55 Soviet Diplomats Depart U.S. on Charter Flight in Ouster War

The 55 Soviet diplomats and their families ordered from the United States as the result of a U.S.-Soviet expulsion war left Washington Friday on a special flight to Moscow.

Spokesman Boris Malakhov said the diplomats left aboard a chartered Aeroflot flight “as requested” by the Reagan Administration.

In the largest mass expulsion of Soviet diplomats ever from the United States, the Reagan Administration 10 days ago ordered the 55 diplomats, 42 stationed at the Soviet Embassy in Washington and 13 at the consulate in San Francisco, to leave by Nov. 1.

Malakhov said that the Soviets in San Francisco flew to Washington to catch the Aeroflot jet to Moscow and that all of the diplomats ordered out of the country were aboard the plane.

The State Department said that all 55 were involved in “activities incompatible with their diplomatic status,” a code word for espionage.

The expulsion was the third round in a tit-for-tat expulsion war between the White House and the Kremlin.

First, the United States ordered that the Soviet missions to the United Nations be cut by 25 diplomats by Oct. 1, the first phase of a 40% reduction ordered by April, 1988, because of alleged espionage.

In response, the Soviets expelled five American diplomats from the U.S. Embassy in Moscow and consulate in Leningrad.

The Administration then ordered the 55 expulsions by Nov. 1, part of an order putting equal ceilings on Soviet diplomats in the United States and American diplomats in the Soviet Union.

In response, the Soviets expelled five more Americans and withdrew 260 Soviet workers from the U.S. Embassy in Moscow and consulate in Leningrad.

The Administration then called a truce, declining to expel another five Soviets but announcing plans to withdraw about six American translators from the Soviet diplomatic installations in the United States.