Marvin Kalb - The Year I Was Peter the Great - 1956 - Khrushchev, Stalin's Ghost, and a Young American in Russia

By June 1956 Khrushchev faced a rising crescendo of doubts about his controversial policy. At JPRS we were beginning to find hints in the controlled press of Kremlin concern about “opportunistic vacillations” and “hostile propaganda,” which in the context of the time suggested anti-party sentiment was on the rise, and the public had to be on alert.

On a trip to Sverdlovsk, Khrushchev warned that a “principled and disciplined struggle” must be waged against these “opportunists.” He blasted the sudden upsurge of “slanderous fabrications” and attacked “anti-party slanderers,” although he did not name them. Bulganin, on a trip to Warsaw, noted that “in connection with the struggle against ‘the cult of the individual,’ not only have hostile and opportunistic elements become more active, but unstable and vacillating people in our own ranks have also come out into the open. These people, misled by ‘hostile propaganda,’ at times incorrectly interpret individual propositions connected with ‘the cult of the individual,’ and this has found its reflection in some press organs of the socialist countries, Poland included.” In other words, some communists in Russia and Eastern Europe had openly defied Khrushchev, even in the press, and argued against his anti-Stalin policy, and this had to be crushed.

That evening I noted in my diary that “it is no easy job running a totalitarian government in a half-totalitarian, half-free manner.”

But on July 4 Khrushchev arrived at Spasso House, the Moscow home of the American ambassador, as if he did not have a care in the world. He had begun to make a habit of dropping in on national day receptions, his way of telling the world that a new day was dawning in the Soviet Union. Ambassador Bohlen had been informed the night before that Khrushchev and several other top government officials would be attending America’s national day celebration, and Bohlen alerted the embassy’s three other Russian speakers, me among them, that each of us would be responsible for a Soviet leader, meaning we had to make certain that he was enjoying himself. The ambassador, of course, would get Khrushchev, and I got… Marshal Zhukov! Why, I don’t know, but there was something wildly incongruous about my new responsibility. Zhukov was a sixty-year-old marshal in the Soviet Army, a World War II hero who had led troops into battle at Kiev and Stalingrad, a minister of defense in charge of nuclear weapons. I was a twenty-six-year-old, ex-PFC (private first class) in the U.S. Army, a translator who happened to have learned enough Russian to get a job at the American embassy in Moscow.

Zhukov was as short as he was wide, his chest was adorned with a forest of medals, all richly deserved, and he loved his vodka. I was tall and thin and indulged in a glass of wine once every week or two, if that. I decided almost immediately that if I was to do no harm to U.S.-Russian relations, I had to find a way to drink with Zhukov without consuming any vodka. Early on July 4 I raced to Spasso House and conferred with Tang, the ambassador’s Chinese-born butler-waiter-handyman, who I always thought was in the employ of at least six secret services. He was short, wiry, and imaginative. More important on this special July 4, he was a master of conspiracy. How, I wondered, could Tang serve vodka to Zhukov and water to me? That was the challenge, rivaling in importance, I imagined, the U.S.-Russian competition for influence in the oil-rich Middle East. Thinking for no more than a minute, Tang, with a broad smile on his face, exclaimed, “Got it!”

He ran to the kitchen, where he found the large round tray, on which he would serve drinks at the reception. He held it out in front of him. “When I come to you and the marshal,” he said with a mischievous glint in his eyes, “I shall be holding the tray just like this.” He nodded to the right side of the tray. “That’s where the vodka will be. The water will be in the same type of glass, but always on the left side.” Tang looked up at me. “Understand, sir?” he asked playfully.

“Indeed, I do,” I replied, feeling as though I was party to a diplomatic conspiracy that only a Metternich could appreciate.

At exactly 3:00 p.m., Khrushchev and company arrived. The garden in back of Spasso House was magnificently aglow with colorful flowers, none more stunning than the red roses hanging from red-white-and-blue trellises. Tables groaning with food and drink were situated strategically so that none of the hundreds of guests had to move more than a few feet for replenishments. And of course Tang led a small army of waiters, each carrying a tray of goodies, including Russia’s best caviar and America’s best hot dogs. Everywhere, American flags fluttered in the breeze. Khrushchev, as usual during the summer, wore a suit that was off-white in color and in desperate need of pressing. He seemed to be in good spirits. Bohlen greeted him with a friendly handshake.

“Happy July Fourth, Mr. Chairman,” he said in his fluent Russian. “I extend the best wishes of the president of the United States, Dwight Eisenhower, and all of my staff here at Spasso House.” With the easy grace only the best ambassadors seemed to possess, Bohlen spoke a little about the weather, which was uncharacteristically hot for Moscow, and then joked a bit about the American presidential campaign, which attracted Khrushchev’s full attention, before introducing his designated Russian speakers to their official guests.

When the ambassador introduced me to Marshal Zhukov, I of course shook his hand. “Welcome, Marshal Zhukov,” I said. “It is a special honor for me to meet one of the great heroes of World War II, a time when the United States and the Soviet Union were allies against Nazi Germany.” It was a well-rehearsed, well-planned greeting—it flattered him and recalled a time when both superpowers were reading from the same script, and I spoke his language.

“Very good, young man,” Zhukov replied, then adding, “We must then raise a toast to ‘peace and friendship.’” It was the popular Soviet greeting of the day. I beckoned to Tang, who was standing on alert only a few feet away. Drinks were served. (I remembered—vodka to the right, water to the left.) But in truth it was only when I felt the cool water sloshing down my throat that I was able to take a deep breath. Tang bowed ever so slightly. He could not conceal the grin forming around his mouth.

“Come, Marshal,” I said. “Let me show you our beautiful roses,” and off we went to a convenient trellis, where we quickly slipped into a conversation about his wartime exploits at Stalingrad. “What was the turning point?” I asked with excitement. Zhukov was happy to answer my questions. Tang seemed always to be available, his vodka tray conveniently at hand, as the marshal, one after another, downed his vodkas and I my waters.

After the better part of an hour, during which time I introduced Zhukov to a number of diplomats and journalists, we walked back to the patio, where Bohlen and Khrushchev were chatting. I thought the marshal was a bit tipsy. He must have drunk seven or eight vodkas by this time.

“Nikita Sergeyevich,” Zhukov bellowed, as if he was preparing to announce a scientific breakthrough, “I have finally found a young American who can drink like a Russian. Meet Marvin Maksimovich!” I heard a few giggles, mostly from the Americans, but Khrushchev extended his hand, which I shook with unaccustomed vigor. I wanted to prove, if nothing else, that Zhukov had taken a proper measure of me as an American who could hold his vodka. Bohlen, who knew I didn’t drink except for that occasional glass of wine, looked at me with questions in his eyes, but none were asked and the illusion of me as a tough, heavy-drinking American held.