Script

Interviews:
Aronson, Alfred

Beria, Sergo

Elsey, George

Gordeyev, Alexander

Kane, Jim

Kennan, George

Khaldei, Yevgeni

Kozinchenko, Luibov

Legchilin, Ivan

Lunghi, Hugh

Ortenberg, David

Roberts, Frank

Yerofeyev, Vladimir

Zarubina, Zoya



     
   


INTERVIEW WITH SERGO BERIA (TRANSLATED)

CAM. ROLL #10342

Q: Tell us, please, your reminiscences about the year 1939. It was the time of Hitler. What did you (.?.) from this time, and what was the atmosphere like in the Soviet Union at that time?

A: I started in the normal Moscow school, and in this school there were a lot of children of German communists who had had to leave Germany. Some of the parents were killed, some were imprisoned, and only with the help of the Red Cross, some hundreds of these children were brought to Moscow. In my home we had about seven people, both boys and girls. They told us much about the atmosphere in Germany at that time. At that time, we were 14-15 years old. We heard much about the situation in Germany in our country too. This propaganda was aimed at preparing the war against Germany. I was a Komsomol member, and I understood everything. The war wasn't unexpected for us; all of us were waiting for this war. We knew that it would happen this year or next year. In our house we had a lot of people, military and others, politicians, and we had a tradition in our house that all the members of the family had their dinner with all the guests together at one table, so we didn't only eat our dinner, but we discussed all the problems, the political situation in the country, in the world, and that's why I heard all this talk and I heard much about the future war. So, after many hesitations by the Soviet Government, this treaty with Germany was signed, and even this treaty wasn't very unexpected. I don't want now to speak about all the reasons for the conclusion of this treaty. There was a lot of talk that the Ukraine and Byelorussian lands must be united, and about the war against Finland. I heard about all these events, and I remember them. I was a pupil at that time. Now I'll tell you what I remember from this time. I remember about General Kuznetsov; later on he was the Admiral of the Fleet and the Minister of the Black Sea Fleet. He used to come to us, and he was very close to my father. I heard a lot of conversations between them, and they said that the war against Finland was a very big mistake. They said that we mustn't fight against Finland, but we must make Finland our friend. And that was the idea of my father, that Finland must be the step between our state, the Soviet Union, and the Western states. My father was against the invasion of the Baltic states. He was against the forceful decisions [i.e. the use of force]. His main idea was that we mustn't make [impose] communism in all the other states; we must let the governments of those states be and work, but we must win their sympathy to the Soviet Union. A lot of people said later on that the invasion of Finland and the Baltic states was the fault of my father, but I want to tell you once more that he said directly in all the meetings of the Government and so on that we mustn't make these invasions in other lands. One more [thing] I want to tell you about is the preparation for the war,

SB2

02:24:13:20

and even when the pact was concluded I heard this from Stalin's lips. He often visited us at home, and he said, ' we have to win time if only two years. Only with this amount of time would the Soviet Union be ready, and then not fully but to some degree, to defend itself against Germany.' I heard conversations like this many times with Molotov and my father. Molotov also often visited us at home, and that is why they have stayed in my memory, that the Western countries might let us down in some measure, that, this was Molotov's opinion, there might be a kind of alliance with Germany, whereby Germany would invade us and the Western countries wouldn't help directly, but find all kinds of ways to urge Germany on.

02:25:23:15

We had a lot of agents in England, and that's why we had full information about what happened in England and what was the situation there. Only some things I remember. In this interview I can't tell everything I remember. But I'm sure that in that situation, there was only one good decision, to make this union, to make this alliance with Germany.

Q: So was the 22nd of June 1941 a shock for you, was it unexpected?

A: No, it wasn't unexpected, because in the year before the war began, we got the documents from Germany about the Barbarossa plan, the main directions of the invasion, what the troops would look like, how many divisions would take part in this war. And for example, General Vasilevsky came very often to us. My father was the leader of all these security organisations; that's why all these documents came to us through these organisations, and of course there was a lot of talk in our home, and I heard all this talk, and I got the impression that my father and all the others did everything to gain time, a minimum of half a year. Germany at that time had to bring its troops to Yugoslavia. That's why Hitler delayed the invasion of the Soviet Union for about a month and a half; but this time wasn't enough for the Soviet Union to be ready for this war. And one more thing I want to tell you about: about 10 years before the war began, my father allowed me to go with him to Leningrad. I was very interested in this journey. My father told me that Kuznetsov would take me to Leningrad. So I was taken by Kuznetsov; we went to Leningrad and resided there(?) at the Fortress in Kronstadt. And there in Leningrad I was taken to the military port; there, between our two big military ships, stood the German submarine, and I heard the talk with the commander of this submarine. The whole team of this boat were against the Hitler regime, and they were volunteers; they'd come to the Soviet Union themselves. He brought a real map; there were certain places where the Soviet ships must be destroyed. So I asked many times later on about the destiny of this submarine and of the team, but...

Q: How did you get the news about the war?

A: The day before the war began, my father called my mother and told her in Georgian that we mustn't expect him for dinner, and the war would break [out] that day or the next. For example, our fleet was ready to meet the German aviation. The frontier troops were ready too, but they were not big enough to fight against German troops. But as far as the infantry was concerned, a lot of my father's orders were not given directly, strictly: they were changed. And to say honestly, our army wasn't ready enough to meet the German troops, because our army didn't understand fully what this war would be like. Later on, a lot of military people wrote that this war was unexpected for them, but those are only fairytales, because this war wasn't unexpected. Zhukov and Timoshenko were in the Kremlin from 4 p.m. on that day. They tried to give good orders; and later on they only lied when they said this war was unexpected.

(Continues on CR #10343)

CAM. ROLL #10343

Q: So they tell(?) much about Stalin. How did he feel on the eve of the war?

A: At first my father rang my mother; and two hours [later] Stalin rang, and he asked my mother if his daughter Svetlana could stay with us for about a week. And in an hour came Svetlana, and he [Stalin?] stayed in our house with my mother. Stalin understood that he would be busy all the time, and that's why he brought his daughter to our house. My father had very close contact with Stalin all the time. My father didn't come [home] even for a night. Stalin was in his summer house all this time, and all the members of the Government were there too. All this talk about Stalin at that time, that he didn't know what to do, that he couldn't make his mind [up], couldn't understand the situation, is not true. If you remember, the Germans first invaded and only late declared the war, and all the allies - Churchill, for example - said that they would support the Soviet Union. For a long time, for about a week, if I'm not mistaken, Stalin didn't answer these messages. he didn't answer, not because, this is what my father said, he had lost his head and didn't know......

SB4

03:03:29:13

of course this was a big sfor him in the sense that he hadn't been able to hold off war any longer. But this was not a surprise for him. The only thing he hadn't expected was that our forces on the borders were superior in numbers, aviation, tanks and ground forces were all greater in number than the German units which had invaded. And what he hadn't expected was that these forces were unable to resist.

03:04:16:09

That's why Stalin couldn't get the situation. He asked the commanders, the generals why our troops couldn't resist the German army.

Q: Excuse me please for interrupting you, but we are interested mostly in the Cold War, and that's why I want you to speak about Teheran, how it happened that you were taken to Teheran, that you were invited to go there.

A: These are the reasons why I went to Teheran. At the beginning of the war, I went as a volunteer to the school of the spies, so I learnt German and spoke it fluently; I could speak dialects and Hochdeutsch too. But I was given to Iran. We were sent to Turkey from Teheran; we met our people in Iran. But when the Germans came to the Caucasus, the State Defence Committee sent my father to the Caucasus, and my father asked me to come to him. That's why I came to the Caucasus, and I led the radio station which made the connection with Moscow. At the end of 1942, I was sent to the Military Academy. And before the Teheran Conference took place, an order came to the Military Academy, and I became one of the candidates to go to Teheran, because I knew languages and knew German very well. That's why Stalin agreed that I would go to Teheran too. From this academy, I came to Moscow. I saw for the first time all the people with whom I had to work during this conference. I knew only one engineer from the radio laboratory at that time.

SB6

03:08:37

We flew to Teheran without knowing that it was Teheran, we flew via baka. And an hour after our arrival we were told what the task was. The they told us , now someone is going to talk to you, but we didn't know who or what was happening. before this my father met me and asked me whether I knew why I was here. I said that I didn't yet know. Then Stalin's assistant came and took us to him, one at a time. Stalin told me that the task he was putting to our group, and particularly to me was ethically very unattractive but the position of the USSR was so serious that he had to know, what they were thinking. Other colleagues were given similar tasks, with regard to other people, Churchill etc.

SB7 That's why my personal obligation was to listen and

record everything connected with Roosevelt and those close to him, to decode the recordings and report all this information direct to Stalin personally. After that, every day in the morning, at about 8 a.m., I had to come to Stalin with all the information written in English and in Russian too, and he asked me very detailed questions about Roosevelts conversations, sometimes for as long as an hour or two. Sometimes he was interested in how Roosevelt said something even what his intonation was, what the concealed meaning was, things like that. When I finished reporting I saw a great amount of paperwork on his desk which was connected to the questions he was dealing with. that is, he prepared for each conversation like a lecturer prepares for a lecture, with archive documents, intelligence reports, army reports etc, and with a complete list of the conversation, held around the conference. Of course he was far better prepared to answer and formulate his tasks than the allies, because he knew in advance for instance, all the things that Churchill wanted to do to spite the Americans, a whole lot of interesting things.

03:11:41

I would not say that they were all incorrect things, they might have had military significance, for instance - a way through the Balkans - to Europe, and so on.

03:11:50

Because until our day there is discussion between the military specialists about this operation in the Balkans, but Stalin thought they simply didn't want to open the second front. And (it was?) the wish of Churchill to betray the Soviet Union, not to allow the Soviet Union to come to Europe. That was the main detail of the conference.

Q: Can you tell us about the listening equipment, what was the technical moments(?)?

SB8

A: Although the Americans and the English had equipment for finding microphones and bugging devices they didn't once manage to find our bugging equipment.

03:13:11:10

They assumed they were being listened to, but they didn't have any real proof. They didn't find any equipment at the Teheran Conference.

03:13:26:18

Although very often the people close to Roosevelt warned him to bear in mind that these things existed, that he was being listened to, in all probability, it was even 100% certainty that he was being listened to. But from what I heard, and later from conversations I had after the conference, I got the impression that sometimes Roosevelt quite simply said things that he couldn't say to Stalin officially. That he conveyed a whole lot of information to him which it was impossible to convey at a state level.

03:13:34:10

He said once that he was for the destruction of the British Empire. In Yalta, later on, he said this once again. But the first time he mentioned the colonial empires was in Teheran. Officially, this theme wasn't discussed, but sometimes in the talks with his generals, with the people who surrounded him, with some of his co-ordinators, he talked much about the British Empire, about its colonies, but he said these things only in order to be heard, to be listened to, to give this information to the Soviet side. About this operation in the Balkans, Roosevelt said that it would be better for the American side to begin the military invasion in France, not in the Balkans.

Q: If they knew that the bugging equipment existed, why did they not manage to find this Soviet equipment?

SB9

A: Our systems were made then at such a level that , the means which the English and American had, were on the basis of - were like mine detectors, the 'Azdika' system, and so on , with which metal substances could be detected. But these things were not made of metal , even the membranes, they just had very delicate microns, (a very delicate) layer of metal.

 

Q: Where was this equipment?

SB10 A: That was the only reason this equipment was very

good; so sensitive that whatever corner of a room someone might be speaking in, the conversation would be recorded.

03:17:19

As Roosevelt lived in our Embassy and this was known hypothetically even before the conference began, because at the time the Soviet Union had information about a conspiracy in preparation. This was not an invention, really, the Germans had a very sophisticated conspiracy in Iran, and the English confirmed this in their intelligence reports. And the English together with the Soviet Union , told Roosevelt to stay in the Soviet Embassy. Hence all the rooms were bugged in advance. But the funniest thing was that equipment was installed in the British Embassy too, but installed by English..... well perhaps not native English people, but people who worked in the British Embassy.

03:23:35

Q: What was the role [purpose] of listening to all the talk at this conference, what was the [purpose] for Stalin?

A: I think that it was very helpful for Stalin, because he was ready for all the situations, for all the details of future talks. But I'm not of the mind that [it was] only because of this bugging equipment that he was ready for these talks, but of course this equipment helped him very much.

Q: Tell us, please, when you came to Yalta, what did it look like?

A: When we came to the military airport in the city of Saki(?) - that is in the northern part of the Crimea -

SB11

we went to Yalta by car, but all the roads were very much destroyed, and it took us about nine hours to get to Yalta, because everything was destroyed and burnt out. The picture was not beautiful. We were used to seeing destruction, but here in the Crimea, in such a beautiful land, this beautiful nature, it was very painful to see that ewas destroyed.

It was a very big contrast for us. It happened in winter; Yalta at that time looked not very beautiful, and I was very much impressed when I saw that they managed to prepare the palaces for the conference. They managed to restore them in a very few weeks. We didn't know at that time in what place the delegation would live. At first we lived in railway carriages. At first we were only shown the apartments of Roosevelt. We knew where Churchill would live, but what palace the Soviet delegation would reside in, we didn't know. And very unexpectedly for us, Iosif Vissarionovich appeared. During the Yalta Conference I didn't give him reports, and later on I came to know that he didn't look through our documents and reports during the Yalta Conference, and all these documents were sent directly to the main military centre [headquarters]. Here was General Antonov, and he made detailed reports to Stalin every day about what happened on the fronts and what was happening here. Everything was much easier for us in Yalta, of course, because it was much easier to report to General Antonov than to speak to Stalin, because it was very difficult from the psychological point of view. For me this work was very interesting, it was very unusual.

SB12

03:23:35

I used to see Roosevelt and Churchill during the walks, this is connected with the equipment, because they often, when the whether was bad, Roosevelt was wheeled in his chair and Churchill walked next to him usually..... and they always talked very intensively and as we already had a system for directing the microphones to a distance of 50 to 100 meters to listen, as there was no background noise, everything was quiet, all these conversations recorded very well, and later on were translated and processed.

03:24:33

And then we wrote up all this information and reported to Antonov. Only later on did I come to know that some people in the American delegation were working for the Soviet Government. For example, Mr Heath(?) was not only accompanying Roosevelt, he was a member of the delegation; that was very important, and he gave his information to us too; and we got some people among the English delegation too. But here, during the Yalta Conference, Roosevelt spoke against the English state directly, openly.

Q: What do you think, was it important, this disharmony between the Allies?

A: There were a lot of people around Roosevelt who did not agree with him because of his attitude to the Soviet Union. Roosevelt told them very strictly, very angrily, that they had to help the Soviet Union economically, and they must make the Soviet Union a friend to America. He thought that the main direction of the American economy must be directed to the destruction of the British Empire, and he wanted to have the British colonies for America. Later on, I read a lot of things about the financial minister, Regenthal(?), and I read that even in Yalta he wanted to organise very big loans, for about 10-15 million dollars.

Q: What was the atmosphere, the situation in the Yalta Conference, compared to the Teheran Conference?

A: During the war, I got the impression that Iosif Vissarionovich understood that the war was not only won, but the role of the Soviet Union changed in that war. They had new thoughts, new ideas. For example, at first he didn't agree to fight against Japan, but during the Yalta Conference he was suddenly for the participation of the Soviet Union in the war against Japan, and in the Yalta Conference he thought about the long-term interests of the Soviet Union, not only in the Far East but in Europe too. When they chose the place where the Teheran Conference would be held, first of all they wanted to hold this conference in Casablanca. Our specialists went there, but it was known that in comparison with Iran, the Soviet side had no spies there, no net(work) of spies in Africa; whereas in Teheran we had a lot of agents and a wide network of spies.

Q: Let us speak a little bit about Potsdam. You were there with your father; that was the conference without Roosevelt. Can you describe the atmosphere of this conference?

A: The fact is that even in Moscow, before this conference, I heard from my father that the Americans at that time were trying to change their policy, their attitude to the Soviet Union. Truman tried to give the impression that the policy of Roosevelt was preserved, but we got a lot of information that this policy towards the Soviet Union would be changed. My father often told me that Stalin didn't worry about that, because he decided to change the policy of the Soviet Union in Europe, in comparison with that was in Teheran and in Yalta was too [Transcriber's note: the last bit was incomprehensible to me]. Stalin thought at that time that the Soviet Union was strong enough and its army was strong enough, and that's why he wasn't afraid of this policy. He didn't understand why the Western countries didn't understand that. Stalin knew that the Americans did their best in order to do research on the atomic bomb. A lot of scientists in the Soviet Union were trying to do scientific research, but of course at that time we were behind America because of our technical possibilities. But they felt that very soon the Soviet Union would get the atomic bomb too. We understood at that time that Truman tried to gain time; he tried to delay this conference because he wanted to come to the conference with the atomic bomb already tested, to be able to say that we were at the beginning of a new political phase. that's what they came to Potsdam with. And what impressed me most of all there? Truman was waiting for the report that the bomb had been tested. And at the same time, my father and Truman received the telegrams about these tests of the atomic bomb. This information was given to Stalin, but Stalin said, "We must wait." He was waiting [to hear] how Truman would explain this, and how he would act. The reaction of Truman came very soon.

SB14

03:35:41

First this theatrical moment was staged: As if incidentally, Stalin was told about a kind of 'Super bomb'. Afterwards he laughed, and said that he had made out that he hadn't understood what it was about at all, and that he had congratulated them on the new bomb. In Churchill's memoirs, which I've read, he writes that they were quite astonished that he hadn't grasped this business. And that hence they had had a great deal of amusement at our expense.

 

We had about 2- or 300 military troops, and these troops could arrive in a week at the fronts, at La Manche...

(Continues on CR #10344)

CAM. ROLL #10344

Q: You have mentioned that in the period between the Teheran and Potsdam conferences, there were a lot of changes in the position of the Soviet Government and of Stalin. What were these changes, what did they look like?

A: That was because the Soviet army was very strong. The Soviet army could very easily go through the whole of Europe, and it was obvious to Stalin that the Soviet Union was able to make a lot of countries communist countries, that they couldn't put up very much resistance to the Soviet Union. And that was till the appearance of the atomic bomb. I can say that at this time the Soviet Union was a little bit aggressive. And my father understood that this period would end when the atomic bomb appeared, but my father said very often that we mustn't put our communist regime to the other countries [i.e. impose it on them], and he said that the economy of the Soviet Union was very much destroyed, and that's why the Soviet Union wasn't able to support all these countries that they wanted to make communist, socialist countries. Beria thought that at the time when America and England would think about the colonies and about the future of these colonies, the Soviet Union would get time to improve its economy, its industry. Stalin thought differently, but there were a lot of young members of the Government, clever people, not these silly communists, the people who supported the ideas of communism, but they understood the situation and they supported opinion of my father. That's why they wanted to make these countries not to be only communist countries, but they allowed the idea that these countries can be bourgeois countries. But Stalin and all the part of the Government which supported Stalin were very strict; they were sure that only a communist regime must exist throughout the world. So at this time there was much political discussion in the Soviet Government. But Stalin wanted to make a lot of countries communist countries, but he understood that if the Soviet Union tried to go further in Europe, it would be stopped.

Q: Tell us, please, something about the relations between your father and Stalin. Was Beria afraid of Stalin?

A: When my father was young, he had the attitude that Stalin was like a god. When our family lived in Georgia, my father thought that Stalin had only positive sides to his character, that he was the best man in the world. But when my father saw that a lot of repressions took place, that a lot of people were killed, he said that these repressions must be stopped. He even wrote some articles to the newspapers. Nobody understood, at that time, the position of my father, and he was very much criticised. A lot of people even wanted to throw him out of the government, but Stalin said that young people can make mistakes, and that "we must understand him", but he must understand that he was not right. Stalin felt at this time that all these massive repressions of the people could destroy his image, and that's why he decided to stop a little bit these [repressions].

Q: What was your own attitude to Stalin? Because you saw him often. What impressions do you have of this person?

A: When I was a child, I had the same impression as my father: I thought he was a god. But when I was older and I could have my own opinion, I can't say I criticised him, because he was a very big person, he was an unusual person, and for an ordinary person it was not allowed to speak about him, to criticise him, because I say once more that he was not an ordinary man. He did much more than Churchill or Roosevelt. You can't compare him even with these people - he was much higher, and he had a very big force; and sometimes I thought maybe that is the force of the devil. But the first time I came to understand this was during the war.

Q: Can you describe for us maybe the figure of Stalin, the person, his personal character?

A: I can say the following. [He] had very big charm and could be very sympathetic to the people. When he wanted, he could find the language, he could find mutual interests with all the people - when he wanted. When he wanted to win [over] the people, he could do it very easily. I was a friend of his daughter, Svetlana. He used to come to us, and I used to go to their house. I wasn't a friend of Stalin's son because he was five years older than me and had other interests. And when I came to Stalin's house, Stalin asked us what we were reading at that time, for example, and he offered us some books and asked us about our impressions, what we thought about these books. He told my mother that I hadn't read Germinal by Zola, for example. So I can say he was attentive to us, to his daughter and to me, and we were very much impressed that such a big person, such a big politician could find some minutes for us. He had a very big sense of humour; he knew a lot of very humorous stories, and he often told them. But of course, there was another side to his character. He had no heart. If somebody stood in his way or had a different opinion than his own, he destroyed them, even if they were his relatives or his close friends. He destroyed everybody. When Svetlana, his daughter, was 16 years old, their relations got worse, and Stalin said he didn't trust his daughter. That's why he spoiled his relations to his daughter. At the end of 1939, or in 1940, thousands of Poles were killed, and I know who was the initiator of this deed. My father refused to take part in this action, and Zhdanov wanted to throw my father out of the government, and Zhdanov wanted to be the minister of inner affairs. But Stalin wanted first to kill Trotsky, to throw out Trotsky, and only then my father. Stalin agreed to allow my father not to take part in this action. Later on, my father tried to explain his position. He said that that was not because he loved people very much and he was altruistic, but he said that this was the eve of the war, and that's why we must reserve all these people and make them fight against the Germans. And when I saw that in one minute it can be decided that thousands of people would be killed, I got a shock, and I thought that Stalin had no heart.

Q: Why did people like Stalin so much in this country?

A: Stalin did his best to build his image, and he tried to do his best to make better conditions of life. For example, he introduced eight years of education for everybody; the health (.?.) industry was very much improved. The working class had a lot of privileges in comparison with the intelligentsia, for example. He did all these things in order to make his image. He said he wanted to build a new society in the Soviet Union, but at the same time he physically destroyed a lot of very good officers, a lot of the intelligentsia, a lot of priests. That was very characteristic of him, and that I couldn't understand.

Q: Let us speak about the appearance of the atomic bomb in the Soviet Union, in connection with the Korean War.

A: The war in Korea broke out on Stalin's initiative. When the Soviet troops came back to this country, Stalin began the new policy. He was of the opinion that on the basis of the communist development, we must organise small local wars in different places of the world. It was begun in Greece, then in China, then in Vietnam, and finally in Korea. That is one of the examples of these local wars. In two weeks, the Soviet troops managed to fight; they were very good. And at that time, Stalin wanted the Soviet troops to fight with rockets; that was the rockets against the ships. They had two types of heads: atomic head and trotyl head. Stalin wanted the Soviet fleet to destroy three or four American military ships; and they told Stalin that after that, the American side would fight with the atomic bomb. Stalin wasn't afraid of this atomic bomb; he said, "Then we'll give our atomic bomb, too." At that time we had very good military aeroplanes; that's why Stalin was ready to begin a very big war. But our military specialists told him that we had no equipment which could catch the American aeroplanes, and Stalin gave the order to build such equipment. And later on, this task was fulfilled. During all the sittings of the Government, he said that the third world war would take place, and that this war had to take place during his life. That's why the military industry in the Soviet Union was very much developed at that time. We got a lot of tanks and rockets and ships, and I think that if Stalin had lived five years longer, we would have had this third world war.

Q: What was the aim of this third world war, and what was the attitude of your father?

A: My father was very much against this idea of the third world war, and my father and Vasilevsky, and for a period of time also Malenkov, spoke against this war. But then Malenkov was afraid of his own destiny [of what might happen to him] - that's why he began to support this idea of Stalin and he changed his position. And my father thought that the main task of the Soviet Union at that time was to give more liberty to these social(ist) countries, and to make them less [dependent on?] the Soviet Union.

Q: Why did Stalin begin this war in Korea?

A: The main aim of Stalin was to organise new conflicts and to control the readiness of these democratic countries to take part in such wars.

Q: Was it known in the Soviet Union that the Americans were going to drop this nuclear bomb on Japan?

A: Yes, it was known in the Soviet Union, and we got information about some of the plans that the Americans had. The aims [targets] were marked, and we gothe maps with the cities of the Soviet Union which the Americans wanted to bomb, and in all the cities we began to build the metro stations in order to save people there. But Stalin was sure that America would bomb only Japan, not the other countries.

Q: Was it planned to use the nuclear bomb in Korea from the Soviet side too?

A: Yes, Stalin had such plans, and my father was very much afraid of these plans. Such a fact(?) took place, and maybe it's not very good that I speak about this now. My father was even against the preparation of this bomb, and he understood that if the Soviet Union got this bomb, nothing would be able to stop Stalin in his wish to conquer the whole world.

Q: The last question: if nobody knew that Stalin was so dangerous, and if people had some plans to stop Stalin.

A: Yes, of course, a lot of people understood that Stalin had such dangerous plans and that they must do their best in order to stop him and his plans. But Stalin was very clever, and he understood everything. He felt all these spirits of people who surrounded him. When he felt that somebody was dangerous for him, he immediately killed them. He protected himself from the enemies, and it was very simple for him to do this. And if he hadn't died in 1953, it seems to me that he would have killed all the members of the Politburo. Bulganin, Malenkov, Khrushchev and my father would have been killed - I am sure of this fact. There are even some documents in which it's written that...

(No more recorded. End.)