Word: politburos
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...since Nikita Khrushchev emerged as top man in the Kremlin had the Politburo received such a shakeup. In the most confident and decisive political move of his eight years as head of the Soviet Communist Party, Leonid Brezhnev last week eased out two enemies from the ruling Politburo and replaced them with four powerful and seemingly loyal allies...
...timing of the leadership reshuffle was masterly. Scheduled to make historic visits to West Germany in May and to the U.S. in June, Brezhnev will now take off with the fullest possible domestic backing for his pursuit of detente. The two Politburo members dismissed (the official phrase was "relieved of duty")-Pyotr Shelest and Gennady Voronov-have been notable opponents of his diplomatic initiatives, as well as of some of his domestic efforts. Among the four men promoted -Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, Defense Minister Andrei Grechko, KGB (secret police) Chief Yuri Andropov and Leningrad Party Secretary Grigory Romanov-at least...
Teng had once ranked fourth in the party hierarchy (behind Mao, Liu and Chou, and just ahead of the now-dead Defense Minister Lin Piao); he was party General Secretary and a member of the Politburo. Accused in the early months of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, Teng confessed immediately, admitting that "my thought and attitude were incompatible Mao's thought." His return to at least a degree of prominence (he now seems to rank about 20th in the hierarchy, though he has not regained his party posts) is another indication of Mao's continuing effort to reunite...
...improvement in the prisoners' treatment. The credit for the change seems to belong to all the people who tried at about that time to focus world attention on the plight of the P.O.W.s-President Nixon, the wives of the P.O.W.s, Congress and the media. Embarrassed by world pressure, the politburo in Hanoi may have passed the word to go easier. At any rate, prisoners were allowed for the first time to exercise outdoors for 30 minutes, but behind bamboo screens so that they could not see each other; they got a third daily meal of bread and water...
When I arrived in Hanoi one night in 1961 aboard a Russian military plane, the entire North Vietnamese Politburo was there to meet Laotian Prince Souvanna Phouma. I got to shake the hands of Premier Pham Van Dong, General Giap and Ho Chi Minh, who told me in near-perfect French: "Please tell the truth." The second time was totally different. There were no honor guards and no flowers at Hanoi's Gia Lam Airport-only a flock of black-suited men with black shoes, black socks and conservative ties...