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is likely to be true of the Vietnamese regime. The answers to all these questions, un- with the Wilson Center s Cold War Interna-
This is not to say that attempts to follow up fortunately, may be a long time in coming. tional History Project and other collabora-
on the POW issue in Hanoi are pointless, but Only two pages (11 and 18) of the earlier tive ventures. The reading room at TsKhSD
at least for now the chances of obtaining translated report were released by the Rus- was shut for the entire summer of 1993, and
meaningful documentation are far greater in sian government, to the American members even before that a host of nettlesome restric-
Russia than in Vietnam. of the joint POW/MIA commission, and it is tions were imposed on foreign researchers,
The potential value of materials stored not clear whether or when the rest of the many of whom were accused by name of
in the Russian archives was demonstrated in document will be turned over. Even if the working for nefarious special services. 89
September 1993, when a second document earlier report is eventually released in full, Among other things, foreigners were not
was disclosed that suggested the North Viet- any hope of determining the accuracy of the permitted to obtain an entry pass ( propusk )
namese authorities deliberately under-re- two translated documents is going to depend to the reading room for more than two weeks
ported the number of prisoners they were on the availability of a good deal more at a time, they were prohibited from receiv-
holding in the early 1970s. This document evidence, including the original Vietnamese ing any document files or microfilm reels,
was a translation of a report presented by a versions of the two reports (whether on and they were forbidden from using laptop
senior North Vietnamese official, Hoang paper or on tape recording), which are likely computers for any purpose unless they re-
Anh, to a plenum of the North Vietnamese to be in the GRU archives. Some of these ceived explicit permission every day from
Communist Party s Central Committee in items may not exist in Moscow any longer, the archive director.
early 1971.85 The official claimed that Hanoi but other documents that bear on the matter The clampdown on scholarly access
was holding 735 U.S. pilots, but had pub- are bound to turn up. In any event, the only was accompanied by a shakeup of personnel
lished the names of only 368 as a diplo- way to know precisely what is available is to at TsKhSD, most notably the replacement of
matic step, adding that these 368 would be have qualified experts sift methodically Usikov by Prokopenko a week after the
released as soon as Washington agreed to through as many of the archives as possible. initial New York Times article appeared. At
withdraw all its forces from Vietnam and Whether that will be practical in the first, the dismissal was attributed to Usikov s
started the withdrawal. Once the pullout near future is questionable, however. So far, purported failure to enforce regulations on
was completed, the report went on, the re- employees of the Russian archives are the access to confidential material, 90 but alle-
maining 367 captured pilots, whose names only ones who have been permitted to search gations soon followed that he had also been
had not yet been disclosed, would be freed. for additional documentation. Their efforts involved in shady financial dealings.
The figure of 368 in the report corre- are obviously crucial, but on a matter such as Whether or not the latter charges had any
sponded precisely to the number of U.S. this, it is essential that outside experts, in- merit and the present author is not in any
POWs in a list that was turned over to two cluding experts from the United States, also position to evaluate them there was no
U.S. Senators in Paris in December 1970, a be permitted to look for new evidence. If the truth at all to the specific allegation that
list whose accuracy was challenged at the matter is left solely to archival officials, Usikov sold the Vietnam document to Mor-
time by the U.S. government.86 The figure of there may be little way of ensuring that their ris. As noted earlier, Morris s request for the
368 also was identical to the number cited search is as thorough as possible, and that document was handled routinely, and Usikov
later on by General Quang; and the total they will release whole documents once they had nothing to do with it. At no point did
number of 735 captured American pilots come across them, rather than just handing Morris even meet Usikov, much less buy
(both acknowledged and unacknowledged) over scattered pages. documents from him.
in the earlier report was nearly the same as Unfortunately, the U.S. government s Furthermore, even if the new authori-
the figure of 767 pilots that Quang provided. apparent failure to request broad archival ties at TsKhSD sincerely believed that the
Still, the newly discovered document raised access at the outset for independent experts Quang document had been sold and ini-
far more questions than it answered: For and scholars may have been a lost opportu- tially they may have it would still be hard
example, why did the earlier report refer nity.87 At this point, any attempts to gain to explain why their reaction to the Morris
only to pilots and not mention other types permission for American scholars to inves- affair was so much harsher than the brief
of POWs, as Quang did later in his report? tigate the matter further at either TsKhSD or periods of retrenchment that had followed
Was the figure of 368 chosen simply be- the Presidential Archive, not to mention the previous scandals at the archives. After all,
cause it was half the number of U.S. pilots GRU archives, are likely to be complicated the controversy surrounding the POW docu-
who had been captured? Why had the figure by the unexpectedly harsh reaction of the ment was hardly unique. Several incidents
of 368 not increased at all, and why had the Russian archival authorities to the disclo- in 1992 had caused a comparable degree of
other figure, of 735, barely increased (to just sure of Quang s translated report. Rather embarrassment for the Russian government:
767) when Quang delivered his report some than welcoming the publication of such a the publication in Italy of an unauthenticated
20 months later, by which time more Ameri- controversial document and encouraging re- 1943 letter from the Italian Communist Party
cans presumably had been captured? The searchers to look for other items that would leader, Palmiro Togliatti, showing seeming
answer to this last question may be con- either corroborate or impugn the accuracy of indifference over the fate of Soviet-held
nected with the fact that twenty of the pris- the translation, Rosarkhiv officials did just Italian POWs; reports in Great Britain about
oners included in the earlier totals were the opposite.88 They sealed off all holdings secret contacts between Labour Party lead-
COLD WAR INTERNATIONAL HISTORY PROJECT BULLETIN 31
ers and Soviet diplomats (which turned out Ognetov s typed message, dated 6 February 1973. These and other documents must exist
to be perfectly routine and above-board); 1973, merely observes that the instruction at either TsKhSD or the Presidential Ar-
and the unauthorized and misattributed pub- [presumably a reference to Katushev s hand- chive. But rather than allowing outside
lication in London of extracts from diaries written instruction] has been overtaken by experts and scholars to find materials that
by Josef Goebbels that had been stored in events and that comrade K. F. Katushev would shed greater light on the issue, Rus-
the Moscow archives.91 After each of these has been informed. 94 This simple, two-line sian archival officials have taken the coun-
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