Teacher spy assassin, p.3
Teacher, Spy, Assassin, page 3
In my next sentence, I made the first two of my three near-fatal mistakes.
I said, “You’ve got to be pulling my leg, Larry.”
The ensuing explosion ensured that I learned that it was not wise to challenge the Ambassador. This was the first mistake, and, as I was to learn later, it also contained the second mistake. His name I was to learn, in public and in private was “Mr. Ambassador.”
The final mistake I also made without knowing. You see, I left when My wife was tired and it was nearing the time that we told the babysitter that we would be home. Quietly, on a later date, a friend whispered to me, shielding his lips, “You only leave the party when the Ambassador goes to bed.”
Larry later came to forgive and/or forget. Maybe it was because his sons and I got along famously. Maybe it was because when Embassy staff had their exit interviews, one of the things the American diplomatic Community valued about this post was the school. It is also possible he knew something about my work for Jim.
But a funny thing happened after the relationship with the Ambassador thawed.
Frequently, Linda and I were invited to the big events at the residence. At one of these gatherings, Larry pointed out a minor member of the Communist party who happened to be the president of a bank. His name was Slobodan “Slobo” Milosevic. Larry explained to me that he was a terrible drunk who rarely brought his wife, and too often pawed the ladies. He had to invite him because of Slobo’s Party connections.
Larry asked me to babysit him. I was to offer to bring him his drinks (and water them down), distract him from any lady he focused on, and laugh at his frequently tasteless jokes. I spent many an unpleasant evening with Slobo. And I got to know him, at least as a drunk, better than any American diplomat.
It was not worth assigning a skilled American diplomat to a minor party member like Slobo. You may remember the name, Slobodan Milosevic. Slobo later became the leader of Yugoslavia.
Chapter 6: Predicting Russian grain shortages
On one Saturday in early fall, we left the house at 8:00 a.m. Liam was up early, as always. He ate some cereal for breakfast. Linda and I would wait to eat. We would have breakfast at the American Club, a part of the Embassy complex with a restaurant, and read the paper while Liam went to a movie in the Club. But, the first stop today, before the movie, would be the large green market downtown. Fall was a delight at the market. There were fruit and vegetables in abundance, eggs, meat, and dairy of all kinds.
We carried a large basket for our purchases. We bought apples, pears, and plums. There were cabbage, potatoes, and salad ingredients. There were parsnips and carrots. We bought some of the distinctive Serbian white cheese, blue cheese, and kajmak, a fermented butter. When we arrived at the egg farmers’ stands. I had my favorite egg vendor, Aco. Today, he was uncharacteristically glum.
“Aco, you seem to be in a bad mood today,” I commented.
“I never make much money with my eggs, but today it is worse,” he noted.
“Why?” I asked.
“It is the cost of grain. It is just going up and up. I have to raise my prices. The people don’t buy as many eggs at this price. And I don’t make enough money. I will soon have to sell some good birds which will drop my future production,” He complained.
“Where do you buy your grain?” I asked.
“Why we buy it from the combinat,” he said. “None of us grows wheat. It all comes from Moscow and the prices are soaring.”
“Here is a little extra for your eggs, my friend. Maybe it will help you.” He smiled and tipped his hat to me and bowed deferentially.
“Now that was interesting,” I commented to Linda, who was always amused at the crazy things I found to be interesting.
We took Liam to the movie and had a leisurely breakfast in the embassy reading Friday’s International Herald Tribune. It always came a day late. We had listened to the news on the BBC or the Voice of America on the radio, but it was always fun to read it in the paper.
Monday, I told my secretary I off to the embassy for some parent meetings and not to expect me back for a while. I went instead to the Embassy documentarian and asked to see back copies of Politika, the communist newspaper of Belgrade. Fortunately, Politika was on microfilm and I was able to search it myself. Every Monday there was a chart of the cost of commodities at the green market that week. So, I found Mondays close to the beginning and the middle of each month and charted the cost of eggs over the last six years.
The price of eggs at the market in Belgrade in August, September, and October, would probably reflect the price of Russian grain. The Russians would probably raise the price of grain to Yugoslavia at the first sign of a shortage. The increase in the cost of grain to these small farmers would raise the price of eggs immediately.
If I then adjusted these prices for changes in the exchange rate between the Yugoslav Dinar and the Russian Ruble, the data should predict any grain shortfall that the Soviet Union suffered in that time period. Using this approach, we should be able to predict when the Soviets would be short on grain looking forward.
You couldn’t learn this in any true Russian satellite country because food commodity prices were set centrally in those countries, and are often subsidized. You couldn’t look at western egg prices to learn this because they did not buy Russian grain.
But here, because small farmers could set their egg prices and because the wheat came from the USSR, we could see the impact early of a bad harvest in the USSR.
Other than chickens, no farm animals were exclusively fed grain in Serbia. If I had examined the cost of chicken meat, the result could be confusing because farmers can hold back live chickens from the market a bit longer to get a better price or push them to market early, but an egg comes to you when fresh, and the farmer must bring it to market.
Eureka!
I prepared a set of predictions using historical data. If historical rises in egg prices in Serbia correlated with historic Grain shortages in Russia. We might be able to reliably predict shortages in the future using the same method. I created tables and calculations. Although I did not know which years were Russian grain shortage years. I called the Agricultural attaché to ask for a meeting on Monday morning.
Chapter 7: Making the case
This time when I went for my appointment with the agricultural attaché at the Embassy, I was sent to the second floor to a tidy office of moderate size. The walls were enhanced by photographs of American farms. Allen Weiss was the attaché and a Cornell Ag School grad. He was about 5’9” slender and wiry.
“Hey Allen,” I said. “I’ve been thinking about that problem of not being able to predict Russian grain shortages that you mentioned last week. I may have an idea that could help.”
“If we knew when they were short, it could strengthen our hand in bargaining with the Soviets. What did you come up with?” Allen asked. “It would be good to have leverage with that bastard Kosygin and his lieutenant, Brezhnev. But the problem is probably too tough to solve. We’ve been working on it for years.”
“I just may have gotten luckier than I deserve.”
“I was at the green market this weekend talking to an egg farmer,” I said.
“He mentioned that the cost of eggs was going up again. When I asked why he said it was the cost of grain. I asked where the grain came from. He said that the big-government combinats have a contract with the Soviets for wheat.”
“We maybe could see early on how the Soviets are predicting their wheat harvest by the cost of eggs at the green market in Belgrade,” I said.
“Now that is a new angle. How could we test it?” Allen asked.
“Funny you should mention that,” I offered, pulling out a small stack of my homework.
“I do not know what years Russia had serious grain shortages, but I have gone back 6 years using the prices for eggs at the green market as listed in Politika from the middle and end of each month. I have graphed these prices on this chart. On the second graph, I have adjusted the price for changes in the exchange rate between the dinar and the ruble on the same dates. I have predicted the years that the Soviets would have a serious grain shortage on this final table. If you can find out which of those years there was a shortage, then we could learn if this is a reliable predictive method.”
“I don’t need to look that up. In my game, that is something you just know. What years does your model show a serious grain shortage?” he asked.
“My model would have predicted shortages in 1971, 1972 (that would have been the worst), and 1974,” I replied, “The model also predicts a moderate shortage this coming year.”
Allen leaped from his chair pumping his fists in the air, laughing. “We’ve got the bastards now,” he shouted out loud.” He shouted. “You did it. You cracked our mystery. Wait until they hear about this in Washington.”
“Can I have those figures?” he asked. “I’ll test some other years just to be sure it wasn’t a coincidence and then I will talk to Washington. Thanks a million.”
“Let’s go over your calculations and sources one more time,” He pleaded.
We went over the figures for almost an hour until he could compute them in his sleep.
“Can I buy you lunch?” he offered.
“No, I’ve got to get back,” I said.
As I was leaving his office for the exit, he was sputtering, “1972! That was the year of ‘the great grain robbery’ when we sold Ten Million tons of wheat and corn to the Soviets, and caused the price of bread to go up in the US, and got nothing for it. That will never happen again.”
I returned to my car and went back to school. It felt good to have stumbled across this.
Later, I learned that this analysis rocketed around the Embassy. Jim Shultz asked me to see him about a sensitive problem with his son. I expected to get a new problem. I arrived at 10:00 a.m. the next day, as scheduled.
After being escorted to the SCIF and taking a seat, Jim started. “Why were you working on that Russian grain Problem?” he started. He had an unpleasant edge in his voice.
“What do you mean,” I asked.
“Was it a problem you thought up yourself” he queried, still in an unpleasant tone.
I gave him “the look” I had perfected as a teacher and principal.
“This is exactly why I didn’t want to become an employee of the Agency. I am a volunteer and if you want my work product, you had better talk to me more sweetly, or you can kiss my ass goodbye.”
He looked at his shoes.
“I have not been given any training, which is certainly not my fault,” I noted. “I assumed that when Allen Weiss approached me that you had sent him.”
“It is just that it was embarrassing,” He replied. “If you just continue to talk to him and others without going through me, the Agency gets no credit. Nor can we be sure that the Soviets won’t learn that we are on to them,” he stated.
“I’m going now.” I walked to the door thinking Jim was right about one thing. I didn’t like him much.
Later I was to learn that this insight helped. Because we knew what years they were going to be pinched for grain, we could ask the Soviets for things we couldn’t get otherwise. We were able to get an easier path for Jewish Russian refugees to the US and Israel through our stronger grain negotiation position. We were also able to demand an improvement in human rights standards. There were certainly other benefits that I never heard about. Yet, this method of analysis was most useful for only a few years. Satellite photography got better. Our people were able to see more in the USSR for themselves, making my calculations less useful.
A funny tidbit: as Soviet citizens felt freer, there was consistently a better grain harvest. People were not as aggressively sabotaging the grain harvest and storage to thwart the government.
Chapter 8 The International School of Belgrade
When I got back to school, I stopped in the library to see Linda. She smiled, “ I will see you at lunch.”
She has a great smile, I thought as I walked the 20 steps to my office. Linda was fit and trim. She wore shirt waisted dresses that showed her fit figure off well. Her smile and beautiful natural blond hair are what usually captured people’s attention. She stood out in any crowd. I didn’t marry her for her looks, but I certainly got lucky there.
Entering my office, people had to pass through a small entry foyer. Olive sat behind her desk to the left. She was a Serb, lively, and optimistic. Her English was fluent, her spelling superb, and her clerical skills over the top. The next desk’s owner was Petar Petrovic. He was a bit older than I and was sophisticated in both his appearance and manner. He was our bookkeeper, fixer, and living Rolodex. His title was Assistant Director.
It was not just the language that made simple transactions hard here. To import the school supplies safely without tariffs took lining the right pocket. Finding a reliable craftsman for repairs, for the school or apartments for our American staff, was challenging.
He also handled our banking. The American teachers and I maintained US bank accounts. When we needed money, we would write a check from those accounts to the school. We could get the check cashed at the school, in the local currency (Dinars), or any of about ten different currencies including Dollars, Deutsch Marks, French Francs, Pounds Sterling, Swiss Francs, or Italian Lira. Petar would cash the check, and patiently wait for the checks to be mailed to the Riggs bank in Washington where the money would be deposited from our US accounts to the International School’s account.
These examples of what Petar did, just scratched the surface. Olive was approaching 40 and Petar seemed ageless in an aristocratic way, but was probably 45. I was 34.
I handled a few calls to parents. I looked at my watch. It was nearly 11:00 a.m. I did one of my favorite work activities. I conducted a string of classroom walkthroughs. We had 180 students, grades kindergarten to eighth grade. An additional 10 high school students were studying with a tutor.
Our campus was located in a prewar mansion. The school also had a library of about 5000 books, and a teacher break room with a small kitchenette in the attic.
The paved surface of what used to be tennis courts together with some swings, a slide, and a tetherball court was our outdoor play space. Over the years the school had converted an old one-car garage into an English as a Second Language classroom. Two prefab buildings were added, over the years, each containing two classrooms, and a gardener’s shed had been rebuilt as our kindergarten.
We had used every possible space. We had a couple who were our caretakers who lived in a small basement apartment pushed hard against the boiler. We were bursting at the seams and I was forced to put children on a waiting list.
The classroom visits were always a highlight of my week.
“Boys and girls, you know our Director, Dr. O’Brien. Who will tell him what we are doing this morning?” asked Mrs. Kindig.
Hands shot up. An impossibly thin second-grader held forth. “Um, this is Art class, I think. We have been learning about artists. Today is Van Gogh. We are famous art forgers and we are trying to make a new painting that looks like one of his. Here is mine.”
She held up a painting of a neighborhood with small bright splashes of color making up the image. From a distance the image was clear, but up very close, not so much. I wandered about the room looking at the student work. I came to understand that the students had discovered what made Van Gogh unique. And best of all, the teacher hadn’t taught them these characteristics of Van Gogh but allowed them to work in groups looking at the prints that she had brought. They discovered for themselves what Van Gogh was doing. This was second grade. I left encouraged about the thinking our students were doing.
“Next week when I visit, I am Going to bring a Van Gogh print you have not seen, and the work of two other artists from the same time. I will know you have learned this lesson well if you can tell me which one is Van Gogh’s.” This was a second-grade class! It was not easy to believe what I was seeing.
We had worked hard to make learning vital. We were not interested in telling our students what they needed to know but wanted them to explore information, working in groups. The teachers were the guides, as skillful learners themselves. The students were the workers who constructed their own knowledge through their own hard work. Once they built the knowledge this way, they never lost it.
Next, it was the third grade. As luck would have it, Mrs. “M” was applying a method we learned from our reading about the Soviet system of Education. We were trying to improve the burdensome multiplication facts lessons. The students were told that there was going to be a contest after the “practice time”. The practice time was an opportunity for the rows of students to get ready for the test.
The student’s grade would be the grade of the lowest-performing member of their row averaged with their score. The rows were carefully selected, without the student’s knowledge to have a rich mixture of student abilities. There was a motivation for the more able students to actively coach the less gifted ones, so everyone would have a comparable chance to get a good score. The motivation for this, otherwise trying lesson, came from the students themselves. They all wanted to win.
They had 20 minutes to coach each other about the number facts. Then, there would be recess and then another 20 minutes to make a last-minute push. Then, the papers would be distributed, upside down.
At the sound of a bell, all the students would turn their papers over and find fifty number facts questions. They would be given 180 seconds to complete the worksheet. There was a bonus problem on the bottom of the page worth 5 points. (each number fact was worth 2 points.) The bonus question was, “How many minutes is 180 seconds?”
When the students had completed their second “cram” session after the recess, Mrs. “M” told the students to begin. At the second bell, the students put their pencils down and a teacher’s aide graded the papers while the class talked about the importance of committing the “facts” to memory.
