Agent 6 Quotes
"The safest way to write a diary was to imagine Stalin reading every word."
"There was no thought or experience that fell outside the Party’s authority."
"A diary could yield as many as fifteen additional suspects, fifteen new leads, often more than the most intense interrogation."
"Since the journal wasn’t intended for any reader, the author wrote freely, producing nothing less than an unsolicited confession."
"His zeal was underpinned not by ambition but by earnest adoration of his homeland."
"A detective was not limited to searching for statements of sedition. Far more important was to be ever vigilant for proclamations of love and loyalty that failed to convince."
"Does a person expressing genuine delight use an abbreviation—i.e.—before describing their emotions?"
"The people who seem innocent are often those we should watch the most carefully."
"In your misguided attempt to protect her, you’ve incriminated yourself."
"Communism faced dangers from many sides. It needed to be protected."
"Perhaps he’d hoped that a man full of dreams about this land would hear the truth and transform from an advocate to a critic."
"The entire audience is white. There were laws in the southern states of America requiring audiences either be all white or all black."
"For the first time in my life I feel the need to keep a record of my thoughts."
"Average black man earns $4,000! Average white man earns $7,000!"
"Black child three times more likely to die than a white child!"
"Black family three times more likely to live in squalor!"
"The purpose of counterintelligence action is to disrupt and it is immaterial whether facts exist to substantiate the charge."
"The Soviet media was only allowed to publish photographs of soup kitchens, lines of the unemployed, juxtaposed beside images of the vast homes of the rich."
"It is not mere entertainment: It is a key weapon in maintaining their authority."
"I don’t care about your rules. You listen to me! That man is not to be moved. The Soviets have invited him here hoping that we’ll try to force him to leave."
"The unfairness, the bias, the intolerance, and the institutionalized discrimination not only against black Americans but against all poor Americans!"
"The desire to be treated fairly does not change depending on where you live, or what language you speak."
"You can disagree with what we believe in if you want. You can tell us we’re fools for our ideas. But don’t tell us that we don’t love each other."
"Why would I go anywhere when this is my home! I’ve lived here all my life. My parents are buried here! Their parents are buried here! I’m as American as you are, perhaps more so."
"He wasn’t proud, Anna, but it’s not like an invitation to perform at Madison Square Garden. It’s not what I had in mind for us."
"Why don’t you go back with them to Russia! - Why would I go anywhere when this is my home! I’ve lived here all my life."
"Anyone could love a person while they were singing and dancing on a stage."
"That building represents the world under one roof. That is the reality of our existence. We live under one sky. We breathe the same air. We get warmth from the same sun."
"Governments exist to serve and protect those basic human rights."
"I’ll fight for those rights as long as I have air in my lungs and blood in my heart!"
"Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas?"
"No matter how much you trust a person, they should always be kept under watch."
"The Soviets worry about controlling roads. This is not a country of roads. Let them keep our roads. We will keep the rest of Afghanistan."
"The difference between murder and execution is just a matter of legality."
"I allowed you an education and you taught yourself to be blind."
"There is love between us. I remember holding your hand. You loved me as a child."
"No matter what their difficulties, she loved her parents and understood that doing so might mean losing them altogether."
"You do as you’re told. You do whatever’s necessary."
"The pride that helped us will now work against us."
"There is no doubt that these men had either directly sanctioned or been a party to the plans to murder his daughter."
"Sometimes a person can become sick from giving up. They’re not suffering from a disease. They have no sense of purpose or direction. Despair can make a person sick."
"I don’t know what you’ve done in the past. This is my country. You must listen to me. I am not afraid of dying. But what you suggest is impossible."
"You find it hypocritical of me to look after Zabi as if nothing were wrong. I tried to have her killed and now I tend to her wounds? Tell me, how should I behave?"
"There was no reason why Leo should care what they thought. He would never encounter them again. It was irrational to be unsettled by their unseen eyes."
"My sense of shame was intense. The feeling was akin to grief, as though her identity had died."
"Entering the depths of the cave network for the first time, Leo was impressed by the degree of sophistication in their development."
"The base was an ingenious fusion of the natural environment and the man-made, enabling this central chamber to be inhabited deep inside the mountain with a thousand meters of rock and snow above them as protection."
"Khareji was a name for a foreigner and spoken with contempt."
"Leo counted six men seated on the floor. Like elders in a village, they wore no uniforms, with mismatched weapons by their sides."
"The lighting in the cave was electric so as not to foul the air with burning torches."
"The Soviet military authorities know this to be true. Nothing scares them more."
"Leo had been a war hero, risking his life countless times to defend the Soviet Union against the advance of Fascist troops."
"To leave Afghanistan they were following the Silk Road, one of the world’s oldest trading routes, fought over for thousands of years."
"Leo felt Nara’s hands grip tight around his own, an expression of despair."
"There were no more detonations. Unable to keep his arms out in front of him any longer, Leo lowered them."
"There’s also a good reason for wanting them to talk."
"I don’t know what the reasoning was. But he spilled his guts, ratted out his colleagues."
"You’re the most amazing girl. You’re going to have a wonderful life here with Nara. I’m sure of that."
"In her eyes I’m a good man. That’s as close as I can expect to actually being one."