THE SOVIET QUARANTINE 83mats and ordinary tourists. Permission for international travel was a
privilege granted only to people who enjoyed the full confidence of the
authorities. The worry was always that individuals might defect or
might somehow be compromised by Western intelligence agencies.
Vacations to Eastern Europe were regarded with much caution. The
Politburo preferred its citizens to take their holidays at hotels and
camping grounds inside the USSR’s frontiers. Trips to ‘capitalist and
developing countries’ were treated as vastly more dangerous, and the
KGB tried to ensure that its citizens went in controllable groups with
a designated leader. One or more of its officers would usually accom-
pany them incognito. Travellers received strict lessons beforehand on
the need to behave as their country’s ambassadors.^29
The ‘Basic Rules’ enjoined everybody to voice support for the
Politburo’s external and internal policies. There was to be vigilance
against the devices of foreign intelligence agencies. Travellers were to
minimize their vulnerability by confining their activity to the official
purposes of their journey. They were forbidden to take documents
of a personal nature out of the USSR. Once arrived at their foreign
destination, they had to register their presence at the nearest Soviet
embassy or consulate. They were to resist every temptation that could
expose them to corruption. Paid private work was prohibited. Accep-
tance of expensive gifts was also put under ban. No one was to deviate
from a planned itinerary without prior permission from the group
leader. Under no circumstances was the traveller to incur any kind of
debt. There was also a warning against taking an overnight railway
journey in a compartment with a person of the opposite sex. (Since
homosexuality was illegal in the USSR there was no need to issue an
admonition against potential liaisons with anyone of the same sex.)
Everybody was to appear well groomed and keep their hotel room
clean and tidy. The rule was that a written report should be delivered
to the authorities within a fortnight of returning from abroad.
If ever America and the USSR were going to improve their re -
lationship, this quarantine had to stop. Communist leaders had
introduced it so as to reinforce their control over their society and
fend off foreign intrusion. The Soviet Union became a militarized
police state. Official practices over decades led to a ruling mentality of
suspicion about everything in the world beyond the state borders.
Kremlin traditionalists and even advocates of moderate reform could
not imagine life very differently; the American administration made it
a requirement for any basic rapprochement.