-Caveat Lector-
an excerpt from:
>From Major Jordan's Diaries
George Racey Jordan©1952 All rights reserved
LCCN 52-6448
Western Islands
395 Concord Avenue
Belmont. Massachusetts 02178
PRINTING HISTORY
Harcourt, Brace edition published 1952
Free Enterprise edition published 1958
American Opinion edition published 1961
The Americanist Library edition published 1965
170pps — out-of-print
--[10]--
CHAPTER TEN
My Visit to the State Department in 1944
The stream of "diplomatic suitcases" passing without inspection through Great
Falls weighed more heavily than ever upon my conscience. During January,
1944, I made a special trip to Washington to see whether something couldn't
be done.
When I explained my intention to Colonel ONeill, he agreed the matter was
important enough for a trip to the Capital and promised to issue the
necessary orders. I left Great Falls on Jan. 4, 1944, which was my 46th
birthday.
Because Colonel and Mrs. Kotikov wished to visit New York at this time, I got
first-class transportation. The C-47 in which we traveled belonged to the
unsuspecting Colonel Kotikov, and bore the Russian red star. Lt. Col. Boaz
was our pilot and when we landed in Minneapolis we were photographed by The
Minneapolis Star.
I reached Washington on the afternoon of January 6. The next morning I went
to ATC headquarters at Gravelly Point, and spent the day being shuttled back
and forth among eight different offices. On the following morning I appealed
to Colonel Paige, who suggested that I try the Chief Air Inspector, Brigadier
General Junius W. Jones. General Jones afterwards denied that he ever met me,
but my diary entry for Jan. 8 reads: "Saw Gen. Jones, Col. Wilson, Col.
Vander Lugt." As a matter of fact, Jones listened to me for fifteen minutes,
and promised to send one of his ace inspectors to Great Falls. He said this
officer would be Lt. Colonel Robert H. Dahn, who actually arrived on Jan. 25.
That afternoon I went to the old State Department Building on Pennsylvania
Avenue. I had been directed to John Newbold Hazard, liaison officer for
Lend-Lease. He was soon to act as special adviser to Vice-President Wallace
on a mission to the Soviet Union and China, and is today professor of public
law at Columbia University and director of its Russian Institute. I was not
to meet Mr. Hazard, however, until some months later at a meeting of the
Washington Forum.
>From his private office, after I was announced, came a young assistant.
"Major Jordan," he began, "we know all about you, why you are here. You might
as well understand that officers who get too officious are likely to find
themselves on an island somewhere in the South Seas."
With natural anger, I retorted that I didn't think the State
Department had any idea how flagrant abuses were at Great Falls. I said we
had virtually no censorship, or immi-gration or customs inspection. Crowds of
Russians were coming in of whom we had no record. Photostats of military,
reports from American attaches in Moscow were being returned to the Kremlin.
Planeloads of suitcases, filled with confidential data, were passing every
three weeks without inspection, under the guise of "diplomatic immunity."
"But, my dear Major," I was admonished with a jaunty wave of the hand, "we
know all about that. The Russians can't do anything, or send anything out of
this country, without our knowledge and consent. They have to apply to the
State Department for everything. I assure you the Department knows exactly
what it is doing. Good afternoon."
I returned to Great Falls in low spirits. But I took heart from Colonel
Bernard C. Hahn, another of General Jones's Inspectors who did not conceal
his indignation after I took him over the base and showed him the things I
had protested. about. "What can we do?" he asked. I replied that the State
Department was hopeless, and that our best chance was to call in Army
Counter-Intelligence.
Colonel Kotikov was displeased when he learned of this turn of events, and
let me understand that he knew I was responsible. An overall report was
drafted, but has never been made public. Its existence was confirmed to me in
1949 by the FBI, through their questions.
On March 28, 1944, however, a report had been prepared, by an unidentified
special agent of Counter-Intelligence. It. ran, in part, as follows:
On 13 March, 1944, while in the performance of official duties, this agent
had occasion to contact Major George Racey Jordan, United Nations
Representative at
East Base, Great Falls, Mont. . . . Major Jordan stated that he was desirous
of conveying certain information to intelligence authorities....
There is an incredible amount of diplomatic mail sent to Russia through Great
Falls . . . All of this was pro-tected from censorship by diplomatic
immunity. It may be significant that it is not at all uncommon for the
Rus-sian mail or freight shipment to be accompanied by two men who openly
state that they are to see that the mail or freight is not examined and the
diplomatic immunity privilege violated....
This agent observed that Major Jordan appeared to maintain accurate, detailed
files and was very anxious to convey his information through intelligence
channels. He requested that he be contacted at a time when the Russian
activity could be outlined in minute detail, and was advised that this would
be done....
It is recommended that a prolonged interview be conducted with Major Jordan;
that his records be scrutinized for information of an intelligence nature;
and that he be contacted regularly.
It is further recommended that the facts contained herein be given due
consideration, with a view to contacting the State Department in order that
they may be made cognizant of the situation and that corrective measures be
taken.[1]
The recommendations were indorsed by the Acting Adjutant General of the U. S.
Army, Brigadier General Robert H. Dunlop, who urged that their adoption, in
his judgment, would result in "a more comprehensive enforcement of existing
laws and regulations than hitherto has been the case."[2]
When the report and indorsement arrived at the State Department, it was
necessary to make at least a show of activity. The matter was assigned to
Charles E. Bohlen, who later became Counselor of the Department. A specialist
on Russia, he acted at Teheran and Yalta as interpreter for Mr. Roosevelt,
and at Potsdam as political adviser to Mr. Truman. On July 6 Bohlen called a
meeting of representatives of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Office of
Censorship, Military Intelligence, Air Transport Command, Immigration and
Naturalization Service, Bureau of Customs, Foreign Economic Administration
and State Department. If any minutes or memoranda of the session were
recorded by the Department of State, they were not made available from its
files when the Un-American Activities Committee asked for them in 1950.
Bohlen had an interview with the Second Secretary of the Soviet Embassy, and
followed with a written memorandum dated July 28. It presented a statement of
U. S. customs and censorship regulations, and advised that in future they
would be enforced. The warning appears to have been ignored completely. On
Sept. 20, 1944 security officers at Great Falls reported that a C-47 left for
Moscow with 3,800 Pounds of non-diplomatic records. They had not been
censored and were therefore in violation of the Espionage Act. But local
officers did not dare to remove the shipment from the Pipeline.
An explanation of their timidity was found in a notarize statement submitted
to the Un-American Activities Committee by Captain Harry Decker, chief of a
new Traffic Control Unit set up in July, 1944 at Great Falls. Its function
was to make sure that overseas personnel and cargo, in and outbound, were
checked by the proper civilian agencies.
Customs, Immigration, Censorship and the FBI now had staffs at Great Falls.
Captain Decker had learned, as I had had to, that it was possible to force
the Russians to accept inspection by refusing to clear American pilots flying
Soviet planes. Beyond that, nothing could be done. Captain Decker said he
had asked again and again for authority to ground any plane bearing
contraband persons or freight, and to hold it until the offense was
rectified.
He was enlightened by a high official of the Department of Commerce, Irving
Weiss, who made a trip to Great Falls. Such authority, Weiss told him, could
be granted only by a top-echelon decision of the State Department, the Board
of Economic Welfare and the President's Protocol Committee. "It seemed,"
Captain Decker observed ruefully, "that the power of enforcement lay at very
high levels beyond the reach of us there."[3] Needless to say, no enforcement
or was issued.
By this time, I was no longer at Great Falls.
pps. 111-114
--[cont]--
Aloha, He'Ping,
Om, Shalom, Salaam.
Em Hotep, Peace Be,
Omnia Bona Bonis,
All My Relations.
Adieu, Adios, Aloha.
Amen.
Roads End
Kris
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