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One foreign ambassador in Moscow concluded a recent dispatch to his government with the cryptic sentence: "The story of Stalin's death has not yet been written." The Russian experts of two other nations (both of whom served tours of duty in Moscow) have pieced together estimates of the situation which agree remarkably well, though arrived at independently. Their interpretation: ¶ That Stalin last fall became worried by slackness in the Soviet leadership, which accounts for the fervent denunciation of nepotism, inefficiency and mismanagement at the null Party Congress in October.
¶ That in ordering the doctors' purge in January, he intended a drastic shake-up in the higher echelons, with Lavrenty Beria (whose police were accused of laxity) marked out as one of the first victims. ¶ That Malenkov got wind of Stalin's intentions, and—fearing that such a purge might involve himself sooner or later— made common cause with Beria. ¶ That something historic happened in the Kremlin the night of Feb. 15, two weeks before Stalin's death. Fact: at the bottom of the back page of Izvestia Feb. 17 appears this laconic death notice: "The Office of the Commandant of the Kremlin regrets to announce the premature death February 15th of Major General Piotr Yevdokimovich Kosynkin and expresses its condolences to the bereaved family." Kosynkin was one of the chiefs of Stalin's bodyguards.
¶ That Stalin was then either murdered by Beria's cops or—old and ailing—had his death hastened by emotional SHOCK which brought on his fatal stroke. ¶ That Beria—who saved his own life by plotting against his master's—is thus the key man in the new regime. But it would be too obvious and jarring to the public for the policeman to assume full powers himself, especially after Malenkov, during the last Party Congress, had been made to appear "most likely to succeed." "The Russians," wrote a U.S. expert, "are purists of power. They pass up all the cheap little victories, like getting your picture in the paper, because it makes it easier to arrive at the ultimate goal of power." ¶That Malenkov, therefore, was set forward as Premier. Ten days later, "at his own wish." Malenkov gave over the vital party secretaryship, and its control of party cadres, to Old Bolshevik Nikita Khrushchev. In Stalin's day, when men began growing too big, he handled them as Hercules did the giant Antaeus: he lifted them up and kept their feet off the ground, whereupon, having lost touch with their roots, they became weak enough to destroy. Beria, presumably, may be doing the same with Malenkov.
If this interpretation, or a substantial part of it, is correct, it helps explain why 1) the doctors' purge was called off by Beria with such violent emphasis on false charges and "impermissible means" of extracting confessions; 2) why the glorification of Stalin's name has abruptly declined in Russian papers; 3) why Russia is so anxious for a relaxing peace offensive. Old Fox. In the clash of bigger battalions fighting for naked power, cunning old Aunty Molly—though nominally one of the Big Three—is not one to get in the way. "You don't seize power by mobilizing Foreign Office functionaries," scoffs an Italian who knew him well.