![]() Vorontsov failed, but the exhausted boxer spent his flight sleeping and arrived in Africa poorly informed and was quickly rebuffed. The night before he left for Tanzania, the first stop on the diplomatic tour, Ali had a late-night meeting with the Soviet ambassador to India, Yuli Vorontsov, who tried to convince Ali not to make the trip. Ali, offended by the Russian invasion himself, agreed to lend a hand. Now the president was in bad need of assistance in selling the plan abroad-and the boxing legend was needed in Africa. and render its move to sit out the games ineffective. The boycott had been ordered by President Jimmy Carter in response to the recent Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, but the White House knew that a failure to get other nations to similarly boycott could embarrass the U.S. State Department officials were dispatched to India in January 1980 to convince the boxing legend and Olympic gold medalist to help them lobby African countries to support a proposed American boycott of the Summer Olympics in Moscow. In a plan that seemed like a good one when it was hatched, U.S. Worst of all, he was unsure about why he was even there. But this was different, and Ali-who had been doing charity work in India the day before-was groggy. By all appearances, the former champion’s arrival in Dar es Salaam looked familiar enough: exactly like the humanitarian missions to which the boxer had become accustomed. ![]() Muhammad Ali was exhausted as he clambered from a plane on a tarmac in Tanzania as the waiting throng exploded with enthusiasm. (The views expressed here are his alone and do not represent the policy of the U.S. He is the author of Dropping the Torch: Jimmy Carter, the Olympic Boycott, and the Cold War, from which this article was adapted. ![]() ![]() Nicholas Evan Sarantakes is associate professor in the strategy and policy department at the U.S. ![]()
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