Caviar & Encomiums

Moscow's lingering chagrin over Svetlana Alliluyeva's defection may have been mitigated somewhat last week by the spectacle of four earnest young Americans describing to Russian audiences their desertion from the aircraft carrier Intrepid as a protest against the Viet Nam war. "They're playing it big," sighed a U.S. official. Twice aired on Soviet television and displayed in Pravda, the self-proclaimed "patriotic deserters" were in Moscow in transit to a neutral country where they might "give all our strength to the struggle against the immoral, inhuman war."

The four enlisted men--Richard D. Bailey, 19, Jacksonville, Fla.; Michael A. Lindner, 19, Mount Pocono, Pa.; Craig W. Anderson, 20, San Jose, Calif.; and John Barilla, 20, Catonsville, Md.--were slipped out of Japan aboard the Soviet liner Baikal Nov. 11, two days before their desertion was trumpeted in a 16-mm. filmed interview.

Baggy Suits. Bailey decided after seeing peace demonstrations in the U.S. that he "was participating in murder" by assisting in the launching of air strikes from the carrier. Lindner, making the farfetched claim of having seen the flash of bombs dropping on North Viet Nam at night (carriers operate too far from the coast for crewmen to witness strikes), argued that the war was "immoral." Anderson urged others "to follow in our footsteps," said he did not believe the majority of pilots "were in favor of the war" but preferred to remain silent. Barilla declared that he was "against war, all war," and that "the majority of Americans do not want to fight in Viet Nam." Their willing hosts clucked in satisfaction. One interviewer applauded them for choosing "a path of courage." Pravda praised "their brave decision, dictated by human conscience."

Moscow provided baggy civilian suits and political sanctuary for the four, prompting the U.S. to summon Soviet Ambassador Anatoly F. Dobrynin to the State Department, where Deputy Under Secretary of State Foy D. Kohler orally protested the "highly improper" Soviet behavior of "assisting, harboring and exploiting" the men. "Such conduct cannot fail to complicate further the relations between our two countries," said Kohler. At the request of the four men, according to the Soviet Foreign Ministry, access to them was denied U.S. embassy representatives and Western newsmen.

"It would appear I have lost a son," said Bailey's father, a former Navy fighter pilot. And while most Americans sat down to a turkey dinner on Thanksgiving, the quartet settled for black caviar and Red encomiums.

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