The Washington times., 1938-01-26

plane and all those instrume1
have been virtually severed
world, politically aligned aga
to maintain complete isolati
Just as in Japan, so in the
kept hermetically sealed fir,
Kobe the customs authoriti
literature, so in Vladivostocl
nese literature, and a good
valuable carbon copies of sto
It was a holiday for the 20
NKVD men at the VladivStock
customs to examine the baggage
of only four passengers, one
Soviet engineer, one wife of a
Soviet diplomat, a Japanese
business man and myself. In 20
years of travelling 1 have never
undergone such a search.
PAPERS SEIZED
They got all my papers, every
scrap of printed matter. They
said I would get them back next
day, but I insisted on going
along to headquarters of the
NKVD to explain to the chief
how important to me were some
of my documents and please
not to lose them.
The idea of going to the
NKVD headquarters petrified
the two Intourist guides who
had met me. They were terri
fled at the institution, as one
of its founders, Trotsky, put it,
is the. instrument of red terror
and terror is intended to
terrify.
Nevertheless we went, and I
was received by the NKVD
chief, figure which for the
first time inspired me with anX-
iety. Of Mongolian extraction,
he had slit eyes, and a thin
mouth which turned down at the
corners, and from a large mole
on his chin grew a pair of
briStles. Without a word he
stared at me for at least a
minute, then turned his back,
but, to my surprise, permitted
me to retain one package Of
documents I priced the most.
HOTEL FILTHY
BY the time we reached the
Hotel Chelyuskin the old famil.
lar pail of anxiety, unreaSon.
able, indefinable, but real as a
physical burden, had descended
upon us.
The Intourist guides showed
me my room. It was dirtier
than the rest of the hotel, small,
ill-lighted, with a lumpy bed
which later proved heavily in.
habited with active insects. The
drain in the waShbow1 was
clogged, the electric light out of
order. The toilet down the hall
would have Sickened a pig.
For these accommodations,
plus the promise of food, 1 had
paid in advance SIS a day.
I walked all afternoon, for
miles along the harbor jammed
with scores of Soviet steamers
In every state of dilapidation.
-Four Soviet gunboats or destroy.
ers, relatively trim, lay anchored
apart from the merchant YES
sells. An American steamer, the
California, from Seattle. was
tied UP, looking uncommonly
elegant and clean among the
unpainted Soviet hulks.
HILLS FORTIFIED
I tried to visit it, but met at
every turn guards of the NKVD,
who were posted by the thou
sands throughout the city at
every public building. ware
house, factory or dock. Their
bayonetS, always fixed, bristled
from every corner, and made
the city seem like a gigantic jail
or fortress. Fortress it certainly
is. Around us, on the crests of
all the hills, ran barbed-wire en-
tanglements, and with field
glasses it was possible to make
out the contours of Notifications
On the land side as well as
from the sea, Vladivostock is
heavily guarded. The Far-East-
ern army is taking no chances
with the eventuality of a break
through by Japanese troops
across the Korean frontier only
so miles away. Already all traf-
fic on the old Chinese Eastern,
now the North Manchurian rail
way, connecting Vladivostock
via Harbin with Manchuli, has
been stopped.
BECOMING SEA POWER
Shrouded in new snow, the
city looked clean, alive and
bursting with energy. 1t sprawls
for IS miles along the harbor,
a frontier town of log houses,
freshly poured concrete office
buildings. and innumerable mill
far&, ood naval hao dn,1aTfay.s