by John Barron
Thank God (despite their professed atheism, the Soviets in talking with Morris used the phrase slava Bogu or “thank God”) the CPUSA was reliable; the Soviets appreciated its undeviating loyalty and intended to reward it with a $2 million subsidy in 1977. At the same time, they clearly laid down the line they expected the party to follow; peace and disarmament remained overriding objectives, and they intended to pursue them no matter what Carter did. The unstated but clear message to the American party was You are to make peace and disarmament your priorities.
On New Year’s Eve 1976, Morris and Eva landed in Boston, and Boyle took them to a motel suite to rest overnight before flying to Chicago. During the night, the racket of men raucously singing or bellowing in Russian awakened them and Eva exclaimed, “I thought we were home! Where are we?” After investigating, Boyle assured them they really were in the United States. The celebration of a visiting delegation of Russians in a nearby room had spilled over into the corridor. Now there was not a sound.
“How do you suppose Walt managed to shut them up?” Eva asked.
Morris said, “Can’t you guess?”
In Chicago, after filing the factual mission reports Morris and Boyle undertook to answer the basic question: What does all this mean?
Despite their irrational fears of what Carter might do, and no matter what he did do, the Soviets intended to make the campaign for peace and disarmament the cornerstone of their foreign policy. Why? Morris recalled that, a few years before, someone in the International Department said to him, “Our military intelligence is perfect; our political intelligence is just the opposite.” He believed that Soviet intelligence about American science and technology was excellent, and that the Politburo heeded it; the oligarchs, who had no military or scientific expertise, had to rely upon their military and scientific advisors, and they always paid attention to anything they perceived as threatening them personally. To Morris, the Soviets no longer boasted, as they had done in the 1960s, that their weapons were as good as or better than American weapons, nor did they talk about “catching up” with the United States economically. They did talk about the necessity of stopping the United States from proceeding with the development of “hellish” weapons now progressing from computer printouts toward testing and production.16
Soviet scientists and generals understood that the Soviet Union could neither match nor effectively defend against these new weapon systems. They understood that, in a real arms race, superior American technology and economic strength would win—by a wide margin—and they so informed the Politburo. Hence, the peace and disarmament campaign. Its long-term aim was to prevent the United States from entering an arms race; the short-term aim was to halt development or deployment of those “hellish” new American weapons.
“If you think like they do, it makes all sorts of sense. If you can’t win a race, then don’t have a race. If they can make us stand still they can walk ahead and I guarantee you they have no intention whatsoever of reducing their military power. The Party and everybody it can influence will denounce any new American weapon as a threat to peace and disarmament.”
Morris did not agree that Soviet political intelligence was “the opposite of perfect.” If the Soviets so adroitly could collect information—much of it secret—about American science, technology, and military power, why could they not collect facts about American politics that were mostly not secret? The problem—and danger—as Morris saw it, lay in Soviet misinterpretation of political intelligence. Lacking military or scientific expertise, Soviet rulers had to accept the judgments of their generals and scientists. In political matters, however, they claimed supreme expertise. But their judgments were warped because they had isolated and insulated themselves from reality and because they were prisoners of their own dogma, slogans, and past. As an example, he cited Soviet reaction to the election of Jimmy Carter.
The results of numerous public opinion polls and competent commentary published week after week in newspapers across America before the election indicated that the outcome would be close but that there was a strong possibility that Carter would win. Surely Soviet diplomats and intelligence officers reported what any American reading the papers in the smallest hamlet knew. Ardent adherents of the adage “Better the devil you know,” the old oligarchs in Moscow wanted Ford to win and therefore he would win. When he lost, they were shocked and feared it would be more difficult to deal with a Democratic president than a Republican president. To anyone vaguely familiar with the American political landscape, this view was other-worldly.
“Walt, what this means is that they’re capable of going off the deep end.”
Headquarters responded: “This is a brilliant analysis and we think it is 100 percent correct. But right now within the [intelligence] community you and 58 are ‘pissing into the wind.’”
The FBI in the spring briefed the new attorney general, Griffin Bell, and National Security Advisor Brzezinski about SOLO, its accomplishments, its potential, and the ultrasecret procedures governing distribution of SOLO intelligence. The briefers also explained that leaks and ongoing congressional investigations in Washington made continuance of the operation increasingly dangerous and diplomatically suggested that the political consequences of its compromise would not be good. For security reasons, the FBI was considering ending SOLO. Bell in turn fully briefed his friend, the president. Shortly afterward, headquarters notified Boyle and Langtry that Carter had expressly ordered the FBI to continue SOLO and that he personally accepted responsibility for the consequences. “He thinks it’s the greatest thing since ice cream.”
THE SOVIET UNION, at some pain to its dwindling treasury, maintained armies of spies and legions of diplomats—most of them intelligent, well educated, and fluent in English—to study and supply information about the United States. They could talk to members of Congress personally, attend congressional hearings, see cabinet officers (even the secretary of state), and read an overabundance of news and commentary about what was happening in the United States. Yet Brezhnev wanted Morris and Gus Hall to come over and tell him what really was going on.
They traveled separately to Moscow in late May and saw Brezhnev four times. Morris was in effect the number two man in the American party, and since as far as he knew the party in 1977 had not a single source in the United States government, they could report only what they had read in the press. But Hall made it seem as if their information emanated partially from unregistered sympathizers in the government, and Brezhnev was pleased to get the inside story from men he really trusted, from men who had actually run for public office in the United States. (Hall was a quadrennial candidate for the presidency.) At Morris’ suggestion, Hall volunteered that the American party would invest all its resources to promote peace and disarmament and, through Morris, coordinate its efforts with the International Department. Brezhnev responded emotionally. The CPUSA was the only party in the capitalist world that truly upheld the principles of Marxism–Leninism. Ideologically, it occupied in the capitalist camp the same position that the CPUSSR occupied in the socialist camp. The CPUSA could have whatever it needed, whatever it wanted.
Hall and his wife departed in early June, leaving Morris and Eva behind to attend to the details of MORAT. Ponomarev ostensibly was ill, and Morris dealt principally with his deputy, Anatoly Chernayev. On June 9, the day before Morris’ seventy-fifth birthday, Chernayev casually mentioned, almost as if by afterthought, that Brezhnev wanted to have a private, “working” dinner with him the next night and that an escort would pick him up in a limousine. Though they had talked many times, Morris had never dined privately with Brezhnev, and he thought it odd that Chernayev did not indicate any topics Brezhnev might want to discuss at the “working” (no wives) dinner.
A well-dressed young man called at the apartment the next evening, introduced himself in faultless English as an interpreter, and led Morris to the limousine. Standing by it, flanked by two bodyguards, was a man Morris knew well—Yuri Andropov, chairman
of the KGB. Morris thought, So this is how it ends. He wants the honor of arresting me himself. Eva, I love you.
Andropov, who spoke a little English, leaned down and hugged Morris. “Old friend, great comrade. It much pleases me to see you.” Through the interpreter, Andropov explained that Brezhnev had asked him personally to escort Morris and to join them at dinner.
Morris called the relatively small Kremlin dining room the “Captain’s Cabin” because it was reserved exclusively for the most senior captains of world communism. As Andropov opened the door, a chorus of shouts in English rang out: “Happy Birthday!” There stood Brezhnev, Suslov, Ponomarev, Chernayev, Mostovets, and about half the Politburo. While an army quartet accompanied by an accordionist magnificently sang, alternately in English and Russian, “Happy Birthday” and “For He’s a Jolly Good Fellow,” the rulers of the Soviet empire came one by one to hug Agent 58 on the occasion of his seventy-fifth birthday.
Brezhnev placed Morris to his right and gave a toast to “a great man, the last of the true Bolsheviks, our beloved comrade, Morris.” The assembled, who had just sat down, stood and applauded. Between courses of the lavish dinner, others offered toasts to Morris, and with such sincerity that Morris had to warn himself: Don’t fall for any of this. Think where you are and who they are. Think about how many millions the men in this room have killed. Think about what Walt and the Bureau will ask.
While KGB waiters served champagne, brandy, fruit, and cheese, Brezhnev—who remained seated—put on thick glasses and started to read the speech of the evening, the product of considerable research and a talented dramatist.
Morris had joined the party in 1919. Who here has served longer? When the Trotskyites threatened to seize our party headquarters in Chicago in 1927, Comrade Morris organized and led a band of comrades who at the risk of their lives defended and held our headquarters. There was a little truth in this. Obeying orders from Earl Browder, Morris, (the “Red Milkman”), did lead a few scruffy comrades into headquarters and for a few nights they slept on the floor, ready to repel the minions of Jay Lovestone, the heretical “American Exceptionalist.” But no one attempted to seize the building, there was no fight or trouble, and Morris had long since forgotten about the incident. But it was recorded in Soviet files, and, in describing it, Brezhnev and his speechwriter made it seem like the battle of the Alamo.
Brezhnev went on rather accurately. As international secretary of the Communist Party of the United States of America, Comrade Morris had won the respect, confidence, and friendship of party leaders throughout the socialist world, and no one had done more to build solidarity among all parties. The CPUSA was the purest of parties, and Comrade Morris for more than fifty years had been a bulwark of that party.
With some difficulty, Brezhnev rose and so did everyone else. He said to Morris, “On behalf of the Communist Party of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, on behalf of the Soviet people and of all comrades here, I have the honor of presenting this decoration.” He then pinned on Morris’ coat lapel a medal, the Order of the Red Banner.
Subsequently, Chernayev told Morris that Jack had also been awarded a medal and that it would be given to him when he next came to Moscow.
In evaluating the ceremony for the FBI, Morris tried to be objective, just as he did in reporting about Soviet persecution of Jews. He thought the Soviets were sincere, or “as sincere as gangsters can be.” They ludicrously overestimated the influence of the American party and credited it with causing phenomena, such as the anti–Vietnam War movement, in which it played only a peripheral part. The old doctrine of “Democratic Centralism” from the 1920s still governed their thinking. Once they made a decision and issued marching orders, everyone in all parties was supposed to march lockstep. Morris, Hall, and the American party, unlike the “Euro-communist” ingrates, always did, and the Soviets appreciated that.
Possibly, too, there was some personal warmth and friendship behind the medal. “I’ve known some of those bloody thugs since the 1930s.” The Soviets, logically, believed Morris and Jack were taking extreme personal risks, and like everyone else they admired valor. They also dearly valued MORAT, which is why they awarded Jack a medal. The gesture of having the chairman of the KGB personally escort Morris and the presence of Brezhnev and the main rulers of the Soviet empire at the extraordinary dinner were personal tributes. But the medals also represented tributes to the American party and MORAT. Morris said, “Right now, we’re all right in Moscow. It’s Washington we have to worry about.”
IN THE PAST, SOLO communications between headquarters and Chicago had sometimes been acerbic, and for that Boyle accepted his share of the blame. After receiving the first reports from one mission, headquarters sent a message with the comment, “58 sounds like a communist.”
Boyle retorted, “Over there, 58 is a communist. He is virtually a member of the Politburo. He has to think and talk like a communist. What do you want him to do? Go to the embassy, round up a fife and drum corps, pick up an American flag, and parade into the Kremlin singing ‘Yankee Doodle’ and talking like John Wayne?”
This earned Boyle a visit in his sequestered office, “the hermit’s cave,” from SAC Dick Held. He realized Boyle was under unceasing stress, that his work was lonely, and that it was supremely important. “But you don’t help yourself or 58 when you make senior people at headquarters look like idiots.”
Boyle promised to refrain from sarcasm, and by summer 1977 exchanges between the field and Washington had become collegial and cordial. The Bureau designated an agent at headquarters, Michael Steinbeck, to handle SOLO administrative matters and day-to-day communications with Chicago and New York. He and Boyle talked often through scramblers, which garbled words spoken into a phone at one end of the line and ungarbled them at the other end.
Even though the line was secure, they tended to speak elliptically or in their own informal code, and in August Boyle asked if the weather had improved any. Steinbeck said it had not. “Do not think it’s safe to fly?”
“We’re trying to decide.”
The Soviets planned an elaborate celebration of the sixtieth anniversary of the October Revolution, and they fully expected Morris to attend, as did Gus Hall. Boyle wanted to know if the Bureau was willing to risk another mission.
Steinbeck telephoned, in October. “It’s a Chicago call. Whichever play you choose, we’ll back you up.” In other words, the Bureau is willing to take the risk, but let 58 decide. It’s his life that’s at stake.
Boyle on October 20, 1977, told Steinbeck over the secure line, “We’ve decided to throw deep.” Morris and Eva left for Moscow the next day.
The Soviets initially put them in a suite at the party hotel so Morris could more easily mingle with (and spy on) foreign leaders gathering for the ceremonies. Despite the demands upon their protocol resources imposed by the presence of so many dignitaries, the Soviets assigned a retinue of women to attend Eva and Elizabeth Hall and even arranged for them to have tea with the first female cosmonaut, who to Eva seemed shy and nice.
In the hotel, Morris encountered Fidel Castro, who greeted him heartily and insisted that he and Eva come to dinner at the Cuban embassy.
Castro said the only other guests would be a Spanish couple and pointedly told Morris not to bring a Russian as an interpreter; they would speak English. Castro was an engaging host and especially gracious to Eva. She recalled, “He knew a lot about the United States and he was very interested in our party. He said some snide things about the Russians and I got the feeling he really didn’t like them; he wouldn’t let any of them come to dinner. They served good steaks and they were a delicacy in Moscow, and after dinner Castro himself poured brandy and asked me if he could smoke a cigar. It was a pleasant evening but he just kept talking and I thought we never would get out of there.”
Eva most remembered the sight of Brezhnev at a formal reception. Two men literally held him on his feet; his face was pale and waxen, his eyes glazed, his speech blurred and inco
herent. The ruler of the Soviet Union gave every appearance of being comatose and Eva thought, That man is not going to get well.
Throughout the four weeks in Moscow, the Soviets were as trusting and friendly as ever. They assembled leaders of South American parties for secret deliberations about how better to coordinate communist activities throughout the Western Hemisphere and invited Morris to participate and make suggestions. Ponomarev said that, despite a shortage of hard currency, they would give the American party $2.1 million in 1978, and he asked Morris to nominate Americans to attend the Lenin School. Except at the reception, Morris did not see Brezhnev, but Ponomarev gave a farewell luncheon for Morris and most of his old acquaintances came.
Eva and Morris started home in mid-November 1977 by flying from Moscow to Prague. About twenty minutes before the Aeroflot plane was to land in Prague, the pilot or co-pilot came to them with an announcement: By order of the “highest authorities,” they must return to Moscow at once. They were not to remove their luggage or other belongings from the plane. While the plane was being refueled, they were at liberty to enter the Prague terminal and speak to the Czech delegation awaiting them. Two comrades would escort them and make sure they did not miss the return flight.
Morris and Eva looked at each other and reached for each other’s hand. They have found out, and we are going to die.
Flying back to Moscow, they held hands, kissed each other on the cheek, exchanged vows of love, and spoke of the wonderful life they had shared. Eva tried to be cheerful, and once she did make Morris laugh by talking about their visit to the Polish horse farm, Gus Hall’s idea of the party selling horse meat as beef, and a communist fast-food chain selling “Gusburgers.” She tried to be optimistic. “Walt and John and Jim will get us out.”