Dimka felt himself redden. For a moment he was lost for words. Then inspiration struck, and he said: “Thanks to Major Yuri Gagarin’s remarkable space flight, Comrade Khrushchev will go to Vienna with the congratulations of the world ringing in his ears.” Last month Gagarin had been the first human being to travel into outer space in a rocket, beating the Americans by just a few weeks, in a stunning scientific and propaganda coup for the Soviet Union and for Nikita Khrushchev.

The aides around the table clapped, and Dimka began to feel better.

Then Filipov spoke again. “The first secretary might do better to have ringing in his ears the inaugural speech of President Kennedy,” he said. He seemed incapable of speaking without a sneer. “In case comrades around the table have forgotten, Kennedy accused us of planning world domination, and he vowed to pay any price to stop us. After all the friendly moves we have made—unwisely, in the opinion of some experienced comrades—Kennedy could hardly have made clearer his aggressive intentions.” He raised his arm with a finger in the air, like a schoolteacher. “Only one response is possible from us: increased military strength.”

Dimka was still thinking up a rejoinder when Natalya beat him to it. “That’s a race we can’t win,” she said with a brisk commonsense air. “The United States is richer than the Soviet Union, and they can easily match any increase in our military forces.”

She was more sensible than her conservative boss, Dimka inferred. He shot her a grateful look and followed up. “Hence Khrushchev’s policy of peaceful coexistence, which enables us to spend less on the army, and instead invest in agriculture and industry.” Kremlin conservatives hated peaceful coexistence. For them, the conflict with capitalist imperialism was a war to the death.

Out of the corner of his eye, Dimka saw his secretary, Vera, enter the room, a bright, nervy woman of forty. He waved her away.

Filipov was not so easily disposed of. “Let’s not permit a naïve view of world politics to encourage us to reduce our army too fast,” he said scornfully. “We can hardly claim to be winning on the international stage. Look at how the Chinese defy us. That weakens us at Vienna.”

Why was Filipov trying so hard to prove that Dimka was a fool? Dimka suddenly recalled that Filipov had wanted a job in Khrushchev’s office—the job that Dimka had got.

“As the Bay of Pigs weakened Kennedy,” Dimka replied. The American president had authorized a crackpot CIA plan for an invasion of Cuba at a place called the Bay of Pigs: the scheme had gone wrong and Kennedy had been humiliated. “I think our leader’s position is stronger.”

“All the same, Khrushchev has failed—” Filipov stopped, realizing he was going too far. These pre-meeting discussions were frank, but there were limits.

Dimka seized on the moment of weakness. “What has Khrushchev failed to do, comrade?” he said. “Please enlighten us all.”

Filipov amended quickly. “We have failed to achieve our main foreign policy objective: a permanent resolution of the Berlin situation. East Germany is our frontier post in Europe. Its borders secure the borders of Poland and Czechoslovakia. Its unresolved status is intolerable.”