Dealing with Kidnapers

The State Department resembled a police missing persons' bureau last week, as U.S. diplomats from Santiago de Cuba to Berlin to Moscow grappled with a new outcrop of organized diplomatic crime. The problem: organized kidnaping of U.S. citizens overseas--47 in Cuba, nine in Russia, nine in East Germany--to be held until the U.S. pays ransom in the form of diplomatic concession.

The U.S. lines of approach to the problem: 1) the U.S. will not pay "blackmail" to get the Americans out, and although 2) the U.S. does not intend to use force to get them out, 3) the U.S. hopes to convince the kidnapers through patient diplomatic negotiation that kidnaping is "counterproductive," i.e., hardly puts Americans in the mood for any kind of concession.

"We are trying to get live Americans back." said President Eisenhower at his press conference last week. "We are not disposed to do anything reckless that would create consequences for them that would be final." The state of the State Department police blotter last week:

Cuba. Forty-seven Americans--30 sailors and marines, 17 civilians, most of them sugar and nickel company employees --were rounded up in eastern Cuba and herded into the mountains by rebel guerrillas headed by Raul Castro, left-wing brother of Cuba's Rebel Boss Fidel Castro (see HEMISPHERE). U.S. Consul in Santiago de Cuba Park Wollam and Vice Consul Robert Wiecha jeeped into the hills, talked with rebel leaders, got a promise that Americans would be let go, set up a Navy helicopter lift that began hauling out the prisoners a handful at a time.

Russia. Nine U.S. airmen were arrested by the Russians in Soviet Armenia when their unarmed Air Force DC-6A transport strayed off course on a tricky navigational leg of a routine bimonthly courier flight across Turkey to Iran (see map], trespassed in Soviet airspace, was forced by two Soviet fighters to land just inside Soviet territory. U.S. airmen wondered if powerful Soviet radio transmitters had not interfered with the relatively weak signal from the U.S. beacon at Van--and if the Russians had not set their rig up to fool the pilots, flying on top of an overcast, into crossing the frontier. Soviet propagandists began cranking up a new point to old charges at the U.N. and elsewhere that the USAF was launching "provocative" flights across the U.S.S.R. The State Department apologized for the violation of Soviet airspace, denied that it was deliberate, told Ambassador to Moscow Llewellyn Thompson to seek the airmen's prompt return. At week's end the Soviet government dropped off a note to Thompson to say that the U.S.S.R. 1) "takes into consideration" the U.S. regrets about crossing the border, 2) "expects" the U.S. to take "urgent and effective measures to prevent repetition."

East Germany. Seven U.S. Army artillery officers and two Army helicopter crewmen, kidnaped by the Russians and the East German satellite state when their helicopter came down in East Germany June 7, were produced by the Communists for a surprise press conference in Dresden. On hand at the conference: a crowd of Communist newsmen and one lone Westerner, Associated Press Reporter Seymour Topping (see PRESS). Presumably the Communists hoped that by showing off U.S. servicemen in captivity they could prod the U.S. public into prodding the U.S. Government to pay a high soldiers' ransom. The ransom, openly demanded through spokesmen for the Russians: U.S. recognition--actual or implied--of Communist satellite East Germany as a diplomatic equal.

Instead, these U.S. soldiers on the Cold War beat--all Army careermen--put on just the kind of on-the-spot performance that made all the police-blotter calculations back home seem worthwhile. Said Army Major George Kemper into the Communist microphones: "They are holding us as political hostages. We are being used as tools." Other Army men shouted at the Communists: "You're kidnapers!" And when, in a quiet moment, the AP's Topping told the Army's Kemper that the U.S. was 1) demanding his men's release but was 2) refusing to pay the ransom of recognizing the Red satellite, Major Kemper grinned. "That's enough for us," he said. "You can tell them that we'll sweat it out as long as it takes."

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