about it at all. I am constantly hoping that each day will bring me some news, and each day I am disappointed when it does not arrive.

“My chances are still much better than I first thought, but each day that nothing happens probably lessens them a little. Maybe this is just pessimism on my part. It is entirely possible that things are being done for my release right now and that it takes time to do this. My impression of Khrushchev is that he is a person who doesn’t do things halfway, but there is much more involved than I know about.

“It would certainly help me a lot to know something definite even if it were bad. It is the unknown that bothers me so much….”

After cursory entries on the first and second of February, I stopped writing in the diary. It was too much a reminder that nothing was happening.

There were a few bright spots during the month.

Among the American magazines the authorities purchased for me in Moscow was the January National Geographic . There was a large color spread on Mamie Eisenhower’s farewell tour of the White House. One Sunday afternoon, when the guard and the cleaning woman expressed interest in seeing the pictures, we opened the magazine on the shelf of the feeding-port door and, with Zigurd translating, I told them about the history of the White House and its significance to Americans. When we finished with the magazines, we showed each other pictures of our families.

That afternoon one little bit of the Iron Curtain ceased to exist. That was a bright spot.

Another was beating Zigurd at chess, an occasion rare enough to be memorable.

Upon my arrival at Vladimir, one of Zigurd’s first questions was: did I play chess? My affirmative reply pleased him immensely. It was only much later, after we had come to know each other well enough to say such things, that he admitted his disappointment after our first game. I knew how to move the pieces, but as for the philosophy behind the game, I knew next to nothing. Chess was big in Latvia, as in the Soviet Union. Newspapers carried chess problems, and Moscow Radio reported notable matches with all the excitement of an American sportscaster describing a no-hitter baseball game. One day Zigurd mentioned beating an opponent blindfolded. This time it was my turn to be skeptical. To prove it, he had trounced me soundly, sitting all the way across the cell with his back turned. Gradually, under his tutelage, I became a better player, but the occasions when I beat him were few and far between.

The National Geographic episode and the chess game were two bright spots. There weren’t many during that month of February.

My disappointment was gradual, but cumulative. As each day passed with no word, I became increasingly despondent. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had been let down, abandoned; that had Ambassador Thompson brought up my case with Khrushchev at the same time as he has the RB-47 pilots, I would have been released. My captors had given every indication they were prepared to let me go. I was happy for the RB-47 boys, yet in my darker moments I couldn’t help thinking that if they hadn’t been here, I might have been released.

Time passed slowly. Movies were now about a month apart, occasionally less often. We had stopped making envelopes because paper was unavailable. I had started another carpet, having mailed the first one to Barbara, but ran out of wool and was waiting to see if Zigurd’s mother was able to find the right colors in Latvia. I knew I should take up my Russian again, but didn’t. Perhaps unconsciously I felt that to do so would be to admit I would be staying. Nor was reading any longer an escape. One evening I discovered I was staring at a blank page: the words were no longer there. My peripheral vision was normal, but my central vision was gone. My eyes were just tired, I decided, putting the book aside. When I picked it up later, everything was fine. But the following day there was the blank spot again. And it kept returning, with increasing frequency. Two things frighten a pilot more than any others: heart and eye trouble. The heart palpitations remained—they had never completely left me since May 1, 1960—and now this. I discussed it with Zigurd, and we decided it might be a vitamin deficiency due to our poor diet. Vitamins were not available through the prison commissary, but Zigurd wrote to his parents asking them to send some. They had done this for him on a previous occasion. However, there would be at least a month before they arrived. Meantime, the problem remained.

That, however, was not my major worry. One thing now concerned me almost to the exclusion of all else.

Barbara had again stopped writing. Her last letter, written January 9, had arrived on the twenty-sixth of that month. After that, nothing.

I was annoyed at myself for letting this business with Barbara’s letters upset me so. I knew she was undependable. But emotionally, I needed to hear from her about the world I knew. Contact with Barbara was contact with home, contact with life.

On February 22 the KGB colonel made his regular visit. Through Zigurd I tried to engage him in conversation, to determine if he had heard anything, but he was very brisk and businesslike. His manner seemed to indicate that something had changed. However, it was not until two days later that I received confirmation. As I wrote in the journal on the twenty-fifth, “The major came yesterday and said the relations between the two countries had not gotten any worse, but they also were not better, and they couldn’t see them getting better in the near future. This is the same as saying I won’t be released in the near future.”