November 9, 1985
The President's address to the Soviet people today via the Voice of America was monitored by Russian language-qualified officers of the American Embassy in Moscow and the American consulate in Leningrad. They report that in Moscow, two and possibly three frequencies were clearly audible and probably not jammed; the signal on one of them was as clear as a local station, according to the Embassy monitoring report. On another 15 frequencies, there were varying degrees of jamming. In Leningrad, one Russian-language frequency was received loud and clear. All others were jammed. A Lithuanian broadcast of the speech was also received clearly in Leningrad; however, this same frequency may have been jammed in Lithuania.
Atmospheric conditions on November 9 were conducive to good reception of shortwave signals in the Soviet Union. English-language broadcasts, which are not normally jammed, were well received. We are pleased and hope that this development will set a precedent which will allow the Soviets to put a permanent end to jamming on all frequencies. A free flow of information would be a very positive development in people-to-people communications between the two nations.