A Belgian reporter is sent on assignment to the new Communist country the Soviet Union, and right from the start hostile Bolshevik agents attempt to thwart him by any means necessary, lest he report that their economic progress is a scam. Russians are starving while grain is being exported to keep up this illusion of progress! A slapstick chase through Germany to Russia and back with pointed political commentary ensues. But Tintin and his dog Snowy beat off their adversaries, and return to Brussels to a triumphant reception.

First published in two page spreads in the youth supplement to the Belgian conservative Catholic newspaper Vingtième=The Twentieth Century from 1929 to 1930, this was the first appearance for Tintin penned by his creator, and at the time the supplement’s editor, Georges Remi. Thus an enormously popular adventure hero was born. Tintin, and his creator, who signed his work R.G. spelled out as Hergé, continued having adventures for the next half century.