The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 Donated by A S Chernyaev to The National Security Archive Translated by Anna Melyakova http www nsarchive org The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org 1983 January 30 1983 Something happened to me after the hospital and Barvikha I’m waning day by day And there’s the anxiety Not because doctors convinced me that my heart doesn’t have much longer left that it is tired and I need to treat it sparingly No It is not the fear of someone who has lived through a heart attack It is something else… There’s a reason I was drawn to read Faust And coming back to work for Ponomarev triggered an acute sensation of the “Uncle Vanya syndrome ” It was more interesting to work on Brezhnev’s “Complete Works” because Brezhnev did not interfere in the writing process Writing for Ponomarev one sincerely hopes to use Ponomarev’s position to put out something worthwhile under his name But Ponomarev interferes and spoils trivializes and primitivizes our efforts Therefore not only do drafts that are more substantive than the final product end up flying into the wastebin but so does all my mental work and painstakingly developed ideas Still that is not the main problem The main problem is that he stands in the way of developing the kind of policy in our sphere that can and must be done under Andropov The trouble is that we are wasting time because this department is headed by a petty vain official with a police-propaganda mindset who is envious cowardly fussy and ready to betray any idea to make sure he “presents” himself the way he sees fit in front of his superiors However the superiors see right through him and he won’t last much longer It’s disappointing that I’ll have to follow him into political oblivion because the apparatus and the superiors identify me with Ponomarev considering me his alter ego In a word I sometimes think that it is time for me like Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya to “grab a gun” against the one who prevented me from becoming myself even while he made me a deputy head a member of the Auditing Commission candidate member of the CC etc He rewarded me in his own style thinking that for me – like for him and everyone else though he despises them all – such things are important and constitute the meaning of life February 13 1983 I’ve been at the Gorky Dacha since February 2nd writing a report on Marx for Ponomarev Myself Burlatsky Krasin Ambartsumov Kozlov Veber plus Pyshkov who was added by Ponomarev because he spent six months at the dacha first in a team writing for Brezhnev then for Andropov from the beginning of the report about Marx in Berlin We wrote 60 pages sharp in the Andropov style… but clearly they would not pass for B N So we started to reign ourselves in Tomorrow I will give him a slightly smoothed out text on 47 pages It is still not really in Ponomarev’s style – for him truth including Marxist truth matters only for “propaganda of our success” or “exposing imperialism ” but by no means for real politics 1 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org By the way in Andropov’s article on Marx in Kommunist there is not a hint of the former or the latter The word “imperialism” does not appear at all As Pyshkov told me when Andropov was commenting on the first draft of that article he demanded first and foremost to contend with the realities and not to say anything “contrary to conscience” according to Lenin He had a similar conversation with the editor in chief of Pravda Afanasiev in the presence of Zimyanin He demanded only the truth from Pravda told them to follow up on his speeches and not to back down until there are real results He instructed them to have a better dialogue with the West praising Arbatov Zagladin the five people who can “speak their language ” He noted by the way that we lost the battle over “human rights…” That we are wasting time pretending that our contradictions are not antagonistic what about the prisons the crimes etc Is that a struggle of “good versus better” or discrepancies And so forth Pravda Sovietskaya Rossia Literaturka have changed a lot since Andropov’s came to power even compared to their formerly fairly “progressive” positions For the first time in many many years people are rushing to read the front page of Pravda The bureaucratic banalities are almost gone and so is the tasteless bragging At the start of Andropov’s visit to the Ordzhonikidze Factory an old worker asks “Yuri Vladimirovich may I open with an unpleasant question ” Andropov “That’s what we are here for…” Worker “Where were you all these years ” After a brief hesitation in the auditorium the reply was “Same place as you were ” In a word I believe in Andropov may God grant him at least five good years And may Ponomarev fade away soon though it could cost me my job Until he is gone we will continue to destroy the ICM International Communist Movement The episode with the letter against the PCI The article for Novoye Vremya he shouted at me “This is opportunism ” when I expressed doubt whether we need to “rebuff the Italians” at all The article was shot down at the Politburo We were advised to limit ourselves to a closed letter to their CC… Essentially the letter was the same as the article… basically it showed that we simply do not want to understand anything or – from the Italians’ point of view – we are simply stupid The letter circulated among members of the PB for two weeks Eventually it was approved… B N notified me of this at dacha over the phone He grumbled forgetting that I am by no means in agreement with him on this issue about how long they hesitated doubted edited the letter but finally agreed It seems Andropov is still affected by the inertia of the “Party father” prestige since he ultimately surrendered How is it possible they can doubt that we are right about everything that we cannot be wrong Plus he does not know what the alternative could be and nobody told him including Zagladin Everything comes back to Ponomarev Tomorrow I will read the ciphered telegrams to find out what came of this senseless initiative 2 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org The story of the draft Gromyko-Ponomarev memo to the PB based on Dobrynin’s telegram about our long-term course regarding the United States I proposed to set a course towards normalization at all costs regardless of who is in the White House KorniyenkoKomplektov ridiculed my draft as a naïve outstretched hand Gromyko agreed with them called B N and now the matter is shelved Our MFA is full of shallow thinkers By the way Komplektov was recently promoted to a deputy at the MFA but he is a petty official through and through – in his education and his work experience Politics for him is just another piece of paper nothing more February 20 1983 On Wednesday Ponomarev came to the Gorky dacha He had railed against our text over the phone the day before However in the presence of “outsider comrades” he behaved nicely maybe also because he finished reading the entire text by the time he came here not just bits and pieces of it Later he even fell into reminiscences associated with this dacha as he usually does… How Stalin and Voroshilov used to visit Gorky at the dacha how the young Mints who is an academician now had “stood on this very veranda” and gave a six-hour report on the text of the first volume of The History of the Civil War… About Yaroslavsky that he survived thanks to Ordzhonikidze who saved him by sending him to exile in Yakutsk while his fourvolume History of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks was excoriated for several months due to one phrase that before Lenin’s return to Russia Stalin had taken some positions that were not entirely correct But these are all just embellishments The real story is in our work Ponomarev handed out a bunch of instructions which irritated me but were received with reverence and understanding distance by the rest of the guys They found crumbs of “progressiveness” in his words for example admitting some failures and contradictions Then we were back to the drawing board I find it annoying that some of the seven men here have turned the dacha into a resort Krasin and Pyshkov barely wrote 2-3 pages in the 20 days we’ve been here… They are constantly out taking walks or skiing Look out the window and you are sure to see one of them out there Krasin seems to be in some kind of manic state he does exercises and jogs before breakfast after breakfast coffee kefir he goes skiing Then he rests on the couch wearing imported noise-cancelling headphones and listening to some calming music I don’t know what he does after that but about two hours before lunch he goes skiing again followed by a walk after lunch… After dinner – billiards and another walk I suspect he has a young mistress so he wants to stay in shape But what does our poor Marx have to do with it This kind of thing infuriates me especially against the backdrop of enthusiasm and a sincere desire to do a good job from Ambartsumov Veber Kozlov I end up having to write and edit not just my own parts but finish up for others too 3 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org We should do away with these dachas – these symbols of freeloading on other people’s brains Or we should go back to Leninist-Stalinist times when PB and CC members would write themselves In other words elect a bunch of the writers and let them work for the cause instead of the collected works of Ponomarev and his ilk I feel some kind of decline in everyday life My internal cycle is completely strained when I am on my own For example I pick up Gulygin’s book about Schelling but if you ask me two days later what I read I could not tell you for the life of me I started reading Renan’s The Life of Jesus and I remember that it was interesting but I cannot recall exactly what I found interesting It all flies out of my mind the next day The same happens with various articles and entertainment books Sometimes I read something clearly significant in Literaturka but the thoughts stay in my mind only until the next issue of the magazine Still I managed to jot down two things from an article by the playwright A Misharin “Today we need a direct impartial conversation a conversation about good and evil about the things and people that are getting in our way It is also absolutely clear that this conversation should have the concreteness passion and depth inherited from our classical Russian culture There is no other way ” Or “…Today’s social drama has to present to the public an examination of issues felt in our society urgent issues that have not been resolved It has to capture the main fundamental shifts in our public consciousness The main among them – the trial of personal responsibility facing our modern citizen… All the questions have been raised anew In this moment the role of literature theater family the foundations of human existence increases tremendously That is what’s on the agenda right now What kind of person will you become A fighter A nouveau-riche of one sort or another What people were waiting for twenty years ago is here now ” That’s the scope we are talking about I’ve written about it before Our literature is once again taking the path it set in the XIX century And life in the Andropov era is taking a new direction one that hasn’t been visible since Stalin’s times Though for now we are going through a shaking up of the rigid system albeit under the guise of restoring order and discipline March 13 1983 I don’t write regularly and that’s a pity because there are things to write about Though I did spend a month at the Gorky dacha But the main reason I don’t write is laziness and strategic fatigue from life I was inspired by Eidelman’s publications on Karamzin to read around thirty manuscripts for the next meeting of Questions of History By the way there was a sensible long article by some colonel of the General Staff on the “Battle for the Caucasus ” Picking it up I of course wondered whether it would mention Brezhnev Well it didn’t Over forty pages of text about the Kunnikov landing there were only a few pages about Malaya Zemlya This time history is rapidly restoring the truth… For how long do we need to be taught decency dignity and basic common sense – not as individuals but as a society 4 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org How is the Andropov era coming along The most noticeable aspect is the press There is no more boasting there is a great deal of criticism a serious conversation about current problems There is no fear of “critics” and slanderers of socialism from “over there ” Higher and higher echelons are being subjected to criticism Holding the title of Minister will no longer save you That’s very good but it is not enough It appears there is a strategy to create a different atmosphere in society But I do not see any major policy any strategy for overcoming the crisis Maybe it doesn’t exist Arbatov thinks so he adores me again because he was pushed aside rather than brought into the inner circle despite his total confidence he would be He is convinced that we missed the opportunity already In his view it all comes down to firing all the former cadres To a large extent personnel is indeed the problem But where to find replacements Where is the mechanism that would help identify new people And most importantly – where is the trust that is necessary for bold personnel policy The KGB is probably not the place where such trust is developed as a political quality of a statesman Arbatov believes that we’ve missed this chance also for this reason – when there is no tangible progress a process of discreditation sets in there is a loss of hope and authority While Andropov was ill for a month prices went up for many goods and services – gas went up 3x the phone bill went up 10x furniture is twice as expensive there were increases in the price of electricity metal products some types of foods gas and so forth In other words a head-on increase for fairly everyday items Arbatov calculated that the salary increases mandated by the XXVI Congress for some categories of workers have already been “eaten up ” People are starting to grumble… The enthusiasm of the first days after Brezhnev have evaporated Many are convinced there is a rivalry between Andropov and Chernenko I do not believe this Andropov’s article about Marx stirred up a variety of responses I liked it for its frankness and “Leninist” style in the sense that it did not conform to the “general” reader It was addressed to a politically literate cultured audience But from the point of view of presenting a set of strategic ideas Arbatov is probably right… It’s been a week since it came out I’ve read it three times But if you ask me what it’s about if we are talking about the outlook and action plan I really couldn’t tell you Still I think it is already an achievement that it is free of boasting and presents an attitude towards socialism as a real society of real living and far from ideal people Speaking of the people in this society I went to the Davis Cup at Luzhniki As always when I find myself surrounded by this mass of Muscovites I am shocked by the fact that I have nothing in common with them It doesn’t really matter that I don’t But I am sure that Andropov Co have nothing in common with them either The crowd could not care less about this “socialism” and all the worries about how to improve it The majority of the people at the stadium were wearing sheepskin coats leather jackets very fashionable modern very selfconfident and well-off In our society this is the intelligentsia the employees and the sportsaffiliated fraternity For many of them being involved in sports means “being in a club ” a club of “their people ” It is both a hobby and the reason for being a way to interact with their own 5 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org kind For them work is nothing more than a means to receive a salary It does not present any intrinsic meaning or interest to them For some it may be just a cover for legal idleness or not quite legal but profitable activities I think they really do not care what kind of society they live in However this is only one layer – the people from the capital There may be several million of them around the country Perhaps from the point of view of public morality it is not the worst layer because it has a certain minimum of culture To whom then is Andropov’s article on Marx addressed To people like me Arbatov Ambartsumov and the rest of the “Gorky dacha crowd” March 20 1983 It was a normal week There was however a meeting of the CC Secretaries international from socialist countries B N is very satisfied Other participants privately “How much longer ” That is how much longer will we keep convincing and informing each other about things that everybody knows perfectly well How much longer will coordination be reduced to monologue lectures about the dangers of imperialism and the significance of joint actions Andropov received the secretaries He read out a memo that had been written by us but significantly weakened by B N That was disappointing I expected him to use the opportunity to say something about the socialist community in the spirit of the 1956 resolution But my attempts were thwarted by B N who guessed what I was up to and again resisted putting original ideas into the General Secretary’s mouth he does not want Andropov’s tenure to bring in a truly “new era ” Andropov’s final speech for the June Plenum on Ideology is being prepared in Volynskoe Zagladin is in a euphoric state but he manages to find time for everything else too From his articles and speeches on Marx 165th anniversary alone an article in Pravda an article in Kommunist an article for Khavinson’s journal World Economy and International Relations one in Novoye Vremya a speech at the international seminar in Paris a speech at a conference at the Party School and so on and so forth Ponomarev is in a rage But he is no longer in control of his first deputy even when it comes to work in the Department For example at the aforementioned meeting Zagladin led the editorial committee and would occasionally step into the auditorium where the meeting was taking place whisper something to B N pick up his folder and leave He thereby demonstrated that he only does his specific part and beyond that he could not care less about this pointless fuss This is one of the symptoms of the collapse of the old “structure” of the apparatus including the International Department On Friday there was a party for Berkov’s 60th anniversary he is a consultant in the International Department Arbatov’s friend at the House of Journalists This “celebration” is the clearest picture of the moral decay of our venerable team We had been so proud of this team since the times of Elizar Kuskov who was B N ’s first deputy before Zagladin Vulgar jokes 6 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org swearing in the presence of ladies vicious attacks against each other under the guise of comradely jokes insulting remarks arrogant cynicism regarding our departmental work The people who especially stood out Menshikov who exposed his vile nature Sobakin – he showed his stupidity in a drunken state and Shaposhnikov who exhibited complete idiocy in my opinion bordering on alcoholic schizophrenia He was incredibly drunk One could only guess what goes on inside him when he is sober based on the incoherent verbiage that came out of him when he was drunk It is a “disintegration of personality ” He was once a pretty good person but he has turned into a spiteful petty vengeful envious guy who can commit any meanness any betrayal I still cannot get over feeling disgusted when I remember those hours at the party This thought crossed my mind among others he Shaposhnikov is after all a very typical person for the stratum that makes up our high and in part the highest echelon of our cadres This is frightening – because people like that have no “self-regulating” categories of decency honor loyalty moral substance All they have is bare career interests and unquenched perverted to the point of illness vanity March 22 1983 I persuaded Ponomarev to let me work from home to do a final cleanup of the text on Marx for his report at the Bolshoi Theater of March 30th At home work goes three times easier faster and better than at the office A new version for B N ’s speech at the Department before representatives of the mass media and public organizations on the outcomes of the meeting of the CC Secretaries of socialist countries A draft letter to Brandt – an address to the Congress of the Socialist International on détente And more routine work Arbatov was after all invited to Volynskoe to prepare the summit on CMEA That is good – both for the work and for him March 25 1983 Last night I finished the report on Marx Eradicated the last bit of freshness from it On two pages in the concluding part of the report I tried to give an answer to the question of why we the CPSU consider Marxism-Leninism as a guide to action A contemporary answer without sounding like a scholastic lecture B N and I had a long argument and he reduced the report to trivialities that could have been written in 2-3 days The work would have consisted of nothing more than looking for quotes… 7 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org What’s the matter Two things He is afraid to put on airs and demonstratively compete for the role of Party theoretician i e maintain the position he obtained under Brezhnev by force of circumstances Now Andropov and Chernenko are “doing theory themselves ” And the second thing he hates to see everyone hoping for a “new stage” under Andropov This is due to the fact that he is personally being pushed away from theory from changing the program of the CPSU in particular and from policy Also he considers “all of them” the nouveau riche in political activity and himself as the only “educated Marxist” and theoretician in their midst Finally and mainly it is because he is almost 80 and his dream of becoming a PB member is evaporating completely… He is resisting not hiding his disdain in front of us his “close circle” for the initiatives and new ideas of the new General Secretary and those who support him His political and ideological conservatism is growing in leaps and bounds Brutents told me how Aleksandrov assigned B N to compose for Andropov for the ideological Plenum three pages on the “third world ” and how B N tried to sabotage this task B N suddenly gave me a gift an amazing set of ink pens I decided to try them out and realized that I already have three gathering dust He’s a strange guy my boss On the one hand he is very lonely He wants at least someone to be close to him like me for example So he got sentimental with the pens On the other hand he is not a particularly generous person because he is an egoist by nature and now his old age is compounding that So he wants to get off easy… for our conversation yesterday evidently on a very sensitive subject for him April 3 1983 B N ’s report on Marx took place on March 30th At the Bolshoi Theater Unexpectedly Andropov was there heading the entire Politburo I ended up in the front row B N read decently but he failed to convey the emotional passages It was received… fairly well The congratulations kept coming in the day after… and to me too I watched very closely for the “sentiment” between the presidium and the speaker There is a condescending slightly ironic attitude towards him He does not want to see it Then again the general public including abroad does not know this On the contrary especially abroad they consider him a “grey cardinal ” while in reality he does not play any role in policy or theory the latter he especially claims as his own it is his last redoubt He is just a highranking experienced official He himself is very pleased with how everything went The next day he went on vacation to the Crimea 8 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org Zagladin left before him again to Hungary then to Vienna for a secret meeting with Cossutta In the last days while B N was still here I tried to save Basov a referent on Afghanistan But it was too late That evening I was “informed” about what happened to him The police seized him on the street he was drunk after attending the wake for a friend who died in Afghanistan Bastards – showing off their uncompromising stand on workers of the Central Committee When I started giving a speech about it to Ponomarev in the morning he said “Well he was drunk And you know how tough they are about that nowadays ” I only managed to save him from a Party investigation and reprimand At the time I was having this conversation the letter of dismissal was already on Chernenko’s desk Since I brought up the subject of how Shchelokov corrupted the police B N mentioned by the way after getting up from his desk away from the phones “If you knew what crimes are associated with him Gustov deputy of Pelše the Chairman of the Party Control Committee reported at the Secretariat… What they did was… They would divide the valuables and jewelry seized from criminals amongst themselves They even had a kind of ‘cooperative ’ a shop where only select people were allowed mostly relatives Their family was using three Mercedes cars There is a great deal of crimes to his name He deserves severe punishment But you understand everyone knows who put him in that post… For ten years he was Minister of Internal Affairs Now it is an awkward situation You know his wife committed suicide ” I tried to use this story to come back to Basov’s case Basov will be fired because of this person But unsuccessfully Meanwhile Shchelokov was in the front rows at Ponomarev’s report at the Bolshoi Theater The tickets personalized were distributed by none other than Comrade Grishin’s City Committee It is understandable of course Brezhnev knew what he was doing He gave “his” people such positions and ranks that it became very difficult to get rid of them The same Shchelokov – he is a full general brimming with medals glorified and untouchable for so many years Suddenly in front of the whole world to strip him of his epaulets And what to tell our people and the world It will not do We do not do such things Let it be swept under the rug We will manage Vasil Bykov’s Sign of Misfortune in Druzhba Narodov The entire philosophy of Soviet history is now in his crosshairs May 14 1983 Again I did not write for a long time even though periodically information came up that deserved it Maybe it is because of fatigue It is permanent from my work Zagladin has not been at work in three months For a brief while he was in the countryside and did some work there Andropov’s concluding remarks for the Ideology Plenum Then he took three business trips abroad including Berlin 165th anniversary of Marx Then he 9 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org was in the hospital due to his diabetes While there he wrote article after article for all kinds of publications from the Polish Nowe Drogi to Novoye Vremya and Agitator His passion for this form of self-expression for a long time aroused universal surprise and respect but now is becoming the subject of universal irony and ridicule the joke is that whatever magazine you open Zagladin is there either under his own name or a pseudonym I visited him in the hospital “at his request ” It turned out that he wanted to share something very intimate with me He decided to divorce his wife He fell in love with a friend of his daughter she is 25 I sincerely supported him saying “For a man he must go with a woman” from Kipling and for a man like him who voluntarily took on an intellectual burden it is even more so A few days later he called me and told me that he informed Tamara his wife of his decision and oddly enough received a release there will be no scandal He asked me how better to notify Ponomarev In a word he is completely occupied with himself writing his essays and looking after his soul By the way even though he is in the hospital on Michurinsky he goes to see a psychic – Juna – every other day He says the results are amazing and the doctors have no idea why and attribute it to their efforts That said he does not forget about his work responsibilities As Aleksandrov-Agentov sarcastically put it Zagladin set up shop at the hospital he edited Chernenko’s report for the Plenum participated in writing the preface for the Andropov compilation which is supposed to come out in the FRG received the head of the SPD delegation Schumacher carried on his secret games in big politics Menshikov visits him almost daily On the eve of Victory Day he came to see me and said that U S Ambassador Hartman invited him for a visit I asked what for “For a cocktail…” “Really what for ” “Don’t you know… I have contacts with many Americans from the time I worked in the U S Those who need to know know about it When I came to work here I told Ponomarev ” “And what did he say ” “Nothing… I visit the embassy very often Especially when one of my acquaintances is here they have a reception I’ve already been several times this year I run it by Zagladin every time This time he also thinks I should go Hartman is going home and probably wants to convey something important before leaving ” “Are you sure that he like the others you met with are telling you anything that Moscow doesn’t already know from Dobrynin and other channels After all you do not read all the ciphered telegrams I read almost all of them and think they contain more than enough material for the PB to competently formulate its policy towards the U S This is the business aspect so to 10 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org speak that eliminates the need for your ‘confidential’ contacts The other aspect is this – can you be certain that they will not turn you in when it appears advantageous for them to do so You are no longer an IMEMO representative in the United States a free scientist You are now an employee of the Central Committee and thus a very good object for provocation ” “I don’t think so They are playing by the rules…” “Be careful… Right now it’s particularly important to be careful Look at the campaign of anti-Soviet spy mania taking place in a dozen countries already our guys were expelled within 48 hours ” “I considered that But you know they sent an invitation to Aleksandrov too He said he won’t go himself but Menshikov should go ” “Who did he say that to ” “To Zagladin ” “So Dixi et salvavi animam meam sic as people say including Marx ” He did go to the embassy and as usual did not show me the record of conversation or even tell me about it at all Naturally I did not ask The day before yesterday my phone rings Aleksandrov Andrey Mikhailovich “Anatoly Sergeyevich ” I hear the familiar Jesuit voice “explain to me please on whose orders did Comrade Menshikov meet with Ambassador Hartman It’s written in his report ‘I was instructed to meet…’ You must know that such phrasing means the order was given by a CC Secretary no less Otherwise it does not count And no one else has the authority to issue such orders Now I have to report to Yuri Vladimirovich and he will ask where the order came from… What am I supposed to tell him There was sensitive information in that conversation even though nothing we did not already know For example that Shultz wants to visit if Andropov receives him that they do not want Zimyatin to visit because it is not the right level ” I told Aleksandrov exactly what happened not forgetting to mention that he supposedly had also been invited In a word I told him exactly what I wrote above I asked him “Did Menshikov send you the memcon himself ” “No Zagladin sent it to me ” “So we should consider it Zagladin’s ‘order ’ I spoke with Ponomarev on this topic a few days ago He was surprised that Menshikov engages in such ‘personal politics’ and denied that Menshikov asked him for general permission to continue contacts when he was approved for our Department Ponomarev definitely did not know anything about this visit for a cocktail ” “What would you have me do Anatoly Sergeyevich ” “I don’t know I could not override Zagladin’s ‘advice ’ especially since there was a reference to you as well ” 11 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org “The devil knows what I will call Ponomarev ” He really did call Ponomarev The latter denied everything of course he told me about it himself later blamed it all on Zagladin who “does whatever he wants even though we don’t see him at work for months at a time ” Ponomarev promised to “put things in order” regarding Menshikov He advised Aleksandrov to shelf the memcon send it to the International Department to write it off That’s what A M did As the result I saw the note Aside from Menshikov’s claims to the significance of his contacts there was nothing in it that we did not already know This is one of the latest episodes of Zagladin’s “secret personal politics ” Another episode is not over yet But it already cost us a couple million rubles and could turn into a huge scandal I’m talking about Cossutta’s purchase of the newspaper Paese Sera He wants to turn it into something like Iskra to fight against Berlinguer Co and then turn the party back into a Marxist-Leninist one Cossutta assures us Zagladin that 25 percent of the PCI is behind him although as the pre-Congress discussion earlier this year showed in reality it is not even one percent Immediately after last year’s January Plenum at which the PCI adopted the famous resolution on Poland and thereby condemned and dissociated itself from real socialism Cossutta made contact with Zagladin they had met secretly in Paris and Vienna and declared that he is going to fight but he needs financial support Zagladin convinced B N who always had a tendency for police methods of work in the ICM by reminding him of similar successful operations from 50 40 and 30 years ago The latter agreed and convinced the CC that we need to do this to defeat Eurocommunism Cossutta receive two million through a shell trading company He managed to buy the newspaper but so far a year there have been no changes ideological-political In the meantime it was steadily heading for bankruptcy The PCI leadership soon “sensed” that something was happening with Paese Sera… They organized a subscription to save the newspaper from bankruptcy The press started openly writing that it was the “hand of Moscow” destroying the newspaper in order to hand it over to Cossutta’s proteges Benedetti Cossutta’s man whom he put in charge of the newspaper finally closed the newspaper recently Cossutta cried out for help again saying that they closed the newspaper to clean up its editorial office put “their own” people in charge and will resume publication in the summer He said he was sure that in 12-13 months it will be quite good But for that he needed another two million immediately in the fall and again in January B N would have given it to him But with our current currency shortage he is embarrassed to ask the Central Committee to take so much money from the Soviet people for an affair that is so clearly questionable from all points of view For two months now Cossutta has been sounding the alarm asking demanding But B N is stalling He keeps making me or Zuyev head of the Latin countries sector “ask” what Zagladin thinks The latter while he is at the hospital refuses to receive a cryptographer to show him the telegrams Over the phone he tells me and Zuyev that since we started it we need to see it through He does not call Ponomarev 12 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org himself I convey “Zagladin’s opinion” to B N but when he asks me for my own I express “deep doubts ” Zuyev shares this point of view B N is torn He really dislikes Berlinguer he really wants to bring him down he dreams that Cossutta would make it happen And B N relies very much on this type of tactic and would have asked the CC for money already but the “currency situation” is holding him back plus he is afraid of failure The recent episode when the entire leadership of the Iranian Tudeh Party admitted that their newspaper had been a spy organization for the Soviet Union since its founding or at least since 1945 further intensified Ponomarev’s hesitation This entire affair is the result of Zagladin’s “personal politics” in the ICM his penchant for intrigues and all sorts of “covert operations ” Come to think of it after Mitterrand’s victory Zagladin was in Paris and made contact with the president’s personal representative Then he wrote to Moscow bypassing Ambassador Chervonenko through the resident communication line “forty barrels of encouraging information ” from which it followed that Mitterrand is practically getting on a plane to Moscow to kiss Brezhnev The reality turned out to be the opposite When Mitterrand expelled 47 of our people from France in early April Le Monde leaked about Zagladin’s secret connections in the highest echelons of the French state apparatus The tabloids hinted that he Zagladin had given the “president’s representative” names of several of our employees who now were among those expelled And once more… about Zagladin The other day B N got up from is desk and went to the middle of his office as he usually does in sensitive situations He told me the following When Honecker was here with an official visit in early May our General Secretary casually asked him “How is our ambassador Abrasimov doing over there ” “I don’t know how he’s doing probably well ” “Maybe he’s been there for a while maybe it’s time for him to go home ” “I would not object ” Erich replied Andropov told Ponomarev about this and said “Who should replace him Semenov ambassador to the FRG But he seems to be well placed And why move from Germany to Germany ” “We can find someone let me think about it ” replied B N “I’ve already thought about it – Zamyatin ” “Will he want to After all he aimed high hoping to become a CC Secretary under Leonid Ilyich and not without reason ” B N supposedly said “Well he calmed down now Plus I already spoke to him He agreed ” 13 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org “Is that so ” “The question now is who would replace him i e Head of the CC Department of International Information What do you think about your deputy ” B N said he needed time to think And he started thinking out loud when I was there I offered the opinion that Zagladin would certainly agree “Sure he would agree The question is whether we should allow it With the liberties he takes he will be sticking his nose in our affairs every day and then might completely take them over ” B N said I was taken aback by hearing such a pathetic argument from a CC Secretary and could not think of anything to say He asked me to think it over and give him a list of names by morning In the morning I sent him a note in which I named some candidates Blatov Dobrynin Yakovlev ambassador to Canada Shishlin Grigoriev deputy in Pravda Kraisov deputy in TASS But in my heart I am convinced that it will be Zagladin B N has been snubbed a few times He expected to be the speaker at the celebratory meeting on the 80th anniversary of the CPSU Zimyanin got that job Ponomarev was sure that he would be allowed to appear in the journal Problems of Peace and Socialism with an article on the subject The journal sent a request to the CC to have Ponomarev as the author saying that he is one of the biggest scholars on the history of the CPSU a notable statesman of the ICM They needed an article precisely on the aspect of the ICM and something else Instead the article was assigned – clearly with Andropov’s knowledge – to Kapitonov This is in response to the request from the journal which had gone through Ponomarev and was directed by him to Gorbachev who has been standing in for the ailing Chernenko for a month now as the head of the Secretariat B N is getting ready to speak at the Plenum I’ve already prepared two versions of the speech for him He brought in scholars two from the Institute of Philosophy and two from the International Lenin School Although it is obvious that their philosophical scholarly roulades are not suitable for any Plenum and no one needs them they will be tossed in the wastebasket along with 95 percent of everything on this subject over the years Moreover it will only be 7-8 pages of text what philosophy can we speak of But in classical B N style he does not consider us except for Menshikov capable of producing anything interesting even though he’s been using our brains and our pens for almost 20 years No amount of empty material from scholars to whom he gives assignments before every event can convince him that they are incapable of writing what we need His natural shamelessness together with the lackey cynicism he has developed over his long political life have no bounds The other day he forwarded me a note signed by the new Head of the Propaganda Department Stukalin It is a denunciation of Nenashev the editor-in14 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org chief of Sovetskaya Rossiya Two of his articles one from April 27th and one yet to be published – on the state of ideological work – have been condemned for being pretentious indiscriminately critical and of course as always in these cases confusing I read the note and was indignant to the core In reality over the last year and a half Nenashev managed to turn Sovetskaya Rossiya into the most interesting most read of all the central newspapers It is sharp bold frank journalistically competent it is fresh in how it poses problems and covers issues it has a deep and honest approach to all our affairs And here you go Once again we take one step forward and two steps back Nenashev’s articles in spirit and execution in how they are substantiated by facts fully correspond to what was said at the XXVI Congress But we are already afraid of our rather timid courage in implementing our own decisions The XX Congress syndrome and its consequences Of course the honor of the Propaganda Department uniform is at play Who is Nenashev to judge all ideological work in such a way By the way Sovetskaya Rossiya is an organ of the CC Indignant I went to Ponomarev although he clearly sent this note to me as a warning since I am preparing his speech at the Ideological Plenum The note was already signed by all the CC Secretaries including Ponomarev I gave a passionate speech He made lazy excuses “I didn’t read those articles ” he said… “How could you sign the note then It is a fundamental matter It is essentially a rejection of the tenets from the Congress What editor would allow himself even a bit of courage and honesty if we use such methods And look at the humiliating form of punishment they came up with someone from the Propaganda Department comes to the editorial board meeting and with everyone present slaps the editor-in-chief in the face I have a feeling that someone intended to simply torment Nenashev so they came up with this obvious fake ” The conversation came to nothing But B N who “didn’t read ” has already crossed out Nenashev from the list of editors I recommended to look over our note on the ICM after a decision is made about it This is our spiritual Beria-ism which it seems we cannot shake off I ran into Nenashev in the stairwell on my way to the Secretariat meeting I asked him “Mikhail Fedorovich why are they messing with you ” “Ah to hell with them Disgusting ” Ambassador Yakovlev was in Moscow in connection with Gorbachev’s forthcoming visit to Canada We chatted He said he keeps trying to figure out why he is being banished “Now Golikov has been sent into retirement and Trapeznikov is about to be driven out Gorbachev himself told me that it was a matter of days I was removed from the Department of Propaganda and sent into diplomatic exile based on their denunciation to Brezhnev But… I was presented to lead the APN the Novosti Press Agency replacing Tolkunov who was again transferred to Izvestia Apparently several secretaries have already put down their signatures However my paper to Andropov was shut down without any explanation ” By the way even before this conversation B N tried to “explain” to me that this is as it should be since they have something against Yakovlev 15 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org So Yakovlev said he keeps trying to figure out what exactly they “have” against him He recalled an episode from 6-7 years ago At a reception at the Portuguese embassy in Ottawa the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada he is of Russian descent approached him and casually over a glass of whiskey said “Why don’t you Mr Yakovlev replace 11 of your employees with 11 diplomats ” “I immediately understood what was the matter ” Yakovlev said “I reported it to our resident and further up ‘the chain of command ’ to Gromyko Three months went by with no reaction from Moscow Then one day I was summoned to the Canadian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and presented a dossier on 11 people – all of them were caught red-handed there was nothing to say They were ‘to be gone from Canadian soil’ within 48 hours I once again reported this dossier ‘up the chain of command’ to Gromyko It seems I should have sent it to another department Now I’m being reminded of it ” It may very well be so People keep saying that Shchelokov the former Minister of the Interior has been expelled from the Central Committee from the Party and is being put on trial I don’t know… B N did tell me that his case was heard at the PB Gustov Pelše’s deputy reported The consensus is that he deserves very serious punishment but it is embarrassing to say this publicly to our people and for the world to find out After all everyone knows who brought him to the capital who nurtured him who covered for him… As for the facts of the matter B N shared only one – a cooperative was formed at the Ministry of Internal Affairs where valuables seized from criminals were sold cheaply to the inner circle For now though we do know that the switchman has been dealt with Shchelokov’s former deputy has been stripped of his rank of general has been expelled from the party and put on trial I also know that Medunov’s First Secretary of the Krasnodar Regional Committee of the CPSU case was heard at the PB I do not know what they decided Everything will become clear at the Plenum Ivashova professor philologist presented me with her book Epistolary Dialogues About modern British literature It turns out there are dozens of notable names I know only twothree of them And I’m from the reading public an intellectual For whom does this literature exist For whom do they analyze the processes of life struggle for the past and future try to teach people something warn about something or simply just inform of how other people live For people like Ivashova – specialists Incidentally what right do we have to be offended that the West does not know our contemporary literature if we the nation that reads the most do not know what is being written by the heirs of Shakespeare Dickens Galsworthy and so forth May 15 1983 16 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org In connection with Kosolapov’s article in Kommunist which is very clever and maybe even useful I picked up Lenin’s works from the bookshelf Once again as in Gorki in the winter when we were working on the report and had to read a lot of Lenin I felt certain we must reread the classics to stay up to date with our times The “new interpretation” of Marx-EngelsLenin for which Trapeznikov hounded Gefter about 10 years ago is the only viable path for us and for everyone Not to mention training one’s ability to think politically We should also learn from them and only them what it means to have moral courage of thought and reinforce this lesson in case someone encroaches on your party card for “dissent ” Here's a simple thing Lenin’s “Under a False Flag” from 1914 Volume 26 It is a piece we studied as students then in graduate school and while I was teaching at Moscow State University I came back to it a few times over the years Now it once again reads as most relevant and smart inspiring and at the same time totally forgotten even my previous examination of it I got a call from work we made an unfortunate omission in the note on the ICM that was sent out on Friday to the Secretariat We forgot to include the CP of Japan among the opportunist parties B N remembered it at night and called Balmashnov and then Zhilin to the carpet since I was not there My mistake also lies in the fact that I did not show the draft of this note to all the deputies though it is a general department matter May 22 1983 The main event of this week was the discussion at the Secretariat of our note on the state of the ICM What was unusual everyone was asked to leave except the Secretaries myself Rakhmanin Zamyatin Stukalin and Lukyanov Bogoluybov Chernenko led the Secretariat he is back after a month and a half absence B N was given the floor After reading the two pages we prepared for this event he went on for 20 minutes talking nonsense in his inarticulate dialect He “set goals ” clearly taking tedious “lessons” about the ICM from some old public speech as I later found out his adviser Vershinin found this text for him It sounded ludicrous and inappropriate to give such an oversimplified lecture to CC Secretaries I was very embarrassed some people glanced in my direction thinking that this was “my doing ” It was rubbish both in content and politically he remembered Lister a Republican general in Spain 1936-38 and gave him an assessment that completely differed from the line we officially established about 10 years ago You could feel that he was “stooping down” to adjust to the level of “his colleagues ” whom he considers complete laymen in their field and capable of thinking about CP leaders only in the categories of “our man” or “not our man ” But he clearly underestimated “his colleagues ” They know some things and as it became clear from their speeches and comments they have their own opinions often more objective and realistic than Ponomarev wanted to present in his report and that we depicted under pressure from him in the note 17 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org Everyone noted the importance of the issue and the fact that the CC has not had such a broad outlook in over 10 years essentially since the 1969 Conference Fragmentary information and individual decisions on this or that party delegations to congresses greetings meetings with visitors here ciphered telegrams from ambassadors do not make up a full picture and are forgotten among the many daily affairs of those who are far from the ICM However The analysis given in the note was deemed to be overstated Dolgikh said “too optimistic ” Kapitonov joined this assessment though I remember when we went to the Congress of the Swiss Communist Party together in 1980 he resolutely opposed my attempt to report to Moscow a genuinely realistic analysis And this is right I think this approach came from the general spirit of the Andropov era realism and truth but also from an increasingly critical attitude toward Ponomarev Even here he looked pitiful in his attempts to primitivize the situation to lead away from serious conclusions to prevent from facing the facts In general they see him as an anachronism albeit with outward respect for his old age They look ironically at his attempts to pose as a theoretician and a major figure They are disdainful of his conceited activity and urge to get on every podium for every special occasion always poke his nose into big politics with his didactic articles and cheap propaganda They gave two weeks for revisions and on top of updating the note we have to provide a detailed Politburo resolution on the ICM Again it is a flick on the nose for B N he pointed it out himself making the flicking gesture when I told him exactly what decision the Secretariat issued Namely to assign Ponomarev Zimyanin Rusakov Zamyatin and Stukalin to work it out in accordance with the discussion In other words it indirectly shows a lack of confidence that B N can provide a “fitting” draft to the P B He started grumbling at me again we should not have gotten involved in this affair we should not have proposed this issue for the Secretariat This is according to the principle if a pile of shit is lying on the road don’t touch it If you touch it – it’ll stink Nothing matters to him except keeping his chair and satisfying whenever possible his senile vanity By the way on Friday we had a disgusting conversation “in this context ” “Did you hear ” he said “that it was decided for me not to speak at the 80th anniversary of the CPSU and even an article to PPS which is purely our business – the international role of our party our journal our issue the editor requested that I write the article was assigned to Kapitonov ” “Yes I heard about it ” “What do you think should I make peace with it or try to do something ” 18 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org I shrugged Ponomarev continued “Could you speak with Aleksandrov As if by happenstance not on purpose and of course not here at the CC or on the phone Perhaps at dacha on Sunday ” “But our dachas are in different locations Mine is in Uspenka his is in Usovo ” “Really ” he feigns surprise “Which one of our guys lives there Ah Brutents ” “I could ask him…” “Do that But warn him to be careful as if he brought it up inadvertently Look for 20 years students have been studying from my textbook History of the CPSU That’s longer than studying from the Short Course even though such a figure is behind it Still it served for 15 years and my textbook for 20 I have been doing ideological work for 50 years ” And so on and so forth in the same disgustingly unworthy spirit This is a Secretary of the Central Committee a representative of the leadership of a great party On Saturday morning I called Brutents and conveyed this “request ” The second event of the week was Arbatov’s 60th anniversary He received his second Order of Lenin He organized a big reception on this occasion at the CMEA a favorite place for such events I mocked and teased him knowing that the event would still take place And it did I organized an address from the International Department for him and read it as a toast By the way I had to go first After the repeated vulgar buffoonery from the toastmaster academician Primakov no one dared to take the floor for 40 minutes or they did not want to waste their sober nerve cells But I was in a hurry Bovin’s toast with the bushel of salt and so forth He once again surprised me with his vulgarity his desire to confirm his reputation as a “free thinker” who is not afraid or anything despite being in the orbit of the highest authorities But the reverse comes out cheap political hooliganism which is not received as “despite” his position but “because of” his position he is under the wing of high authorities therefore everything is allowed He is shitting in the trough from which he eats I left early But Sashka Berkov told me what happened later Our establishment academic-MFA-journalistic interspersed with some from the CC apparatus looked trite pitiful narcissistic cowardly and impudent The repulsive face of our high society However the partyCC element was the most modest and reserved After my “serious” oral-written toast no one from the CC fought for the microphone In a word this is all unworthy of the hero of the day who despite his Jewish attachment to home and fame has a clear sense of duty and passion to work for the cause and for himself only in passing May 26 1983 19 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org I turned 62 So many years Many lives fit into these 62 years Yesterday I had the people I like from work over to my house Today I read 45 pages of Chernenko’s report for the Plenum A complete disappointment It’s small change It has a bit of everything He praised and scolded everyone And it turns out we are no longer talking about a radical restructuring of ideological work as was written in the 1979 special CC resolution but only about “improvement ” In a word this era has not yet begun we have not yet made a serious step forward but we are already getting ready to take two steps back You cannot tell from the report that the ideological situation if taken seriously in the Leninist way in society is awful The report is protective rather than innovative The word “continuity” keeps coming up… Continuity of what Of whom Of Shchelokov Trapeznikov Golikov the Brezhnev family Medunov Though I did also read Andropov’s concluding remarks for this Plenum they were sent out a week ago They are much more serious But it is not really about ideology rather about politics and our way of life May 27 1983 My wartime friend Kolya Varlamov when we were celebrating Victory Day together told me in great secrecy that his new son-in-law a successful young doctor gets called to Andropov several times a week for a total blood transfusion Andropov’s kidneys do not work at all “Did you see how he makes his signature ” Indeed I noticed it later It’s like a crooked line only worse Today I finished the updated version of the note and draft resolution on the ICM for the CC Coordinated it with other departments Bogolyubov called “Andropov considers this issue very important it was discussed at the PB…” Meanwhile Ponomarev is still afraid of this issue He still has not decided what he will speak about at the Plenum should he be given the floor About the ICM or about drunkenness or about the “duty of scientists” for the scientific and technological revolution In my opinion there is already a complete collapse of the social and moral impulse in him I am reading another book by Eidelman Big Jeannot about Pushkin sic 1 Again I admire his ability to write historical things about us about contemporary times without any subtext Zagladin is still out of office The flow of paperwork from morning till 7-9pm is crushing my nervous system I came across something while reading Mezhirov… I am older than my colleagues by only 5-7 years including Zagladin – yet I am also older than them by the entire Patriotic War But I cannot look down on them for that even though it could be useful… for my own greater 1 Big Jeannot is about Ivan Pushchin trans 20 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org peace of mind As for Ponomarev I have the right to completely despise him Instead I have been serving him for almost a quarter of a century June 5 1983 My week went by in small skirmishes with Ponomarev who is clearly fussing and getting old… He just cannot adjust to the new bosses And they keep pushing him to the side I think the Plenum will not be pleasant for him He still cherishes the promise that he will be given the floor he is torturing us with preparation for his speech He keeps proposing appallingly primitive ideas We are trying… But we no longer have the fervor we used to – to say something significant through him Nobody wants to listen to him anymore June 6 1983 Today I had a new clash with Ponomarev On Friday we gave him one version of his Plenum speech He summoned me in the morning and greeted me with an exclamation “Help ” Meaning that the material won’t do at all I got angry and started to brazenly ask him what he actually wants specifically He once again started talking pretentious nonsense I objected what he’s asking for is already included in Chernenko’s report and in Andropov’s closing remarks It would not suit you to repeat the report and should your speech anticipate the General Secretary’s remarks – it would be a scandal because the entire leadership knows that we all received the contents of the concluding remarks a month before the Plenum From the long altercation that followed I began to understand that he simply wanted to appear like a great scholar “the theoretician of our party ” As usual he does not really care about the cause only about how he will look But I still do not understand how exactly he wants to position himself He was not included in the roster for the celebration of the 80 th anniversary of the party so we cannot even hint at this subject He is being pushed out of foreign policy and he lost interest in the “crusade ” But I do not understand why he is stubbornly avoiding this subject just as he did when we were preparing the note on the ICM for the CC He does not want to associate himself with the Communist Movement because there is nothing good and useful left there for us Possibly But the entire party and the CC associates him with the ICM He has to take that into consideration There are after all the rules of the game He cannot make a coreport he must speak “about himself ” But he does not want to He wants to set tasks for scholars talk about the role of science and theory and propose problems for theoretical research Which ones I again started to impudently question him but he could not name a single one All the ones we can think of are already presented by Chernenko and Andropov I told him twice that it looks like I am not up to the task which means Kozlov and Veber are also not up to it He should assemble another team I said I could not understand him “I see that you do not understand me ” he replied But he did not take me up on the challenge He just kept lamenting that he lost time and should have assembled a team at a dacha ahead of time as we did for the report on Marx… That time it turned out beautifully He tried to name some issues regarding capitalism For example to give an answer to millions of people around the world – what are the causes of the crisis I replied there are dozens 21 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org of books and hundreds of articles including in the journal of his beloved Khavinson that provide answers to this question based on contemporary science If we do not read them it is our problem and not science’s If these materials are not being read abroad that is an issue of funds and propaganda cadres which could be discussed at such a political forum as the Plenum But you can’t get through to him He is ignorant both in science and in theory even in his history of the party He sent me a note with an outline of an idea on how to introduce class consciousness into the working-class movement – even a first grader would get a failing grade for such nonsense All of this is about myself – what a humiliating role I am in doing everything I can to dress a naked completely naked king September 6 1983 Complete mental frustration I am in the proximity of crucial events but “thanks to” Ponomarev there is nothing but fuss On September 1st a South Korean Boeing 747 with 269 passengers on board was shot down over Sakhalin In the name of inviolability of borders From hundreds of information notes that I have been rummaging in for days it is clear that the Americans set up a provocation for us The tragedy is that we fell for it Reagan started such an anti-Soviet furor around the world that nothing will wash us clean of the stigma as murderers of innocent people in the eyes of regular people around the world of whom there are billions Dozens of governments parliaments all sorts of organizations and leaders including social democrats and even some CPs for example the JCP no longer consider us part of the civilized world Reagan threw out the slogan “Us and Them ” meaning the entire world and the USSR Thousands of newspapers and other voices picked it up By the way socialist countries except the ČSSR are still silent China condemned us in terms similar to Reagan’s The country’s moral prestige the idea of communism has been dealt another terrible blow Everything looks different now all our international affairs We should go into deep isolation separate ourselves from the world not use our mental of financial resources on socalled international relations and prestige Close ourselves off and work on ourselves Create a new image for ourselves in the course of five to ten years after internally rebuilding and really renewing our country The new “edition” of the Party program is being prepared it would be great to put into it a completely new conception of our position in the world… Utopia But is there any other way out Some kind of fate is overtaking our leaders Stalin – 1937 Khrushchev – 1956 Brezhnev – 1968 and 1979 and Andropov barely had time to get started and now he will forever be associated with this ill-fated aircraft Alas I do not know maybe we did not shoot it down But now we can’t prove anything We behaved and continue to behave stupidly during this episode 22 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org inconsistently helplessly This episode showcased with monstrous obviousness the power and pressure of the “military complex” over our entire life and politics I’m really neglecting my diary Meanwhile every day presents material practically for the history books I wanted to immediately write down how the August 25 Politburo went but I did not get around to it and now only fragments are left Still The atmosphere itself… unprecedented Debates comparison of positions thinking aloud disagreements and even refusal to pass a resolution because members failed to reach full agreement All of this took place in a comradely spirit without attacks as if it was normal practice Of course Andropov and Gorbachev are setting the tone but the invited speakers are not afraid to get involved in the discussion Andropov is very frank and does not hesitate to question the “sacred truths ” For example there was a discussion of the prices and subsidies for agricultural goods we get from Bulgaria It was clear that our “friends” are ripping us off more and more brazenly they stopped supplying the best and most sought-after goods they are selling them for cash to the West The mediocre stuff they do send us arrives late poor quality and so forth The prices they charge are higher than world prices All the while they demand we keep the annual subsidy 400 000 000 rubles for nothing In 1978 they received this gift supposedly for the development of agricultural infrastructure but since then they haven’t spent a ruble of that money on developing their agriculture i e specifically to increase exports to us So the question arose to do away at least with this subsidy – their annual gift Yu V Andropov was against this idea He said every time a member of the PB makes any decision he must keep in mind the state of the communist movement Consider what is happening the Chinese are successfully drawing various communist parties into their orbit they are deftly and cleverly pursuing their line of isolating the CPSU We should not help them by taking the kind of actions that were proposed here Look we did not give Cuba the kind of military support it requested and our relationship went downhill Honecker came with a request we did not give him everything he asked for Our relations cooled The Poles have been asking for God knows how long – we cannot give them everything and again there is a cooling Now with the Bulgarians Besides it takes five minutes to quarrel but it takes decades to rebuild relations Consider China We had a falling out 20 years ago Moreover the party fully supported us and condemned the Chinese and so forth Now that two decades have passed you look at those events and think what was it for in fact Whom did it benefit What was the whole argument about And you do not find anything serious to justify our position September 10 1983 We admitted to shooting down the airplane and everything got back to normal just like everything else in this modern terrible and indifferent world I just read an article by V Kupriyanov in Literaturka about contemporary young poetry I was amazed that such things are being printed now I mean the poetry in Soviet publications 23 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org The 1981 collection “Young Voices ” Turns out there is this passage from I Zhdanov “Fatherland is night and a feast everything else is foreign We are faithful citizens of the night we deserve to turn off the light ” Or Oleg Khlebnikov “As for happiness and greatness – oh please keep up appearances when in public and do not flutter with a seal of happiness on your face ” And Andrey Dmitriev’s big poem “Home ” September 12 1983 Today I read the transcript of Gromyko’s meeting with Schultz in Madrid It is as they say an image of our time Schultz asked to start with a one-on-one meeting What for To talk about Sharansky At such a moment He said our representative in Madrid promised their representative that Sharansky would be released after serving half his term so in September or February Only under this condition would Reagan agree to sign the final document of the Madrid meeting Gromyko replied “Your representative either misheard or something else We did not make any promises everything is clear with Sharansky… We explained to you many times this is none of your business I will not talk about this anymore please do not raise this subject again ” Schultz “This and that how can it be… you are going back on your word If Sharansky dies in prison it would be catastrophic for Soviet-American relations etc ” Gromyko “I told you I will not discuss this subject If you have nothing further to discuss we can leave ” Schultz expressed all kinds of indignation and started talking about the plane Gromyko interrupted him “I will not start our conversation by talking about the plane We have issues to discuss that affect the life of all mankind I agreed to meet with you for that reason I have things to say about the plane too But I refuse to discuss this issue first ” The tete-à-tete ended at this point and they came out to their advisers With nearly a dozen people present Schultz started by discussing the plane Gromyko interrupted him again After a fairly inappropriate altercation and bickering for such a level Schultz was forced to listen to Gromyko’s rather long statement about missiles i e about the issue that “affects the fate of mankind ” or to put it à la Ivan the Terrible about “our sovereign affairs ” Schultz tried to twist this topic by bringing it to the importance of the human right to life and again started talking about the plane and the 269 lives lost saying that human lives are nothing to the Soviet system This time Gromyko heard him out and then gave a rebuke blaming as expected the United States entirely and completely for the airplane crash He concluded by saying that he rejects all requests and claims material compensation to relatives access to the crash site 24 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org apologies and promises that “it won’t happen again” Rather rudely he said “Let those who are responsible do these things ” Schultz was squirming again he does not understand he is outraged he has no words etc Finally he said he had “exhausted himself ” This brought the “conversation” to an end Such a transcript say in the era of Prince Gorchakov and Bismarck would be an interesting document about diplomatic customs In the 1930s it would be causus belli And for us… what is it for us Not war but still evidence of the fact that this vast world full of fantastic achievements of the human mind and labor can in a few short minutes fall victim to a nervous breakdown of one the two “superpower” leaders Dobrynin is already reporting in ciphered telegrams Reagan was furious when Schultz told him what happened Of course He had been imperturbably told that we don’t give a rat’s ass about all their “indignation ” all their threats and their mighty hot air their national and global hysteria against us At the same time he had been calmly reminded that as Nixon and Brezhnev admitted “we can destroy each other 7 times over now it is over 12 times ” And yet we are not shuddering or panicking Indeed when you walk down the street you see hundreds and thousands of people I bet that throughout the day and in particular the day when Gromyko met with Schultz not one of them thought even once that tomorrow they and everything around them could be gone Our people are not made that way they are not taught to believe in nuclear apocalypse or that there will be a war They do not think about it They come to protest only when their trade union or party committee directs them to Today I composed and Zagladin then polished up material for Andropov’s conversation with Zhivkov on matters of the Communist movement We came up with a completely new modern concept of our policy in the ICM though it is based on the words hints and “the spirit” of Andropov’s own statements made at the Plenum the Politburo and in his conversation with Cunhal This position would be completely unacceptable for Ponomarev But we prepared a speech for him based on this new position for the closed meeting of the CC Secretaries of socialist countries on September 20th after “today’s sparrow” will have already flown to the South into the hands of Yu V even though he will say this to Zhivkov if he agrees a month after Ponomarev We will try to make policy this way Will it work September 16 1983 I got sick again I’ve been home for two days Running a fever when you have a heart condition is not good I don’t want to get old or succumb to infirmity The Politburo led by Chernenko was nothing out of the ordinary Results from Gromyko’s meetings in Madrid and France He described how it went but the transcript conveyed it more vividly 25 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org I was struck by Mitterrand’s preamble speech with Gromyko he was effusive about his friendship and love for Russia etc But don’t touch our missiles he said Gromyko was more polite with him than with Schultz but still said everything about Chad and the missiles Our MFA’s handling of the meetings was well-received at home Only today I found out over the phone that Gromyko would not go to the UN in New York even though not a word was said about this yesterday It is the right decision we will not collect any dividends on the plane but to sit there and listen to public insults Reagan is planning to speak there himself It is not appropriate for our rank In general we should pay less attention to what others say and think about us Since Khrushchev’s times we have taught Westerners to see us as partners who engage in the game and play by the rules The problem is these are THEIR rules We will never be “good enough ” no matter how we try and how patient and noble we try to appear So we should engage less in their games Let us remain a mystery to them There would be more dignity in that For that to happen the MFA must be reduced to the rank it held under Chicherin and Litvinov not at the level of the Politburo By the way I think in no other socialist country is the Minister of Foreign Affairs a PB member I’m re-reading the Kreutzer Sonata for the first time in many years Physiologically this “problem” is still the same But sociologically – things changed enormously The way Tolstoy presented this aspect of the problem now seems ridiculous primitive absurd A little while ago I received a call from the history department saying that the second edition of The Moscow State University during the War is coming out Could I provide my information I was not included in the first edition even though I’m not somewhere in the Far East and I not only studied but also taught at the university For some reason I got excited I wrote three pages about how I fought in the war and went to take them over there still with a feeling of nervous excitement Disappointment set in when I found room 504 at the end of the hall It contained two miserable women one looked familiar but very faded and the sad-looking “office” furnishings of a poorly funded institution Our old history department on Herzen Street was creaky and crumbling even before the war but the mementos of the former princely mansion with a copper sign at the entrance “Please Remove your Galoshes ” and other vestiges of the former status gave the history department an academic and museum-like charm The new location is a prefabricated concrete building that has gotten shabby in 15 years But that is not the problem The problem was that these women as well as the book’s editorial board are not interested in me as a person in the slightest They have an “assignment ” a job There was no chance for any heartfelt connection with my past at the history department I needn’t have gotten excited It was just another small lesson about people’s loneliness and the indifference of “social” existence Nobody cares about you or anyone else as a person only as a unit of something in the past or the present something that is in the field of view of the artificially created or real interest of some groups of people or departments Zhilin called me in the evening He said Ponomarev was disappointed with the ICM text that was based on my draft and written by me for the closed meeting of the CC Secretaries of socialist countries What was the problem The text was short and written in the spirit of 26 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org statements Andropov made publicly and even more often at the PB as well as any statements somehow related to the subject In other words it is a realistic assessment with a concern for unity rather than “ideological” purity through greater attention to the specific conditions in socialist countries their internal issues how they are going to solve them is their business increasing the theoretical authority of the CPSU and of course putting things in order in our country as the decisive factor in influencing socialism around the world and our prestige in the ICM Apparently this will not do at all Apparently we should have taken the speech he gave to the embassy party committee secretaries in August and copied from there – that everything is fine in the ICM the movement is on the rise that good and very good parties like the American German Danish are fantastically and successfully fighting against capitalism and bringing to the masses the “truth about real socialism ” There are some individual shortcomings and manifestations of opportunism in some parties of course but for the time being it is completely resolvable if we all work together This is the stuff he will read to Bil’ak Axen Ovari and other members of the Politburo and CC Secretaries of socialist countries in a closed meeting i e a confidential setting But these people know the real state of affairs They have been telling us for a long time at the level of CC department heads and deputies in the communist parties of the socialist community including the Germans Hungarians even the Bulgarians that we sugarcoat things at such meetings They do not understand why From a political viewpoint it means we do not trust them we are deceiving them throwing dust in the eyes of our most faithful friends What for Only so Ponomarev does not have to be present at the collapse of his empire à la Churchill i e so the communist movement appears the way he wanted it to be 50 40 25 20 years ago But there is another danger here at best our friends may simply consider us to be fools who do not understand what is really happening in the ICM and are talking nonsense and trying to pass it for policy This policy however cannot be coordinated because it has nothing to do with reality We the deputies and consultants will once again be embarrassed in front of our colleagues from the International Departments of fraternal parties At the same time these people have known us personally for the last 10-20 years they know we are not stupid Which means that the “concept” Ponomarev presents to them is the position of the CC CPSU In other words look higher the stupidity is coming from our party Finally B N ’s senility has progressed so far that he does not sense the danger to himself personally After all the same Bil’ak or Axen can go to their General Secretaries or even to ours and say why the hell do we need such coordination built on illusions and self-deception In a word Ponomarev is not only an impediment he is also endangering our policies in the communist movement If he hadn’t been around 10-20 years ago the situation in the communist movement would have been better more natural I won’t even mention the fact that in the six months of the Andropov era we could have radically changed our policy and the entire atmosphere of the ICM 27 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org I am not upset because he rejected the text I wrote I am upset because he is harming the cause I am in favor of removing Ponomarev as he has outlived himself two and three times over – even though I am sure it would negatively affect me personally I would have to leave soon after Most likely because Chernenko and maybe even Andropov believe that I am the primary author of the nonsense that Ponomarev delivers more often than necessary I do write it but only because my job requires it But I hate it more than anybody and I have been open about this at the Department for a long time I am surprised it hasn’t reached B N yet September 18 1983 I cannot stop worrying about the “Ponomarev phenomenon ” Naturally it is also where my public life will come to an end Alas But I have nobody to blame but myself Turgenev’s 100th anniversary I read an article about him precisely the kind I wanted to read I haven’t read Turgenev in a long time but I was reading him at the start of my formative years at the start of the journey to become who I am today in the attics at the dacha in Laikovo as a 12-year-old I would read his novels ecstatically endlessly with tears in my eyes I could not put them down I wanted him to be “reinstated” in our memories cleared of textbook gloss Looks like it has been done on the occasion of his 100th anniversary Moskva No 9 September 20 1983 I did not go to the meeting of the CC Secretaries of socialist countries that took place on Lenin Hills My excuse was that officially I was still sick In reality it is unbearable to sit through this tiresome farce and pretend along with everybody that something serious and important is taking place Plus it is shameful in relation to our friends Every time they come to a meeting of this type their Politburos seriously consider the delegation’s positions and the delegations are authorized to take some actions Meanwhile our delegation which has been headed by Ponomarev for the last 10 years is given no authority not even for propaganda The things he says have no informational value our friends know all of this already – about the missiles about American imperialism and about the communist movement We never offer any real coordination or cooperation in the sphere of policy or propaganda we do not want it Ponomarev’s main objective is to get assent and put a checkmark next to his name contributed to consolidating the unity of the socialist community In a word I did not want to participate in this embarrassment Still my conscience is bothering me a little like I shirked my duties even though I am officially still sick But I wrote about ten pages of “text” on the ICM I conceived it while walking to work as a “frank” note for Ponomarev but then got carried away and did not notice how the style changed and it turned into something like theses for our Department’s “theoretical conference ” Rykin has long been encouraging me to make an introduction at it I will figure out later how to use it September 28 1983 28 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org I completely lost the thread connecting my personal and work life – the course of world events This is probably because for me this process happens through Ponomarev and he has succumbed to a state of senile vanity He is “pounding his feet ” as Brutents says to remain in the line of sight of Andropov and Chernenko to please and to appear needed But this only increases their contempt and disdain for him Every week adds some fact to this score things that are significant in the apparatus So if I still believe that something worthwhile can be done in the ICM it is only because Ponomarev will likely be given the boot soon Nothing is possible while he is around He keeps dressing up the phony narrative he cultivated and nurtured for his entire political life Zagladin has detached himself from the Department probably thinking along the same lines as I am Unlike me however he has been gaining points as an independent figure while at the same time satisfying his passion for self-expression – on TV in reports in interviews in conversations with delegations or as yesterday for example in a 4-hour “Question and Answer” 84 items session at the Lenin School Despite the fact that this is “Vadim’s illness ” it is a thousand times more useful than Ponomarev’s red-tapism and quasi-Stalinist orthodoxy Today I was putting together a work plan for the ICM in accordance with the PB resolution from July 13 Around 80 percent of it is unrealistic And the part that will be done will amount to nothing more than a checkmark for events they will not be able to influence anything Meanwhile B N rushed off to the South taking Brutents with him He wants to be present at the conversation between the Yemeni Muhammad and Andropov Brutents told me how B N impudently and humiliatingly nominated himself for the trip This is disgusting not only in its own right but also because we his deputies and associates look like idiots in the eyes of our colleagues because everyone understands that all of his so-called activities would be impossible without us For those around us and those involved we are an integral part of his trite bustling and pretentiousness October 1 1983 On the 27th Andropov made an announcement about foreign policy I think this is the most important step we have taken in many years We finally decided to show our “class dignity ” as if to say “we are not going to cozy up to you and we will not let ourselves be pushed around and if it comes to that we may just tell you all to go to hell ” Perhaps it is a not-quiteconscious step in the right direction for which I’ve been waiting a long time now – a step in the direction of a kind of limited isolationism Russia was always a mystery to them the Soviet Union even more so But under Khrushchev and Brezhnev we squandered this powerful foreign policy resource considerably So it is time to restore it Now about the mishap During the “Vremya” program some ridiculous passage about maneuvers of the armies of socialist countries appeared in text of Andropov’s address The tone and subject-matter of this passage were completely different from the rest of the address I had seen the text of the address earlier in the day through the mailing list When I heard the 29 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org newscaster my eyes grew wide in disbelief I decided that this was a last minute “correction ” probably from Ustinov – he decided to show our fist more openly But in the morning I found out that it was a “technical” error Two telex tapes were mixed up and a paragraph from some article in Krasnaya zvezda Red Star or Na zashchite rodiny Defending the Motherland was inserted into the General Secretary’s address This happened despite the fact that the text was behind seven seals and came to Lapin at the TV station as early as 9am At one o’clock it was read by the announcer Kirillov i e there was a ton of time before the evening Vremya program to listen through it and check Unfortunately carelessness has taken deep root even here Chernenko assigned me us – the Department together with the Department of Propaganda and the Department of Foreign Policy Propaganda Zamyatin’s to urgently investigate and “make proposals ” We summoned Lapin and Mamedov politely interrogated them then Stukalin went to see Chernenko In the end we signed a note with a reprimand for the “person responsible for the release” that day We put a blank next to the names of Lapin and Mamedov the Secretariat will set the punishment measures itself Maybe they will fire the biggest scoundrel on TV It is high time Aleksandrov his main patron is not so powerful anymore to protect him if there is a decision to remove him How did the “West” react to this incident Dzhavad stopped by in the morning he said he was listening to the BBC The commentator said “These Russians Just try to deal with them… They always have a secret agenda They had one version for the internal audience saying that if anything happens they will deliver such a blow that the West won’t know what hit them Rest assured so to speak And the West got a softened version to lull with their peaceloving rhetoric Their fist is hidden inside of a decent glove ” Dzhavad commented all these Kremlinologists cannot even imagine that this is just Russian sloppiness not a cunning premeditated move by the Kremlin rulers October 8 1983 Zagladin jetted off to Paris again Mitterrand asked him to come secretly not directly from Moscow to convey something “extremely important” through the top channels B N is dissatisfied with me because I did not speak at the Secretariat when there was a discussion of notes on the 40th anniversary of the Leipzig process and Zionism Ponomarev complained that our Department prepared the majority of this material and Zamyatin is reaping the benefits again since he always butts into any discussion and goes on about things that are fully presented in the notes and the Secretaries know perfectly well That’s exactly why I did not “butt in ” especially since there aren’t any doubts about either of the issues Meanwhile Ponomarev keeps making appearances Every week he makes a report somewhere ready to speak for any audience It’s some kind of illness Now he came up with the idea to gather the editors of fraternal party newspapers in Moscow for the November holidays He wants to “instruct” them how to fight against Reagan They don’t know how to do it 30 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org themselves of course I tried to talk him out of it I provided a reference note half of the European CP newspaper editors including from the majority of the NATO countries will not be able to attend even the Daily World from the U S because the Congress of the Communist Parties is taking place at this time In other words precisely the people he wants to “educate” will not be there As for the Latin Americans or the Danes and Arabs they are entirely on our side us anyway But my arguments were in vain He is not interested in the purpose or the results The only thing that matters is that he shows up on the international arena yet again A week ago he made me put together a plan for the implementation of Politburo’s resolution on the ICM I called all hands on deck We put it together Presented it to him But he lost interest He used to bustle near Brezhnev trying to be visible at all times and to be noticed on every occasion Now he is doing the same thing with Andropov and Chernenko again to appear indispensable And they disparage him more and more openly It seems they are not doing it out of personal distaste for him though it might be well-deserved but simply because they have “more important things to do” than pay attention to Ponomarev And he tries to attract their attention all day every day The day before yesterday I read Bush’s speech in Vienna after he traveled around Romania Hungary and Yugoslavia He was in general rather obsequiously received there How much contempt disgust and blind hatred towards us the Soviet Union How much stupid unwilling to know anything ignorant and vulgar sometimes offensive demagogy regarding our past our culture our role in world history Made me furious What does it mean if anyone can push us around like that loudly and in front of the whole world No “Isolationism ” withdrawal into ourselves reciprocal contempt for them that wild West that has now gathered practically the entire world at our borders That’s the only way When he calls us using the words of a Polish writer a wild and primitive country it is impossible to continue playing a game of common “world politics” with them It looks like we are starting to understand this The PB meeting from the day before yesterday on the results of Andropov’s announcement seems to be going in the same direction But our foreign policy and foreign propaganda apparatus is too huge and influential to give up its “bread” so easily – rebuffing everything butting in everywhere with its “initiatives ” seeking support and approval from every possible place In a word continuing to play the KhrushchevBrezhnev games on the world comedic stage to the detriment of our national prestige and budget October 9 1983 Today my grandson and I decided to take a stroll in the Moscow suburbs I chose a very poor route as it turned out We were unlucky with the weather too It started to rain and we had to walk to the bus stop through the mud On the way we met a woman and asked her how to get to Alabino “Come I’ll show you ” We walked together for half a kilometer During this time she told us almost her entire biography as one does “You won’t be able to go straight If it was dry then maybe but this time of year a tractor is the only thing that can get through If every 31 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org person gave five rubles we could have a road Not to put too fine a point on it but people could stand to give a hundred rubles a month for the road they wouldn’t be the worse for it If they weren’t drinking of course ” There is Russia for you You will never see anything like it in Czechoslovakia the GDR or Bulgaria for an urban-style town with three large factories to have impassable unpaved roads not to mention roads on the outskirts of the town There is only one solution stop the missile production We have enough already to be considered a superpower Tell them all to go to hell and work on this on the issues that are so close to central Moscow streets In addition we passed the generals’ dachas we walked for about three kilometers and the entire time there were these palatial mansions with huge well-cared for gardens There are multiple such subdivisions of generals’ dachas just in the Moscow region On what merit do they get such privileges Because they fought in the war Everyone fought in the war… and then worked created something made themselves even a little bit useful In the meanwhile the generals continue to freeload off the people like they always have corrupting people by the mere sight of such mansions The more time passes the more corrupting it will be because even now these luxurious custom-designed houses with garages and outbuildings are occupied by descendants who have not done even a trace of service to the Motherland October 27 1983 U S invasion of Grenada This is “my” country I was there when we first established contacts with them at the Congress in Jamaica I met Bernard Coard he came across as an educated Marxist and a “firm Iskra-ist ” Then he visited us later we established diplomatic relations etc Now Coard looks like Bishop’s killer a person who instigated the intervention However this is a normal course of development for any revolution canonized by history And we should not be the ones to throw a stone at those who wanted to speed it up or at least strengthen it Especially since we did not do even the bare minimum to help this economically tiny state with a population that is probably smaller than the population of my Kropotinskaya street to help it from ending up with 40 percent unemployment in two-three years The main thing now lies elsewhere Reagan proved once again that in his “crusade” he would behave as outrageously as he wants putting us in an increasingly more awkward position – a “superpower” that is unable to stop him And since we are following a plan so it works out in 1972 the Americans started bombing Hanoi and we received Nixon in Moscow Right now they invaded Grenada and will probably do the same in Nicaragua and what are we doing Last night Andropov made dramatic proposals for the Geneva talks on medium-range nuclear missiles The Cubans are honoring and mourning their people who heroically fought in Grenada against the U S Marine Corps The whole world shuddered even Thatcher “criticized” Reagan while we seem to be pulling the world’s attention to matters that are truly vital for humanity But morally we are losing and we look selfish while doing so 32 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org Besides the humiliating comments will start coming in Reagan’s “firmness” is producing results because the USSR is again going back to the obvious major concessions October 30 1983 I finished reading the ciphered telegrams at work With Sokolov we finished Ponomarev’s article for PPS and sent it to Prague I stopped by Zagladin’s he was sitting with Schumacher the editor of the SPD’s theoretical journal analogous to our Kommunist I got into a discussion about how dangerous it was to be ignorant about Russia and the Soviet Union especially for the Americans The bearded man calling me Herr Chernyaev supported this idea and railed against Bush and his Vienna speech On Saturday morning I was editing Ponomarev’s draft for the meeting of editors of communist newspapers Then I strolled through old Arbat with my grandson We stopped by a used bookstore and a store of foreign language books I was amazed at the abundance of volumes with reproductions of the great Italians Dutch French – and I considered myself the owner of a treasure-trove November 2 1983 I talked with the delegation of the PNP Social Democrats of Jamaica for three and a half hours Educated and cultured people They speak well – British training At the end in addition to regular requests radio equipment cars newsprint students etc the General Secretary asked his colleagues to step out and conveyed Manley’s appeal to Andropov give him money for the election campaign That’s all there is to it Then I argued with Kovalyov from the MFA about Andropov’s reply to Berlinguer on missiles Enrico is “insisting” for the second time that we should make concessions We agree with the MFA that we need to give him the brush off but we want to use comradely-party language rather than state-bureaucratic language I wrote a telegram to the ambassador in London – to the Pravda staff reporter Maslennikov to talk with McLennan and others about the threat of a split in the CPGB and that we are concerned about it A conversation with Brutents an episode worthy of the brush of Aivazovsky Ponomarev and Brutents received the Mexican delegation with Chernenko The conversation apparently was not too lively When K U said goodbye and headed for the exit B N said to Brutents “This one is barely walking too ” Meaning that Andropov is seriously ill now although he is still involved on some issues When he was meeting with the Yemeni Muhammad who was brought to him in Crimea Andropov needed people to hold him up like Brezhnev once did in Bonn This means initiatives and high intentions are turning to dust We do not get from words to deeds Andropov probably hasn’t enough strength or interest because of his health to insist on results control to take risks By God it is a disaster November 5 1983 33 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org We finished a report for Ponomarev I quarreled with him about yet another one of his real false theories “about the failures of imperialism” against the background of the defeat of the Grenadian revolution Romania’s position disappearing socialism in Poland Angola breathing its last breath Mozambique where Samora is going “around Europe” looking for weapons the American missiles being installed in Europe our helplessness to defend Lebanon and Nicaragua the retreat of the labor movement in the economic struggle Mitterrand and Nakasone being pulled into NATO the heaviest blow to Castro’s entire revolutionary strategy in Latin America and so forth Either he really does not understand what is happening in the revolutionary process or he deliberately engages in optimistic demagogy Which means either we completely subordinated theoretical substance to ongoing propaganda or we truly cannot face the truth However Lenin did not hesitate to admit such “downturns” the III Congress of the Communist Party the CPSU b at the XIV XV Congresses Why then is he straining to portray the meeting of the editors of the communist press as a mini CP Congress They will ridicule such cheap optimism rightly seeing the CPSU’s impotence and theoretical destitution… And we starting from the November Plenum promised to “realistically assess the situation ” Though this kind of tone is absent in Andropov’s announcement Still B N runs the ICM for now It’s embarrassing Kozlov and Veber sympathized with me in the hallway “You were acting like a soccer player who received a penalty You cannot argue against fate He already showed you two yellow cards but you keep at it Watch out he will disqualify you for the next three reports ” I was at the celebratory meeting at the Palace of Congresses Andropov did not appear Romanov’s report was without a shadow of cultism Without boasting and almost without demagoguery I can imagine what his report would have been a year ago Something has really changed in the atmosphere At least we can feel the Andropov era in that I received Chater and Mary Rossett from Morning Star today The newspaper is dying they are asking for help to save it In their estimation the party is also dying as a class-based party Dez’ka David Samoilov sent me his latest collection and a nice letter November 7 1983 Parade Very complex feelings comparisons with demonstrations from my school and university days echoes of war soldiers formations equipment music but behind me the vulgar chatter of jaunty dignitaries – the “ruling class ” for whom nothing is sacred neither ideas nor recollections or regrets The marchers were rather cheerful the devout faithful yelling out slogans the ironic youth ready for mischief within the limits allowed on the Red Square Overall there is a feeling of forced spontaneity why not get out in the streets and make some noise The human chain of militiamen separating the demonstrators from the Mausoleum made an unpleasant impression especially knowing that many foreign friends and enemies are on the podium At least it’s good that there were no schoolchildren with flowers or freezing “athletes” waiting for an hour before the group performances 34 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org Andropov was not present just as he wasn’t yesterday at the Palace of Congresses So he must be ill I doubt he will get better considering what Kolya told me I stopped by work twice Nothing is happening with Ponomarev’s report Of course nobody is reading it over the holidays But tomorrow we will have to finish it up because on the 9th he will be reading it in eleven languages November 12 1983 We held the “mini-Congress of the ICM” at “Pavlov’s house” Pavlov is a chief administrator at the CC the place was given this “popular” name as a mocking allusion to “Pavlov’s house” in 1942 Stalingrad – a new party hotel which as it turned out cost the Soviet people 30 million But it was done tastefully Luxurious but not gaudy This time “our friends” were glad to gather Only the Italians once again showed their provincialism sent a delegation to the celebration of October but forbade them from participating in any “collective actions ” B N gave a lecture for almost an hour and a half Then he instructed us to immediately adapt it for an article for Kommunist Afanasiev – an academician and the editor in chief at Pravda – came up with a completely pathetic text which by the way contained the following passage “A year ago we lost the leader of our party and our people Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev…” He denied the existence of a new period in the development of Soviet society No this is not opposition Just indifference and stupidity Zagladin and I rejected this text B N said he would speak without a text It turned out “candid ” simply put It was not fitting for our press but it was quite appropriate for our “friends ” Still I had to thoroughly edit it before distributing the translations Zagladin distanced himself from all of this – the entire event I mean from B N ’s report even though B N asked him personally to work on it as well as from organizational and political preparation Even from participation in the meeting – he was there for a few hours used this time to write a daily article for Pravda on Cunhal’s 70th anniversary and then disappeared The next day he left for Berlin for a meeting of the deputies of the International Departments of Socialist Countries Zhilin managed to take it easy as he always does when a big project comes around Even though B N ’s report ongoing information about the meeting and information on its outcomes are all part of his job description and his responsibilities not to mention editing the relevant texts for publication He was sick before the meeting and at the celebrations during the meeting itself he was noticeably drunk Pyshkov who was instructed to lead the information group prepared two embarrassing pieces of nonsense which I rejected The last version which Zagladin managed to approve before he left I think without reading it I picked apart in the presence of his entire group right there in the “meeting palace ” He behaved terribly interrupting me at every phrase Finally I had to bang on the table and make him listen to me In the morning he presented a better text but 35 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org I still had to essentially rewrite it myself One guy from his group said “Since he doesn’t like anything let him write it himself Anyway why try so hard who cares how it is written nobody needs it nobody there i e at the PB will read it anyway ” The last part is true Yesterday Ponomarev said the same phrase when he was editing a note for the PB to which the “information” is an appendix and was transferring some parts from the information into the note I started to object but he talked sense into me twice “Who will read this information ” Even though at the meeting he turned around I was sitting behind him and instructed me to “urgently” prepare it and fill it with “interesting” thoughts and statements from the participants’ speeches The main irritant for me in this entire episode was the behavior of Pyshkov and Yermonsky Pyshkov acted like “Ponomarev’s favorite” for whom anything goes He was clearly demonstrating including in front of people from other departments how he could talk with the deputy head Meanwhile he has long turned into a parasite who puts together texts for B N for an internal audience by taking pieces from our texts for Ponomarev but “with an international emphasis ” The rest of the time he is boozing having turned his office into a bar Yermonsky is the darling of theoretical dachas this year he spent three quarters of his time there there was Zimyanin’s report for the 70th anniversary of the RSDLP articles for Chernenko for PPS and Kommunist then Romanov’s report for November 7th… He is asked to be there Zimyanin called and asked for him by name He is indeed a good writer but not very educated He used to be a pretty good guy Now he acts like he is above doing the regular menial consultant jobs That must be done by Veber Kozlov and now Rybakov – they are overall a higher class than he but they haven’t lost a sense of decency and duty to the job that pays their salary Why do I react this way even when we are talking about work that no one really needs Firstly because I have to finish up after everyone Zagladin Zhilin many consultants and heads of sectors Why do I need to edit and put finishing touches on their work Why not let it be as-is nobody would notice As a craftsman my sense of dignity for his product will not allow me to do otherwise Secondly because it disgusts me when people neglect and even despise “their work ” when they are indifferent to it and all their thoughts are aimed at “pushing it onto someone else” or “getting it off their hands ” Even though for this work they do not want to do well they get paid half a thousand a month they get meals medical services a dacha etc It’s not ethical to say the least Yes people are tired and they see the pointlessness of working hard A lot of energy goes into the wastebasket So who is stopping you from leaving Try to find a job in your sixties where you would see a direct result of your work and feel satisfied Yesterday I leafed through over a hundred ciphered telegrams from all over the world One had a troubled postscript by Andropov in which he instructs “to do everything possible to prevent Reagan’s invasion of Nicaragua like Grenada because it will be a terrible blow to 36 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org Cuba and Castro’s entire policy and therefore to us – as a superpower as the bulwark of socialism and the liberation movement ” This is regarding the idea that “imperialism is suffering one defeat after another” – the theory that B N imposed in his speech at the aforementioned meeting This will be printed in Kommunist I should quietly cross out this section let him wave his arms at me later At least I will save the journal from embarrassment I am writing about irrelevant things Maybe I am avoiding writing about myself I am suffering from sciatica The pain can be terrible one day I barely made it to work I don’t have time to treat it and I don’t really want to – I don’t believe it I keep thinking it will pass it will be fine I still rely on my body being dependable as it managed to stay youthful for sixty years Yesterday I looked through a book about Landau I haven’t finished the Einstein book yet I picked up Byron today Manfred after seeing a program on TV that showed his notebooks as part of the school curriculum I haven’t turned to his diaries in a long time same as Blok’s I should refresh myself or I’ll forget how to write my own There was a banquet after the meeting of communist press figures essentially CC representatives at the same “Pavlov’s house ” B N made a toast it was a good thing he read it from a paper we prepared for him although he did add a bit about Lenin’s Iskra He possesses a quality that amazes all of us – he sincerely believes that all the reports speeches toasts articles statements after they are delivered were prepared by him After standing in the presidium I went around and caught up with Berecz now the editor of Népszabadság the central organ of the party formerly a head of a CC MSZMP department an American a Jamaican who made a very good speech at the meeting by the way an Australian a Frenchman from L'Humanité… At this point I was called to the phone Ponomarev who already “departed ” was calling me from the car He said we needed to add to the communique that at the end of the meeting he made a final speech no need to mention that it was at a banquet that he expressed the “political essence ” and that the Czech gave a reply on behalf of everyone I stepped aside and jotted down two paragraphs on the couch I gave it to Afanasiev who handed it to a lad from Pravda Even though it was 10pm already they stopped the copy and added it in November 14 1983 Volkov a junior referent from Dzhavad’s sector was sent to Geneva for training as a candidate international official for the WHO through the Ministry of Health He departed on November 4th On November 12th he got drunk at a bar refused to pay the bill was taken by the police to the embassy When he woke up there he declared that he did not remember anything and was put on the first available flight to Moscow In the 6-7 years that he’s been at our Department he never got into any kind of trouble especially drunkenness He has absolutely no talents he is quiet polite inarticulate He himself said that he would not even make it to referent asked to find him a position somewhere outside the Central Committee I may receive a reprimand along the party line for this 37 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org Pushkin’s well-known poems on the evening radio Touching Only now in my seventh decade on earth do I feel every word of the poem and what lies behind every word November 15 1983 A very stressful day Draft article for Ustinov about our rebuff to the American threat Distribution to the Politburo remarks for Ponomarev Page proofs for Ponomarev’s article for Kommunist When he speaks his language is passable but when you prepare it for print it is really no good So I have to use some tricks Gorbachev is meeting with an American figure the heir of Khrushchev’s farmer Garst Crystal A memo materials to complement his own “philosophical” thoughts about the two “superpowers” and the fate of the world A memo for Ponomarev who will be reporting to the Politburo on Thursday on the outcomes of the meeting of the communist press Various papers and notes on daily matters Up to a hundred ciphered telegrams carrying out and assigning various tasks based on them Reception for the Guyanese delegation special representative of President Burnham commander in chief two members of the leadership of the ruling party They brought a message for Andropov and explained that after Grenada Nicaragua and Guyana were next in line Therefore they need help economic and military I pulled the wool over their eyes with promises and sent them off to the department to have a “concrete” examination of their requests Prior to that I received Ponomarev’s instructions we will not give military assistance that would mean making them a target for an American attack “and we cannot do anything”… A meeting at Ponomarev’s Epishev Chebrikov Kryuchkov and some lieutenant general from the 7th Directorate – based on Andropov’s approval of B N ’s idea to start working “with enemy troops ” i e with American troops abroad Ponomarev bored these professionals very much with his memories of working “among German troops” during the war he was doing this work in the Comintern back then Everyone agreed but politely made it clear that we are not at war and that American troops are contractors and get paid very well Furthermore the GDR will not permit releasing balloons with leaflets into the FRG’s airspace and in response our troops in the GDR would be flooded with leaflets and radio intrusion… However Ponomarev “was right” as always and everyone received instructions It was embarrassing to listen to his tales The American sector headed by Mostovets is worthless I had to redo everything myself or assign it to Menshikov and other consultants The referents there are just like their boss November 17 1983 38 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org Gorbachev asked me to be present at his talks with the American John Crystal And even though it took extra work and time I do not regret it Gorbachev did a great job With his lively mind he virtually attacked the American with the force of his conviction his knowledge arguments and his fluent grasp of the material – particularly in economic affairs of course The American was impressed With people like that at the helm the Soviet Union could actually achieve the things it proclaimed and promised When I told Ponomarev about my impressions of Gorbachev he was very displeased He cannot accept the fact that someone is smarter than him especially since I “innocently” tried to tell him how aptly Gorbachev handled the international relations part of the conversation He is jealous petty and corrupted to the core with bureaucratic cowardice and careerism It is sad and disappointing Yesterday he discussed with us deputies Andropov’s new note to the PB about what to do after the missiles are installed But more about that later When I got home last night after a very difficult day at work I drafted some ideas for my talk in France where I am going on Sunday November 29 1983 I was in France from November 20-27 A delegation for the party exchange plan But I have no energy to write about it And there were almost no everyday impressions Discussions took up all of my time December 3 1983 The inertia of camaraderie the desire to complain to the former elder brother – among the simple workers in Lyon Overall it was just serving the diplomatic norm of our relations – an exchange of information rather than an engaged conversation of like-minded people as it was just 15 years ago The entire week in France I could not shake the feeling that we are strangers to each other and neither they nor we care about what the other is doing except for the academic and theoretical aspect Marchais’s interview in Le Monde November 22 rubbed me the wrong way He expressed “total” support for Mitterrand’s foreign policy Not even because it tramples on internationalism and can harm the anti-war movement the anti-imperialist solidarity of communists as I wrote in the ciphered telegram It is for aesthetic reasons you could say it is disgusting when people spit on their own principles when they demonstrate their opportunism so cynically This internal selling out is repulsive Things happen but when an entire party so shamefully smears its communist face it makes you sick to your stomach It is especially vile when the PCF which used to be the party of Thorez applauds a president who ordered the bombing of the national liberation forces in Lebanon and justifies it by the need for “retaliation”… 39 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org I said all this to Maxime Gremetz member of the Politburo CC Secretary who inherited Kanapa’s seat He huffed and puffed Then casually asked me to “understand them” you are smart and subtle politicians he said… Incidentally political opportunism leads to a decline in the intellectual level of cadres Over the traditionally long French meals I had discussions with several CC members Their competence “in the field of philosophy ” their attempts to philosophize about their politics are pitiful I repeatedly had to stop myself from embarrassing them in front of their comrades but the bareness of their thoughts was really striking This does not mean that I had something to offer them But if I were or we were in their place we probably would behave differently The main shortcoming of their moral nature is the Ponomarev type of communist – bad and even dangerous but our guy is even worse From a tourist point of view the trip had no substance I did not go anywhere I did not see anything except the Central Committee of the PCF the metro restaurants and one movie with Belmondo Because we had discussions morning to night I did not even see Lyon where we spent an entire day I had one free evening and tried to head in the direction of Place Pigalle but didn’t make it because it was late and a little creepy on the completely deserted streets lined with cars We also ended up having very little money the referent gave all our hospitality allowance to the embassy and we were left with pennies from the per diem money I returned to Moscow to the same thing Ponomarev’s ideas with propaganda of the truth about our good foreign policy Yet another emergency meeting of the CC Secretaries of socialist countries – in light of the installation of American missiles in Europe and our pulling out of Geneva Even though Andropov’s explanation letter was sent to everyone and anyone and the mass media is explaining implementing and convincing morning till night I am mystified once again does Ponomarev really believe that we can convey something convince someone through our hyperactivity Or does he simply have no personal alternative no other way to remain in big politics At Rhône-Poulenc I asked the young communists party organization activists at this factory 25 000 workers 9 200 are PCF members how they feel about our foreign policy “We don’t know about it ” they replied frankly and in unison They explained the things we say and write do not reach them Only 20 percent of communists read L’Humanite the rest not to mention non-party people do not read newspapers at all except for sports and entertainment The general public is convinced that participating in the pacifist movement equates to “working for Moscow ” That’s how it is And we are spending millions on Novosti Press Agency APN alone The embassy people say without hesitation we put this junk in storage to save ourselves the embarrassment 40 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org So we are writing another report for Ponomarev – on the consequences of “Pershings and cruise missiles in Europe” and “what is to be done” in this new situation for everyone everyone everyone In reality nobody knows what to do and Ponomarev least of all But he does know that he needs to explain Andropov’s statement and “prevent” the decline of the antiwar movement in Western Europe Meanwhile our friends from socialist countries are coming here once again in the hope of getting at least a glimmer of a practical program… beyond the “retaliatory measures” they already know and that we need to convince everyone of their necessity especially in Czechoslovakia and the GDR where as our TASS guys are reporting there is rather widespread discontent and fear I walk along my bookshelves sometimes and look over them It is staggering how much I read in my life how much of that is forgotten and how much enjoyment came from those pages never to return again How many thoughts have been forever lost both mine and of others And what else Is there anything else to be had from books It is like with the history of culture I once picked up a volume of Montaigne leafed through it and was once again dumbfounded All the motives and mechanisms of human relations were discovered and analyzed in the XVI century There has been nothing new in 400 years only the outer presentation changes The same in one’s personal relationship with books… It seems you do not need anything more from them there is no use for it not for work not for self-enrichment not for communicating with others Andropov is still not back in public But he is constantly present notes to the PB and the Secretariat instructions phone calls etc It is too bad He started out so well We started to hope It is unlikely that he will get better And then what The Plenum was postponed several times but finally scheduled for December 26 th It could not be postponed any longer we need to approve the plan for 1984 December 4 1983 I did not sleep well In the morning I rushed to edit Ponomarev’s report with a fresh mind My ridiculous conscientiousness for my “craft ” which provides if not pleasure at least a sense of satisfaction December 6 1983 Today I finished up B N ’s report for the meeting of CC Secretaries of socialist countries The report is now even more meaningless along with the meeting after yesterday’s press conference by Ogarkov-Kornienko-Zamyatin Then again nothing new was said at the press conference either After lunch I received a delegation from the Irish Workers’ Party led by General Secretary Seán Garland We tried for several years to get O’Riordan’s consent for us to have contact with this party We never got it But I persuaded B N and we got a CC resolution I took it upon myself to tell them that from this point on we can consider inter-party ties between the Workers’ Party of Ireland and the CPSU established 41 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org It is a serious party with deep national roots and a sincere desire to learn from the experience of pre-revolutionary Bolsheviks Without a doubt they have the future in their hands And O’Riordan will be left behind completely But for us it is one more signal the ICM is being undone not just by “Eurocommunism” and the Chinese but also by the emergence of such parties They are free of the burden of mistakes and unfulfilled hopes of the communist movement They have no formal obligations to the movement but they are taking on the burden of the revolutionary process It is good that we have enough common sense to take them seriously and recognize them without delving into the nature of this phenomenon December 7 1983 Ponomarev got another snub When he was preparing us to write his report for the upcoming day after tomorrow meeting of CC Secretaries of socialist countries on what to do after the Pershings and Tomahawks are installed he spoke with enthusiasm that we should strengthen the political governmental aspect of our report to raise it above the purely propagandistic nature of these meetings We got excited and got ready although without going too far since we knew that B N ’s ambitions would be tamed by the MFA Still he said he would go to Chernenko and discuss it before the draft was distributed for review The main question is the negotiations It is clear we are closing them all Vienna… But the whole world is demanding to continue negotiations Anti-war movements our friends and social-democrats are warning that the USSR would “lose face” if it “gets stubborn ” The more so because the USSR itself argued long ago even at Congresses that the principle of negotiations is the only way to prevent a nuclear catastrophe Furthermore we already have “experience” in 1979 after NATO’s decision we also declared through Gromyko and all our propaganda that there would be no negotiations if they did not rescind their decision about “retrofitting ” But then we went to Geneva anyway It is clear tactically we need to stay “tough” for prestige But then what It’s fine if the MFA guys at their meetings they have a committee of deputy ministers of socialist countries they have an “institution” of ministerial conferences keep pressing their point But if CC Secretaries PB members our “loyal friends” are meeting for the first time without Romanians who refused to come we could finally talk in a truly friendly confidential manner What Zagladin and I added to the text for B N was not much our departments are now reviewing the entire arms race issue taking into account the installation of American mediumrange missiles The work is not finished but the goal is to develop a new platform which with a strict observance of the principle of equal security will be offered to the West That’s the gist of it not verbatim When this was distributed for review Gromyko crossed out all of this as well as the expressed positive attitude towards “Brandt’s plan ” 42 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org All that was left was once again propaganda Simply put – calls to support and explain propagandize justify and substantiate the Soviet retaliatory measures From the point of view of “socialist internationalism ” this is shameless It is a cynical great power move a demonstration of the fact that the commonwealth countries have to “turn” at our beckoning without the right to share their worries even confidentially or show a minimum of initiative When we return to the negotiating table they will have to explain with the same zeal to their people and to the entire world that this is right just as our current refusal to negotiate is right But this is the so-called “big politics ” And what about our Ponomarev He is now convincing Zagladin and me that it is impossible and “would have been wrong” to consider any negotiations at all Reagan Co are gambling on the fact that we will be forced to return to Geneva despite the installation of missiles Therefore we need to show them that they will not be able to reassure their public As if Zagladin and I were born yesterday we don’t know anything and did not hear him say he was “determined” to have a politically serious discussion with our friends at this conference He really did go to Chernenko He even sent him the text ahead of time to get Chernenko’s consent before Gromyko got to it But the former held on to it for two days did not read it and allowed it to be distributed for review In other words he put Ponomarev in a position to get a slap in the face from Gromyko As for Gromyko he created a monopoly on foreign policy and is playing diplomatic prestige games as if we were in the 1930s or 50s If Andropov continues to tolerate this we may come dangerously close to the nuclear threshold December 9 1983 It is around midnight We held the conference All my grumbling turned out to be pointless everyone is happy everyone checked their boxes both in front of their superiors and in front of Moscow Everyone agrees on everything including in condemning the Romanians who are “turncoats” and “capitulators ” but we should not break with them we need to “work” on them And in general we will fight back and rally all those who are for peace Short-wave communication коротковолновое общение one-on-one with the delegations the Hungarians Bulgarians Germans demonstrates clearly that everyone understands the rules of our game of nuclear diplomacy and strategy very well They also understand that it can’t be helped and they need to quietly adapt and carve out for themselves whatever they can get away with We the apparatchiks did our job quickly and professionally speeches the report communiques transcripts notes information on the outcomes final speech and this time also a letter to our party on why the Romanians did not come and to the socialist countries’ fraternal parties on the same subject The conference was over at 4pm by 8pm all the “resulting” papers were ready December 10 1983 43 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org Another volume of the History of Marxism from the “Progress” publishing house distributed through a mailing list Ambartsumov the author of the prefaces is creating for the elite a new style of criticism of anti-Marxism and non-Marxism Along the way he is also rehabilitating Bukharin nothing like this has been printed about him in Soviet publishing houses in 50 years Paradoxically though to be expected Ponomarev – the author of the textbook on the CPSU which is reprinted almost every year and used by all the students – has no idea that through such publications the majority of Soviet intelligentsia at least the thinking and interested segment of it has obtained factual information about the true history of our party Maybe it even reaches students December 18 1983 Yesterday I met with the Irish again The outcome of our theoretical discussions was that they asked for money… They said their former sources of “funding” practically dried up due to the tightening of security of banks and improved electronic protection Their “head of the technology department” as they call their group in charge or robbing banks for the needs of the party was recently killed during an operation… Money is running out but they need to “build” the party they need to print newspapers and literature they need to participate in elections Naturally I told them that it was a difficult and sensitive issue with many complex aspects… But to myself I thought it’s not going to happen dear comrades Today I met with Clancy He is a heroic man He became blind but he is full of courage and energy to create a united new Communist Party of Australia I was nice to him cheered him on I think we might be able to help him mainly through the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions However this entire “objective” process of centralization of leftist forces will collapse as soon as Clancy is gone I’m going on vacation in a few days probably to Pushkino It is somewhat unnerving to go somewhere where I’ll be physically alone and trying my endurance in skiing and swimming after everything that happened It’s been almost 10 years since I vacationed there… December 29 1983 I’m at Pushkino The weather is damp skiing did not work out I went to the Plenum It took place in a new location specially built for this purpose built into the Cossack house opposite the Sverdlovsk Hall Crystal white marble straw-colored wood post-modern armchairs This must be Pavlov’s legacy He was walking around there yesterday already as a retiree It looks like he got off easy he should have been kicked out of the party Andropov was not present He sent in his speech which was distributed It is good they did it that way as opposed to how it was done one time with Brezhnev Brezhnev’s speech was distributed but the participants were asked to keep quiet about the fact that the speaker himself was absent The newspapers published it as if he was there A very calm serious text reaffirming the “new era ” Moreover it was only about domestic affairs It looks like things are moving but only just This could be seen from the 44 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org speeches too The “spectrum” of the speakers was broader than usual The majority were selfevaluation reports and commitments by secretaries of regional committees and ministers By the way all of them followed the example set by Grishin who spoke first and still considered it necessary to inform the CC Plenum that “Comrade Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov is the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Council of the USSR ” Only Gorbachev Tikhonov their speeches were innovative too at least compared to the last 10 years factory directors and one milkmaid departed from this “norm” and called Andropov either just “Comrade Andropov” or “Yuri Vladimirovich ” That said there was almost no personal praise again with the exception of Grishin and Bagirov Aliyev’s heir in Baku But there were get-well wishes for Yu V followed by applause This was well-received Something else left over from the Brezhnev days was the “tradition” to stand and applaud when the Politburo appeared in the presidium Like school children in class And vice versa unfortunately a good party tradition has been lost – not to clap after every speech like in theater or a ceremonial meeting This started during Brezhnev’s time I think and not right away but only from the early 1970s when the phrase “and personally” started to be used and the quasi-cult of Leonid Ilyich began Frankly speaking I was surprised by the election of Solomentsev and Vorotnikov to Politburo membership even though the former makes sense in the current environment of tightening control over party morals or rather “non-party behavior” of officials and the latter is simply good for Russia People say Vorotnikov is a smart and independent man though not very ceremonious Chebrikov as candidate member of the PB – also understandable I heard about this even before the Plenum same as about Ligachev’s election as CC Secretary By the way this means Kapitonov is being completely removed from personnel matters Gorbachev’s and Tikhonov’s speeches were “to the point ” without idle talk without demagogy and boasting with concrete economic and other ideas This is also a new phenomenon something that had been long-forgotten under Brezhnev In general even though not much was new in terms of substance at this Plenum there was no longer an atmosphere of a palace ritual focused on one person Of course the general political ritualism remained in the sense that the Plenum is not a platform to work out positions and make decisions – everything is prepared ahead of time There were some outstanding speeches they showed that we have cadres who are capable of doing their job well I especially remembered the young and handsome director from Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Works a secretary from the Kamchatka regional committee and the Chechen-Ingush secretary… Arbatov consulted with me all the time about his three ideas which he told me about it in Barvikha when I was visiting him 45 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org - - About the grain agreement Andropov read it handed over to Patolichev to conclude and the latter completely botched it A draft of Andropov’s new statement on missiles Arbatov showed it to me I had some specific comments but overall it could be a way out Andropov read it and “sent it out” to the MFA the General Staff Blatov Aleksandrov He mentioned that the text was Arbatov’s work i e he introduced a “personal” aspect into the readers’ perception of the text So far Arbatov says the predominant reaction is – the Americans won’t accept it Most of the readers have not yet given their reaction on the substance of the proposals to Andropov except Andrey it seems who is of course indignant The draft for the electoral speech has not yet been submitted Arbatov is not upset at all he is even upbeat and cheerful Even if nothing passes he said he did his job and he will not go unnoticed in this regard In other words he is less interested in the essence of the matter in the real consequences of his initiatives That is not what is most important to him The main thing for him is to show in a timely manner “his presence” in big politics He thinks of himself in terms of the state Even his private affairs he considers appropriate to solve at Chernenko’s level rather than Chazov’s level if we take medical issues for example Zagladin was withdrawn we saw each other during the break on the second day of the Plenum He only perked up when Pribytkov Chernenko’s adviser approached him and asked to prepare two pages for some speech or official paper He understands that it is not the time for foreign policy initiatives even though at the meeting of deputies in B N ’s office he defended the same ideas that are present in Arbatov’s drafts But neither he nor B N took them anywhere I noticed that almost no one said a word about ideology and culture Though Andropov did mention ideology as one of the means of fulfilling and overfulfilling the plan… I stopped by the office Rykin managed to inform me that I have already been assigned to make a report at the party meeting on the outcomes of the Plenum In the evening I spoke with Karen Brutents about all sorts of work matters during these weeks about Ponomarev Karen happened upon him just after the meeting where Ponomarev was again bypassed for PB membership and saw how B N gathered himself on the spot and again set a course of action as if nothing happened On a personal level I am sorry for him But on the other hand there is nothing to “reward” him for with a Politburo promotion Moreover there would be nothing to gain from promoting him – it wouldn’t advance our cause in any way I am enthusiastically reading André Maurois From Aragon to Montherlant and Yuri Levitansky 46 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org Postscript to 1983 The “volume” dedicated to this year – from today’s point of view – appears more “personal” than other years For the most part it deals with the author’s concerns his dissatisfaction with the work he was doing as the deputy head of the CC CPSU International Department and especially with his dislike for and almost total disagreement with his boss B N Ponomarev Today this subject matter seems somewhat trifling at first glance not deserving of public attention However looking more deeply at the specifics of that era the author thought the exasperation of a high-ranking official which the author was his thoughts and reflections may be of some interest to those who are interested in or even studying the pre-perestroika period The author is unhappy with Ponomarev’s reaction to what is happening in international affairs and in the communist movement In the case of international affairs the harm caused by Ponomarev is insignificant because he was not given access to the important issues But if we take into account the incredible output of this CC Secretary in foreign policy propaganda and “instructing” the ruling parties of the socialist community Ponomarev’s negative role is visible and not without consequences As for the communist movement the author’s indignation on these pages is of a more narrowly professional nature He believes that matters could have been handled “more properly” and “better ” For example we could have been more open towards Eurocommunism we should not have taught the fraternal parties in the spirit of the Soviet experience that was essentially unsuitable for them We should not have imposed outdated dogmas and rules we should have freed them from the forced labor of defending the USSR and “protecting” it from imperialism Ponomarev saw these two functions as the main task of fraternal parties and the main reason for their very existence In other words we should have given them the opportunity to transform into a national force which the Eurocommunists tried to do despite resistance from the CPSU However the author’s position is paradoxical and even absurd because by this time and for a long time before that he did not believe in the viability of the communist movement Whether we “improved” it or not the result would be the same which was soon revealed only 5-6 years later the ICM had long become a politically insignificant force in the world process and would completely disappear from the historical stage It is instructive that the author filled his notes with facts and information about his discontent They testify to the fact that the CPSU leadership began to feel the hopelessness of the degrading communist movement the loss of even its apologetic capacities in relation to Soviet socialism According to some officials in the CC and the government the communist parties even became somewhat burdensome as a certain component of Soviet state “realpolitik ” 47 The Diary of Anatoly S Chernyaev 1983 http www nsarchive org We understand it now but at the time the author could not clearly articulate this conclusion as long as the ideological component of great-power foreign policy was preserved the CPSU would not refuse to support the communist movement would not stop the “upkeep” of fraternal parties The exasperated characterizations the author gives to his colleagues take on a completely different meaning now Rather than being just a statement about a lack of personal discipline laziness or “dishonesty” of the people mentioned these symptoms – shirking responsibilities and sloppy performance – were the result of a complete loss of faith in the cause they were working for There was a loss of respect for the people leading this cause But even now while understanding the underlying cause of their behavior the decay of the socio-political system as a whole the author is not inclined to justify it Almost everyone had lost the faith by then but only some people “slacked” and shoved their work onto others Unfortunately this was done by a significant segment of the cadres In this the author sees signs of the moral decay of the apparatus and the loss of professional skill which later had a detrimental effect on the formation and work of the state forming under Gorbachev It contributed in no small part to the undoing of perestroika The loss of work ethic selflessness and honesty in the work for which you receive a good salary and benefits became characteristic not only for Chernyaev’s colleagues in the International Department but for the apparatus as a whole The year 1983 judging by the records of a person who was close to the top and had access to classified information shows the accelerating and dangerous deterioration of the situation in the country At the same time it gave reason to hope for improvement The illusion as always happens with us was based on the personality of the new General Secretary Andropov The author of these notes also partook in these illusions But he was one of the few in the apparatus who sincerely cared about the fate of the country regardless of how this “change for the better” would affect his own career Soon from this group of people would appear those who put themselves at the service of perestroika 48