Sardonic New York Timesman Brooks Atkinson last week took advantage of Moscow's new freedom from censorship to get a few things about Russia off his chest. He noted the "fatuous satisfaction" in the Russian press over Soviet Russia's soccer victory in England (TIME, Nov. 26), and quoted a sample from the Moscow News: "Would it not, perhaps, be well to get to know us better? Better knowledge of us might, perhaps, help foreign observers understand other things about us besides sports."
Said Atkinson: "This temperamental remark . . . assumes that the effort toward understanding is to come all in one direction....