Messengers from Moscow.

• Author: Simes, Dimitri

The end of Soviet communism has given Westerners unprecedented access to Moscow's historical resources. Various archives have been opened and living witnesses to history are suddenly prepared to tell their stories, even in front of foreign television cameras.

The abundance of new information coming straight from the horse's mouth is unlikely, however, to settle American debates about the origins and nature of the Cold War. History is an imprecise science allowing for a variety of interpretation -- particularly when those doing the interpreting have a strong predisposition, or even a vested interest, in seeing things a certain way.

Still, the four-part documentary series Messengers from Moscow, shown in the United States by PBS and in Britain by the BBC, represents a powerful blow to two fundamentals of the liberal dogma -- namely, that the Cold War resulted from a Western overreaction to largely defensive, even if rather heavy-handed, Soviet policies and that the preoccupation with the communist menace inside Western democraticies amounted to a vicious witch hunt. The series, ably directed by Daniel Wolf and produced by Eugene B. Shirley with Herbert E. Ellision as chief consultant, is based on numerous on-camera interviews with Soviet insiders ranging from Stalin's second-in-command Vyacheslav Molotov to Brezhnev's personal physician. The accounts they present are sobering.(1)

Molotov, in a 1972 taped conversation with poet Felix Chuyev, stated point blank that expanding Soviet borders "as far as possible" was his official duty. In Molotov's view, "there could not be a peaceful Germany unless it takes a socialist path." But he cautioned that it had to be accomplished "carefully," without provoking a war with the West.

The Soviet instrument of choice during the initial postwar period was the manipulation of Western communist parties which, the Comintern's dissolution notwithstanding, were obedient instruments of the Kremlin at that time. These tactics prevailed over local resistance in East Germany and elsewhere in Soviet-occupied Central Europe. But where Moscow was not in a position to support its communist clients through brutal repression, the gamble failed miserably.

However, that failure did not happen for lack of trying. It was the dual U.S. policy of militarily containing the USSR and stabilizing fragile Western European democracies through the Marshall Plan that demonstrated to Stalin the futility of further offensive action in Europe.

Stalin was a genuinely cautious and calculating statesman. Yet his kind of caution demanded as much control of everything within reach as he could realistically obtain short of war. Moreover, his definition of acceptable conduct was totally uninfluenced by moral considerations or domestic political constraints. It was Stalin's calculations of U.S. will and power that played a decisive role in shaping his definition of a prudent foreign policy.

Where, as in Korea, Stalin felt that aggression had a chance to proceed with impunity, his risk-taking would become bolder. The documentary shows an official cable from Stalin to his ambassador to North Korea stating, "agree to accept" regarding Kim Il Sung's design to invade the South. Other documents and participants in the Soviet decision-making process confirm this as well: Stalin was not only informed about Kim's plans, but also gave them a green light.

The documentary then goes one important step further. It implies that Stalin actually ordered the North Korean attack. Retired KGB Colonel Gavriil Korotkov, interviewed for the series, claims that Kim would never have dared to contemplate the invasion on his own. According to him, the idea came from Soviet advisors acting on Stalin's orders. Kim then brought it to the Soviet ambassador who immediately consulted Stalin, giving Stalin an opportunity to approve the operation that he himself had masterminded. No supporting evidence or rationale is offered to explain...