Soviet America: Popular Responses to the United States in Post-World War II Soviet Union
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Soviet America: Popular Responses to the United States in Post-World War II Soviet Union By Copyright 2012 Konstantin Valentinovich Avramov Submitted to the graduate degree program in History and the Graduate Faculty of the University of Kansas in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. ________________________________ Chairperson Eve Levin ________________________________ Nathaniel D. Wood ________________________________ David Stone ________________________________ Theodore A. Wilson ________________________________ Edith W. Clowes Date Defended: June 15, 2012 The Dissertation Committee for Konstantin Valentinovich Avramov certifies that this is the approved version of the following dissertation: Soviet America: Popular Responses to the United States in Post-World War II Soviet Union ________________________________ Chairperson Eve Levin Date approved: June 15, 2012 ii ABSTRACT KONSTANTIN AVRAMOV: Soviet America: Popular Responses to the United States in post-World War II Soviet Union In this work, I attempt to explore how average Soviet people reacted to the images and depictions of America presented to them through official and unofficial channels from both sides of the Iron Curtain during the Cold War. I argue that average Soviet citizens’ view of America was primarily informed by, and closely followed that of official propaganda. Deprived of any coherent information about America, Soviet citizens fell back on pre-World War II and even pre-Revolutionary views of America as an incredibly rich yet socially unjust country dominated by an insatiable pursuit of money. While these views did not remain static they adjusted to social and political events--the changes remained on the outer layers and did not touch the foundations of ordinary Soviet people’s image of America. To put it another way, Soviet citizens had two levels of beliefs about America. The first, or the core level, was more static, based mostly on official propaganda. The second, or the outer level, was more flexible and allowed for incorporation of unofficial information about America, including the use of American consumer and cultural products. Moreover, I will show that core Soviet attitudes about America remained roughly the same at least into the mid-eighties, highlighting a high degree of success in the Soviet state’s manipulation of information on this issue. I contend that unofficial information about America available to the Soviet people in form of radio broadcasts, magazines, movies, and encounters with foreign visitors did little to alter their core perceptions of America. Furthermore, when Soviets came in iii contact with information about real America through interaction with Western travelers, they frequently chose to ignore it if it challenged their core image of the United States. Instead, many average Soviets used new information in a way that reinforced their already formed beliefs, positive or negative, about America. While outside information and products from the United States served as a proverbial “window to the West,” they also served as a mirror through which the Soviets, denied free access to information, sought to reflect on their own country and its standing in the wider world. iv Acknowledgements First and foremost I would like to express my gratitude to my parents Valentin and Nataliya Avramov who tirelessly devoted their lives to raising my brother and me. They left their lives and successful careers in the Soviet Union to provide a better future for us in the United States. I can never thank them enough, because without their endless guidance, devotion and support none of this would have been possible. I owe much to the lifelong companionship of my brother, Yuriy Avramov, who has been by my side from the very beginning, who shared and supported me through all of life’s ups and downs. On the scholarly front, I can not express enough appreciation to Dr. Eve Levin, my advisor and mentor at the University of Kansas. Her commitment to her students through every facet of graduate school sets the highest standard for both historical and mentoring professions. I would also like to thank countless faculty and graduate students at the University of Kansas, University of Oregon and University of South Dakota, particularly Dr. Donald Price and Dr. Steven Bucklin, for their patience and encouragement in my often challenging transition from biology into history. Support from my good friends, especially Ali Ashraf, Dustin Jones, Eric Wienke, and Courtney Williams, kept me grounded and sane during the often all-consuming process of writing a dissertation. Their good humor and intellect reminded me that life is not just history but happens around you everyday. I owe a debt of gratitude to my friend Dimitri Venkov, who has been a great friend for many years and a wonderful host during my research in Moscow. v A number of institutions provided critical support for this project. A grant from the International Research and Exchanges Board (IREX) funded my research in the Russian archives. Oswald P. Backus II Memorial Dissertation Research Award (University of Kansas Department of History), University of Illinois Slavic Research Laboratory Award, and Harry S. Truman Foundation Award provided the necessary funds to ensure this project’s timely completion. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER 1: Informing the Masses: Official Propaganda and Public Reaction to America 16 Introduction 16 Constructing the capitalist: official propaganda before World War II 21 Brief Friend-New Enemy: official propaganda after World War II 28 Good American-Bad American: dual nature of America in official propaganda 45 Pseudo-Country: American society and culture 55 Why do they want to bomb us?: public reaction to official propaganda 70 Lets race!: presenting America in the Khrushchev period 81 If America is so good, why didn’t it launch the Sputnik?: public reaction to America in the Khrushchev period 94 Gangster’s paradise: official presentation of America in the Brezhnev period 107 Better safe than rich?: public reaction to America in the Brezhnev period 117 Conclusion 125 CHAPTER 2: Sources of Unofficial Information About America 127 Introduction 127 The Voices: Western radio broadcasts 133 Goals and content 133 Audience 145 Official response 159 Public response 170 Magazines 190 Movies 207 vii CHAPTER 3: American Exhibitions in the Soviet Union 225 Introduction 225 1959 Exhibition in Moscow 228 Exhibitions in the 1960s and 1970s 239 Visitor demographics and factors influencing attendance 239 Why people came 245 Public reactions to the exhibits 255 Face to face with Americans: exhibit guides 262 Negative perceptions about America 266 Reactions to American foreign policy 273 East vs. West: comparisons between the two countries 276 Conclusion 277 CHAPTER 4: Soviet Youth and the West 281 Introduction 281 Stylish Ones: some post-war trends among Soviet youth 284 Talking about my generation: West and Soviet generational conflict 290 For-Sale Men: Soviet black-market and the West 305 Times they are a changin’: Soviet youth in late socialism 309 Conclusion 318 CONCLUSION 319 BIBLIOGRAPHY 332 viii Introduction The Cold War has had a lasting impact on Americans' perception of Russians, and on Russians' perceptions of Americans. The threat of nuclear war between the world's two military superpowers, which arose out of the disintegration of their alliance in World War II, colored two generations' sense of their identity and their future. In the past ten years Cold War scholarship finally began to address the fact that this conflict was not just diplomatic or geo-political in nature. At the time of the Berlin Airlift and the Cuban Missile Crisis, both the Soviet Union and the U.S. also waged battles for the hearts and minds (to use a well-worn phrase) of their own citizens as well as people outside their borders. Various forms of soft power, a term I borrow from Joseph Nye, stood at the center of this struggle.1 Here, I attempt to explore how average Soviet people reacted to the soft power of the images and depictions of America presented to them through official and unofficial channels from both sides of the Iron Curtain during the Cold War. In this work I will argue that average Soviet citizens’ view of America was primarily informed by, and closely followed that of official propaganda. Deprived of any coherent information about America, Soviet citizens fell back on pre-World War II and even pre-Revolutionary views of America as an incredibly rich yet socially unjust country dominated by an insatiable pursuit of money. While these views did not remain 1 For more on soft power see Joseph Nye, Soft power : the means to success in world politics (New York : Public Affairs, 2004). 1 static they adjusted to social and political events--the changes remained on the outer layers and did not touch the foundations of ordinary Soviet people’s image of America. To put it another way, Soviet citizens had two levels of beliefs about America. The first, or the core level, was more static, based mostly on official propaganda. The second, or the outer level, was more flexible and allowed for incorporation of unofficial information about America, including the use of American consumer and cultural products. Moreover, I will show that core Soviet attitudes about the United States remained roughly the same at least into the mid-eighties, highlighting a high degree of success in the Soviet state’s manipulation of information on this issue. I contend that unofficial information about America available to the Soviet people in form of radio broadcasts, magazines, movies, and encounters with foreign visitors did little to alter their core perceptions of America.2 It did, however, force Soviet authorities to tailor their domestic propaganda message to adjust for outside information. Furthermore, when Soviets came in contact with information about real America through interaction with Western travelers, they chose to ignore it if it challenged their core image of the United States.