4 ms·
Who knows. At least according to (then Germany's chancellor) Helmut Schmidt, at an official visit of Brezhnev where he had invited him to his private home in Ha
by luckylion 4y ago
Who knows. At least according to (then Germany's chancellor) Helmut Schmidt, at an official visit of Brezhnev where he had invited him to his private home in Hamburg, Brezhnev was flabbergasted that the German chancellor could live in an average home, next to normal people, without walls and hundreds of soldiers separating them.
- Thlom 4y agoWe have the same story in Norway. Apparently Nikita Khrusjtsjov visited then prime minister Einar Gerhardsen in his small and modest housing association apartment in 1964 and subsequently demanded to know where Gerhardsen REALLY lived, cause he couldn't imagine the prime minister living in a normal apartment in a normal apartment building. But he did and lived in the same apartment until his death in 1987.
- luckylion 4y agoIt might be a matter of Soviet diplomacy to act surprised. Is the story with Gerhardsen relayed by him / officials? Schmidt told it himself, so at least it's not something somebody made up and everybody repeated it because it's such a nice story, unless he himself made it up. He wasn't the type, but who knows.
- Thlom 4y agoThe story has been told by his son, but I think it is confirmed by several sources. I don't think Gerhardsen himself ever told it publicly.