ABSTRACT
In the same Soviet empire there is another type of election which takes place in the mind of each citizen who finds himself faced with, or seeks out, the opportunity to cross the line that separates the known from the unknown, the Communist world from the uncertain world outside. All around the vast perimeter of the Soviet empire, each day the type of election takes place. While the vote by flight to freedom from East Germany is dramatic because of the annual numbers involved and because it is that escape is easier, it was in Korea, after the Korean War, that the most significant election took place. Strangest of all the statistics in the cold report was the news that 4700 members of the East German people's police were among those who escaped to freedom. The moral triumph was a signal to the captive peoples that, when an opportunity presents itself, a real election will be theirs.
