A German dockworker peered through the drizzly fog that hung over the North Sea port of Bremerhaven last week and muttered: "Da kommen die Schweine [There come the swine]." Out of the mist lumbered two sharp-prowed, 6,500-ton icebreakers wearing huge Soviet flags on their sterns and the painted-over names"North-wind" and "Westwind" on their bows. Six years after the U.S. had lend-leased these $10,000,000 vessels to its wartime ally, the Russians handed them back, somewhat-the worse for wear and well dappled with rust.
At the height of the U.S.-Soviet honeymoon, Washington lend-leased 710 vessels...