shoe-banging incident
The Nikita Khrushchev shoe-banging incident happened during the 902nd Plenary Meeting of the UN General Assembly held in New York on 12 October 1960 when the infuriated leader of the Soviet Union pounded his shoe on his delegate-desk.
During the meeting, head of the Filipino delegation to the United Nations Lorenzo Sumulong stated the following in reference to Soviet foreign policy:
Mr. Khrushchev came to the rostrum, being recognized on a Point of Order. There he demonstratively, in a theatrical manner, brushed Sumulong aside, with an upward motion of his right arm — without physically touching him — and proceeded to demand that Assembly President Frederick Boland from Ireland call "the toady of American imperialism"[Other translations of what Khrushchev said as reported by newspapers say "a jerk, a stooge and a lackey of imperialism", see Nina Khrushcheva's article] Sumulong to order. The President did caution Mr. Sumulong to "avoid wandering out into an argument which is certain to provoke further interventions".
Khrushchev pounded his fists on the table during the continued speech of Sumulong and even picked up his shoe and banged the desk with it.[A Global Affair: An Inside Look at the United Nations (1995) ISBN 1860641393, p.230 ]
The Philippine Delegate was again interrupted. Now on a Point of Order, made by Romanian Foreign Vice-minister Eduard Mezincescu. The latter also managed to provoke and insult the Assembly's President to such an extent that Mr. Boland, crimson in face, turned off the Minister's microphone. The chaotic scene finally ended when General Assembly President Frederick Boland pounded the gavel (which shattered and bounced off), adjourning the meeting.
Other sources report a slightly different order of events: Khrushchev first banged the shoe then went to the rostrum to protest.[Nikita Khrushchev, by William Taubman, Sergei Khrushchev, Abbott Gleason, and David Gehrenbeck, Yale University Press (May 2000) ISBN 0300076355 ]
Khrushchev's great-granddaughter Nina Khrushcheva writes that after years of embarrassed silence her family explained how exactly that happened. Khrushchev was wearing new and tight shoes so that he took them off while sitting. When he started pounding the table with his fist during his angry response his watch fell off. When he was picking it up his shoes caught his eye... She also mentions that multiple versions of the incident have been in circulation, with various dates and occasions.[The case of Khrushchev's shoe by Nina Khrushcheva, New Statesman, UK, 02 October 2000]
Nikita Khrushchev in his memoirs mentions a yet another case of shoe-banging. Khrushchev says he was speaking against the Franco regime in strong expressions. A representative of Spain took the floor to reply, and after his speech the delegates from Socialist countries made a lot of noise in protest. Khrushchev says: "Remembering reports I have read about the sessions of the State Duma in Russia, I decided to add a little more heat. I took off my shoe and pounded it on desk so that our protest would be louder."[Memoirs of Nikita Khrushchev. Vol. III: Statesman, Penn State Press, 2007, ISBN 0271029358, p. 269 ] The footnote to this text says that Khrushchev's recollections are mistaken.
New York Times
The New York Times, Oct 13, 1960 Page 1, Col. 7 and Page 14, Col 5:
NOISY U.N. SESSION CUT SHORT TO END HECKLING BY REDS — Khrushchev Bangs His Shoe on Desk, By Benjamin Welles: OCT. 12 — Premier Khrushchev waved his shoe today and banged it on his desk, adding to the lengthening list of antics with which he has been nettling the General Assembly. This time Mr. Khrushchev was apparently infuriated by a statement by L. Sumulong  Mr. Khrushchev thereupon pulled off his right shoe, stood up and brandished the shoe at the Philippine delegate on the other side of the hall. He then banged the shoe on his desk. Later during the debate Mr. Khrushchev alternately shouted, waved a brawny right arm, shook his finger and removed his shoe a second time. The second shoe incident occurred during a speech by Francis O. Wilcox, an Assistant United States Secretary of State.
Mr. Khrushchev and Foreign Minister Andrei A. Gromyko exchanged smiles and winks and Mr. Khrushchev then reached down and slipped his shoe back on.
Page 1, Col. 8 and Page 14, Col 7: BOLAND ANGERED — Chairman Acts After Colonialism Debate Causes an Uproar
By Thomas J. Hamilton: Oct. 12 — Mr. Boland, who is Ireland’s permanent delegate to the United Nations, adjourned the meeting at 6:54 PM to tomorrow. The President was so irritated that he broke the gavel, and he omitted to say when the Assembly would hold its next meeting. Earlier Mr. Khrushchev heckled Mr. Sumulong After returning to his seat, Mr. Khrushchev took off his right shoe and waved it menacingly at the Filipino who had resumed his speech. The Soviet Premier then banged his shoe on the desk in front of him, and left it there. He drummed with both fists on the desk in the way he had previously demonstrated his disapproval of speeches by Prime Minister Macmillan and other Assembly representatives. Other members of the Soviet delegation also drummed on the desk. The head of the gavel flew in the air over Mr. Boland’s head. E. Mezinescu banged the speaker’s stand with his fist, causing its electrically operated mechanism to move up and down.
The New York Times — EDITORIAL, Oct. 14, 1960: Mr. Khrushchev’s Last Fling
After attempting to make a circus out of the United Nations General Assembly, pounding tables with his fist, and even with his shoe, Premier Khrushchev returns to Moscow. Significantly enough, Mr. Khrushchev’s most violent outbursts came when the free world speakers touched upon the most sensitive and vulnerable chink in his armor, the Soviet subjugation of Eastern Europe.
Christian Science Monitor
THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR, October 13, 1960, Page 1, Colonialism Issue Sparks Red UN Jeers,
By William R. Frye — Once again the Soviet bloc has demonstrated extreme sensitivity to the charge that world communism is a new colonialism, which enslaves people.
The 99-nation UN General Assembly adjourned in an uproar Oct. 12 after Soviet Premier Nikita S. Khrushchev, one shoe brandished aloft; his full vocabulary of epithets in action had protested the charge. What happened was this: About half way through a debate on how to deal with the Soviet-plan to free al colonies, Senator L. Sumulong of the Philippines made the statement: “The declaration proposed by the Soviet Union should cover the inalienable right to independence not only of the peoples still under Western imperialism and colonialism, but also the peoples of Eastern Europe and elsewhere who have been deprived of the free exercise of their political and civil rights.”
(Eduard Mezinescu, Deputy Foreign Minister of Romania, leaped to his feet and shouted “Point of order!”) Mr. Boland ruled that although the Philippine comment had been controversial, it had not been out of order. Mr. Mezinescu repeated his complaint and Mr. Boland his ruling. A large segment of the Assembly applauded the President, but Mr. Khrushchev took off one shoe, brandished it aloft and pounded his desk with it.
(Mr. Khrushchev storms up to the rostrum where he calls Mr. Sumulong what was translated as “jerk” and “American stooge”). Later as a result of a phrase in Mr. Boland’s ruling, which perhaps by inadvertence seemed to limit the whole proposed discussion to non-Soviet colonialism, Francis O Wilcox, United States Undersecretary of State for International Organization Affairs, attempted to redefine its scope.
Even under the terms of the Soviet proposal, he commented, the discussion need not be limited. Moscow had mentioned “the sovereign rights and the territorial integrity of all states.” Everyone in the Assembly, Mr. Wilcox said, “is fully aware of the sad fact that there are a number of states in Eastern Europe which do not have their complete independence.”
Mr. Mezinescu jumped up again to remonstrate both with Mr. Wilcox and Mr. Boland. (He questioned Mr. Boland’s impartiality, in the process becoming so insulting that:) Mr. Boland interrupted him half way through the sentence. Rapping the gavel so hard it came apart, his face grim, the stern-voiced Irishman said: “In view of the scene which we have just witnessed, I am sure the appropriate step is that the General Assembly should be adjourned. It is hereby adjourned.”
There was an ovation from most non-Communist delegates. Mr. Krushchev’s shoe came off again for use as a parliamentary weapon of protest. New African delegates looked at each other in amazement. They all filed out, some commenting wryly about the “barefoot Premier” of the Soviet Union.
THE CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR — EDITORIAL, By Neal Stanford, Saturday, Oct. 15, 1960:
Red Rules for Political Assemblies
Soviet Premier Khrushchev’s behavior in the United Nations General Assembly has shocked many delegates. He has interrupted speakers with shouts; ponded his desk with his fists; vilified nations, delagates, speakers, even taken off one of his shoes as if to throw it at the presiding officer and then used it to pound the table in derision.
Indian Premier Nehru couldn’t believe his eyes when Mr. Khrushchev tried to brek up British Prime Minister Macmillan’s Assembly speech by shouting and pounding. Many other delegates felt disgust and revulsion that any UN member should act so boorishly and uncivily.
“Communism repudiates parliamentarism . . . . Its aim is to destry parliamentarism” the editorial goes on to say.
New York Daily News
New York Daily News, October 13, 1960,
UN Adjourns in Near-Riot As Red Calls Boland Stooge
By Peter Wallenberg — The circus-like session twice saw Soviet Premier Khrushchev yank off a shoe and wave it angrily at the rostrum. Once he pounded on his desk with it, but then roared with laughter as if it were all a joke.
Some observers thought he was winding up to throw at Boland whom he accused of favoring the West. Boland quickly sounded the gavel with a terrific bang and adjourned the Assembly before the Romanian could get in another word. Most delegates immediately rose and gave Boland a one-minute ovation.
Twice overruled — Khrushchev burst forth after Boland twice overruled Romania’s attempts to closure Filipino Sen. L. Sumulong for “insults and vilification of a UN member nation — Russia.
It was then that he first took off his shoe and pounded and waved with it.
The second time was when Wilcox was speaking.
Time Magazine
TIME Magazine October 24, 1960, page 34, UNITED NATIONS, The Thunder Departs — It took 25 days and nearly as many tantrums for Nikita Khrushchev finally to win a vote in the United Nations. In getting his way, Khrushchev banged his fists, took off his shoe and thumped it on his desk, shook a finger under the nose of a Spanish delegate, and harangued the world in a purple-faced passion.
Near panic set in among the Communist delegates. Romania’s Deputy Foreign Minister Eduard Mezinescu popped up on a point of order and Khrushchev took off his shoe, waved it and pounded it. Then apparently dissatisfied with Mezinescu’s protest, Nikita Khrushchev strode briskly down the aisle to pour vituperation on Sumulong.
Next morning Sékou Touré, young (38) President of Guinea who had brought his country a long way toward the Communist camp, had not been in the Assembly the day before, but had watched Khrushchev’s antics on TV in his hotel room. What he saw shocked him. Canceling his plan to leave the U.S.
Sékou Touré telephoned the UN, asked for permission to speak.
The Mission. Touré’s speech in French was eloquent. He spoke directly to the “Romanian delegate and the group to which he belongs,” appealed for Communists to recognize that the UN ideal is “freedom, the right of every people to self-determination” and he demanded that the Communists should quit smothering the debate “with propaganda.” The end of colonialism, said Touré “is imperative and irreversible. Therefore, why not do it in an atmosphere of understanding and collaboration instead of trying to feed the fires of discontent and disturbance in this place and that, with the results we all know these troubles produce: mounting casualty lists, the engendering of hatred, deepening lack of understanding and the digging of a grave for history.” He prayed that UN action would demonstrate that “the General Assembly is located near a statue, the Statue of Liberty,” which represents “not American liberty alone, but liberty for all peoples and all men.”
The entire Assembly roared its approval.
Touré was followed by Nepal’s Rishikesh Shaha who declared his concern over “all this sound and fury, all these ugly gestures.” He warned that Asia and Africa would “not be bullied by gestures of superiority, “which were insulting to our intelligence.”
(A very dark picture, difficult to discern, of Mr. Khrushchev accompanies the article.
Subtitle: “KHRUSHCHEV ADDRESSING THE UN. A shoe on the tail and a foot in the mouth”
There is also a cartoon by Mouldin — St. Louis Post Dispatch, depicting Mr. K with a shoe in his mouth).
In popular culture
In the finale of the 1966 film version of Batman, members of United World Security Council are rehydrated following the accidental mixing of their powdered remains. The mixing of powders results in the mixing of personalities and languages of the delegates and the British representative is seen shouting in Russian and banging his shoe on the table, possibly in reference to this event.
In The Simpsons episode "Das Bus", Principal Skinner restores order at a Miniature UN meeting by banging his shoe on the desk. This is a direct reference to Khrushchev's actions.
External links
 A photo of Khrushchev brandishing his shoe, archives of Komsomolskaya Pravda
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