Those Sinister Muscovites
"One of Our Submarines is Missing" by Thomas Dolby - apparently inspired by the death of his uncle aboard one of the Royal Navy's submarines. Playing in the background and definitely one of my favourite TD songs. The lyrics imply that the sub was loitering in the Baltic hence spying on those damned Russians during the Cold War, I'll be bound.
Here's another one- Michael Caine served in the Korean War - in Korea - as a national serviceman. Then he featured in a film about the Korean War - "A Hill In Korea", filmed here in the UK, which must have seemed a little strange. And of course the Korean War would never have taken place if it weren't for Stalin deciding to meddle in the peninsula. Those damn Russians again!
And where - as I blogged earlier - has young Eddy Snowden vanished to? Imagine it, an American espionage expert who is seeking asylum, who happens to turn up at Sheremetyevo Airport and who nobody will really miss if he <ahem> "goes missing" <cough coughSiberiacough> Ah them wily Russians at it again!
Actually
Silliness aside, I don't really dislike or fear the Russians, and got into trouble at school in the 1970's (yes I am really that old) defending them, and later in the 80's for being interested in Russian culture and art. The Strugatsky Brothers wrote some corking science-fiction that was definitely different from the Western version, then you had Russian classical composers, awesome Russian chess players, Andrei Tarkovsky the film director and literary giants such as Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky and Gogol. Try explaining to your 1980's contemporaries that not every Russian male is an agent of the KGB who would die happy if he could rip your evil capitalist throat out with his bare teeth, or that every Russian woman was not a svelte Mata-Hari-esque seductress who could kiss or kill with equal facility.
Whilst the Soviet Union liked to project an air of competence and ruthless efficiency, the truth was rather different - bureaucratic inertia and rampant skiving. Here's a telling joke:
A CIA agent is parachuted into Russia, but decides to pack it in before starting and heads for the nearest town and the KGB offices there in order to give himself up. He goes into the Reception area and speaks to the clerk there.
"Hello, I'm an American spy and I've come to give myself up."
The clerk eyes him in a measuring way.
"What is your mission here? Propaganda? Assassination? Sabotage?" he snaps.
"Sabotage,' confesses the American.
"Then you need the First Floor. See the clerk there."
The spy takes the lift to the First Floor, encountering the security guard on reception there.
"Hello, I'm an American spy and I've come to give myself up," elaborates the spy.
"You are here to commit acts of sabotage?" asks the guard. The American nods.
"What kind of sabotage? Against buildings? Transport? Industrial sites?"
"Ah - transport," the American clarifies.
The guard tuts.
"Wrong floor. You need the Third Floor. Use the lift."
The American uses the lift and debarks on the Third Floor, where he again encounters
a guard at the reception desk.
"Hello, I'm an American spy and I've come to give myself up," he repeats.
The guard stares at him.
"You are here to sabotage transport facilities?"
"Yes."
The guard snorts.
"Wrong floor. You need the Fifth Floor. Use the stairs, the lift is broken."
The spy clambers up the stairs and encounters a guard at the reception there.
"Hello, I'm an American spy and I've come to give myself up," gasps the sweating spy.
"Sabotage of transport? What type! Road, rail, air or marine?" barks the guard.
"Rail," says the spy.
"Down the corridor, fourth door on the right," explains the guard, going back to his
newspaper.
The spy walks down the corridor, knocks and enters the fourth room. Inside a man
behind a desk looks up with annoyance.
"Hello, I'm an American spy and I've come to give myself up," repeats the spy.
The man behind the desk looks at the wall clock.
"Look," he says. "It's five to five on a Friday afternoon. Can't you come back on
Monday morning?"
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