“As we enter the 1980s …”
In March 1980, the Voice of America radio-station broadcast an interview with Sakharov entitled “Some Thoughts as we Enter the 1980s”.
(He gave the interview in written form on 22 February 1980 to a Washington Post correspondent. The newspaper published his answers on 9 March 1980.)
QUESTION 1:
What is the future of the Soviet human rights movement in the 1980s?
“In answering this and other questions about the future, I can only voice my own fears and hopes: I cannot make any forecasts.
“In the 1980s we will be working in difficult conditions. Taking advantage of this period in which the international situation is becoming generally more serious, the authorities have made massive attempts to stifle dissent wherever it appears, whether in Moscow or the provinces. This attack is directed against the human rights movement as a whole: against samizdat periodicals which are independent of the authorities (e.g., the information journal A Chronicle of Current Events, the journal of debate Poiski [Searches]) and against members of the Helsinki Groups, as well as related Commissions, such as those dealing with psychiatry and religious problems. Religious persecution has increased, the number of exit visas granted has dropped dramatically, and the persecution of Crimean Tatars has intensified.
“The measures taken against me are part of an extensive campaign against dissenters. The statements I made about events in Afghanistan were probably the immediate cause of these measures, but I imagine that they were prepared long ago.
“Over the past few months, Tatyana Velikanova and Victor Nekipelov have been arrested; and criminal proceedings have been instituted against Malva Landa. These people have worked selflessly for many years for the human rights cause and are greatly respected and loved. Their imprisonment (like that of Sergei Kovalyov and Yury Orlov who were sentenced before them) is of particular importance to the authorities since each of them combines in his or her activities all the various strands of the struggle for human rights in the USSR.
The following have also been arrested:
- Valery Abramkin, Yury Grimm and Victor Sokirko (Poiski),
- Viacheslav Bakhmin (The Working Commission to Investigate the Use of Psychiatry for Political Purposes),
- Antanas Terleckas and Julius Sasnauskas (Lithuania).
- Fathers Yakunin and Dudko, Lev Regelson and Presbyter Goretoi (religious persecution).
The following have been given long terms of imprisonment:
- Gorbal, Yury Litvin, Badzyo and Alexander Berdnik (Ukraine),
- Reshat Dzhemilev and Rollan Kadiyev (Crimean Tatars).
- Kovalyov, Orlov, Shcharansky, Bolonkin, Tykhy, Rudenko, Lukyanenko, Petkus, Ogurtsov; many others who were sentenced earlier are living in very difficult conditions.
“Vladimir Shelkov, the spiritual head of the Adventist church has died in Yakutia aged 84 [CCE 56.2]. He was sentenced one year ago for writing a letter to the [CSCE] Conference in Belgrade about the persecution of believers and for his religious publishing activities. Sentencing an 83-year-old man was, in itself, an appalling act of inhumanity.
“There is every reason to fear further repression.
“I appeal to world public opinion, to Amnesty International and other human rights organizations, to government figures in all countries, not to slacken their efforts to defend prisoners of conscience in the USSR, and equally in other countries. I am convinced that the work of defending human rights in the USSR will continue, even in the present, more difficult conditions. At any rate, no one can erase what has already been brought to the attention of the entire world.”
QUESTION 2:
What, in your view, was the significance of the human rights movement in the 1970s? Did it have any real impact on the inner life of the USSR?
“The moral significance of the human rights movement in the USSR, which was formed in the mid-1960s, has been enormous, although the movement itself is small in numbers and, on principle, apolitical.
Andrei Dmitrievich SAKHAROV, 1921-1989
“It changed the moral climate and created the spiritual preconditions needed for democratic changes in the USSR and for the formulation of an ideology of human rights throughout the world.
Dangerous illusions about the essential characteristics of our system, which at one time were almost universal among Western intellectuals, became far less widespread. Today they are virtually non-existent. I myself was attracted and influenced by the human rights movement of the mid-1960s, which left a deep imprint on my general attitudes and the nature of my public activities.”
[Question 3 and Sakharov’s reply are omitted]
QUESTION 4:
Will the authorities gain, or try to gain, greater control over the country’s internal life?
“I fear they will…”
[Questions 5-9 and Sakharov’s replies are omitted]
QUESTION 10:
Will you continue to speak from Gorky on matters you consider important?
“I do not recognize the legality of the restrictions imposed on me, especially on my right to speak on any issue I consider crucially important for our country and the entire world, and for people whose rights are, I firmly believe, being violated.
“I’m aware that each time I speak out in this way I may be attracting unlawful repression and Mafia-type measures against myself and my family. I am counting on people of integrity in the USSR and throughout the world — government figures, scientific colleagues and all who cherish freedom of speech and world peace — to actively defend my rights.
“I am grateful to all who have spoken out in defence of my rights.”
*
On 26 April 1980, Sakharov replied to a question sent to him:
“The idea of boycotting the Moscow Olympic Games [summer 1980] because of the invasion of Afghanistan is being discussed everywhere. But in my opinion there is no uncertainty.
“The USSR is engaged in military activities which are condemned by most countries throughout the world. It is precisely the separation of sport from politics which calls for refusal to take part in the Olympic Games. Otherwise, each participant and each spectator is indirectly participating in this war — and war is war, no matter how those conducting it try to explain it.
“I am speaking now the day after a great tragedy: the failure of the attempt to free the hostages in Tehran. I might have been able to breathe a sigh of relief, as after the Entebbe raid. But this was not to be. One should not pass judgment on this bold, noble attempt. It is important, however, that the Americans and their allies should now try to understand why the attempt failed, analyse the causes of the Iranian crisis and other dangerous crises of the present time, and, through the combined efforts of many countries obtain the release of the hostages. It is wrong to look on this as the responsibility of the American government alone.
“I have written these few words at the request of Dutch friends, but they are not addressed only to the Dutch, but also to the Americans, who are ever present in my thoughts during this difficult period, and to people throughout the world.”
*
On 4 March 1980, after arriving from Gorky early that morning, Liza Alexeyeva telephoned foreign correspondents and invited them to a press conference in Sakharov’s Moscow flat, starting at 12.30 pm. (Yelena Bonner was in Gorky at the time.)
Two people arrived at the flat at 11 am.
They told Rufa Bonner that criminal elements were gathering in the flat (registered in her name) and that press conferences were being organized there for foreign correspondents. This was illegal, they said, and if it continued Rufa Grigoryevna could be prosecuted; Mrs Bonner will be 80 this August. They were from the Moscow city procurator’s office, they told her. Rufa Bonner finally persuaded them to tell her their surnames: Golovnin and Baryshev (only Golovnin produced an identity card).
At 11.30 am a police cordon was set up outside the doors of the flat. Virtually no one was allowed to enter it that day.
On the days which followed, Soviet citizens were admitted if they produced their ID documents (‘passports’). On 17 March 1980 in the morning Yelena Bonner arrived from Gorky. In the evening of that day the cordon was taken away.
On 21 March 1980, Sophia Kalistratova, a member of the Moscow Helsinki Group, found an anonymous note in her post-box: “Measures are being planned to curtail Yelena Bonner’s activities as a messenger.”
That same day Ivan Kovalyov, also a member of the Moscow Helsinki Group, found a similar note in his post. Tatyana Velikanova’s children were issued a similar ‘warning’ by telephone.
*
In Gorky, on 19 March 1980, policemen seized SAKHAROV in the street and pushed him into a car in order to take him to ‘report’ at the station (he refused to go of his own free will).
Sakharov protested. People began to gather round. The police then released him and he returned home. After a while, without any invitation from Sakharov, the head of the post office next door to Sakharov’s apartment block called on him; she always delivers Sakharov’s post in person. She took a telegram to Moscow which Sakharov had written. The telegram was sent from Gorky at noon on 20 March 1980. It reached its destination at 6.00 pm. (After this, on days when Yelena Bonner had gone to Moscow, leaving Sakharov alone, he began to receive regular summonses to the police.)
On 20 March 1980, the police drew up a record concerning Sakharov’s ‘malicious disobedience’. He refused to counter-sign it.
Around this time, at her Moscow address, Yelena Bonner received an order from a Gorky judge, fining her 50 roubles for “petty hooliganism in a public place”. During her next visit to Gorky, she found out that she had committed this ‘petty hooliganism’ on 15 February when, not finding Yury Shikhanovich at home (see above), she went to the support point to tell Captain Snezhnitsky “exactly what she thought of him”.
*
Three scientific papers, which Sakharov submitted on 21 January 1980 to the Physics Institute of the Academy of Sciences [PIAS] for the publication of off-prints in English, a customary procedure, were not approved by Glavlit, the official censorship body.
To make photocopies in PIAS of his old (published) works, special permission is required. The photocopying of the works of other scientists does not require such permission.
At the end of April 1980, Sakharov completed a paper, which he wrote in Gorky: “Cosmological Models of the Universe and the Turn of Time’s Arrow”.
*
Protests about Sakharov’s exile
Sakharov’s exile has aroused numerous protests:
- A collective “Open Statement” (23 January 1980, 10 signatures),
- A statement by the Lithuanian Helsinki Group to the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Soviet (Document No. 26, 29 January 1980),
- Letters to the editors of Izvestiya (29 January 1980) from engineer Arie Mizyakin
(CCE 37./// to CCE 39 & CCE 45)and the writer Vladimir Voinovich, - Moscow Helsinki Group statement “In Defence of Academician A.D. Sakharov” (Document No. 121, 29 January 1980),
- a statement by the Action Group to Defend the Disabled (29 January 1980),
- a collective letter written by literary figures (29 January 1980, 15 signatures),
- a statement by writer Bella Akhmadulina (30 January 1980),
- a letter from the Catholic Committee for the Defence of Believers Rights (Document No. 30, 7 February 1980),
- an “Open Letter in Defence of Andrei Sakharov” from Yelena Bonner (9 February 1980),
- a statement by A.F. Arendar, Chelyabinsk resident, to the Chairman of the USSR Supreme Court (9 February 1980),
- statement from political exile Vadim Konovalikhin (CCE 52.6 & CCE 54.15) to the USSR procurator’s office (22 February 1980), and
- Open Letter from Anatoly Marchenko to Academician Pyotr L. Kapitsa (1 March 1980).
The following is an excerpt from the collective ‘Open Statement’ [1]:
“Andrei Sakharov embodies the conscience of our country. Andrei Sakharov is the pride of his country and people, both as a humanist and as a scientist… The exile of Andrei Sakharov is a tragedy and a disgrace for our country.”
Voinovich [No. 3 above] wrote:
“Allow me to use your newspaper to express my feelings of disgust for all the organizations, work collectives and individuals who have taken, or are still taking part in the hounding of the best person m our country, Andrei Dmitrievich SAKHAROV.”
An excerpt from the statement [No. 4] issued by the Moscow Helsinki Group:
“A.D. Sakharov did not ‘move’ to Gorky, he did not leave Moscow, he was exiled, subjected to the criminal punishment of exile without being sentenced…
“The published legislation of our country does not make any provision for administrative exile.
“The lawlessness and tyranny committed against A.D. Sakharov which have caused alarm throughout the world, are profoundly ominous, not just in themselves. They set a terrible precedent for every free-thinking person in our country. Now anyone can be seized in the street, at work or at home, and before evening it will turn out that he or she has ‘moved’ to another town and been placed under open surveillance.”
The following is an excerpt from the letter [No. 6] written by literary figures — the artist Boris Birger and the priest Sergy Zheludkov are among those who signed it:
“The name of Andrei Sakharov has become synonymous with benevolence, heroism and humanity.
“Who could possibly profit from hounding and persecuting the first Russian winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, a man who, in the eyes of hundreds of millions of people all over the world enhanced and maintained the prestige of our Motherland, a man who personifies its honour and dignity?
“Only those who want the dark times of Stalinism to return. Let us think again. If today it is possible to persecute Andrei Sakharov, then tomorrow the whole nation can expect the same.”
The 15 people who signed the letter included four members of the Union of Soviet Writers. Three of them, Sarra Babyonysheva, Raisa Orlova and Felix Svetov, were expelled from the Writers’ Union as a result (see “Miscellaneous Reports”, CCE 56.25).
Yelena Bonner’s letter [No. 9] states in part:
“Businessmen and politicians, journalists and scientists, simply private individuals who have travelled to see Russia and Sakharov… I appeal to you to give evidence under oath in the courts and the government and public commissions of your countries concerning the substance of your conversations with Andrei Sakharov. My husband’s life depends on your memory and persistence. He has been denied his right to a trial, and as soon as you forget about him or fall silent, they will pounce on him.
“I appeal to scientists. The radio brings us the voices of Western scientists and each one brings us joy. We believe that their voices will not fall silent until Andrei Sakharov is given back his right to think, speak and live as a free person.
“But Soviet scientists are silent… Sakharov’s colleagues in the West — do not interpret this silence as a protest! The authorities have not ordered a smear campaign. It is in their interests to deceive you with silence, so that you make contact with silent people.
“Of course, the Soviet Union is a difficult place for those who do not keep silent; but now silence is no defence. In appealing for defence of Sakharov, I am appealing to you, Soviet scientists, to defend yourselves and your right to be human beings.
“I appeal to you to visit Sakharov. He is forbidden to meet foreigners and criminal elements, but he is not forbidden to see you, the respected Soviet colleagues of my husband. I can offer you hospitality whenever you come to the one-man prison with which they have ‘humanely’ provided Sakharov so that, using your silence, they can put an end to this abnormal phenomenon of our common life.
“My thoughts turn to the physicists. I have heard so many good things about you from Andrei. The very word ‘physicist’ has a special meaning for him and to this day he is sure that physicists are essentially good, courageous people.
“Today I feel like crying out: where are you, Soviet physicists? Surely the competent agencies are not longer and higher than your science?”
*
Anatoly Marchenko to Kapitza
In his open letter [No. 12] to Academician Pyotr Kapitza, Marchenko states:
“… Why do you — a worthy and respected scientist with a world-famous name — say nothing? … Are you really not offended, as a Nobel laureate, that a Nobel Prize is interpreted as a reward for anti-Soviet activities?
“You can reassure yourself, of course, by saying: ‘Unlike other Academicians, I have signed nothing against Sakharov and do not intend to do so’.
“Indeed, many Academicians have shown themselves to be scoundrels over the Sakharov case. But you need not stoop to their level, Pyotr Leonidovich. More is demanded of a good man. Let others look to you as an example. Give your colleagues, fellow-scientists and students an example worth following … Is it possible that the only reason the Soviet Academy will be remembered is its active or passive involvement in the destruction of its people’s best sons?
“It connived [in 1943] when Academician Nikolai Vavilov, who devoted all his talents to the world-wide control of famine, was starving to death in Saratov Prison.
“It connived [in 1946] when Academician Pyotr Kapitza was banned from scientific work and thrown out of the institute which he himself had founded.
“It is conniving now, when disgusting scum are shutting Sakharov’s mouth and immobilizing his pen …
“Was Vladimir Ilych [Lenin] the wisest of the wise when he said: ‘The intelligentsia are not the brain of the nation, but its shit?’
“Luckily, he was not correct: in the past our intelligentsia included Pryanishnikov [note 3] and Kapitza; today it includes Sakharov, Orlov and Kovalyov. But perhaps, Pyotr Leonidovich, Kapitza should not yet be thought of in the past tense? Gold, as they say, shines even in muck.
“Knowing how busy you are, I do not expect any reply; and this is not a personal letter.”
*
On 6 February 1980, Vyacheslav Bakhmin, Sophia Kalistratova, Ivan Kovalyov, Alexander Lavut, Tatyana Osipova, Alexander Romanov and Leonard Ternovsky sent the following statement to the UN Commission on Human Rights:
“We have learned of the Commission’s intention to focus on the situation of Academician Sakharov.
“In this connection we request you to consider Document No. 121 of the Moscow Helsinki Group, written in defence of Academician Sakharov, and also his own statement describing the regime imposed on him in exile. We would draw the Commission’s particular attention to the fact that Sakharov’s unlawful exile cannot be viewed in isolation from the arrests of defenders of the rule of law in recent months, the sharp increase in the extrajudicial pressure which has been brought to bear on them, and the arrests currently being prepared.
We hope that the disgraceful measures taken by the Soviet authorities against A.D. Sakharov, and indeed the general campaign of repression against the entire movement to defend the rule of law of which this exile is the newest culmination, will be properly evaluated.
(Three of the seven authors of this statement — Bakhmin & Ternovsky (CCE 56.4); and Alexander Lavut CCE 56.6 — have already been arrested.)
*
On 25 January 1980, Vazif MEILANOV staged a one-man demonstration in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan (North Caucasus) to protest against Sakharov’s exile. He was arrested a few minutes later (see “Arrests”, CCE 56.13).
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NOTES
(Sub-headings have been added to this long text, JC 2023.)
Andrei Sakharov remained in Gorky (Nizhny Novgorod) until mid-December 1986.
Following the death in prison of Anatoly Marchenko, he was invited back to Moscow by the then CPSU Secretary-General Mikhail Gorbachev: see the Bukovsky Archive, 9 December 1986, 2407-CH (“Sakharov and Bonner”) and “Vesti iz SSSR” [R], “The liberation of Sakharov and Bonner” (No. 24, 31 December 1986).
***
[2] See P. Dornan’s chapter in Rudolf Tokes (ed.), Dissent in the USSR, Johns Hopkins UP: Baltimore, 1975 (p. 406), for an analysis of the official distortions of this episode.
[3] Dmitry N. Pryanishnikov (1865-1948) was an eminent agrobiologist. Noted for his “decency and civil courage”, he approached both Beria and Stalin in an attempt to secure Nikolai Vavilov’s release.
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A Chronicle of Current Events 