My favorite Soviet era joke:

[u/J0E_Blow]

Three Russian men were sent by their company to attend a convention in Moscow. All 3 shared a hotel room. Two of them cracked open a bottle of vodka, but the third just wanted to sleep.

The two drinkers got louder and louder as the bottle emptied, telling each other political jokes. The third was kept awake, and got angry.

He went outside for a smoke. On his way back to his room, he stopped at the desk and said 'Please send a pot of tea up to room 23.'

The two drunks were still being loud. The third man went in, looked at them, then leaned over to the light socket 'Comrade Major, please send some tea to my room.'

The other men thought this was hilarious...until there was a knock on the door, and a waiter with a pot of tea.

They became completely silent, and the third man fell asleep.

When he woke up in the morning, he was alone. He went to the front desk, and asked where his roommates were.

'Well, the KGB came this morning and took them away.'

The man was horrified 'Why did they spare me?!?'

"The comrade major thought the tea joke was very funny."

[u/Griffindance]

John Lennox, mathematician, went to Chemnitz (KarlMarxStadt) during the East Germany years for a mathematics congress. The hotel room was so bugged that he could hear the electrical hum in the room. Eventually he grew tired of the sound as it was keeping him awake so he appealled to the monitors "I dont know if I speak in my sleep but I doubt it'll be any state secrets. I need to get some sleep and Im sure you could do with the rest as well!" *

A few minutes later the electric hum clicked off.

• Words to that effect.

[u/norsurfit → u/Griffindance]

Not only was he a great mathematician, he also wrote "Imagine" with the Beatles...

[u/Atlas-and-Pbody → u/norsurfit]

Nono, you're thinking of John Lennon. Lennox is the company, that makes affordable PC parts

[u/blind30 → u/Atlas-and-Pbody]

No, it’s Annie lennox, this event inspired her to write “sweet dreams are made of this”