Reunion at the Yar

George Marshall's pilgrimage to the Moscow Peace Conference was surrounded by episodes, signs & portents, few of them cheerful.

The Lost Spring. Marshall's first stop was Paris, where President Vincent Auriol gave a dinner in his honor at the Elysee Palace's somber Salle Murat. On the guest of honor's right sat Jeannette Vermeersch Thorez, longtime mistress and now wife of France's Communist boss. The First Lady of French Communism speaks no English, and Marshall has forgotten most of his French; so hardly a syllable passed between the table companions in the flickering candlelight, while Jeannette vigorously concentrated on her dinner (Consomme Camelia, Timbale Joinville, Jambon d'York, Baltimore Laitue Nivernaise, Mousse Cyrano, Fromages, Fruits). Maurice Thorez himself was conspicuously absent.

In the salon next door, a saxophone quartet from the Garde Rapublicaine, reinforced by a violin and a harp, played throughout the meal (sometimes with so much gusto that an attendant had to quiet them down). The consomme was accompanied by some airily impressionistic Debussy, the timbale by a new composition entitled Song of the Lost Spring. Just then, the springy weather outside gave way to a violent snowstorm, which remained over Paris until Marshall's departure for Berlin next day.

The weather was just as bad in Germany. People fighting their way through unusually heavy snow cracked bitterly: "They're even going to take spring away from us at Moscow." In Berlin, Marshall urged conclusion of a 40-year Big Four Alliance to keep Germany disarmed, which, he said pointedly, should eliminate the suspicions with which some of the U.S.'s allies regard the U.S.'s role in Europe. But ever since Jimmy Byrnes first proposed this alliance last October, the Russians have ignored the offer.

"Better to Buy a Guitar." In Moscow, though the sun was out when Marshall's plane landed, things looked scarcely brighter. Andrei Vishinsky appeared, wear ing the steel grey Soviet diplomatic uniform with its star like a marshal's. The U.S. Secretary of State wore a plain overcoat and a neat grey Homburg. Reported one U.S. correspondent: "So in these strange times, a civilian dressed up like a general met a general dressed like a civilian."

Into a waiting microphone, Marshall spoke a brief message: "This is my first real view of Russia and the Russian people, except for a brief period at remote Yalta." His blue eyes twinkled at the word "remote," as though it could be taken to mean not only Yalta's distance in time & space, but also the remoteness of Yalta's mood of fatuous confidence. That afternoon, Ernie Bevin, 66 that day, dropped in on Molotov, who had turned 57 on the same day; the double birthday party was not festive.

Next day, at his first Moscow press conference, Secretary Marshall was asked whether he would try to reform Soviet working habits (Russian diplomats usually work till late into the night); the Secretary grinned and said: "I have a great many important things to settle here and I do not intend embarking on anything I don't have to. Besides, the Russians might object to your use of the word 'reform.' "

In other respects, the Russians were reforming. Cafes likely to be visited by foreigners received consignments of fresh potted palms, and waiters even got white shirts. The Metropole Hotel was astoundingly clean and patrons were requested by the management to take off their slushy galoshes at the entrance. The Ministers' meeting place, about 15 minutes by car from central Moscow, was the Aero (Aviation Officers') Club, a massive grey building which underwent refurbishing operations up to zero hour; workers put in carpets, telephones, new toilet seats. Soviet Painter Alexander Mikhailovich Gerasimov inspected the decorations, found that French Foreign Minister Bidault's room contained only some dull landscapes. Forthwith, Gerasimov ordered them replaced by "lighter subjects," including a nude. In pre-revolutionary days, the Aero Club had been one of Russia's gaudiest restaurants, the Yar; pre-revolutionary Russians still remember the ditty:

Sweetheart don't go to the Yar

Don't throw your money away

Better to buy a guitar . . .

And play on it all day. . . .

The Lessons of Ashkhabad. Would the Ministers soon consider their visit to the Yar equally unprofitable? If they bogged down in their task of making peace for Germany, there were other things for them to do in Moscow. For instance, they could look about them and learn.

The focus of the current world crisis was the Near East (see NATIONAL AFFAIRS). A typical Russian propaganda picture recently pointed up Soviet preoccupation with that region. Obviously designed to please the strategically scattered Moslem millions, it showed faithful Mohammedans bent in prayer at a Moscow mosque. Soviet iconography included another striking symbol of the strange alliance and devious devotions of which Soviet policy is capable: a rug from Ashkhabad (capital of the Turkomen Soviet Socialist Republic), into which was woven the likeness of the late Prophet Karl Marx.

A second more intimate lesson for foreigners (it concerned Joseph Stalin and his relations with his people) was contained in a letter from the Generalissimo to the magazine Bolshevik. In it, Stalin complained about the "panegyrics" in his own honor found everywhere in Russia. Some recent samples:

"The sun of our life. . . ." "The great captain of all victories, Comrade Stalin." "Comrade Stalin, the creator of all our victories!" "Coryphaeus of science." "The greatest learned man of our age." "Stalin, the will and intelligence of millions." "Author of the most democratic constitution." "Our beloved father, friend of the working classes, the wise leader Joseph Stalin." "The most beloved teacher of the Soviet people, Joseph Stalin." "The greatest and most beloved man--our own Stalin." "Stalin's genius lights up our road. Stalin is our force, our faith, our happiness."

That kind of thing, said Stalin, "grates upon the ears." It is "really uncomfortable to read." The Soviet press has been intoning this fulsome litany to Stalin for nearly 20 years, which just goes to show that a so-called dictator doesn't have everything his own way.

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