Letters to the Editor

To the Editors:

I have read Russian Life since its first issue and have thoroughly enjoyed learning more about Russia.

It was interesting to read about new facts that have recently come to light about Soviet thoughts and actions during the eventful year of 1956 in Hungary. I was particularly interested to learn that Yuri Andropov was in the Soviet Embassy during those weeks in 1956, as it was he who later became the mentor of Mikhail Gorbachev. That surely is a twist of fate and very revealing of Andropov the man.

However, there was no mention of foreign policy debacle of the United States that complicated the situation. President Eisenhower had just that year issued a warning in a speech that implied strongly that US aid and support would flow to Eastern Bloc countries brave enough to break the Soviet hold. It has been a subject of some study here in the US, with the falsity of this warning and the failure of our foreign policy clearly admitted in publicized documentary television programs.

This element of the Hungarian Revolution must have played a part in Soviet thinking at that time, perhaps forcing the Soviet military into harsher actions than might have been necessary. Perhaps Mr. Medvedev could shed light on this aspect of that interesting period of our history.

Nels Larson

Greenbelt, MD

Dear Nels,

I agree that today we can assess American, British and French foreign policies as being highly unsuccessful in those weeks. These countries were unable to provide proper help or put significant or at least subtle pressure on the Soviet government.

It was of course a very difficult time because there was a war on in the Middle East. Britain, France and Israel were fighting against Egypt, and the attention of all Western countries, including the US, was fixed on this. For Eisenhower and the US administration these events seemed closer to home, and he was unable to put pressure simultaneously in two places.

Britain and France were forced to give the Suez Canal to Egypt. The canal was nationalized, and Egypt and the Soviet Union signed a friendship agreement. This was also a major defeat for US foreign policy.

Relations in the world were at that time extremely difficult and dangerous. I suspect that the US President did not dare put stronger pressure, although US historians can probably better judge this than I can, as I am not acquainted with all the studies that were carried out at that time in the US or the West in general.

Thank you for your interest in my article.

— Roy Medvedev

To the Editors:

I very much enjoy your magazine, but I do have a complaint about some missing facts in the October issue. The interesting article Dawn of the Russian Navy does not discuss the very important role of Voronezh.

In late September I spent 8 days in Voronezh participating in an international ecological congress. While there I learned much of the city’s early role in building ships for Peter the Great’s early navy.

A new park has been created there commemorating 300 years of the Russian navy, celebrating the local contribution to the early history.

Sincerely,

Davie E. Krom

Dear Davie,

We apologize for the omission, but would like to point out that many Russian cities played important roles in creation of the navy. In 1696 Peter built ships in Voronezh for his first fleet, the Azov flotilla, which then sailed down the Don river and help land forces to capture this Black Sea fortress from the Turks. A fortress and Admiralty were later built in Voronezh, though the city ultimately lost its importance as a naval center to St. Petersburg.

— The Editors

To the Editors:

I have a couple of comments regarding the cover story on Catherine the Great and her Enlightenment:

1. With the annexation of eastern Poland-Lithuania she launched the suppression of the Greek Catholic Metropolitan Province of Kiev, affecting 8 million faithful. While the Church died out, its clergy conforming to Orthodoxy or being imprisoned, it set the pattern for later repressions which were bitterly resisted by Greek Catholic believers, under both tsars and Bolsheviks, through 1989.

2. Her reign was also provoked the great migration from western Europe to settle the fertile south acquired from Turkey. Thus, until Communist times, there were Volga and Black Sea German colonies, also Swiss, French, Swedish, and Czech farm colonies. A whole new German culture was created, which was later forcibly transplanted east by Stalin, and is the principal source of the 2 million Germans in Russia and the former Union today.

Sincerely,

Rev. Christopher L. Zugger