The Foreign Service Journal, December 2011

suppression of a peaceful demonstration in Tbilisi (that left 19 dead), of the KGB as a criminal organization and of So- viet operations in Afghanistan. One session, in particular, remains seared in my mem- ory. Andrei Sakharov, the moral leader of the dissident community, approaching his 90th birthday, rose to con- demn Soviet operations in Afghanistan and repeated charges that Soviet generals had at times ordered their own troops to be killed so that they would not be captured by the mujahedeen. A disabled Afghan veteran then took the floor and, with raw emotion before a hushed hall, de- nounced Sakharov and spoke of the valor of his fellow sol- diers in service to their country. “Today,” he ended, “I will say three words that I believe we should fight for with all we have: State, Motherland, Communism!” With that, the hall rose as one in a pro- longed ovation; everyone in the diplomats’ lounge leapt to his feet to join in, save me. The menace to Gorbachev’s reforms hung in the air. But in retrospect it is now clear that it arose not only from cynics and time-servers but also from those who believed in their country and had served it in good faith. The case for reform was not as straight- forward as we would have hoped. Reporting and the New Realities Massive street demonstrations finally arrived in Moscow in 1990. Tens of thousands of Muscovites regu- larly marched to the designated rally site — and at least once to Manish Square in the shadows of the Kremlin — where orators would denounce the Soviet government for an hour or more. The security services, in full riot gear and reinforced by heavy equipment, were always out in force, blocking side streets and channeling demonstrators to the rally site. We walked along the margins, talking to the partici- pants, and listened to the speeches at the rallies. It was a heady experience. In such an environment, it was hard not to be carried away by the marchers’ enthusiasm and en- D E C E M B E R 2 0 1 1 / F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L 37 F OCUS Excerpt from the Abyss Cable By Ray Smith 90 Moscow 23603 of July 13, 1990, originally SECRET/Exdis, now declassified by the State Department. SUBJECT: Looking into the Abyss — The Possible Collapse of the Soviet Union and What We Should Be Doing About It SUMMARY: Gorbachev, or even more progressive reformers, may triumph and the Soviet Union may move rapidly into full and productive interaction with the rest of the world. But they also may not, and it appears to us that the poten- tially less happy outcomes are the ones that require more forethought. The prospects of the Gorbachev regime have deteriorated over the past year and Soviets themselves are increasingly talking in apocalyptic terms. Some Republics will leave the Soviet Union and there will be a substantial redefinition of the remaining Republics’ relationship to the center and to each other unless massive repression is used to prevent it. Truly dangerous scenarios — ranging from civil war and the loss of control over nuclear weapons to a truncated, belligerent, nuclear-armed Soviet or Russian state — cannot be excluded, even if they are not as likely as less apocalyptic scenarios. We need to take a close look at our policy to make certain that it minimizes the probability of extreme outcomes, and minimizes the risks to the U.S. if they should occur despite our best efforts. We should move now to establish a permanent presence in each of the Soviet Republics. A major expansion of our exchange programs, both governmental and private, is essential. We need to keep our focus, and that of the Gor- bachev regime, on moving forward on economic reform. Our arms control negotiations are in serious danger of being a day late and a dollar short. We need to rethink our objectives and how we are going to get there, from war-fighting strategy to modernization to how we organize ourselves as a government to conduct arms control negotiations. We need to move beyond ad hoc-isms in civil conflicts to the establishment of international principles and mechanisms for dealing with them. END SUMMARY. Source: Raymond F. Smith, The Craft of Political Analysis for Diplomats , Potomac Books, 2011.