Evening star., 1954-11-23
Death Comes for Mr.. vishinsky

How does one measure a man like
Andrei Vishinsky? AS occasion required,
or as his mood moved him, he could be most
personable. He could laugh. He could
joke. He could emit great deal of charm
as an individual And if he had been an
American, if he had been reared in these
environs of ours he might well have been
an outstanding and highly successful fig-
ure in our public life-perhaps an unbeat-
able Congressman or perhaps an impressive
Secretary of State,
But this is only very small fraction
of the sum of Mr.. Vishinsky. To appreciate
the measure of him, to see him in perspec-
tive, to comprehend the gulf between his
sometimes attractive personality and his
dark career as harsh servant of the Soviet
state, it is necessary to keep in mind how
he lived the 70 years of life allotted to him.
It was a life that began in well-to-do, bour-
geois circumstances But the poison came
into it at an early age. He was an active
revolutionary while still in his young teens,
and by 1920-tWo years after sthe BolShevik
upheaval in Russia-he was a full-hedged
member of the Communist Party, and from
that point on he moved steadily upward
in the hierarchy of Marxist evil.
At the start, in his maturing years, he
was the professional type scholarly,
learned, brilliant scintillating to a degree
that made him, ipso facto, member of the
Bolshevik elite. This was the phase in
which he became one of the key developers,
a founding father, of the Soviet system of
law and justice--a system poles apart from
ours and in many ways incomprehensible
Y1d xfron f0 1Nn Wyncfn MIN hot
thinks of courts in terms of safeguarding
the rights of the individual rather than in
terms of serving the inhumane ends of an
implacable tyranny dedicated to the en-
slavement of men and nations. And it was
under this SySten-a black thing largely
of his own making-that Mr.. Vishinsky,
with almost incredible ferocity and lack of
conscience, prosecuted and sent to their
deaths scores of Soviet political and mill
tary leaders in Stalin's terrible blood purge
Of 1868.
Nor was Stain forgetful or unappreci-
ative Of all this. For Mr.. Vishinsky, who
throughout his career displayed a remark
able ability to survive the perils of the
Kremlin's palace politics. went on from the
purge to rise to new heights of influence.
Now the pitiless prosecutor became prime
mover in Soviet diplomacy and interna-
tional intrigue. Now, working in harness
with Mr.. Molotov, he played a key role
both during and after the Second World
WARM destroying the freedom of nearly
dozen ce-independent lands in Europe.
And now-for awhile as Foreign Minister
(from 1949 until Stalin's death last year,
and more recently as Moscows chief dele
gate to the United Nations-he developed
into the worlds most famous, or Infamous,
name-caller, past master of invective and
oratorical vitriol, and a man who could
turn the truth upside down with greater
aplomb than any of the grim fictional char
acters in George Orwells spine-chilling
1884
Some new Soviet man will replace him
in the United Nations now that death has
called him from the stage. But though the
personality will be different, and perhaps
less able, the role will be the same. Mr..
Vishinsky's going can mean little, for better
or worse, in the East-West tug-of-war in
which he was for time one of the Krem-
Inns strongest mouthpieces. Nothing will
change for the better in that sense unless
and until the Kremlin itself changes.