As we call know, the Soviet Union as well as a dozen Soviet/Communist aligned countries boycotted the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles officially citing “Security Concerns” with the idea that the new Ronald Reagan administration of the United States was whipping up an anti-Communist/Soviet fervor in the United States and that Pro-West terrorists might attack the Communist athletes.
Now, I was always told it was a tit-for-tat response to the United States lead efforts at boycotting the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow but I’m surprised the above linked Wikipedia article just calls it a “Hypothesis” and was wondering if there were any actual alternative theories that have any merit.
The only reason I’m bringing this up is because a “History” podcast I listen to covering the year 1984 talked about the Olympics and the Soviet Boycott but then claimed that “Soviet claims of danger to their athletes was warranted” but then offered no clarification nor support for this, and was wondering if somehow there was a popular narrative shift regarding the boycott.
I lived in Los Angeles at the time, and the prevailing sentiment at the time was the “security concerns” were pure bullshit and it was just a tit-for-tat response to the Moscow games boycott. In the almost four decades afterwards I have never heard anyone suggest otherwise.
I still remember Romania getting a standing ovation during the opening ceremony Parade of Nations, as they were the only Eastern Bloc country to participate.
The consensus in the US was that security reasons was just an excuse by the Soviets to ruin the LA Olympics, the same way Jimmy Carter supposedly ruined the Moscow Olympics but part of the official Soviet statement read,
The arrogant, hegemonic course of the Washington administration in international relations is at odds with the noble ideals of the Olympic movement"
Their concern in that regard wasn’t entirely without merit. A day before the closing ceremonies, Ronald Reagan was caught joking around on an open mic:
“My fellow Americans, I’m pleased to tell you today that I’ve signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes."
After hearing that (followed shortly by Reagan’s landslide re-election), I’m sure the boycotting countries were confident that they made the right call.
I‘m not quite sure what you mean by the last sentence. You mean Soviet citizens visiting the games as spectators would not have been secure? Well, the Eastern bloc wasn’t exactly very forthcoming in permitting its citizens to travel to Western countries; it was difficult to get an exit visa and the dollars you’d need to spend in America, so there wouldn’t have been large numbers of Eastern bloc spectators in Los Angeles anyway. Or do you mean risk to the athletes? As in a Munich-type of attack on athletes in the Olympic village?
Yes. And their quite large support staff and officials. Regardless of what Americans might think or even what the actual likelyhood of violence was, the hostile attitude toward the Soviets and their allies in 1984 America was enough to make safety a legitimate concern for them.
[Moderating]
Unless the Russian Olympic officials are still alive and posting to this board, there’s not really any factual answer to this question. Moving to IMHO.
If the Soviets and their satellite states were really worried about potential “pro-West terrorists” making the U.S. in 1984 a dangerous place, they would’ve pulled out their spies, excuse me, diplomatic entourages en masse. I don’t recall that happening.
Diplomatic entourages are to be found in embassies, which are well guarded. Sending thousands of athletes, coaches, and officials for a 2-3 week visit is quite a different thing.
While I think we all agree it was mostly a tit-for-tat thing, do not underestimate the Communist bloc’s distrust of the West. That was a real thing.
I wonder when the Russians meant “secure enough for the athletes” they meant “secure” enough to prevent Russian athletes from defecting to the United States.
Security for diplomats was and still is extremely high. There was no way the LAPD and other security at the LA games could possibly achieve that level of coverage.
I’m not arguing that the boycott wasn’t a tit for tat, but Americans have a blind spot about how they and their country are perceived overseas, especially in regard to crime and American jingoism. From their perspective, the US was not a friendly place to visit.
That too was implied in the American media at the time. We had this idea that every Russian secretly wanted to foreswear their family and countrymen and defect.
“Diplomats” undertake excursions outside of their embassies all the time. If they stayed holed up in their buildings all the time, there’d be little need for diplomatic immunity, and no problem with mass flouting of local traffic laws.
(the Soviets and the U.S. had a major scuffle over diplomats ignoring traffic laws some years ago, after Mayor Guiliani announced a crackdown over the Soviets’ $5 million in unpaid fines. The Soviet Union retaliated against American diplomats, but maybe that was because the Americans were such dangerous drivers, not out of revenge).
And as we well know, terrorists do not respect the sanctity or security of embassies.
There is a huge difference between someone formally trained in the language and culture of a country they are tasked with working in and someone trained to do back flips on a balance beam.
Diplomats still have a private life in the cities where they’re posted. They go to shops, bars, restaurants. It’s not like they spend their time behind closely guarded embassy walls 24/7. I find it quite far-fetched to argue that a Soviet citizen in 1980s America was jeopardising their life in any way beyond the usual non-zero but small everyday risk that other residents of America are subject to.
While the boycott was obviously a tit-for-tat for the Moscow boycott, it shouldn’t be underestimated how much the Politburo genuinely believed the Reagan Administration to be a threat on a different level than previous Cold War presidents. In March of 1983 he delivered his “evil empire” speech to the National Association of Evangelicals, deliberately framing US-USSR relations as a conflict of good versus evil. In November of 1983, the Soviets feared that Operation Able Archer – an annual NATO training exercise – was a cover for a NATO first strike and drove the Politburo to even higher high levels of paranoia.
So while the specific charge of potential anti-Communist terrorists may have been overblown, the Soviets had good reason to be apprehensive about American intentions.
For what it’s worth, the Olympic Colosseum is just a few blocks from ground zero of the Crips/Bloods crack war in 1984. One of the cool things about the 1984 Olympics was that locals like me were able to visit the area safely. A month before or after, not so much.
But how is the risk for a Soviet visitor in that area any different than that from any other visitor? It’s not like the crack gangs can spot a Soviet guest from afar and are more likely to assault that person as a consequence. The point we’re discussing here is not whether L.A. in 1984 was a dangerous place in general, but whether it was a dangerous place for Soviet citizens in particular, as a result of anti-Soviet rhetoric at the time.
