In the early 1950s, some members of the People's Labor Union (NTU), the leading anti-Soviet organization of the Russian diaspora, lived in Beirut and Tripoli. Their task was to fight the communist ideology of the USSR and the growing sympathies for socialist ideas not only in Lebanon, but throughout the Middle East. The view from this unexpected angle, reflected in the letters of the NTS residents to their supervisor in Germany, adds some details to the picture of historical events in Lebanon, the end of Bishara al-Khoury's presidency and the activities of Camille Chamoun in this post.

Keywords: Lebanon, People's Labor Union, Gallipoli Society, Bishara al-Khoury, Camille Chamoun, anti-communism, Arab socialism.

In the history of Lebanon, the beginning of the 1950s is estimated ambiguously by historians. This is the end of a whole era of confrontation between two powerful coalitions in the Lebanese political arena-the Constitutional and National blocs. These associations, which emerged during the French mandate, included prominent politicians who saw the country's development paths differently, first of all, the ways to achieve full independence. Parties that emerged in the 1930s and 1940s on a confessional basis, as well as around pan-Arab, nationalist, progressive and socialist ideas, also had their own options for solving the key tasks facing the country. As a result of this diversity, assessments of Lebanon's socio-political development at the end of Bishara al-Khoury's presidency and at the beginning of Camille Chamoun's tenure vary widely.

One of the defining factors of the country's development after achieving full independence was the fact that the issues of coexistence and political participation of all confessional communities in the life of the new state remained formally unresolved. Even when the French mandate authorities created the State of Greater Lebanon, the majority of these communities were immediately dissatisfied with the boundaries of the new state entity, which determined the specifics of the national and religious composition of the country's population. Even the Maronites, who found themselves in a privileged position under the French, initially expressed concern that the Greater Lebanon, along with its main component - Mountain Lebanon, included territories with a significant percentage of the Orthodox population, as well as Sunni and Shiite Muslims. Other confessional communities were dissatisfied with their lack of representation in the power structures of the new state. Thus, intentionally or unintentionally, a reliable basis for a long-term hotbed of tension was created [Sarabyev, 2012, p.215]. Nevertheless, the struggle for their own statehood and full independence continued, despite ethnic and religious contradictions, and consolidated the Lebanese people. Party building

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This often happened contrary to the principle of confessional solidarity, based, in fact, on theoretical ideological attitudes.

Since the second half of the 1920s, Lebanon has been painstakingly forming its own state authorities - so far under the supervision of the French mandate administration. For many years after the establishment of the national Parliament and the election of the country's first President in 1926, the Lebanese political elite, under constant pressure from the mandate authorities and the High Commissioner, was trained to develop political consciousness and patriotic struggle. In the 1930s and 1940s, the main Lebanese parties entered the political arena, most of which, having gone through a difficult path of transformation and development, are still active today. The long - term struggle of the leaders of the Constitutional and National blocs-Bishara al-Khoury and Emile Edde-was carried out with varying success and ended with the election of B. al-Khoury as President of independent Lebanon in 1943.

By the end of the 1940s, opposition to the existing government began to grow stronger, and after the 1951 parliamentary elections, opposition deputies formed an alliance opposing the current president - the National Socialist Front. It includes deputies from the Kataib party, members of the newly created Progressive Socialist Party, supporters of Camille Chamoun, who left the pro-government Constitutional Bloc, and other forces. Discontent with President al-Khoury resulted in popular protests in the spring and summer of 1952. On September 14, a general strike began in Lebanon, and on September 18, B. al-Khoury was forced to resign. K. Shamun became the new president.

This energetic politician was initially pinned hopes not only by opposition leaders who believed his promises. The President promised to implement their plan of internal political reforms, put an end to corruption and nepotism, pursue a neutral foreign policy and adopt a new electoral law in the near future. Given the turn in Egyptian politics that took place after the July 1952 revolution, the countries of the socialist camp also welcomed the events of September in Lebanon. But very soon it became clear that K. Shamoun is pursuing a policy that is very far from the course pursued in neighboring Egypt by the members of the Free Officers organization who came to power.

The new Lebanese electoral law of 1952 was drafted in such a way that supporters of the President were able to get a majority in Parliament (as a result of the new system of allocating electoral districts and reducing the number of deputies). The executive authorities were also replenished with supporters of K. Shamun. In foreign policy, the new president began to pursue a clear pro-Western line, which caused criticism from the Socialist bloc states, some Arab countries and the internal opposition, which later merged into the National Front.

Chamoun's administration eventually moved closer to the United Kingdom, the United States, and other Western countries, as evidenced by the fact that Lebanon did not impose diplomatic sanctions against Britain and France after the 1956 Sinai campaign, as some other Arab countries did. This was contrary to the internal agreements of 1943, known as the National Pact, according to which, among other things, the Maronites were obliged to recognize the Arab identity of Lebanon and were supposed to advocate for preventing any possibility of foreign intervention.1
1 Apparently, this clause was intended to prevent the Maronites of Lebanon from relying too much on Western countries to the detriment of Arabism. For example, the German historian Michael Kuderna wrote that Emile Edde, as early as 1932, approached the French administration with a project to reform Lebanon - to create a mandatory state with a Maronite majority of the population, even if at the cost of reducing the territory of Lebanon [Kuderna, 1983, p. 23].

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Joining the "Eisenhower doctrine" in 1957 clearly showed that the Lebanese leadership was completely oriented towards the countries of the West, accepting military and financial assistance from them in fact in exchange for opposing the Arab countries of the socialist orientation.

There is an extensive historical literature devoted to the analysis of the events of the 1950s in the Middle East, in particular in Lebanon. Let's try to look at the events in this country from a very unexpected angle. No matter how much we would like to believe that the pathos of the victory over fascism in World War II covered all residents of the Middle East, including Russian immigrants, we have to admit that there were Russian Lebanese who did everything possible to spread anti-Soviet sentiment in the region. Little is known about the fact that in the early 1950s some members of the People's Labor Union (NTU), the leading anti-Soviet organization of the Russian diaspora, lived in Beirut and Tripoli.2 Being away from the main emigrant centers, they kept in touch with the Frankfurt-based leadership of the NTS, represented by the long-term chairman of the Union, V. M. Baydalakov.3
Most of the Russians living in Lebanon at that time emigrated from Soviet Russia in the early 1920s.A small part of the Russian White Guards who fled from the Crimea via Constantinople got to Beirut with the help of the French military administration. The list of surnames of Russian White Guard officers who worked as topographers and surveyors throughout Lebanon includes 99 items [Fares, 2010, pp. 143-157], and the total number of Russian immigrants in Beirut in the 1920s reached 3 thousand people. The Topographical Society created by them was engaged in drawing up maps of Lebanon for the French army, and then for the French mandate administration [Sarabyev, 08.10.2012].

They were relatively young people who were looking for the use of their energy. They created the Russian Technical Association in Lebanon, which connected immigrants from Russia of various technical specialties: architects, builders, topographers, engineers, land surveyors, accountants, draftsmen, etc. Under the Association, there was a mutual aid fund, a Russian (Thursday) school, and a youth circle [Fares, 2010, p. 143].

In 1927, an Orthodox parish with a Russian priest was founded in Beirut. The parish belonged to the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad (ROCOR) and had its own premises until 1960. Then the building was requisitioned, and the church functioned in a private house. Soon, for many reasons, the parish was forced to close. The majority of Russian Orthodox immigrants began to take care of the parish of the Metochion of the Moscow Patriarchate in Lebanon (no longer ROCOR, but the Russian Orthodox Church), which was founded in Beirut in May 1946, after the visit of Patriarch Alexy I of Moscow (Simansky) to the Middle East [Sarabyev, 08.10.2012; Fares, 2010, p.143].

Not all the first emigrants from Bolshevik Russia managed to fit in harmoniously with the life of the Arab country, overcome the language barrier, integrate into economic life and find a suitable job. One way or another, some Russians joined the activities of anti-Soviet organizations, in particular the NTS.

2 Fairly recent materials covering in detail the history and anti-Soviet activities of the NTS and its subsidiaries, including during the Great Patriotic War, are available on the website of the People's Labor Union of Russian Solidarists, which bears the following title: "Internet publishing house "InterPosev": Professional analytical and innovative website " - URL: http:// nts-rs.ru/.

3 Viktor Mikhailovich Baidalakov (1900 - 1967) was born in the Region of the Don Army. In 1918, he volunteered for the White Cossack troops, was wounded, and was promoted to an officer for military merit. In 1920, he was evacuated to Gallipoli with the White Army, then left for Serbia. He graduated from the Faculty of Chemistry of the University of Belgrade. One of the founders and long-term chairman of the NTS. In 1955, after a split in the ranks of the NTS, together with a group of supporters, he was deprived of membership in the organization (V. D. Poremsky was elected as the new chairman). He died in the United States.

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Part of the correspondence of Lebanese residents with V. M. Baidalakov is kept in the personal archive fund of the latter, located in the Special Collections Department of the Georgetown University Library in Washington-it was to America that the former leader of the NTS moved from Europe in the first half of the 1950s. However, some of the letters remained in Germany and are now stored in the fund of the Posev publishing house. This collection is an important part of the archive of the Center for Eastern European Studies at the University of Bremen.

The documents cited below cover the period from 1949 to 1954. The main body of these documents allows us to rely on the opinions of two Russian anti-communists living in Lebanon at that time - N. A. Nemeshaev, a representative of the NTS in Tripoli, 4 and I. V. Pitlenko, a representative of the NTS in Beirut. These materials provide an opportunity to analyze how the situation in Lebanon was perceived by Russian emigrants living there, what were their tasks as representatives of the Union, and what were the assessments of the possibility of expanding anti-Soviet activities in the Middle East.

Historians ' attention has long been drawn to the figure of the first president of independent Lebanon, Bishara al-Khoury. According to the American historian of Lebanese origin K. Salibi, al-Khoury "did not belong to the Arab nationalists and willingly considered Lebanon as part of the Mediterranean region. But, being a realist, he could not ignore the fact that geographically his country was inseparable from the surrounding world, which spoke Arabic. Therefore, he did not see the point in condemning Arab nationalism and tried in every possible way to come to an agreement with it" [Salibi, 1969, p. 272]. The problem of Bishara al-Khuri, K. Salibi pointed out, largely consisted in the corruption of a significant part of the Lebanese state apparatus during his rule [ibid., p. 276].

It is precisely this inconsistency of B. al-Khuri's rule that was pointed out by contemporaries of the events - Russian emigrants. For example, Nemeshaev believed that al-Khoury ("Popov in Russian", as the author of the document translated the surname) was a "wonderful" president. However, his entourage, among which relatives were named, in particular his son, brother Selim and others, "wanted to benefit from the fact that their relative is the president." N. Nemeshaev stressed that it was not only the al-Khoury family that was distinguished by corruption. The blame for the situation in the country was also laid on members of Parliament, who also "sought to cover their election expenses" [FSO UB NA, 29.09.1952]. As a result, as the author of the letter wrote, by the beginning of the 1950s, "speculation, theft, bakshishi, the arrangement of their affairs by the powerful of this world began to worry the people" [ibid.].

This kind of public sentiment prevailed in Lebanese society. The president was accused of pandering to rampant corruption, economic stagnation, and conservatism. The opposition united various political forces based on the ideas of social transformation and government reform. However, the oppositionists practically did not have the opportunity to act without attracting protest movements of the masses. As N. Nemeshaev noted, the number of opposition factions was only 14 people out of 77 deputies of the Lebanese Parliament. They launched a "systematic attack" on the president and his entourage, demanding reforms and "an end to outrages" [ibid.].

The 1951 parliamentary elections did not fundamentally change the situation in the country: As the radical Arab nationalist M. Majzoub pointed out, the results are very different.-

4 Nikolay Alekseyevich Nemeshaev (1896-1974), captain of horse artillery, who fought on the side of the White Movement in the Drozdov artillery brigade in southern Russia during the Civil War. After moving to Lebanon, he worked as a tonographic engineer at the Lebanese Cadastre. In 1946-1947, he participated in the compilation of topographic maps of Aley [Fars, 2010, p. 150]. He died in 1974 in San Francisco. It is known that Vadim Nikolaevich Nemeshaev, a native of Lebanon, also lived in the United States, possibly his son (see: Filipchenko, 2010, p. 272).

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The hogs retained the "influence of the feudal lords" (Majzub, 1959, p. 51). It should be noted that even Russian emigrants who held conservative political positions actually agreed with this assessment. The same N. Nemeshaev pointed out that deputies were still "rich people, begs, large house owners, etc." [FSO UB NA, 29.09.1952]. Although all observers agreed that the opposition's influence had increased somewhat, even after the 1951 elections, Parliament was dominated by al-Khoury's supporters, who still held more than 50% of the seats.

Similar in many respects to Nemeshaev's assessment of the situation in Lebanon at the end of al-Khoury's presidency was the assessment given by another Russian immigrant, I. V. Pitlenko, a representative of the NTS in Beirut (an employee of a local trading company and an architect by profession [Stolypin, 1986, part 3, Chapter 10]). He took a broader approach to the causes of the September 1952 events: he felt that it was necessary to take into account the situation not only within Lebanon, but also in the entire region as a whole. "Our East is seething," he wrote. - All Arab countries suddenly experience crises and regime changes. The main reasons should be considered the emergence of a new state entity in the heart of the Arab environment - Israel " [FSO UB. I. V. Pitlenko emphasized that a whole group of factors contributed to the crisis phenomena in the Near and Middle East in the early 1950s. Among them - the unsuccessful war of Arab countries with Israel and "incredible social backwardness" [ibid.]. Curiously, the Russian emigrant believed that the catalyst for the political crisis was the discovery of rich oil deposits in Arab countries. This circumstance led in some cases to the growth of" medieval chauvinism", which was accompanied by the awakening of the" social consciousness of the masses", who demanded agrarian reforms and other transformations. "The East swings between Nazism and communism," I. V. Pitlenko made a curious conclusion [ibid.]. The events in Lebanon were just one of the manifestations of this general crisis in the Arab world. Although I. V. Pitlenko also wrote about the "long-term uncontrolled theft of the president and his numerous relatives" [ibid.], he also showed that the real roots of discontent with President al-Khoury and his resignation lay much deeper.

Similar descriptions were made by two Russian emigrants of the events of September 1952. I. V. Pitlenko, who was directly in Beirut, wrote: "On September 15, 16 and 17, the city closed down and froze, but no mass actions followed. Life could not endure the deathly silence for long, and on September 18, the streets were waiting for performances. Then, from 17 to 18, the president surrendered to the pressure of the street, handing over power to the army. The city opened up, and life took on a normal look " [FSO UB ON, 14.10.1952]. Already on September 23, the parliament elected a new president - Camille Chamoun, a prominent former figure of the Constitutional Bloc, one of the leaders of the opposition.

Nemeshayev watched all these events while in Tripoli. He apparently knew about the general strike announced by the opposition to put pressure on B. al-Khoury:" All shops and markets have closed - life has become better, "the Russian emigrant pointed out [FSO UB NA, 29.09.1952]." Seeing that it is pointless to resist, " Prime Minister Saeb Salam resigned, even before you have fully formed your cabinet. Bishara al-Khoury" on the night of the third day of the strike " [ibid.] summoned the commander of the Lebanese army, General Fouad Shihab. The latter was given full power, and it was Shihab, as Nemeshaev writes, who called new elections [ibid.].

How did the Russian emigrants assess the prospects of a new revolutionary government in Lebanon? Being conservative in their political views, these people were very skeptical about such upheavals, remembering well what they once led to in their homeland. A month after the coup, in mid-October 1952, I. V. Pitlenko noted :" Now the opposition is raging... "Broad reforms" are promised, and the city has calmed down so far, having survived the "first bloodless "war" (here he clearly hinted at

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historical parallels with the events of the February Revolution of 1917 in Russia) [FSO UB ON, 14.10.1952]. N. Nemeshayev was also a skeptic, who was well aware that the new government would have to solve the same problems as the al-Khuri-Salam government. "I think," he directly pointed out already 6 days after the election of Camille Chamoun as president , "that it will be very difficult for him to do anything, because all the same people who were in the administration are in power, the deputies are still the same, that is, those who want to "grab" " [FSO UB ON, 29.09.1952].

Russian Lebanese were aware that the situation in the country was influenced by a whole range of various factors, among which the Israeli one played a major role. Their attention could not fail to be drawn to the terrorist act that took place on February 9, 1953. On this day, a bomb was thrown at the territory of the Soviet Embassy in Tel Aviv. Three employees of the diplomatic mission were injured, and windows and doors on several floors of the building were broken.5
As you know, this terrorist act was the reason for the break in Soviet-Israeli relations three days later. But some Russian anti-communists living in Lebanon felt that the impact of this event on the situation in the world could become much more serious. N. Nemeshaev, for example, compared the explosion at the Soviet mission on February 9 with the "Sarajevo shot" that started the First World War [GUL SC, 19.02.1953]. At the same time, despite his commitment to anti-communism, the Russian emigrant did not take the side of Israel in this matter. It seemed to him that Israel bears a significant part of the responsibility for the escalation of tension in the region. In many letters, the NTS representative in Tripoli harshly criticized the policy of the Jewish state, which, as he wrote a week after the break in Soviet-Israeli diplomatic relations, for years "sat in tents about a million Palestinians in Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, etc." [ibid.]. The Russian anti-communist was also outraged by the expansionist line of Israel, the statements of its politicians that the borders of the Jewish state are "on the Euphrates" [GUL SC, 12.08.1954]. According to N. According to Nemeshayeva, such a policy of Israel was one of the main factors that hindered a peaceful settlement in the Middle East.

During the presidency of Camille Chamoun, the situation in Lebanon remained tense, in particular, relations between various religious communities remained problematic. Once again, the question was raised about which way the country would develop further. In the spring of 1953, N. Nemeshaev in his report pointed out as the main problem in the region the widespread idea of creating a " pan-Arab "(and at the same time Islamic) state" from the Atlantic to the Great Ocean " [GUL SC, 26.03.1953]. Naturally, there was no unity on this issue in Lebanese society. As N. Nemeshaev noted, a significant part of the national political elite proceeded from the fact that "Lebanon is the only refuge for all the sire and persecuted" [ibid.], and therefore the country should not have entered into a close association with other Islamic states. A special resonance, according to the Russian emigrant, was the appeal issued by the so-called Muslim Committee 6 about the need for a new state of affairs.

5 In 1961, a member of the extremist organization Malchut Yisrael (Kingdom of Israel), J. Mankes, admitted that the bombing was carried out in response to the anti-Jewish actions of the Soviet authorities. On February 11, 1953, a "Note from the Soviet Government on the termination of diplomatic relations with the Government of Israel" was sent to Israel, in which, in particular, the following was reported: "On February 9, a bomb exploded on the territory of the USSR Mission in Israel with the apparent connivance of the police, as a result of which the wife of the Envoy K. V. Ershov was seriously injured, the wife of the Mission's employee A. P. Sysoev and the Mission's employee I. G. Grishin. The explosion damaged the building of the USSR Mission."

6 An organization that probably originated from the Lebanese branch of the National Action League, which was exclusively Muslim. The League was established at a closed conference in the Lebanese village of Karneil in 1933, its headquarters in Damascus began functioning at the same time, and the Lebanese branch was founded in 1936 [Khoury, 1987, p. 401; Ziadeh, 1957, p.199]. The League, and later the Muslim Committee, supported Arabism and the unity of the Syro-Lebanese nation on the basis of a common Syrian Arab identity.

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unification of the country with Syria. After all, in accordance with the above-mentioned National Pact, both Shiites and Sunnis refused to strive for the unification of Lebanon with Syria, so such an appeal led to undermining the agreement on renouncing foreign policy claims in general, and, accordingly, the part of it where it was said about the distribution of key posts in state structures between faiths.

A number of Christian communities and some Muslim politicians opposed this idea of the Muslim Committee. But N. Nemeshaev noticed a special position of the Orthodox, who were "silent". Indeed, the Lebanese Orthodox did not express a single opinion on such initiatives. Most likely, such an opinion simply did not exist: if Orthodox Christians living scattered in Lebanese cities could sympathize with Assyrian sentiments, then it was difficult to assert this in relation to the inhabitants of the Orthodox Kura governorate (with a predominantly rural population). As a Russian immigrant wrote, the special line of the Orthodox community of Lebanon was dictated by the desire for "unity with Muslims and Syria in order to eliminate the influence of Catholics" [ibid.].

Judging by the tone of the letter, N. Nemeshaev himself was unpleasantly surprised by his discovery. However, this position of some Lebanese Orthodox Christians was rooted in the circumstances of previous decades and was not unexpected. Even during the Arab revolt of Sherif Hussein and the actions of Emir Faisal in Syria in 1916-1918, the Orthodox fervently supported the Arab troops, seeing in them a more acceptable alternative to Western Catholics and Protestants. This choice could allow the Orthodox to preserve their original Eastern spiritual and cultural heritage. Subsequently, the Orthodox tried to resist the implementation of the plans of the French mandate authorities to strengthen local Uniate communities, which was facilitated, in particular, by the creation of the Great Lebanon and the dissection of the flock of the Patriarchate of Antioch along the state border. However, active and mass protest actions of the Lebanese Orthodox were observed before the election of the first Lebanese Orthodox president Charles Dabbas in 1926. Later, for some time, two patriarchs of Antioch acted in parallel: Alexander (Takhan) and Arseny (Haddad) - respectively in Damascus and Tripoli-from 1931 to 1933. [Sarab'ev, 2012, p. 217]. However, ordinary believers remained convinced for a long time about the danger of dividing the Syro-Lebanese Orthodox in the face of the threat of Catholicizing the Christian population of the Levant.

N. Nemeshaev considered the problem of internal disunity of Lebanese society to be very acute. He believed that the factor of the Cold War, one of the fronts of which was the Middle East, played a role here. As befitted a representative of the NTS, he believed that the main culprit for destabilizing the situation in the world was the Soviet Union. The very existence of the communist regime in the USSR, as N. Nemeshaev imagined, contributed to the aggravation of international tensions. As you know, the NTS strongly opposed any agreements with the Communists. That is why its leaders were completely indignant at any talk about "peaceful coexistence" that resonated with a part of the Western public. Outraged by such sentiments of some American politicians and intellectuals, N. Nemeshaev exclaimed: "They continue to chew the cud about "world peace"! But they know perfectly well that this is nonsense. Under all the worlds, the Communists want to rule everywhere, whether it is peace or war. How can they be taught that peace is out of the question as long as the Communists exist?" In view of this state of affairs, the STC representative in Tripoli saw it as his task to "tell the people the truth" about the international situation "over the heads of Governments" [GUL SC, 26.03.1953].

However, in the spring of 1953, the leadership of the STC in Lebanon, like all anti-communists, began to hope that with the death of J. V. Stalin, the situation in the world could change dramatically. On March 26, 1953, N. Nemeshaev wrote from Tripoli to Frankfurt am Main to V. M. Baidalakov: "I congratulate you on the good news-the death of Stalin!

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It is possible that this will be a turning point in the history of Russia, the beginning of liberation from Bolshevism "[ibid.]. At the same time, the representative of the NTS in Tripoli noted that this event almost coincided with the death (March 14) of another prominent communist - the President of Czechoslovakia, Clement Gottwald (1896-1953). These two developments raised hopes among opponents of the Soviet bloc that it would weaken in the near future.

In the meantime, the Soviets and their allies, from Nemeshaev's point of view, were working to split the local population in the Near and Middle East in their own political interests, including by economic methods. The situation in the Lebanese economy was not very favorable, and the socialist countries allegedly sold their goods to the Arabs cheaper than the West. "Now everything is littered with Czech, Hungarian and Austrian goods," wrote the Russian emigrant. "There are a lot of German ones, but because of the boycott of Germans by Arab states, they will probably be imported from East Germany." And money, N. Nemeshaev noted, is the "God of the East" [ibid.]. Apparently, in relation to Germany, the reaction of some Arab countries (following the Soviet Union) to the country's accession to NATO and the strengthening of the Bonn political line directed against the countries of the socialist camp was meant.

Nemashaev notes with annoyance that ordinary Lebanese, if not support socialist ideas, then at least indifference to the anti-Soviet rhetoric coming from the West. In this sense, another letter from this representative of the NTS is remarkable, where he pointed out that he was forced to conduct constant disputes with local Arabs and Armenians. The author was inclined to attribute this approach of the Lebanese to their alleged cynicism and self-interest: "For several years in a row, you tell these people about the horrors of the Soviet regime, and as a result: "It is profitable for us!". Do you understand what a horror it is! Such behavior, as N. Nemeshaev believed, was not only immoral, but also completely destructive: "Apparently, these Judas will eventually suffer the same fate, with the difference that not they themselves will strangle, but what will strangle them?"- Receipt number " [GUL SC, 01.05.1953]. In general, describing the moral and moral atmosphere in Lebanese society in the spring of 1953, the author summed up: "It's getting harder to live" [GUL SC, 26.03.1953].

There was no fundamental change for the better in the country's economic life. The situation in the Lebanese economy remained difficult under the regime of Camille Chamoun, as evidenced, in particular, by the letters of local Russian anti-communists. So, in August 1953, I. V. Pitlenko in one of his letters to Frankfurt noted:: "Lebanon is currently experiencing a crisis, the republican ticket office is empty, and salaries are not paid for six to seven months" [GUL SC, 14.08.1953].

However, the leaders of the NTS also recorded favorable shifts in the ideological attitudes of the ruling regime. For such an ardent anti-Communist as N. Nemeshaev, it was gratifying to see in the spring of 1954 - "for the first time in 24 years" - articles in the Lebanese press directed against the Communists. "The times seem to be changing. God grant it, " he exclaimed in a letter [GUL SC, 18.05.1954].

However, already in August of the same year, a Russian anti-communist reacted with indignation to the visit of one of the Lebanese ministers to Hungary, during which he "sang the praises of the Soviets" [GUL SC, 12.08.1954]. In this letter, N. Nemeshaev again writes about the notable "work of communists": it seemed to him that a wedge was deliberately "driven" between Lebanese Muslims and Christians. "This is all done very clumsily, you can see hands directing the crowd to riots. Day and night it is hammered into people's heads that the government is no good, changes are needed, they reach... the need to have Soviet power!!!" [ibid.].

How did the Russian anti-communists deploy their activities in Lebanon under such conditions? It is appropriate to recall K.'s opinion in this connection. Salibi noted that under Camille Chamoun, "free expression of public opinion was ensured" (Salibi, 1969, p. 282). Contrary to this thesis, the letters of NTS figures show that the law is sufficient

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it strictly regulated the conduct of political actions and agitation in the country. In May 1953, N. Nemeshaev noted: "Speeches on political and communist topics are absolutely prohibited by law in our country" [GUL SC, 01.05.1953]. The only way out of the situation, which was used by Russian anti-communists, was private meetings, "without advertising in posters" [ibid.].

It is clear that it was extremely difficult to promote their ideas among the Lebanese population in these circumstances. Given this, the representative of the NTS in Tripoli was rather skeptical about the news about the possible visit to Lebanon of the ideologists of this organization V. D. Poremsky 7 and R. N. Redlich 8-odious figures known for their anti-Soviet activities during the tragic years of the Great Patriotic War. N. Nemeshaev, who was well aware of the situation in Lebanon, believed that visiting anti-communists would simply not be given the opportunity to speak to anyone. According to N. Nemeshaev, the only more or less favorable audience for V. D. Poremsky and R. N. Redlich could be Muslims and Catholic youth [GUL. SC, 05/01/1953]: the latter, in particular, was the object of anti-communist propaganda and on the part of Catholic priests.

The obvious difficulties faced by anti-communists from the STC in Lebanon were typical of this kind of activity throughout the Middle East. Yet this region, as an extremely important Cold War front, has always attracted the attention of the European NTS center. In addition to the already mentioned leaders of the Union, an employee of the NTS A. P. Timofeev 9 conducted operational work on this site. After many years of activity in Europe, it was he who led the activities of the NTS in the Mediterranean and Middle East. At the height of the Cold War, A. P. Timofeev traveled to the countries of the Near and Middle East, developing contacts of this organization with anti-Soviet and anti-communist groups in the region. Long-term leader of the NTS E. Romanov 10 later recalled A. P. Timofeev: "He spoke 12 languages, conducted the widest correspondence in them (hundreds of acquaintances and correspondents all over the world), was an extremely sociable person. But at the same time, he is a very talented conspirator, a brilliant organizer, always extremely accurate and reliable.-

7 Vladimir Dmitrievich Poremsky (1909-1997). He was born in Czestochowa in a military family. In 1920, he was evacuated to Yugoslavia with his parents. In 1928, he graduated from the Sorbonne and then from the Institute of Chemistry in Lille. One of the founders of the NTS, since 1934 - Chairman of its French department. In 1942, together with R.N. Redlich, he was sent to a prisoner-of-war camp in Wustrau, Germany, as a teacher at courses on training Nazi administrative personnel in the occupied territories. In 1944, he was arrested by the Gestapo along with other members of the NTS, and released at the request of General A. A. Vlasov on April 4, 1945 [Pushkarev, p.19]. After the Second World War, he was one of the main ideologists of the NTS, the author of the anti-Soviet "molecular theory", described in the 1948 work "Towards a theory of revolution under a totalitarian regime". 1955-1972-Chairman of the NTS. In the 1990s, he repeatedly visited Russia and met with prominent Russian philosophers. He died in Frankfurt am Main.

8 Roman Nikolaevich Redlich (1911-2005). Born in Moscow, he worked as a mechanic on the railway, then as a junior researcher at the State Institute of Psychology, Pedology and Psychotechnics. In 1933, he emigrated to Germany. In 1940, he graduated from the University of Berlin and received a Ph. D. in philosophy. Since 1940-member of the NTS. During the Great Patriotic War, he also worked in a propaganda camp in Vustrau and served in schools that trained saboteurs from Soviet prisoners of war. For many years he was a member of the NTS Council.

9 Timofeev Alexander Petrovich (1916-1985). Born in Tallinn, the son of a Russian naval officer, he left Estonia for Sweden in 1929, joined the STC in 1937, and was active in anti - communist propaganda in Scandinavia and France in the late 1930s and 1940s. Subsequently, he headed the operational work of the NTS in the southern sector (Italy, Greece, Turkey, Iran, Egypt, etc.).

10 Romanov E. (Ostrovsky Evgeny Romanovich). Born in 1914 in Yekaterinoslav (now Dnepropetrovsk) in the family of an officer. In 1934, he entered the Mining Department of the Mining Institute, and later moved to the Faculty of Russian Language and Literature of the Dnepropetrovsk University. After the beginning of the occupation of Dnepropetrovsk by Nazi troops during the Great Patriotic War, he remained in the city and worked in the editorial office of the Dnepropetrovsk Newspaper. A member of the NTS since 1942. Evacuated after the Nazi troops after their retreat, then worked in Berlin in the newspaper "New Word". Arrested by the Gestapo in 1944. Since 1946-member of the Council of the NTS, in 1984-1995-Chairman of the NTS. He died in 2001 in Bulgaria.

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be attentive to both business partners and yourself" [Romanov, p. 296]. Such a warm response was primarily due to E. Romanov's high assessment of the effectiveness of A. P. Timofeev's anti-Soviet activities, which he successfully conducted in such a vast space."

The anti-communist activities of the NTS in the Middle East have always been linked to the political situation in the region. In particular, in a number of countries they were suspicious of any agitation and propaganda on the part of Russians, without understanding its direction. It is no coincidence that back in 1949 V. D. Poremsky asked his ally in the Union A. P. Stolypin12 to prepare special letters to the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Turkey and Afghanistan. As V. D. Poremsky pointed out, the distribution of Russian emigrant newspapers in Turkey was practically impossible due to the fact that "for the local government, Russian (white or red) is one and the same" [FSO UB ON, 20.05.1949]. Russian newspapers were distributed only by subscription, and it was not allowed to subscribe to more than one copy. Getting more could cause "unpleasant questions" from the Turkish authorities. Therefore, the NTS management decided to send a request to the Turkish Foreign Ministry for permission to send the press organ of the Posev Union to the country - "on an equal basis with other foreign newspapers." This petition drew attention to the specific nature of "Seeding". First of all, it emphasized the significant role that the magazine could play in "awakening and strengthening prudent anti-communist tendencies among people of Russian origin living in Turkey, or local citizens who speak Russian and are interested in relevant issues" [ibid.]. A similar message was sent to the Afghan Foreign Ministry at the same time.

The situation of the Russian anti-communists in Lebanon could hardly be described as quite prosperous. Nevertheless, they tried in every possible way to expand their ties and involve any like-minded people in neighboring countries in their activities. So, it is known that they tried to draw into the orbit of their tasks long-time immigrants from Russia who lived in Syria, Iraq and Iran and sympathized with anti-Soviet ideas.

At that time, several white officers from the Gallipoli Society lived in Damascus [Ivanov; Russian General Military Union]. According to one of I. V. Pitlenko's letters, he was aware of the presence of at least three irreconcilable anti-communists among them. However, the age of these people and their psychological state clearly hindered their involvement in political activities: "They are already heavy, and it has not yet been possible to encourage them to do new things" [FSO UB NA, 14.10.1952; GUL SC, 01.05.1953]. N. Nemeshaev also maintained correspondence with Russian emigrants living in Syria. From them, for example, he received information about the strengthening of the Yugoslav position in Syria in the early 1950s. In one of his letters to V. M. Baidalakov, N. Nemeshaev pointed out that the "Syrian colonels" had granted the Titovites a concession for the construction of a port in Latakia, and noted at the same time: "Syria wants to have its own port, and not a transit port through Lebanon - Beirut and Tripoli" [GUL SC, 01.05.1953]. As old Russian emigrants from Damascus informed Nemeshaev, Yugoslav officers also served as instructors in the Syrian army.

In the early 1950s, an attempt was made to establish an NTS cell in Iraq. It is known that the representative of the Union in Baghdad was a certain Pyotr Nikolaevich Kravchenko 13 [FSO UB ON, 14.10.1952]. So far, we have not been able to find any sources that characterize-

11 By the way, in the 1990s A. P. Timofeev's extensive collection of books and emigrant periodicals was transferred to Moscow and now forms a significant part of the Russian Abroad Department of the Russian State Library.

12 Stolypin Arkady Petrovich (1903-1990). Son of the Prime Minister of the Russian Empire. In 1920, together with his family, he was taken by the Polish Red Cross to Warsaw. Lived in Germany, Italy, France, worked in the banking sector. From 1935 he was a member of the STC, and from 1942-1949 he was Chairman of the Union's department in France. From 1969 until his death , he was a member of the editorial board of the journal "Sowing".

13 Mention of Peter Kravchenko is also contained in one of V. D. Povolyaev's essays in the collection "Russians in Lebanon" on p. 113.

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relevant results of its activities. It is quite possible that they will be found one day, and we will learn more about the anti-Soviet activities of the NTS in Iraq in connection with the disengagement in the Arab world on the issues of the Baghdad Pact (1955), the Eisenhower doctrine (1957) and support for one of the poles of the Cold War.

The anti-communist activities of the NTS in Iran, apparently, were also not very successful. A letter was delivered to Beirut from one of the Russian anti-communists living in Tehran, which emphasized::

"We have never had any legal emigrant organizations here, for the reason that, according to the Soviet-Iranian treaty of 1921, there should not be any political Russian associations in Iran. The advisers identified themselves in this regard more than 30 years ago and are vigilant to this day, so that this agreement is not violated "[ibid.].

I. V. Pitlenko in his letter with annoyance reported: "10 months of intensive correspondence did not give positive results, we still do not find anyone to entrust the organization of the cell. Several of our friends have died."

Letters to Lebanon from Tehran vividly demonstrate how the political moods of Russian emigrants living in Iran evolved during the Second World War. As the author of one of these letters noted, "during the war, during the days of the Allied occupation, very many Russians ran to the Soviet consulate and offered their services in betraying their neighbor, or in terms of espionage activities in general "[ibid.]. Thus, as in other centers of the Russian diaspora during the Great Patriotic War, many Russians in Iran were seized with patriotic enthusiasm and sought to provide some kind of assistance to their homeland.

As a result of the war, there was a significant change in the "geography of the Russian diaspora". From Europe and other regions where the Red Army was likely to arrive, anti-communist emigrants sought to go overseas. This process also affected the countries of the Middle East. So, according to one of the letters received by a Russian Lebanese, representatives of the Tolstoy Foundation, an organization created by Leo Tolstoy's daughter, Alexandra Lvovna, to help Russian refugees, arrived in Tehran in the early 1950s from the United States. According to this source, about two thousand Russians living in Iran expressed a desire to leave for America through the Tolstoy Foundation. And this is not accidental, since the situation in the country in those years was generally restless, and among Russian immigrants it was even nervous: "The public is afraid to buy newspapers, and if anyone buys them, they do it with great caution" [ibid.].

To activate the anti-Soviet forces in Iran, the NTS leadership in Germany also used its Lebanese contacts. The importance of Persia for Russian anti-communists was repeatedly pointed out by the leaders of the NTS, in particular V. M. Baidalakov. The importance of this country in anti-Soviet propaganda, of course, was dictated in general by the importance of Iran in the Cold War strategy. I. V. Pitlenko in response letters to the Center pointed out: "In your letter you wrote that Persia is important for the NTS. I think that without a trip to Persia, it is impossible to organize an NTS cell there" [ibid.]. The importance of the Persian direction for the central leadership of the Union became an occasion for I. V. Pitlenko to raise the question of "replenishing the East with fresh forces" [ibid.], i.e., sending new active anti-communists to this region.

The "work" of Russian anti-communists in Lebanon was also complicated by tense internal relations and an atmosphere of mutual suspicion. I. V. Pitlenko in one of his letters called the conflict of interests of many foreign intelligence agencies in Lebanon the reason for this [GUL. SC, 14.08.1953]. He himself was on very bad terms with Nemeshayev: representatives of the NTS in Beirut and Tripoli did not trust each other. N. Nemeshaev, in turn, signaled to the Center about the connections of I. V. Pit-

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Lenko with the "Bolsheviks" [GUL SC, 01.05.1953]. Nevertheless, despite such warnings, the correspondence of the NTS management with the latter continued.

In the autumn of 1951, I. V. Pitlenko made a trip to Europe. In Germany, he met with the leaders of the NTS, having received the authority to conduct anti-communist activities on behalf of the Union. When he returned home, he sent V. M. Baidalakov a very emotional letter from Lebanon:

"Dear Viktor Mikhailovich, Having twice slipped under the half-drawn iron curtain of Austria, through fabulous Venice,<... It wasn't until October 1 that my wife and I returned to loud, noisy Beirut. After a wonderful trip to Europe, which gave me so many exceptional memories, with a refreshed and unbridled energy, I cheerfully meet the working days with their endless bustle <...> According to the plan we worked out in Limburg, I start work, inspired by the hope of its implementation. < ... > I have now sent out preliminary letters throughout the Middle East, so that establish connections. I need constant communication with you and allied literature "[FSOUB. ON, 15.10.1951].

A few years later, the real shock among the leaders of the NTS was caused by the information that I. V. Pitlenko turned out to be an agent of the Soviet special services. It was only after he underwent Soviet agent training in Vienna during a new trip to Europe in the summer of 1954 that the former leader of the Russian anti-Communists in Beirut was finally exposed by the NTS leadership [GUL SC, 21.10.1954]. After the dismissal of I. V. Pitlenko, G. G. Runge, who lived in Beirut, became the main representative of the NTS in Lebanon [GUL SC, 18.10.1954].

Of course, Lebanon has never been a major center of Russian political emigration. Nevertheless, it was through the Lebanese "Russians" that the NTS tried to conduct anti-Soviet propaganda in the Middle East and even find a way to deploy it in Turkey and Iran. The successes and failures of the anti-Soviet and anti-communist activities of the NTS in the Middle East can be discussed by studying in detail a wider layer of archival materials of the central leadership of the Union in Frankfurt am Main, which turned out to be in various private and public archives.

The studied letters of Russian immigrants living in Lebanon provide us with invaluable historical evidence of the events of the early 1950s, show how the authors-eyewitnesses perceived the situation in the country as a whole, what opportunities they saw for anti-Soviet propaganda and preventing the spread of socialist ideas among the Arabs. This approach, which is somewhat unusual for Russian researchers, obviously calls for closer attention to the Cold War front in the Middle East and allows us to see new facets of Lebanon's political history in the first decade of its independence.

LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS

FSO UB HA - Forschungsstelle Osteuropa an der Universität Bremen. Historisches Archiv.

GUL SC - Georgetown University Library. Special Collections.

14 Runge Georgy Georgievich (1896-1972). Born in St. Petersburg, he graduated from the First Cadet Corps and the Nikolaev Engineering School. He studied at the Kyiv Polytechnic University. Lieutenant of engineering troops. During the Civil War, he served in the Drozdov Engineer Company. Member of the Sofia, Salonika (1925-1929), Paris (sub - department in Beirut, 1930 - 1959) departments of the Russian All-Military Union (ROVS) [Copy of certificate No. 3471]. In 1930, he moved to Lebanon, worked in the Beirut municipality as a draftsman [Fares, 2010, p. 153], according to other sources - as a hydraulic engineer and topographer. From 1955 to 1959, he was a representative of the NTS in the Middle East and the Posev publishing house in Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq. In the early 1960s, he moved to the United States. Until recently, he was active in the NTS and served as Chairman of the Audit Commission of the Union's North American organization. A year before his death, he became a full member of the Gallipoli Society (award No. 3471). He died in 1972 in New York [Runge; Copy of certificate No. 3471].

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list of literature

Ivanov I. B. K 80-letiyu Obshchestva Gallipolijtsev [To the 80th anniversary of the Gallipoli Society]. 2001. N 1 - 2. URL: http://izput. narod.ru/k801og.html.

Copy of certificate No. 3471 of the Gallipoli Society. URL: http://izput.narod.ni/g/3471.jpg.

Majzoub, M. The Tragedy of Democracy and Arab Nationalism in Lebanon, Moscow, 1959.
Pushkarev B. People's Labor Union (NTS) in the history of Russian Resistance. URL: http://nts-rs. ru/ist240513.doc.

Romanov E. In the struggle for Russia. Memoirs of the head of the NTS. Moscow, 1999.

Рунге Г.Г. // URL: http://voldrozd.narod.ru/proеkt/usa/novo-diеv/rungе.html.

Russian Combined Arms Union (ROVS). The Gallipoli Society. URL: http://izput.narod.ni/g/g.html.

Salibi, Kamal S. Essays on the history of Lebanon, Moscow, 1969.
Sarab'ev A.V. At home and abroad. Migrations of Christians in Syria and Lebanon (2nd half of the XIX - 1st half of the XX centuries). Moscow: IV RAS, 2012.

Sarab'ev A.V. Rossiiskaya diaspora v Libanevom [Russian Diaspora in Lebanon] / Fund for Support and Protection of the Rights of Compatriots Living Abroad. 08.10.2012. URL: http://pravfond.ru/?modulе=articlеs&action=viеw&id=43.

Stolypin A. P. In the Service of Russia: Essays on the history of the NTS. Frankfurt am Main: Posev Publ., 1986, Part 3, Chapter 10. http://ntsrs.ru/contеnt/glava-10-uspеhi-i-nеudachi-ch-6.

Fares A. Russian Topographical Engineers in Lebanon: Post-revolutionary Emigration. Russian compatriots in Lebanon: history and modernity. Collection of materials / Comp. by S. A. Vorobyov. Beirut, 2010.

Filipchenko M. V. List of Russian families who emigrated to Lebanon after the revolution. Russian compatriots in Lebanon: history and modernity. Collection of materials / Comp. by S. A. Vorobyov. Beirut, 2010.

FSOUBHA. F. 98. V. D. Poremsky to A. P. Stolypin. 20.05.1949. Folder "Letters to Frankfurt. 1951-1952". I. V. Pitlenko - V. M. Baidalakov. 15.10.1951; 14.10.1952. N. Nemeshaev - V. M. Baidalakov. 29.09.1952.

GUL SC. The Victor M. Baydalakoff Collection. Box 9. Folder 1. I. V. Pitlenko - V. M. Baidalakov. 14.08.1953. N. Nemeshaev - V. M. Baidalakov. 19.02.1953; 26.03.1953; 01.05.1953. Folder 2. G. G. Runge to V. M. Baidalakov. 18.10.1954. L. A. Rahr - Heads of departments, general representatives and employees of the NTS foreign Affairs sector. 21.10.1954. N. Nemeshaev - V. M. Baidalakov. 18.05.1954; 12.08.1954.

Khoury Ph.S. Syria and the French Mandate: The Politics of Arab Nationalism, 1920 - 1945. L.: Tauris, 1987.

Kudеrna M. Chrislichen Gruppen im Lebanon: Lampf um Ideologic und Herrchaft in einer unfertigen Nation. Wiesbaden, 1983.

Ziadeh N.A. Syria and Lebanon. L.: Ernest Benn Ltd., 1957.

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