COMMUNISTS: The Fur Flies

If Josip Broz Tito thought that Joseph Stalin had reached the top of his voice, he had heard nothing yet. Last week, amplifying earlier charges that Yugoslavia was mistreating Russian nationals residing in Yugoslavia, Moscow loosed a 3,000-word blast against Tito that was enough to make the marshal’s formidable wolfhounds dive whimpering under the nearest bed.

The Moscow note cited specifics which would seem familiar to many a Russian citizen who never left home:

“Soviet Citizeness Strelkach, who was thrown into a Belgrade prison in March of this year, was summoned every night for questioning for 22 successive days…Six times she was thrown into a cell with only enough room to stand in …

“Soviet Citizen Dodonov…was suddenly dismissed from a factory for ‘political reasons’…systematically beaten…kept on his feet without moving for 20 days…Soviet Citizeness Demidenko…received no food for six days…was beaten on the feet with clubs in an attempt to wring an admission from her that she had gathered some sort of information for the U.S.S.R….”

The note charged these atrocities to the personal account of Yugoslav Interior Minister Alexander Rankovic, who spent part of 1946 in Moscow learning his business from Soviet Secret Police Boss Lavrenty Beria.

The Moscow note also suggested that it was the task “of healthy forces” inside Yugoslavia’s Communist Party to “remove” the party’s “present leaders.”

“The Soviet government,” concluded the note, “considers it necessary to declare that it will not rest content with such a situation and will be forced to resort to other more effective measures…to call to order the unbridled fascist rapists.”

Next day, Tito’s government hurled back charges of “lies and slanders,” “distortions of the truth,” and “unworthy insinuations,” branded Russia as an enemy and “double-crosser.” East and West, the question was: If Joseph Stalin” is no longer willing to “rest content” with the existence of Tito’s regime, just what does he intend to do?