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For Marshal Josip Broz Tito, the heretic who got away with it, this was a moment to savor. Splendidly adorned—braided cap, sky-blue military blouse with ribbons, red-striped slacks—he drove out to Belgrade's Zemun Airport and waited. Seven years before, Russia's masters had kicked Yugoslavia out of the Cominform, reviled Tito as "traitor," "fascist," "spy and murderer," urged his people to revolt against him, harassed his borders, shut off his country's trade. Dictator Tito, an old hand at intrigue himself, survived it all. Now, unrepentant and unintimidated, master in his own land, Tito sat in his open Rolls-Royce and puffed on his long cigarette holder as a silver two-engined Ilyushin-14, bearing Russia's top leaders, touched down and taxied to the newly asphalted ramp. TIME'S Jim Bell reported:
"Precisely on schedule at 5 p.m., the door of the plane opened, and there, half as large as life, stood stubby little Nikita Khrushchev, his arms up in a gesture which seemed to say, 'Here I am, you lucky people.' As Tito, enormously dignified, walked up the red ceremonial carpet to meet him, Khrushchev happily skipped down the plane ramp, looking for all the world like a samovar salesman arriving at Minsk for the annual convention. He was all smiles and handshakes and pats on the back, and seemed to do a happy little dance. Beaming, Khrushchev said to Tito: 'Everything's going to be all right.'
"Tito seemed relieved when he could turn to shake hands with the less-animated Premier Bulganin. Wistful and out of place in his distinctly subordinate role, goateed Nikolai Bulganin looked like a professor of geology who has suddenly been swept up in a reception for Danny Kaye. Anastas Mikoyan, First Deputy Premier, who followed him from the plane, was dark and sour, an Armenian rug merchant unsure of his sucker. First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrei Gromyko, pale and drawn, stayed behind.
"Khrushchev shook hands with the Soviet embassy staff in the manner of a candidate on tour, then proceeded to inspect the honor guard. Bulganin trailed along behind. Khrushchev, scarcely looking at Tito's soldiers, hopped along beside his slightly taller host, talking with his hands, anxious to waste not a moment in selling his samovar. Tito frowned."
Bear Trap. Tito led Khrushchev to a microphone to make the customarily innocuous speech of arriving dignitaries. Tito had made clear in advance that he was receiving the Russians only as chief of government, not as a straying disciple prepared to discuss his reconversion and return to the Kremlin's true faith and stifling embrace. But Khrushchev had ready an ideological bear trap.
Pulling a manuscript from one pocket and glasses from another, he planted his feet widely and started reading in his loud, cocky miner's voice. "Dear Comrade Tito . . . and leaders of the Yugoslav Communist League," he bawled. Instantly, Tito's handsome features froze.