Forty-one years ago today, on November 2, 1984 (October 10, 1984 in the lunar calendar), Stalin's daughter returned to the Soviet Union. 1967 Stalin's daughter Svetlana defected to the West in April and held a press conference in New York. On November 2, 1984, 17 years after leaving, Svetlana Alilueva returned to the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union celebrated the event as a propaganda victory. The Western world was puzzled. Why did Stalin's daughter give up what she called "a life of complete autonomy"? On reflection, Alilueva's decision coincided with her experience. She was married three times. The first time she married a Jew her father hated (he ordered them to divorce); the second time her father urged her to marry a Soviet official; the third time she married an American architect she did not know. One of her fiancés, an Indian expatriate, committed suicide again. Miss Alilueva's mother committed suicide when she was only 6 years old. One of her brothers was addicted to alcohol, and her other brother died strangely. Alilueva, 53, certainly has the right to seek comfort wherever she thinks she can find it.