Soviet Union: Cracking Down

Andropov vs. free thought

At the conclusion of Soviet Historian Roy Medvedev's monumental 1971 study of the Stalin era, Let History Judge, the author sounded a warning note: "Not everything connected with Stalinism is behind us, by no means everything. The process of purifying the Communist movement, of washing out all the layers of Stalinist filth, is not yet finished." Those words rang true last week when the Soviet Union's top law enforcement agency warned Medvedev to "cease hostile activities" or face criminal charges.

The move against Medvedev added weight to evidence that Party Leader Yuri Andropov has stepped up the campaign against independent thought that he had begun as head of the KGB. Said Medvedev, who had predicted as early as 1978 that Andropov would succeed Leonid Brezhnev as party leader: "People have been asking me about the new Andropov government, and I've been saying that it's going to be strict on the one hand and appear to be intellectual on the other. However, we've seen plenty of examples of its being strict and so far little intellect."

Medvedev, 57, was summoned to the office of the Soviet Prosecutor General in Moscow and accused of producing "mockingly hostile scribblings that have slandered the Soviet Union," referring to Medvedev's 19 books that have been published only abroad. Deputy Prosecutor Oleg Soroka told Medvedev, "Either you stop writing such books and articles, or we will put you in jail." The nonconformist Marxist historian, who cannot properly be called a dissident, pointed out that he had been writing for two decades with no interference from the authorities. Replied Soroka: "The fact that we have not called you in for 20 years is a reflection of our great patience. But that patience is coming to an end. It may run out in 1983."

Medvedev then refused to sign a copy of the official warning. Instead, he gave the prosecutor a statement saying that "any honorable historian" must continue writing whether his work is pleasing to those in power or not. "I am scarcely troubled by the prosecutor's and the KGB's opinion of my work. Any honest and independent historian should be concerned with only one thing: the search for truth." Medvedev later said that he would not go into voluntary exile. "I have absolutely no desire to leave the Soviet Union, and no one is pressuring me into doing so."