In one of his newspaper
interviews, my father Artem was asked about his relationship with Khrushchev. It
is inconceivable, the interviewer said, that Khrushchev didn’t know about Stalin’s
adoptive son. Even more inconceivable, I might add, that Khrushchev would not
know that the great Dolores Ibarruri, La Passionaria of the Spanish Civil War
and subsequently, the Queen of International Communism, had a much decorated
Soviet General and Stalin’s adoptive son (!!!) for her one and only
son-in-law, married to her sole surviving issue Amaya Ibarruri-Ruiz. And yet, Artem responded to the question with
a firm, but perfectly enigmatic denial:
“He did not
know me, Khrushchev, did not know me at all. And Brezhnev did not know me either!”
I guess it is quite
possible to know about a person and to meet him on an almost regular
basis without really knowing him, without really knowing him at all. In
this sense, Artem may not have crossed the line between the truth and a
categorical falsehood, but nevertheless, his answer was extremely disingenuous.
There was a continual string of one-on-one meetings and other communications
between Khrushchev and Artem all the way up to the very end of Khrushchev’s
political career, and we shall touch upon these occasions in various storylines
of the Khrushchev subsection. In this connection, the reader is advised
to read the already posted entries In
Memoriam (March 5, 2011); The Man Who
Destroyed The Soviet Union (January 26, 2011, under the umbrella title La Forza Del Destino); Khrushchev: Politics And ‘Marshal’ Arts (October
17-18, 2011), and definitely the Cuban diptych (October 20 and 22, 2011).
Being able to shoot
yourself in the foot is an incredible luxury that very few people can afford.
My father’s relationship with Khrushchev was bizarre from the early beginning.
After Stalin’s death, Artem’s life and career depended in great measure on
Khrushchev’s good graces. Yet each time Khrushchev would stretch out his hand
in an offer of friendship, Artem would turn him down.
During his first four
years at the helm of the Soviet Union, from 1953 to 1957, Khrushchev's position
was precarious. He had been installed at the top in a hurry, and almost in
jest, by people who despised him. The sole reason for his promotion to First
Secretary was that among all other contenders he appeared the easiest to
unseat whenever the real leader was
to emerge out of the real power
struggle. But Khrushchev refused to think of himself as a figurehead. He felt
very comfortable at the top, and wanted to stay there, and now he cleverly
solicited every friend he could get, to help the puppet fight and defeat the
puppeteers.
In his young thirties,
General Artem was a singular figure in the Soviet military-political establishment.
As Stalin’s adopted son, he had become a powerful magnet, attracting men of
much older age and much greater prominence than himself. He was a symbol, the
rallying point. Had he agreed to play a supporting role, he would have made himself
unstoppable, career-wise. But he was too arrogant, and not ambitious enough, to
seek political alliances as a necessity of life…
(This is the end of Part
I. Part II will be posted tomorrow.)
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