At the end of World War Two, two important generals from two of the victorious Allied
nations celebrated the end of the war in a very simple and wholesome way - by sharing
a good, old-fashioned glass of iced-cold Coca Cola.
Little did either of these great men know it at the time, but this simple moment of
celebration and camaraderie is why Soviet Russia invented clear Coca Cola.
One of these great men was General Georgy Zhukov, a highly decorated and popular Soviet
General.
After earning commendations for his actions as a cavalry commander for the Red Army during
the Russian Civil War, he studied military science in Russia and Germany.
A dedicated Bolshevik, Zhukov worked his way up the ranks of the Soviet Army, serving as
Chief of Staff during the Winter War with Finland before being promoted to Chief of
Staff for the entire Red Army.
During World War Two, Zhukov was appointed as Commander in Chief of the Western Front.
He organized and oversaw the defence of Leningrad and Moscow, and was credited with driving
the Nazis out of central Russia.
As Marshal of the Soviet Union, the most important command during World War Two, he led the final
and victorious assault on Berlin in nineteen forty-five.
His bravery and leadership before and during the war earned Zhukov a place at the table
as the Soviet Union’s representative at Germany’s formal surrender.
And it was at this meeting that Zhukov had his first fateful taste of Coca Cola.
The most important leaders and generals from the victorious Allied Nations were gathered
in Berlin on May eighth, nineteen-forty-five to accept Germany’s formal surrender.
Zhukov was there as the Soviet Union's representative, and he was tasked with reading the terms of
Germany’s surrender aloud to the gathering of high-ranking military leaders, which included
the renowned U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Moods were high as the Allied leaders celebrated their victory, but they also used this opportunity
to try and shore up their alliances with each other.
That could be why Eisenhower decided to take this opportunity to share a glass of America’s
favourite soda with his Russian counterpart.
If Coca Cola is the quintessential American drink, how did Zhukov end up tasting it in
decimated Berlin at the end of the war in the first place?
Well, believe it or not, Coca Cola played a big role in the U.S.’s World War Two war
machine.
Before the war broke out Coca Cola had already become synonymous with the American way of
life and American values.
During the war countless soldiers wrote home about how they were really fighting for the
little things, like an iced-cold glass of Coca Cola, rather than for bigger political
ideals.
At the outbreak of the war the Coca Cola company allowed all soldiers in uniform to buy a bottle
of Coca Cola for just five cents, but that was just the beginning of their war-time activities.
In nineteen-forty-three General Eisenhower wanted to boost the morale of his men on the
front lines who were missing the comforts of home and the familiar luxuries like soda
fountains.
Eisenhower decided that bringing soda to the soldiers on the front lines was just the thing
to boost morale and keep his men’s spirits up.
He sent an urgent telegram home asking for three million bottles of Coca Cola for his
men, along with the equipment to clean and refill the bottles.
The Coca Cola Company did him one better - they sent one-hundred and fifty of their own employees
to the front lines to oversee the installation and management of several new Coca Cola bottling
factories near the action.
Although they weren’t technically in the army, these employees were given military
uniforms and were treated as officers, which led to them being affectionately nicknamed
“The Coca Cola Colonels” by the grateful men on the front.
Coca Cola was strategic about their marketing during the war, too.
They promoted Coca Cola as “the taste of home” and “the drink that fights back”,
and marketed the drink heavily to soldiers on the front lines and workers on the home
front.
Their taglines focused on Coke’s ability to bring people together, with “Have a Coke
- a way of saying ‘We’re With You’”.
They even encouraged workers and soldiers to take a break and enjoy a Coca Cola, “the
pause that refreshes”, because it would apparently make them more efficient, according
to research conducted by Coca Cola’s executives.
By the end of the war, sixty-four new Coca Cola bottling plants had been built in Europe
and North Africa, which worked out well for the Coca Cola Company in the long run.
GIs were eager to share their favorite drink with the locals as they liberated towns and
cities all over Europe, effectively creating a huge new consumer base for Coca Cola in
Europe.
Many of the bottling factories remained open after the war as Coca Cola focused on expanding
their reach internationally and becoming the world-leading refreshment company.
Some places, though, remained stubbornly opposed to Coca Cola and all that it represented.
After his first sip of the sweet, caramel soda, Zhukov knew he was now a bonafide Coke
addict.
And with new Coca Cola plants popping up all over Europe during the war, he had no trouble
feeding his habit while he spent months in western Europe working with other leaders
to decide the fate of Germany and design the new landscape of European and world politics.
Zhukov wanted to make sure he could still have his favorite drink when he returned home
to Russia, but there was one small problem - he knew that there was no way that the Soviet
regime would allow him to bring Coca Cola - the very embodiment of American capitalist
ideals - into his communist home country.
This may have been the pre-Cold War era, but relations between the U.S. and the USSR were
far from warm.
There was already tension between the capitalist U.S. and the communist Soviet Union as each
country sought to emerge from World War Two as the dominant world superpower and spread
their values and politics across the globe.
The Soviet Union’s goal was to spread communism around the world, and the capitalist Americans
were their greatest foe in this regard.
The Soviets saw anything American, including - and maybe especially - Coca Cola, as the
very embodiment of ‘evil’ capitalist values.
They would never allow Coca Cola to sell their products in the Soviet Union, and they certainly
couldn’t let a high-ranking and extremely popular war hero to be seen to be promoting
capitalist values by drinking Coca Cola.
Zhukov was all too aware of how dangerous it could be for him to bring Coca Cola home
to Russia, but he wasn’t ready to give up on his new favorite drink just yet.
Zhukov was determined to build a stockpile of Coca Cola to feed his new addiction once
he returned to the Soviet Union.
Zhukov decided to take advantage of the U.S.’s apparent desire to keep on good terms with
the Soviets to help him secure a supply of Coca Cola before he returned home.
Legend has it that Zhukov approached U.S. President Harry Truman himself about his predicament,
and that Truman agreed to help the Soviet General get his hands on some Coke.
Whether or not President Truman was really involved, Zhukov’s wishes became known to
General Mark W. Clark, the U.S.’s commander in Austria in nineteen-forty-six.
In his book For God, Country and Coca Cola, author Mark Pendergrast claims that General
Clark acted as Zhukov’s go-between with the Coca Cola Company, and was the one to
pass along Zhukov’s specific and rather strange demands.
Zhukov knew that even being seen with a bottle of caramel-colour Coca Cola - or even just
being caught with a distinctive Coke bottle - could be disastrous for him.
The Soviet elite had destroyed men’s careers and ruined their lives for much less, and
his high-ranking position and recent popularity made him especially vulnerable.
Other Soviet elites would be watching him with hawk eyes, searching for any tidbit of
information that could be used against him.
Still, he was determined to get his fix, and he knew just how to make it happen.
Zhukov had an idea that would help him bring Coca Cola into the USSR in disguise, and he
asked General Clark to relay his specifications to the Coca Cola company.
Zhukov requested that his special batch of Coca Cola be made “a different colour”
and not be “put in that funny-looking bottle”.
The Coca Cola Company jumped into action yet again.
This time, one of their chemists played around with their secret formula until he was able
to get the same great Coca Cola taste without the signature caramel colouring.
The finished product was clear in colour and Clear Coke was born.
Fifty cases of the new custom Clear Coke were produced in Brussels especially for General
Zhukov.
The clear beverage was bottled in specially-made straight-sided bottles, since the regular
curvy Coke bottles that were designed to fit comfortably in your hand would have been a
dead giveaway.
The new bottles even came complete with a red Soviet star on the white cap that sealed
each bottle.
Zhukov was thrilled - he knew his plan would work because the new clear beverage looked
just like vodka.
Although just getting caught with a bottle of Coca Cola could be grounds for getting
you sent to the dreaded gulags, it was perfectly acceptable for high-ranking members of the
Soviet regime to drink straight vodka in public at all times of the day and night.
Zhukov would now be able to enjoy his new favorite beverage right under the noses of
the Soviet elite, and no one would think twice about it because they would assume he was
just drinking vodka like a good Soviet would.
The Coca Cola Company did Zhukov a solid, but they didn’t do it purely out of the
goodness of their hearts.
In exchange for their troubles, Zhukov made sure that Coca Cola employees and executives
could travel freely in Soviet-controlled Austria without dealing with mountains of red tape.
That seems like a small price to pay for fifty cases of a custom-made beverage!
Sadly, but not surprisingly for Soviet Russia, Zhukov fell out of favour with the Soviet
regime shortly after he returned to Russia following the war.
His extraordinary popularity among the Russian people made him a great threat to Stalin,
the Soviet leader, and Zhukov spent the next several years working obscure, regional commands
away from the centre of power in Moscow.
After Stalin’s death he briefly regained some of his old power, being appointed Deputy
Minister and then Minister of Defence under new leader Nikita Khrushchev.
But Khrushchev quickly tired of Zhukov’s constant attempts to make the Soviet army
more autonomous and he was once again relieved of his commands and removed from all party
posts.
He lived the rest of his life in relative obscurity until Khrushchev fell from power,
but at the end of his life Zhukov was awarded the Order of Lenin for his heroic actions
during World War II and his lifelong service to the Soviet Union, and he was allowed to
publish his autobiography before he died in nineteen-seventy-four.
Oddly enough, nineteen-seventy-three, the year before Zhukov died, was the first year
that Pepsi was available for purchase in the USSR.
Sadly, Zhukov wouldn’t live to see his favorite Coca Cola products hit Russian stores in nineteen-eighty-five.
In nineteen-ninety-two, Coca Cola released its own brand of clear soda, called Tab Clear.
The product was a huge failure and was pulled in nineteen-ninety-four, but insiders claim
that this was Coca Cola’s plan all along…
During the mid-nineties there was a huge trend towards clear drinks because they ‘communicated
a sense of wellness’ to consumers.
Even beer companies were rushing to produce clear versions of their products to capitalize
on this craze.
Pepsi had introduced their version of a clear soda, Crystal Pepsi, in the early nineties,
and Coca Cola chief marketing officer Sergio Zyman - who had defected from Pepsi years
earlier - created Tab Clear in a kamikaze effort to destroy Pepsi.
The competing branding of the two products was intended to confuse consumers about the
health benefits of the clear beverage market and when Tab Clear inevitably failed, it took
down Crystal Pepsi with it - just as Coca Cola had planned all along.
Clearly, clear soda is great for fooling Soviet leaders into thinking that one of their heros
is just drinking vodka, but it’s not-so-great for getting the average capitalist consumer
to part with their hard-earned money.
Be sure and check out our other videos, like “Russian Stereotypes”, or this other video
instead.