BLOCK. GIANT. A man without nerves. Unperturbed to the point of impossibility. Elephant memory. And so on, and so on, many people found their own epithets to describe the largest diplomat of our country in the twentieth century. Everyone tried to indicate the personal perception of this outstanding politician, scientist, person and, of course, first of all, a diplomat who lived a truly remarkable life and left not a trace, but, one might say, a furrow in the history of the country and diplomacy.

To say everything about A. A. briefly, on a few pages, is an unsolvable problem. Even for a person who was lucky enough to be close to the minister for 16 years - first ten years in his secretariat, and then six years as Secretary General of the Foreign Ministry.

Therefore, here are just a few episodes that reflect the personal experience of communicating with A. A. Gromyko and, hopefully, complement the memories that many of his colleagues, employees, acquaintances and friends shared about him both in our country and abroad.

AS YOU KNOW, there was a somewhat strange period in the history of Soviet-New Zealand relations, which was initiated, as I believe, by a misunderstanding. Ambassador V. N. Sofinsky was declared persona non grata, and, accordingly, the New Zealand ambassador in Moscow went home. This period lasted no less than three years, and our relations were maintained at the level of charge d'affaires.

I had to fit in with this situation when A. A. called me in and suggested" tomorrow or the day after " to go to Wellington and

Yuri E. Fokin-Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary.

negotiate with the New Zealanders to return relations to a normal level. Since I had just returned from a three-week trip to six countries in Latin and Central America, I might have been incorrect in telling A. A. that I was still "out of my head"after this trip. In fact, the trip was difficult both in terms of duration and "stuffing". Not to mention the lengthy consultations in each country on the upcoming regular session of the UN General Assembly, there were unexpectedly additional assignments during the trip.

There were separate conversations on the then-urgent nuclear program of Argentina, and the beginning of conversations with Panamanians about establishing diplomatic relations, and conversations in Caracas, in the Venezuelan commission for UNESCO. All this was accompanied, as usual, by a voluminous cipher message. Although, as A. A. instructed us, not everything can be trusted with a cipher. Therefore, we personally reported the most sensitive things to the Minister.

A. A. looked at me carefully and asked me how long it would take to get to New Zealand. I suggested that it would probably take at least 25 hours, if we were lucky enough to connect planes. "Well," A. A. said, " in 25 hours, your brain will fall into place."

I asked I. N. Zemskov, who was in charge of the Second European Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, why I was chosen over the head of the department, V. P. Suslov, who certainly knew better than anyone the specifics of our relations with New Zealand and the background of the quarrel that arose out of nowhere. I. N. said that when discussing this topic, the minister also took into account who should be entrusted with this mission. He told V. P. Suslov, who was present at the discussion: "Stop sulking at each other with the New Zealanders. You have been at loggerheads with them for three years, and you need a more neutral person to resolve this issue."

Three days later, we left via Japan and Fiji for Auckland and then Wellington, with the cover of an assignment to hold consultations on UN affairs at the country's Foreign Ministry just in case.

Minister W. Cooper received us immediately, and a one-on-one conversation with him was settled in 15 minutes. Looking ahead, I will say that three months later, the Soviet Ambassador V. Bykov and the New Zealand Ambassador to Moscow E. Stokes were sitting in both capitals, respectively.

After consultations at the Foreign Ministry and another 25 hours on planes to Moscow, we reported to A. A. about the results. Of course, in advance

the corresponding encryption was sent. I didn't have the tact not to notice in the conversation that a 15-minute conversation with the New Zealand minister and a glass of champagne on this occasion had to spend 50 hours on planes. AA, turning his head to the side, said with a grin: "Well, now you have a better idea of the meaning of the theory of relativity".

A. A. was ABLE TO EXPRESS his approval or disapproval of certain actions, without saying a word, silently, with his eyes. One of the many functions of the General Secretariat was to oversee the work of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of the Union Republics. And either the Secretary General or my Deputy, Yuri Sokolov, visited the capitals of the republics to discuss issues of interest to the Center and the Foreign Ministry of the Republics. The powers of the Republican Foreign Ministries determined by the 1946 decision were, frankly speaking, not just limited, but flawed. And we tried to increase the scope of their functions step by step in our contacts, and most importantly in the work of the central office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, without much advertising of our actions. Every time we reported to the Minister, we tried to emphasize our common interest (or at least that's how we saw it) in expanding the spheres of activity of the Union Foreign Ministries. At the same time, we relied on our observations of how carefully A. A. treated the republican ministers. Among the latter were many outstanding diplomats. It is enough to recall T. Tairova, A. K. Gren, V. M. Zenkevicius, as well as a number of future ambassadors who served valiantly in our diplomatic system.

Our country's delegations to the UN General Assembly sessions always included republican foreign ministers, to whom A. A. paid special attention, as well as the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine and Belarus, which, of course, had their own representative offices at the UN. The problem was that there were people in the Politburo and the leadership of departments of the Central Committee of the CPSU who considered "messing with the republics" unnecessary. A. A.'s caution with regard to our initiatives is understandable in this regard, but his tacit consent was sufficient for us to continue moving in this direction. I would like to note that the work with Republican diplomats can be assessed as an element of his line on raising personnel both for foreign institutions and for the central office.

NOW about the" evergreen disputes " about A. A. Gromyko's sense of humor. His aides have repeatedly found that the minister hated dirty jokes. He appreciated subtle humor and was able to give his own assessments that were tinged with a good sense of humor. I remember a situation concerning the relationship between A. A. and the then long-term Foreign Minister of the Philippines, Romulo. These relations somehow did not improve, although the Philippine minister invariably asked for meetings from one session of the UN General Assembly to another. A. A. clearly did not like the fact that the delegation of the Philippines looked the Americans in the mouth too much and, as a rule, voted with them.

The case helped. The Filipino approached A. A. in the hall of the UN General Assembly, accompanied by a member of the delegation-the Chief of the General Staff of the Philippine Army, who was two meters tall and weighed 150 kilograms. The Filipino minister was, one might say, short, rather puny - in clear contrast to his military counterpart. A. A. greeted the minister dryly, but the latter did not let go of his hand and said to Andrey Andreevich: "Mr. Minister, take a look at this giant. My president always asks me why I take him to the General Assemblies. And I answer the president: "The fact is that he is a better goal than I am (he is a better aim)." (The backdrop for this was the tense situation in the Philippines.) AA chuckled, and basically, the ice was broken. Subsequently, A. A. repeatedly returned to this topic and retold the conversation with obvious pleasure.

G. Kissinger stands in A. A.'s office on the seventh floor of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and, looking at the Borodinsky Bridge, asks:" Where does this street lead? "A. A.:" To the West, where do all the problems come from?".

At the same time, A. A. had a certain acerbity when his colleagues showed some pretentiousness. At his deputy, who sometimes acted as a connoisseur of history, A. A., as if inadvertently asked under what circumstances Vasily the Dark became "Dark". And the history professor had to look in the reference books to answer the question. In this light, A. A. showed a quality that we, his assistants, were very impressed with. When in difficult protocol situations - which often occurred in New York, because he met people of different positions and different calibres - Gromyko calmly referred them to other sources for solutions, asking, for example, "How is it with Satou?"

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