als, Christians, agrarians, and partisans ofrnthe Western model. Emphatically, thernreturned parties are not communist, althoughrnthey retain certain familiar features:rna predilection for centralism, arnrougher tone vis-a-vis the West (whosernweakness they detect better than thernliberals), a tougher trade and customsrnpolicy, and a more forceful insistencernon reducing the debilitating foreignrndebt—contracted in the past by therncommunists!rnNone of this cancels the ills mentionedrneadier, but it does signal a greaterrnsocial discipline. Watching the situationrnin Hungary at the end of 1994 and comparingrnit with that of the year before, Irnfound that a once-rebellious public nowrnsubmitted almost meekly to the government’srndecisions, for example againstrnstrikers. And they meekly submittedrneven when these decisions hurt, like thernsteep increase in the price of foodstuffrnand fuel. Let’s be cynical: Was it becausernthe media, one after another,rnpassed into government hands?rnThomas Molnar’s latest book isrnThe Emerging Atlantic Culturern(Transaction).rnPROPAGANDArnSoviet Spies andrnAgents of Influencernby Arnold BeichmanrnProbably the greatest triumph in publicrnopinion manipulation in modernrnhistory was the West’s elevation of thernSoviet Union into a symbol of righteousnessrnand a country beyond criticism.rnThis triumph was all the more notablernbecause from day one of the BolshevikrnRevolution, Lenin’s system, to quoternRobert Conquest, “had as one of itsrnmain characteristics falsification on anrnenormous scale.”rnThis successful manipulation ofrnWestern public opinion was made possiblernbecause of Soviet penetration ofrnWestern journalism and the academyrnand the political culture of the Westernrndemocracies. The British public, for example,rnwas recently in a flap over the revelationrnin the London Spectator that onernof Britain’s distinguished dailies, thernGuardian, had as an editor an admittedrnSoviet spy who took money from thernKGB. In resigning from the newspaper,rnthe editor, Richard Gott, admitted hernhad taken the money but said it was onlyrnfor travel expenses to European citiesrnto meet a Soviet official sent fromrnMoscow. His admission that he tookrnthese secret KGB payments, of course,rntaints his demurrers. The KGB does notrnhand out money except for services rendered,rnas Aldrich Ames and other KGBrnspies have testified.rnThe British press has also opened uprnabout British citizens who were recipientsrnof Soviet subsidies not for actualrnspying but for acting as propagandists forrnthe Soviet cause, as agents of influence,rnhi time, American public opinion willrnalso demand to know who our agents ofrninfluence were during the Cold War,rnthose Americans who were always readyrnin the name of world peace or socialismrnto explain avva’ Soviet or Maoist atrocitiesrnand in the process to denounce anticommunismrnas Cold War propaganda.rnThe self-willed assignment of suchrnagents of influence was not necessarily tornact as spies for the Soviet Union, as KimrnPhilby or Alger Hiss did, but under arncloak of innocent respectability to exploitrntheir prestige and moral authorityrnin support of Soviet actions, particularlyrnin foreign policy. Some of these agentsrnof influence were probably on a KGBrnpayroll; others, businessmen like ArmandrnHammer, were on a different kindrnof “payroll.” Thev benefited financiallyrnfrom their Soviet connection and stillrnothers, true believers, were unwittingrnagents of influence.rnThat the United States had a plethorarnof such agents during the Cold Warrnis undeniable. Even without any KGBrnarchival revelations, there is no questionrnthat men like Vice President Henry A.rnWallace or American ambassador to thernSoviet Union Joseph Davies were, in everyrnawful sense of the phrase, wittingrnagents of influence, whose apologies forrnSoviet foreign policy were helpful to thernenemy’s cause.rnHollywood even took Davies’ pro-rnStalin book Mission to Moscow, and withrnthe help of Warner Brothers turned itrninto one of the sleaziest pro-Sovietrnpropaganda films ever made outside thernSoviet Union. Later in 1946, Davies,rnever the Soviet agent of influence, said inrnan Associated Press interview: “Russia inrnself-defense has every moral right to seekrnatomic-bomb secrets through militaryrnespionage if excluded from such informationrnby her former fighting allies.”rnFor helping Russia to exercise thatrn”moral right,” as Davies called it, spiesrnJulius and Ethel Rosenberg went to thernelectric chair.rnWhile Wallace and Davies were wittingrnagents of influence, Harry Hopkins,rnon the other hand, was probably an unwittingrnagent of influence. Here is whatrnMr. Hopkins, probably the advisor closestrnto President Roosevelt during the warrnyears, said in 1945, after the calamitousrnYalta conference: “In our hearts we reallyrnbelieved a new day had dawned. . . .rnThe Russians had proved that they couldrnbe reasonable and farsighted and neitherrnthe President nor any one of us had thernslightest doubt that we could live withrnthem and get on peaceably with themrnfar into the future.”rnRegarding Henry Wallace, we will onernday have to decide what role he reallvrnplayed during Stalin’s reign. From myrnstudies of his career as wartime Vice President,rnthere is no question that Wallacernwas the preeminent witting agent of influencernwhose political activities servedrnthe Soviet cause to an extraordinary degree.rnOne shudders to think what mightrnhave happened had President Roosevelt,rnrunning for a fourth term in 1944, allowedrnWallace to remain on the Democraticrnticket as his running-mate insteadrnof switching to Harry Truman.rnAs Secretary of Commerce, until Trumanrnfired him in 1946, as well as in thernyears thereafter, Wallace engaged in sornmany pro-Soviet activities—defendingrnthe 1948 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia,rnrunning for President in 1948 asrnthe candidate of the openly Communist-rncontrolled Progressive Party—thatrnthere is no escaping the conclusion thatrnWallace was an ally of Joseph Stalin.rnWallace did not break with Moscow untilrn1950, when he blamed the SovietrnLhiion for instigating North Korea’srnaggression against South Korea.rnIn the realm of journalism, long beforernthe Guardian’s Richard Gott, therernwas another agent of influence of Britishrnorigin, Walter Duranty, the PulitzerrnPrize-winning New Yor^ Times correspondent.rnHe and others like him in thernearly years of the Soviet Union concealedrnthe truth about what is today recognizedrn46/CHRONlCLESrnrnrn