U.S. PROTEST OVER SOVIET PRESS INSULT TO TRUMAN

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22447, 30 September 1947, Page 3

U.S. PROTEST OVER SOVIET PRESS INSULT TO TRUMAN

(11.30 a.m.) , WASHINGTON, September 29. The United States has vigorously protested to the Soviet Government against a “wantonly libellous’’ article by Boris Gorbatov in the Moscow magazine Literary Gazette, in which President Truman is likened to Hitler. The Soviet has rejected the protest.

This was revealed by the State Department today when it released letters exchanged between the United States Ambassador to Moscow, Lieut.-General Walter Bedell Smith, and the Soviet Foreign Minister, M- Molotov. Lieut.-General Smith’s letter described the Gorbatov’s article as “shocking,” adding that every fair-minded American citizen, regardless of his political opinions, would be deeply affronted and would feel that he, in some way, shared the personal insult gratuitously offered to President Truman. Lieut.-General Bedell Smith said: “I cannot believe the article represents the opinion of the Soviet Government, and request that it be officially disavowed. If. contrary to my belief, it has the

approval of the Soviet Government, I would appreciate a statement to the eff M. t ’Molotov, replying, said the Soviet Government could not bear responsibility for Gorbatov’s article. The Russian press, more than the press of any other country, had tried to elucidate the actual situation and the true facts of life in other countries, including the United States, whereas the reactionary supported United States press not only published lying and slanderous articles about the Soviet and its statesmen but also inflamed hostility between the peoples It was well-known, in international democratic circles that the United States press had no serious support within .the United States.