Ambassador Bullitt never lost his vision of a Monticello in Moscow, which, he once quipped, would have a quotation from Thomas Jefferson over the entrance: GOD FORBID THAT WE SHOULD LIVE FOR TWENTY YEARS WITHOUT A REVOLUTION.17 He even obtained the necessary $1.2 million appropriation, which caused controversy in Congress but was justified on the grounds of the expected “Red trade offers.”18 But Stalin never had any intention of giving up such valuable land in the center of Moscow, so the money was never used and Bullitt’s kiss was returned in vain.
