Times Change in Moscow

What is the most important news story in the world today? Russia, says the New York Times's Publisher Arthur Hays Sulzberger. And how many men has the Times got on it? One--and the paper had a hard time getting that one in.

It took ex-Theater Critic Brooks Atkinson six months and a personal cablegram to Joseph Stalin to get accredited to Moscow. Even before he left New York, the Times began going through the red tape necessary to get his successor in. Last week the Times succeeded. It had taken nearly a year and the intercession of U.S. Ambassador "Beedle" Smith to get the visa. Said Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Vishinsky to Beedle Smith: "The New York Times is not particularly friendly to Russia."

Out from behind Moscow's iron curtain, after ten months, comes erudite, ironic Atkinson, to rest a spell and then perhaps to return to Broadway's asbestos curtains. In goes chubby, energetic Drew Middleton, one of the Times's top-flight newsmen.

New York-born Drew Middleton, 32, goes to Russia with few illusions. He regards the Moscow assignment as "something every reporter should do once at least." He has agreed to buck it for the next two years.

Good Eye, Good Ear. In the slow-moving Times hierarchy, Drew Middleton has shot up fast. Syracuse University's School of Journalism refused to grant him his degree because he couldn't type fast enough (he got the degree later when he became a famous son). After two years of newspaper work in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., he went to A.P. as a sportswriter in 1937. He asked to be a foreign correspondent, but was sent to England in 1939--to cover sports. When the war came, he was the youngest (25) reporter accredited to the British Expeditionary Force.

His coverage of Dunkirk and Dieppe was so good that Raymond Daniell, chief of the Times's London Bureau, hired him away. Daniell sent him to North Africa, where Middleton's analysis of the tangled Darlan-Giraud crisis was from the first surprisingly mature and shrewd. His up-front combat stories showed a reportorial eye, a literary ear.

In the thankless task of covering SHAEF, he frequently clashed with the censors. He had the energy to get around on his own, the imagination to infuse official communiques with color and meaning.

Middleton's aggressiveness will be a change from Atkinson's urbane inquisitiveness. Colleagues are curious to see whether Middleton will check his shoulder chip at the Russian frontier. Says National Correspondent James ("Scotty") Reston, himself a Times topnotcher: "Moscow will be good for his temper. It will teach him patience or kill him."

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