Contention

USSR in June 1956. The event was, at the time, perceived as the culmination of the rapprochement between the two countries. Many observers, such as the British Ambassador in Moscow, Sir William Hayter, saw Tito’s visit as the confirmation of Yugoslavia’s return to the Soviet ‘camp’.3 The truth however, could not have been more different. Underneath the pomp, mass jubilations and manifested comradeship, the talks between two delegations resembled more of a battle between irreconcilable adversaries. Tito’s visit was in fact the beginning of the next Yugoslav-Soviet confrontation.4 Tito’s visit took place between 2 and 23 June 1956, and was his first trip to the Soviet Union since 1946. During the three weeks, the Yugoslav leader travelled to Leningrad, Kiev, Stalingrad and the Kuban region. On the eve of the visit, the Soviets made gestures intended to impress Tito. On 22 May, Khrushchev sent Tito a detailed account of the April visit to Moscow by a French Socialist Party delegation, led by the Prime Minister Guy Mollet. Mollet’s visit represented Moscow’s first official dialogue with a major Western socialist party. During Khrushchev’s visit to Belgrade, a year earlier, the Yugoslavs had urged the Soviets to establish contacts with the socialist and social democratic parties of Western Europe. By sending a report on talks with Guy Mollet, Moscow wished to prove to Tito that his suggestions were being taken seriously.5 Furthermore, Molotov’s resignation from the post of Foreign Minister was officially announced a day before Tito’s arrival. Although the resignation most certainly reflected the consolidation of Khrushchev’s leadership position, the announcement was conveniently timed to ‘soften’ Tito ahead of his talks with the Soviet leaders. The Soviets were aware of Yugoslav animosity towards Molotov. In March and April 1948, together with Stalin, Molotov co-signed the letters that triggered the conflict with Yugoslavia. The same calculated motive may have been behind the timing of the announcement of the dissolution of the Cominform, which came on 18 April, six weeks ahead of Tito’s visit. The stage was thus set, as the Kremlin certainly hoped, for Tito to be more responsive to Soviet demands during the forthcoming talks. Four rounds of official Yugoslav-Soviet talks were held in the Kremlin during Tito’s visit.6 The Yugoslav delegation consisted of Tito, Kardelj, Koča Popović and Mićunović, the newly appointed Yugoslav Ambassador in Moscow. The Soviet side was headed by Khrushchev and included Voroshilov, Mikoyan, Bulganin, Molotov and Shepilov, the new Soviet Foreign Minister. The first official round of talks was held on 5 June and was devoted to foreign policy issues and economic cooperation. In his opening statement, Tito emphasized Yugoslavia’s interest in increasing economic cooperation with the Soviet Union and other Eastern European countries. He focused on Yugoslavia’s desire to build aluminium plants with Soviet assistance. Tito, however, insisted on the bilateral character of the economic cooperation. His obvious aim was to pre-empt possible Soviet effort to channel the cooperation through the Comecon. Addressing international issues, Tito underlined the convergence of the Soviet and the Yugoslav positions on many international issues. Speaking about the Middle East, Tito urged the Soviets to provide more aid to the Arab countries of the region, in

particular to Nasser’s Egypt. He confided that his intelligence reports suggested the creation of a Western plot to overthrow Nasser.7 In his opening exposé, Khrushchev reiterated that he fully shared Tito’s views on many international issues. He addressed the issue of Western economic aid to Yugoslavia in a conciliatory manner, commenting that ‘one should be reasonable and take advantage of possibilities offered to Yugoslavia by its current international position’.8 At the end of this round of talks, Tito returned to the issue of the US economic and military aid announcing that Yugoslavia had asked the Americans for the future economic assistance to be in the form of commercial loans, rather than the aid. Tito stressed that this would eliminate Yugoslavia’s moral indebtedness to the US. He also downplayed US military aid, characterizing it as obsolete and largely symbolic. However, according to Tito, Yugoslavia was not presently in a position to cancel it for political reasons. He also underlined that Yugoslavia had never made political concessions to the Americans in return for their aid. Accentuating that he trusted the honesty and friendship of his Yugoslav comrades, Khrushchev, nevertheless, remarked sarcastically that ‘capitalists never give to anyone unless it is to their benefit. If they gave help to the Yugoslavs without political preconditions, it meant that Yugoslavia, as it was, was of use to them’.9 By playing down the importance of the US economic and military aid to Yugoslavia, Tito obviously intended to pre-empt anticipated confrontation with the Soviets over this question. Much of the first round of talks was devoted to Germany and Yugoslavia’s relations with People’s Democracies. On Germany, Khrushchev repeatedly insisted that it was the most important international problem. According to him, it was an issue through which the West would try to exert a blow against socialism. He made it clear that ‘for this reason, the USSR doesn’t even contemplate giving in and that a special effort will be made, together with the countries of Eastern Europe, for a speedy development of East Germany’.10 Khrushchev added that East Germany (GDR) should become the showcase that would demonstrate the advantages of the socialist system. For this reason, according to him, all necessary economic resources would be made available for GDR’s rapid development. Addressing Yugoslavia’s relations with the People’s Democracies, Tito confirmed improvements with Poland, Czechoslovakia and Romania, but not with Bulgaria and Hungary. With regard to Albania, however, Tito was bitter and insisted that reconciliation with Enver Hoxha was impossible. Khrushchev mentioned the brewing crisis in Hungary only in passing. He admitted that things were very difficult there and asserted that ‘undesirable forces are mushrooming [in Hungary]’. Khrushchev insisted that it was Stalin and not Rakosi who was responsible for the present difficulties. He then informed Tito that the Soviet leadership, worried about developments in Hungary, had decided to dispatch Suslov to Budapest in the coming days.11 In continuation of the first day deliberations, Tito also informed the Soviets about his visit to France, several weeks earlier. Khrushchev responded with a detailed account of his visit to the UK, also in May. He described how the Soviets were insulted by Eden’s frosty reception and condescension. According

to Khrushchev, at one point, he and Bulganin had decided to interrupt the visit and return to Moscow but were persuaded against at the very last moment after a sudden positive change in Eden’s attitude. On disarmament, Khrushchev and Tito agreed that efforts should be made for a substantial reduction, especially of nuclear weapons. Kardelj revealed later that when talking off-the-record about disarmament ‘[the Soviets] always added: “Nevertheless, the conflict [with the capitalists] will unavoidably happen one day and we have to arm ourselves. Throughout history, disarmament has always been a fiction” ’.12 Kardelj’s account illustrates the extent to which the post-Stalin Soviet leaderships’ foreign policy outlook was moulded by ideological postulates. At the end of the first day of talks, having agreed that there was high degree of symmetry in their views on international issues, the two delegations concluded that there was no need for further discussions on the subject. The second round of official Yugoslav-Soviet talks was held on 9 June. The agenda for this day consisted of one issue only – relations between the CPSU and the LCY. The beginning of the session was burdened with considerable unease and hesitation. A commentary in the Yugoslav transcript of the talks reveals that,

it seemed as if no one was ready for the discussion on Party matters. For this reason, almost forty minutes of the meeting was spent in conversations about Leningrad from where Comrade Tito returned this morning, on Stalingrad and Kuban where he is going tomorrow, or on the reactions to this visit in the world.13