Moscow, December 25, 1991

Yeltsin’s public lectures in the United States were well received, except for one scheduled at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore on September 12. The Russian was drunk when he arrived late on September 11 aboard a private plane supplied by Rockefeller. “It was the most astonishing scene I have ever witnessed,” recalled his host in the United States, Jim Garrison, executive director of Esalen’s Soviet American Exchange Program, which engaged in nongovernmental diplomacy with Soviet counterparts. “The president of Johns Hopkins was there to greet Yeltsin, and a young lady with a bunch of roses. When he came down the steps, Yeltsin turned around and urinated on the back tire of the plane.” Yeltsin was bundled into his hotel, where he spent the night drinking Jack Daniels. He was so intoxicated the next morning he could hardly stand, said Garrison. An admirer of Gorbachev, Garrison came to dislike Gorbachev’s “forceful, primitive and highly erratic” rival, who was “completely consumed with a dark passion” for overthrowing the Soviet leader. Yeltsin managed to give his lecture but “with the students laughing at him, not with him.”²

As Yeltsin was struggling through his speech at Johns Hopkins, the White House called to say that the Russian president, who had requested a meeting with President Bush, would be granted a session at 11:30 a.m. in the White House with National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, with the possibility that Bush might “drop by.” Bush did not want to offend Gorbachev by giving his fiercest critic anything resembling a summit meeting in Washington, particularly at a time when he and the Soviet leader were working together to achieve a number of American goals, such as the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Eastern Europe. The party drove at speed to Washington and arrived at 12:15 p.m. “Jim, you are late,” said Bush’s special assistant, Condoleezza Rice. “Condi, you have no idea,” replied Garrison.

Yeltsin at first refused to enter the White House unless Bush would promise to meet him. He protested, “I am an important man in my country.” But when told Scowcroft would not wait, he crossed the threshold. The national security adviser greeted him truculently with the question “What is the meaning of your trip to Washington?” Yeltsin retorted, “You want to know the meaning of life?” The White House official and his deputy, Robert Gates, were treated to what Gates later described as an “excruciatingly monotonous presentation” from the boorish visitor. Scowcroft at one point closed his eyes as if sleeping.³ When Vice President Quayle dropped by, Yeltsin stared at him hard and long without speaking until Quayle left, crushed. Bush at last appeared in the room. The Russian, suddenly stone cold sober, proceeded to give an earnest account of the situation back home. Later, White House sources told reporters that the visitor was a lightweight with no political future, who had made “off-the-wall” predictions about the Soviet Union’s collapse.

Tipped off about the Russian’s behavior, the Washington Post published a colorful account of “Yeltsin’s Smashing Day.” It was lifted by Italian journalist Vittorio Zucconi and embellished for an article that appeared in the Italian tabloid newspaper La Repubblica on September 14. Zucconi wrote that, for Yeltsin, America was a bar 5,000 kilometers long and that he had drunk six bottles of spirits and numerous cocktails and embarked on a wild shopping spree. It was partly an invention, based on the Post article and the correspondent’s conception of how a full-blooded Russian might behave on his first visit to the United States. The La Repubblica article was brought to the attention of Gorbachev, who encouraged Pravda to republish it. It duly appeared on September 18 in the party organ, complete with every lurid detail.

This latest attempt to discredit the people’s hero also backfired. Copies of Pravda were burned in Red Square by irate Muscovites who saw it as another dirty trick to pull down the one politician they felt they could trust. Three days later, after Pravda editorial staff had checked out the story themselves and found it to be partly invented, the paper was forced to apologize—the first ever retraction by the communist flagship.