“So, there is no going back,” Borodin observed. “We have all agreed upon our course of action. Now we are committed to it.” Their reactions to his words were just what he expected them to be—sober. As well they might be. All were single; no one left behind a wife or children. All were Party members in good standing, their dues paid up to the end of the year, their Party cards right where they were supposed to be, “next to their hearts.” And each one shared with his comrades a deep-seated dissatisfaction with, in some cases a hatred of, the Soviet government.
