BR thanks Thirring for his letter of 10 June. "I am very sorry not to comply with your suggestion—especially as I am completely sympathetic with your object and hope that you may be successful—but I am pretty certain that it would be useless to do so. I wrote directly to Khrushchev in the case of Madame Ivinskaya and her daughter, but I had no acknowledgment and nothing came of it. This persuaded me that such interventions are useless."

[BR was to change his mind about not trying to win the release of family members and perhaps political prisoners.]