EAST-WEST: Turmoil on the Tarmac

A dancer's spectacular defection leads to a U.S.-Soviet quarrel

When Soviet Ballet Star Alexander Godunov decided to defect to the U.S. last week, he could hardly have foreseen the fallout from his electrifying leap to freedom: a Moscow-bound Soviet jetliner with 112 passengers aboard grounded for more than 24 hours and surrounded by police at New York's Kennedy Airport; top U.S. officials at the U.N. and in Washington getting into the act; the official Soviet news agency, Tass, accusing the U.S. of "political blackmail"; and Godunov's ballerina wife an unwilling hostage in the...

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