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few words about himself, that he was from Texas, had served as a U.S. Marine, and had decided to go and see this country, Russia. He had read, he told Rimma, that Soviet people lived good, useful, and very peaceful lives.
    Now, in those days, Rimma was a great patriot, a very great one, she would say, so she was quite sure she agreed with him. She told him, Certainly ours is the best country, and you were right to come. She also felt that he was trying to get closer to her, because she was someone he could exchange information with. Not serious information, just talk about life. She was very enthusiastic that he liked her country, but she had never expected him to speak like this.
    He started talking about how war was very bad because innocent people got killed, and as he talked he became more friendly, and she understood that he wanted to tell her so many things from his point of view.
    Then he said that his real idea was that he didn’t want to return to the United States. There was no sense in his going back, he told her. He had already settled that in his mind. He was going to stay here. He gave reasons. To her, they sounded like good ones. He said that his mother had remarried and had another husband, practically had another family, so his mother was not interested in him. Nobody was interested in him there. And when he had served in the Far East, he had seen so much suffering, so many deaths, for which he blamed the United States. His country fomented unjust wars, he said, in which he did not want to take part. He gave her an impression that he had actually been in combat, fighting for his country, definitely gave her this impression, and he was sympathetic and believable to her. She thought he was quite right. It was certainly very strange that there was an American like this, but she was sure he was quite right. So she told him she shared his opinion, that there should not be unjust wars—certainly, it was unnatural to kill people. He said again he wanted to stay here. This was a proper country from his political point of view.
    Rimma was surprised. Even shocked. It was not a simple situation. Not routine at all. Nobody in training had ever spoken about something like this. So she helped him to write a letter to Supreme Soviet and she had it delivered. Nobody asked her to; it was her young wish to help him. But later, when she spoke to her boss, a woman, and told this story, her boss was not happy. Her chief said, “What have you done? He came as a tourist. Let him be a tourist.”
    Rimma was a little upset because she felt her chief was taking the easiest way. That was bureaucracy. For sure. But Rimma knew her people. In general, most people were slow. They did not want to be energetic. They would say, “My job is not a wolf, it won’t run away into the forest, so why should I hurry?” That was one prevailing attitude. But Rimma was also sure that her chief would get in touch with someone above her and they would know what to do.

    I explain to her [Rimma] I wish to apply for Russian citizenship. She is flabbergasted, but agrees to help. She checks with her boss, main office Intourist, then helps me address a letter to Supreme Soviet asking for citizenship.

2
    The Idiot
    Alexander Simchenko was the boss of OVIR, the Passport and Visa Office. Decades later, still speaking some English, he would say to the Oswald interviewers, “I can tell you very honestly that everybody at that time who was working for Intourist was under observation and control by our KGB. If they asked, ‘What is your impression of so-and-so?’ concerning someone we were taking around, it was not possible to say, ‘I don’t care to speak about it.’ Even if you liked a tourist, you had to give your professional opinion. When some KGB officer would call, he would, to identify himself, give you his first name and patronymic, but not his family name. He might say ‘This is Gennady Petrovich. We want to know about