CHAIRMAN KHRUSHCHEV DIES
Moscow, USSR (JFK+50) On September 11, 1971, Nikita Khrushchev*, former premier of the Soviet Union, died at a hospital here in Moscow of a heart attack.
Mr. Khrushchev, who was 77 years old at the time of his death, served as First Secretary of the Communist Party from 1953 to 1964, and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the U.S.S.R. from 1958 to 1964.
As Soviet Premier, he said to the West, "We will bury you," but after Soviet missiles were discovered by the United States in Cuba, agreed to remove them.
Premier Khrushchev once said...
"Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge even where there is no river."
New York Times Moscow correspondent Harry Schwartz wrote...
"Mr. Khrushchev opened the doors & windows of a petrified structure. He let in fresh air & fresh ideas, produced changes which time already has shown are irreversible & fundamental."
*Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev (1894-1971) was born to poor Russian peasants in Kalinovka. NSK served in WWII as Lt. General in the Soviet Armed Forces. He met with President Kennedy in Vienna in June 1961 & agreed in October 1962 to remove Soviet nuclear missiles from Cuba. NSK is buried in the Novodevichy Cemetery in Moscow.
Khrushchev & Kennedy at Summit
Vienna, Austria
June 3, 1961
U.S. State Department
JFK Library Photo
