210 The Postwar Period
too. Early in 1950, an American news-magazine reported that to official Wash-
ington, thanks to his split with Stalin, “Tito (still) is a son-of-a bitch but (now
he is) our son-of-a-bitch.”^310
With this audacious policy of internationalizing the dispute with Stalin,
Tito provoked hostile attacks by the “shining Muscovite leader.” Beginning in
1948–49, a series of spectacular show trials were organized in the East Euro-
pean satellite countries against political personalities accused of “Titoism,” who
were then condemned to harsh prison sentences or death. In Poland, as pre-
viously mentioned, Władysław Gomułka was removed from office and was
lucky enough “only” to be jailed and tortured. The Hungarian foreign minister,
László Rajk, the Bulgarian leader, Traicho Kostov, and the Albanian, Koçi
Xoxe, ended up before the firing squad or on the gallows. Their accusers spoke
about terrible plots—entirely invented—organized with Tito before and dur-
ing the war, which created an atmosphere of hysteria in their respective coun-
tries.^311 The “revelations” made during the Rajk process offered Soviet Deputy
Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrei A. Gromyko the pretext to denounce, on
28 September 1949, the “Treaty of Friendship, Mutual Assistance and Postwar
Collaboration,” signed by Tito and Molotov in April 1945. At the end of Octo-
ber, the Yugoslav ambassador, Karlo Mrazović, was expelled from Moscow on
accusations of “espionage” and the following month the same happened to the
chargé d’affaires who took his place. Although diplomatic relations between
the two countries were reduced to a minimum, they were not completely inter-
rupted. All the satellites followed this example except Albania, with which
Yugoslavia had severed all diplomatic ties.^312
During its third session, held in Hungary between 16 and 19 November
1949, members of the Cominform, furious and knowing there was nothing they
could do to destroy Tito and his comrades, denounced them as “fascists.” The
resolution formulated on that occasion by the delegates and published on the
anniversary of the Second AVNOJ was eloquently entitled: “The Yugoslav
Communist Party in the Grip of Assassins and Spies.” It proclaimed: “The fight
against Tito’s clique is the international duty of all Communist and workers
parties.”^313 The delegates did not limit themselves to words. In the following
years, ninety-eight training centers were organized in the Soviet Union and its
satellite countries with the aim of sending “every hour of every day saboteurs to
Yugoslavia.”^314 The Yugoslav borders with the countries of the Soviet bloc were
practically sealed off, save for the guerrilla groups that provoked continuous
armed incidents. Between 1948 and 1953, there were 142 serious border clashes,
in which six hundred enemy agents participated.^315 An especially dangerous
center of this offensive was Trieste, where Stalin’s henchman, Vittorio Vidali,
organized a stronghold of propaganda and espionage. With the help of Italian