False Dawn

The Baku was the first Russian ship to call at Brazilian ports since 1917. Citizens of Santos and Porto Alegre paddled out on surfboards to greet female members of her crew. The captain bade his ladies stay aboard, let it be known that by next year 50 Soviet ships would be plying South American waters. From lighters he began taking aboard coffee and hides.

But the Baku brought nothing for Brazil. If import-hungry Latins had hoped that the U.S.S.R. could help them sooner than the U.S. or Britain, with possibly a captured German factory or two, the Soviets had failed them sadly. In the first five months of 1946 Russia had sent only $93.58 worth of goods to Argentina, since then only one cargo of Polish coal. Uruguayans who had signed a trade treaty with the Soviets earlier this month were still looking for Russian goods.

The Russians were not doing so well at trade either. Just before the war the Soviets bought 13 times as much as they sold in Latin America. Now they need coffee, cotton, hides and linseed oil. So far they had managed to buy just one cargo of linseed from the Uruguayans and a second, through UNRRA, in Argentina. They had also purchased several thousand tons of fat and tallow, 500 tons of bacon, 500 tons of ham. But Soviet-Argentine trade was about as bustling as trade between Luxembourg and Andorra.

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