On April 11, 1917, Soviet leader Vladimir Ilyich Lenin called the U.S. consul in Switzerland and spoke with Allen Dulles (then a junior diplomat). Russia, Lenin explained, was contemplating withdrawing from World War I and signing a treaty with the Germans.
Dulles, who had a big date that evening, asked Lenin to call back in the morning, when the office officially re-opened. Incredibly, Lenin's message was never delivered to Washington...
[The negligent Dulles was later named chief of the CIA -- and was forced to resign after the Cuban Bay of Pigs fiasco.]
[Churchill's verdict of John Foster Dulles? "Dull, Duller, Dulles."]
Sources
Maxim magazine
