K. Goes Home

"Goodbye--good luck--friends," said Nikita Sergeevich Khrushchev in fresh-minted English this week as he peered out of TV screens on his last day in the U.S. Typically, he had just turned in a doctrinaire defense of Communism as "the ' most humane and truly just system," and attacked U.S.-style capitalism as immoral because, so he said, the few become rich by the labors of the many, "counter to men's conscience." But Nikita Khrushchev's farewell address, like his farewell press conference and his approach to the U.S. in the final days, was free of bombast and bluster, and characterized by a roughhewn folksiness. Said he: "I am glad of this opportunity to speak to you before my departure. We liked your beautiful cities and wonderful roads, but most of all your amiable and kindhearted people."

Despite its perilous beginnings, the Khrushchev visit had turned out substantially to the U.S.'s advantage. In his second week he had won grudging respect for his energy and his drive, if not for his heavyhanded, oft-reiterated message.

Officially speaking, he had come to the U.S. avowing that he hoped to relax tensions--and, in a way that was probably not on his agenda, he had. In three days of secret talks with President Eisenhower at Camp David, Maryland (see The Presidency), he had given what the U.S. took to be a commitment to lift the ultimatum on West Berlin that he had invoked last November.

There was no settlement of the problem of recognition of East Germany. At his final press conference, Khrushchev stood adamant on Russian determination to recognize the two Germanys, but said amiably: "If you have other suggestions, voice them. But I do not think there is any other way toward peace." The two leaders agreed to increase cultural exchanges, promised vaguely to explore increased trade. On summit talks, the U.S. would not commit itself. But most U.S. experts thought that summit talks would probably follow another go-around at the-foreign ministers' level, where the Camp David understandings would be tested. Said Khrushchev: "The Soviet government and myself feel the time is ripe. I am prepared to go anywhere. Perhaps Geneva is the place."

Khrushchev's departure from the U.S. had something of a sentimental quality. He drove onto the runway of Andrews

Air Force Base, Maryland, in an open car accompanied by Vice President Nixon and Mrs. Khrushchev, who was carrying an enormous bunch of red roses. And Khrushchev replied to Nixon's warm bon voyage with a briefer farewell address that was perhaps his most effective statement in the U.S. Said Nikita Khrushchev: "As a result of the useful talks we had with President Eisenhower, we came to the agreement that all of the pending international questions should not be settled by force but by peaceful means--by negotiation. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart for your hospitality and, as we say in Russia, for your bread and salt. Let us have more and more use for the short American word 'O.K.' " And Nikita Khrushchev was gone.

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