Between November 1963 and October 1964, in a stretch of less than one year, the two superpowers of the world lost their high-profiled leaders, one to a physical assassination, the other, to a political one.
One year after the Cuban Missile Crisis President Kennedy was assassinated… They say that Hitler, in the final agony of his imminent crushing defeat at Stalin’s hand, had become exuberant at the news of FDR’s death in April 1945, just because President Roosevelt was one of his three biggest enemies, admittedly not the biggest one. And now, the man who had humiliated Khrushchev so much by calling his Cuban bluff was dead. Why then wasn’t Khrushchev gloating? The in-your-face, shoe-thumping, vulgar peasant was in tears. He grieved over the loss of his enemy-in-chief. The Cuban Missile Crisis had been business. President Kennedy’s death was Khrushchev’s personal tragedy.
Khrushchev had huge respect for President Kennedy. He had found him strong against bullying and clever in his ability to manipulate circumstances and events. Besides, he had an irresistible personal attraction to his youthful American counterpart. In fact, this American tragedy was no less a Russian national tragedy, the loss of Russia’s idealistic American dream, somehow embodied in the person of JFK.
But when Khrushchev was briefed on the background of President Kennedy’s assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, who in the recent past had lived in the Soviet Union, he immediately flew off the handle:
“***!!! Devil’s ***!!! They are pinning it on us!!!”
He rushed to give orders to deliver the Soviet plea of “not guilty” to the American side, using all available means, including the dispatch of a high-profile Soviet KGB “defector” Yuri Nosenko, son of a senior Soviet government official, whose main purpose of defection was apparently to personally convince the American side that the Russians had nothing to do with the Kennedy assassination.
Khrushchev was terribly concerned that even though Moscow had indeed absolutely nothing to do with it, the choice of Oswald, who had defected to Russia several years before, but then had become disappointed and re-defected back to the United States, was a clear indication of the dirty plan to blame it on the Soviet Union.
The American authorities were never to go so far as to connect Oswald to any Soviet-backed conspiracy but still the shadow was hanging out there, and Khrushchev found it offensively unfair. He was crushed. He had felt like he could do business with Kennedy improving the US-Soviet relations and negotiating arms control agreements. But he had a deep personal dislike, for some reason, for the new President Lyndon B. Johnson, and this relationship did not look like it was going anywhere.
Besides, Comrade Khrushchev’s own political clock was ticking away. Not that he was getting too old. He was not yet seventy, and some active life was still left in him. But he must have felt all alone in the world, and he realized that there were people out there, plotting against him all the time.
Ironically, President Kennedy had looked like the only friend he had, but now even he was gone. Everyone in Moscow hated Khrushchev for a long litany of egregious offenses. Like trampling the laurels of Russian glory by his denunciation of Stalin, and by removing his body from the Mausoleum. Like betraying his old Presidium buddies, and making a fool out of Russia’s national treasure Marshal Zhukov. Like humiliating the whole military establishment by his “cult of the missile” and his disrespect for the brain capacity of the military commanders. And of course, like allowing the USSR to be seen as the loser by the world public in the Cuban Missile Crisis... Too many indictments and too many thumbs-down for one old man. Too many personal animosities from active political players, like Gromyko, and so on, and on, and on.
Everybody knew that Khrushchev was a goner. The only question now was who would replace him. And just because this question had not been answered yet, throughout 1963 and 1964, the battle royal of power succession was raging around Khrushchev, while allowing him to enjoy a deceptive stillness, and even to celebrate a noisy, if tense, seventieth birthday, surrounded by some mawkish, and unmistakably mocking, adulation.
But the end was nevertheless just around the corner, and in October 1964 Khrushchev was gone.
One year after the Cuban Missile Crisis President Kennedy was assassinated… They say that Hitler, in the final agony of his imminent crushing defeat at Stalin’s hand, had become exuberant at the news of FDR’s death in April 1945, just because President Roosevelt was one of his three biggest enemies, admittedly not the biggest one. And now, the man who had humiliated Khrushchev so much by calling his Cuban bluff was dead. Why then wasn’t Khrushchev gloating? The in-your-face, shoe-thumping, vulgar peasant was in tears. He grieved over the loss of his enemy-in-chief. The Cuban Missile Crisis had been business. President Kennedy’s death was Khrushchev’s personal tragedy.
Khrushchev had huge respect for President Kennedy. He had found him strong against bullying and clever in his ability to manipulate circumstances and events. Besides, he had an irresistible personal attraction to his youthful American counterpart. In fact, this American tragedy was no less a Russian national tragedy, the loss of Russia’s idealistic American dream, somehow embodied in the person of JFK.
But when Khrushchev was briefed on the background of President Kennedy’s assassin Lee Harvey Oswald, who in the recent past had lived in the Soviet Union, he immediately flew off the handle:
“***!!! Devil’s ***!!! They are pinning it on us!!!”
He rushed to give orders to deliver the Soviet plea of “not guilty” to the American side, using all available means, including the dispatch of a high-profile Soviet KGB “defector” Yuri Nosenko, son of a senior Soviet government official, whose main purpose of defection was apparently to personally convince the American side that the Russians had nothing to do with the Kennedy assassination.
Khrushchev was terribly concerned that even though Moscow had indeed absolutely nothing to do with it, the choice of Oswald, who had defected to Russia several years before, but then had become disappointed and re-defected back to the United States, was a clear indication of the dirty plan to blame it on the Soviet Union.
The American authorities were never to go so far as to connect Oswald to any Soviet-backed conspiracy but still the shadow was hanging out there, and Khrushchev found it offensively unfair. He was crushed. He had felt like he could do business with Kennedy improving the US-Soviet relations and negotiating arms control agreements. But he had a deep personal dislike, for some reason, for the new President Lyndon B. Johnson, and this relationship did not look like it was going anywhere.
Besides, Comrade Khrushchev’s own political clock was ticking away. Not that he was getting too old. He was not yet seventy, and some active life was still left in him. But he must have felt all alone in the world, and he realized that there were people out there, plotting against him all the time.
Ironically, President Kennedy had looked like the only friend he had, but now even he was gone. Everyone in Moscow hated Khrushchev for a long litany of egregious offenses. Like trampling the laurels of Russian glory by his denunciation of Stalin, and by removing his body from the Mausoleum. Like betraying his old Presidium buddies, and making a fool out of Russia’s national treasure Marshal Zhukov. Like humiliating the whole military establishment by his “cult of the missile” and his disrespect for the brain capacity of the military commanders. And of course, like allowing the USSR to be seen as the loser by the world public in the Cuban Missile Crisis... Too many indictments and too many thumbs-down for one old man. Too many personal animosities from active political players, like Gromyko, and so on, and on, and on.
Everybody knew that Khrushchev was a goner. The only question now was who would replace him. And just because this question had not been answered yet, throughout 1963 and 1964, the battle royal of power succession was raging around Khrushchev, while allowing him to enjoy a deceptive stillness, and even to celebrate a noisy, if tense, seventieth birthday, surrounded by some mawkish, and unmistakably mocking, adulation.
But the end was nevertheless just around the corner, and in October 1964 Khrushchev was gone.
No comments:
Post a Comment