Cold War US State Dept brochure falsely accused many USA citizens as also being USSR citizens

Many tens of millions of U.S. citizens were falsely accused as being also USSR citizens during the cold war years by the U.S State Department by an error in a brochure that the U.S State Department distributed.

The U.S. State Department published a USSR travel-warning brochure during the cold war years that was written for the purpose of warning U.S. citizens about the dangers of traveling and visiting in the USSR controlled counties then. There was an error in these brochures up until about 1983 when this error was corrected, that incorrectly interpreted the exact details of the dual USA-USSR citizenship laws of the USSR.

This error interpretation of the USSR dual citizenship law caused many tens of millions of U.S. citizens to be falsely accused as also being USSR citizens. The problem of this error interpretation involved the date of the beginning of the USSR, in Oct 1917. The USSR Dual citizenship laws actually only applied to people ( and all of their future descendents ) who had formerly been living in the USSR lands on or after the Oct 1917 date. But the first State Dept brochures included everyone ( and all of their future descendents ) for all times, even those in the USA from the USSR lands centuries and even just years prior to October of 1917.

The title of this U.S. State Department travel warning brochure was "Tips for travelers to the USSR" and the 1982 version was the last version to have this error. The document number is as follows: U S GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE 1982 - 389-636. Possibly copies of this document may be obtained from the US National Archives, if anyone is interested.

It is my belief that this error may have been used by communist hunters in the USA to justify harm and injury to many innocent victims in the US, who were citizens of the USA.

[edit on 26-4-2010 by trader21]